Baby

 The story, told by one woman from the words of her colleague, seemed to me quite interesting...

It happened just over 30 years ago. As a young graduate of the pedagogical institute, I was assigned to a rural school. I will not hide that this fact did not cause much joy, but, alas, I did not have a thief at the institute, nor did I have a city groom, so I had to go, whether you want to or not.

When I arrived at my destination, it turned out that there was some kind of mess with my check-in, and there were simply no empty places in the hostel. Of course, they apologized to me for a long time, promised to fix the situation, but in the meantime they decided to place me with someone from the locals. The room was found pretty quickly. The hostess of the house, Elvira Vasilyevna, a woman of 45-50 years old, was, in my opinion, a classic example of an "old maid". Quiet, neat, often dissatisfied with this and that, and fond of speculating on the topic "oh, and the youth has gone now." However, she was a careful hostess, she didn't interfere with my life, and, in general, she was quite satisfied with me.

The room I lived in was located opposite the kitchen. Sometimes, waking up in the middle of the night, I was surprised to find that Elvira Vasilyevna was awake, rattling dishes and even saying something. One day, driven by curiosity, I quietly crept up to the closed door to my room and put my ear to it. "Eat up, baby, eat up," my hostess muttered from the kitchen, "I'm probably hungry." Of the pets, Elvira Vasilyevna kept only chickens, so it was unclear who she was regaling in the middle of the night. Cats are probably feeding strays, the "old maids" love it.

And about a week later, disaster struck - my Elvira was taken to the district hospital with a suspected heart attack. I was left alone in the house. As usual, I drank tea at night and fell asleep. After a while, I woke up, I don't know why. There were noises coming from behind the door, as if someone was running briskly through the hallway or kitchen. Judging by the nature of the footsteps, they could hardly have been human, most likely, some kind of animal ran into the house. It looks like one of those cats that my hostess carefully feeds at night.

At first, I wanted to ignore it, turn over and start snoring again. But then I thought that a pet walking around the kitchen wasn't so harmless: after all, a cat could shit or ruin something in the house. I decided to scare away the uninvited guest.

When I entered the kitchen, I immediately noticed that something was moving in the corner, which looked like either a cat or a small dog. Well, well, baby, here you are! Without hesitation, I pressed the switch button. My eyes adjusted to the light for a few seconds, but then I could make out the kitchen and what was on its floor.

The "something" that I initially mistook for a dog or a cat didn't look like any of these animals. His body, as it seemed to me at that moment, resembled the body of a baby. And here's the face... It looked as if it had just been skinned. It's a terrible, disgusting sight! I couldn't see the eyes, and only the large, protruding teeth stood out against the disgusting red mess.

The creature seemed as afraid of me as I was of it. In less than half a minute, I think, it flew out of the kitchen like a bullet and disappeared into the darkness of the house...

I spent the rest of the night in the courtyard on a bench. It wasn't as creepy here as in that house, where the monster might still be. I wanted to run away to the neighbors, but I was too shy: I didn't know the locals very well yet and was afraid that they wouldn't believe me and would take me for a madwoman. But the next day, I still managed to persuade a friend, the school janitor, to take me in. It's unusual, they say, and scary to be alone in a huge house. Well, then a miracle happened! A couple of days before Elvira Vasilyevna's discharge from the hospital, my housing issue was resolved and I was finally assigned to a dorm.

I lived in that village for another year and a half. She didn't visit Elvira anymore, only greeted her on the street on rare occasions. By the way, an interesting detail: there was a creepy legend about this woman among the locals. It's like when she was a young girl, she got pregnant by some guy, and that scoundrel flatly refused to get married. Elya was left alone with a huge belly. She lived by herself, patiently endured the taunts of her neighbors, and one day appeared in front of her fellow villagers without a belly and... without a child. Everything seems to be understandable: she gave birth and refused. But the woman in labor did not contact the local paramedic, the ambulance was also not seen in the village, where and how she could have given birth is a mystery.

Since then, a terrible rumor has been spreading about Elya: they say she gave birth to a baby and buried it in her garden. Allegedly, one of the neighbors saw her and her mother digging in the garden at night and even heard crying. Whether it's gossip or not, I'm not going to judge. And, of course, I don't know if this village story has anything to do with what I saw...

Anyway, after more than a year of teaching, I met my future husband. He lived in the city and came to our village with classmates, "for potatoes." After a while, we got married, and my husband moved me to his place. I've never been to those parts again, which, in fact, I don't regret at all: I wouldn't like to see the Baby again.

Unplanned stop

 I tell it from my father's words, he likes to tell this story a dozen times to everyone who is happy to listen. He was teaching physics at the time and rode the subway every day. It was a long time ago, when our metro was still called Leningrad.

He was driving after work one day, and then the train stopped in the tunnel. Passengers are not panicking, everyone is doing their own thing. Only a sound began to be heard, as if water was gurgling somewhere, or a tunnel draft. They said over the speakerphone that the train would resume movement soon.

And then the lights went out.

There were no mobile phones to light up, and people in the dark began to worry. Someone lit a lighter, but it was of little use. A girl started crying in the carriage. People gradually began to worry and grumble, saying what an outrage. Through the grumbling, my father could make out the sounds from the tunnel: the murmuring had become louder.

"The tracks are flooded," a passenger said knowingly. — We'll be standing for a long time.

People started to worry, someone had already panicked and started shouting that the tunnel was going to flood up to the ceiling, and they would all drown here.

The train had been waiting for ten minutes. The water was gurgling quite clearly now — it seemed as if it was flowing directly under the carriages, and in a rather violent stream. In addition, there was another sound — as if someone was slapping wet palms on the glass and rubbing the glass with a characteristic creak. You never know what anyone does in the dark from idleness — my father did not pay attention to it at first, but then realized that the sound, firstly, was moving - the "flip—floper", invisible in the dark, moved from one end of the car to the other, faded away, and then returned back. And secondly, the sound was clearly coming from outside.

Even my father felt a chill here. Other passengers also began to notice something was amiss. At first, an aunt told them not to bully, but then a more attentive citizen whispered, "It's outside," and everyone fell silent at once.

Soon, the sound began to come from the other side of the car, as if this bully had easily bypassed the car and walked on the other side. The train was standing in pitch darkness in a tunnel in which water was clearly gurgling. The invisible minx easily reached the windows with his hands, although everyone can imagine the height of the car. At the same time, he jokingly walked around the car in a circle, as if the coupling between the cars was not a hindrance to him.

The guy with the lighter decided to investigate what was going on there. When the sound got closer to him (he was standing at the door), he lit a light and held it up to the glass...

Everyone who saw who was outside jumped to the other side of the carriage at once, so that it swayed. A face was staring at the glass. White, even bluer. It was difficult to see the details through the glass, but this creature had small dark eyes framed by thick dark circles, like those of a terminally ill person. His mouth was wide open, and the skin around it was sagging and flabby. It was only visible for a couple of seconds, then the guy dropped the lighter, and the car plunged back into darkness. Now the slapping on the glass has become more frequent. Someone screamed, "Close the windows!" People huddled together in the center of the car in a panic. Then the splashing of water was heard already inside the carriage, as if someone had knocked over a bucket on the floor...

My father doesn't remember much about what happened next, but for about five minutes there was complete confusion — people were screaming, clinging to each other, no one understood anything. And then suddenly the lights turned on. People looked at each other and at the black windows. The splashing stopped, the murmuring of the water subsided. The train started moving slowly. When the doors opened at the station, people rushed out so quickly that those on duty at the station even became worried.

And when my father looked back, he saw that the sides of the car and the windows were all wet, although, as it turned out later, there was no flooding of the tunnel, there was just a wiring malfunction, which was repaired in ten minutes.

The subway incident

 I went down to the subway. The time was about eleven o'clock in the evening. As usual, there was a lot to do at work on Friday, which is why I came home so late. Very tired, I entered the last carriage. Ignoring everyone, I sat down on an empty seat, turned on the player at full volume and closed my eyes. Fortunately, it was necessary to go along one branch — however, to the very end.

I must have dozed off. When I woke up, the train had already stopped. I noticed that there was no one near me. Looking around, I saw that I was the only one in the carriage. This alarmed me, but then I looked into another carriage and calmed down. A large group was sitting there and discussing something. The train began to accelerate, and I finally calmed down. But then a song went through the player, followed by another one... I knew that we had a long commute between stations on the line, but it was only for a little over two minutes, and both songs lasted at least three minutes. The train was still traveling at the same speed.

I went to the glass between the carriages and looked at the company from the front carriage. They looked calm, but something about them seemed strange to me. There were three of them—two girls and a guy. One of the girls was sitting with her back to me, facing the others. Suddenly, I realized what had confused me: the girl sitting with her back was moving her arm too rhythmically. Every fifteen seconds, she raised her hand, twirled it, explaining something, and lowered it again, like a wound-up mechanism — with precision to the second. Then I noticed the same pattern in the guy. He nodded his head with the same frequency. I knocked on them, but they were doing the same thing at regular intervals.

"I like trains," came a voice from behind.

A chill ran through me. I forced myself to turn around. A boy of about six years old stood near one of the doors and looked out the window.

 I could barely manage, being absolutely sure that there was no one in the car a minute ago.

—Alexey,— he introduced himself seriously, looking at me with green eyes. Then he turned to the window and stared in fascination.

— Why are you alone, where are your parents?

"My parents left without me," he sighed. — Mom was crying, but they couldn't take me away...

The boy sighed again and continued:

— The station is coming soon, and I'll go for a ride, — he looked at me and smiled. — I really loved riding the subway and on the train to visit my grandmother...

Suddenly I woke up, sitting in a crowded carriage. I stood up, giving way to a lady, and stood all the way home, looking at the people crowding around me. When I got home, I poured myself some hot tea and went online. I spent an hour typing queries for the name of the station, stage, and nearby stations — until finally, on one of the news feeds, I found a mention of the boy's death right in the train carriage on the stretch between stations. There was a picture of a boy on the side. Alexey was looking at me from the monitor screen.

Since then, I have been unable to sleep on the subway and, driving along the stretch between these stations, I always remember the boy with green eyes who loves to ride trains.

TV

One day my TV burned out and I decided to buy a new one. I worked as a security guard in a supermarket, well, of course, the salary was too much, so I couldn't afford a high-quality and good TV.

The next day, I went to buy a TV at a private market, accidentally noticed a strange store of various things and decided to go there. There were a lot of different watches, all kinds of books, souvenirs, old tape recorders, mirrors and many different things. After walking a little further, I came across a TV, it was lamp-mounted, but not small, it was old, black in color, the name was somehow incomprehensible. And the amount was ridiculous, only 100 rubles. I wondered why it was so cheap. Later, I realized the reason for such a low price!

I came home and put the TV in front of the couch. When I turned on the TV, I was surprised that the quality was excellent, how lucky I was, I was happy... I spent the whole evening watching TV and went to bed. In the middle of the night, I woke up to a strange knocking sound, as if tapping on glass, in my sleep I thought it was tree branches hitting the glass, but when my head cleared, I realized that there was no wind outside. The pounding continued...

Opening my eyes, I began to listen to where the knocking was coming from, it seemed to me that the knocking was coming from the TV. I sat down on the couch, started watching TV, and suddenly noticed some movement on the screen, decided to turn on the light, but it didn't turn on, probably a power plant malfunction, I thought.

Going to the window, I pulled back the curtains and the moonlight illuminated the room. I went and sat in front of the TV, looked at the screen, I saw something terrible, there was someone's terrible face on the screen, I had never seen such a terrible face in any horror movie. There were no eyes on the face, there were only two holes from which blood was flowing, and the mouth was cut almost to the ears and sewn with thick thread, the skin was blue and long black hair. Out of fear, I leaned to the side and fell down in a daze. The hair was so long that it started to come out of the screen, then it slowly started to come out of the TV.

Out of fear, I ran screaming out of the gym, put on a windbreaker and flip-flops, and ran outside. Near the house, I kept looking at my window without looking away, then I noticed a dark silhouette near my window, I was standing and looking at this shadow, slowly moving back, suddenly the glass of my window broke into pieces. I winced a little, but when I looked out the window again, the shadow was gone.

I was outside all night, and it was scary to enter the apartment. When it started to get light, I calmed down and decided to go into the apartment. When I entered the hall, I saw that the TV was in place, as if nothing had happened. After assessing the situation, I thought that if I threw the TV away, someone might pick it up and take it for themselves, so I decided to smash the TV. I took out the TV with a big hammer and went into the house where there was an abandoned 3-room apartment and there I completely gouged out the TV.

A month has passed, and everything has returned to normal. Having saved up a little money, I bought myself a normal good TV in a normal hardware store. And I put new glass in the frame. And one evening, after work, I sat down to watch TV, as usual, and on some news I heard that a man's corpse had been found in front of the TV, the man's eyes had been cut out, and his mouth had been slit and sewn with thread. The windows and locks were locked from the inside, and the police couldn't figure out what had happened there. When the story from the apartment was shown, I froze again, there was the same TV on the table that I had smashed...

The Witch's Curse

 The southern regions of Russia are rich in witches and witches. This was talked about even before the October Revolution, but rumors are still leaking out.

About six months ago, a girl told me about an old woman flying at night.

I was visiting the village once. My grandmother lived there, so I came for a vacation. I got off the bus and walked down a country road.

Suddenly I see a figure looming in the woods. I looked closer: a creepy old woman hobbles, dirty, shaggy, hump on her back. I stop in fright, and an old woman screams at me from the thicket in a raspy voice:

– What are you staring at, haven't you seen Grandma? Wait, now you'll see – it won't seem enough!

Then the old one hobbled towards me, laughing cunningly. But I've often heard stories about witches, so I was pretty scared.

An old woman came up to me, and she glared with angry eyes. I almost lost my breath in horror. And she realized that I was scared, grinned, and said smugly:

"You'll be damned forever now!" You'll remember Grandma!  And she ran her nasty bony hand over my cheek. Then she muttered angrily to herself and went back into the forest.

Previously, I would have perceived such a story as another horror story, you'd think, some kind of witch, there are a lot of crazy people around. But within a year of that meeting, I started having health problems. My wife left, taking the child with her, and just recently I suffered a heart attack, although I had never had heart problems before.…

Just don't turn around

 This story was told to me by my neighbor Julia. A few years ago, she and her husband Sasha rented an apartment.

One morning, when her husband was at work, the girl woke up because it seemed to her that someone was stroking her hair. She got up from the bed, looked around and lay back down, deciding that she had made a mistake. Less than ten minutes later, she felt someone's touch again. She became so scared that she was afraid to move. It was over in a couple of minutes.

A few days later, when she was alone at home again, something even more terrifying happened. Yulia was lying on the bed, facing the wall, and dozing.

Suddenly, she heard someone breathing behind her, and someone's cold fingers touched her neck. Assuming that it was her husband who had returned from work, Julia asked sleepily:

– Sasha, is that you?

I heard it from behind:

— no. Just don't turn around.

As if scalded, Julia ran out of the apartment, squeezing her eyes shut. Later, she and her husband found out that a young guy who had hanged himself in the bedroom had lived in the apartment before them.…

Do not turn off the light

 "Dad, don't turn off the light," the boy asked when his father wished him good night and headed for the door.

My father shook his head disapprovingly.

– At your age, it's already a shame to be afraid of the dark.

"It's not the dark I'm afraid of,– the boy whispered, pulling the blanket higher.

But Dad had already pressed the switch, and the room was plunged into darkness.

"Don't be afraid, son. My mom and I are right here, if anything," my father said, leaving the room. – Everything will be fine.

"Yes, but you can't save me from her," the boy wanted to scream, but instead he nodded weakly and said:

–Okay, Dad. Good night.

As soon as the door to his room closed, the boy dived under the covers with his head. The fear, however, has not gone away. He could have called his mom, of course, and she would have listened to his request, but Dad might have gotten angry.

–I wonder what you would do now," the boy thought of his father, and pulled the blanket closer under him.

He didn't know how long he had been lying there, afraid to move and open his eyes. His alert ears picked up the tiniest rustle. The flashlight, his only means of escape, remained on the table.

"How could I get caught so stupidly?" – the boy thought excitedly to himself. "If only we could get to the table." How many steps? Four? Five?

The clock in the hallway struck midnight.

"So it's been two hours," the boy whispered to himself. "God, I'm so scared!" Can you still try to get to the table?! You just need to…

There was a sound from the door, a creak, faint, barely discernible. The boy froze and shrank.

"Let it just be my imagination, please, let it just be my imagination," the boy pleaded in an undertone.

The creaking was repeated a little closer. Then even closer. Someone was slowly approaching him.

"It's too late… This is... this is the end..." the boy whispered almost crying.

The footsteps stopped by the bed. Every cell in his body, every nerve was tense to the point of pain.

Suddenly, a soft, melodious female laugh rang out directly above him.

"Are you without your trinket today?" – A woman's voice said softly. – It's sad. We had a lot of fun last time!

The boy was holding his ears tightly with his palms under the blanket.

– It won't work! – the voice intoned again and laughed.

The voice became a little louder. It seemed to be coming from inside my head. And the scariest thing was that the sound calmed him down.

"You don't want to talk again?" "What is it?" the voice asked. "Well, I don't insist. Eventually, someday you'll want to answer. Maybe even sooner than you think.

There was such confidence in the voice that the boy almost believed it himself.

– You can't give in! Resist! Resist!  The boy kept telling himself.

"It's no use, my good man. Fighting with yourself is stupid," the voice replied casually."How old are you?"

"Don't think! Don't think about anything!" the boy was already repeating like a prayer.

His own thoughts began to drift away and only that voice filled his whole being.

"Nine years?" – the voice replied thoughtfully. – Such an adult! I guess your mom doesn't kiss you at bedtime anymore.

The boy nodded faster than he realized. The voice laughed softly again.

– I understand. You probably want to be kissed?

He couldn't lie. The voice wouldn't let him think. The boy could only obey the enchanting sound. He made a last desperate attempt to escape.

"Get out!"  The boy shouted.

"It's a pity, my dear,– the voice replied softly with a restless sadness. – Don't resist what you crave! Are you afraid? People are always afraid of the unknown, but when they find out…

The boy shuddered. He felt the edge of his bed bend under the weight of someone's body.

"Don't be afraid, my good one," the voice said softly, and did not let the fear break through.

The boy didn't even move when a hand was placed on his shoulder over the blanket. The grave chill that went through him from that touch was replaced by a pleasant coolness.

"Don't resist...– the voice whispered softly.

There was so much sensuality in the voice now that the boy wouldn't even think of doing it. He was filled with a new, previously unknown feeling of intimacy with someone. When his mother hugged him, he felt safe, but he had never felt such excitement.

–Do you want me to kiss you?" "What is it?" the voice asked.

- Yes.

The boy nodded so hard that the edge of the blanket slipped off his head. However, he didn't care about that at all now. The only thing that mattered was that voice coming out of the darkness every night, just like now. But never so close.

"That's right, my good one,– a voice sounded very close.

The boy felt a light breath on his neck.

–Open your eyes,– the voice said.

- No! – the boy's inner voice shouted. "It's a trap!" I know! I can't! Help!

"I command you!"  The voice literally burned him cold. – Open your eyes!

The boy squeezed his eyes shut, desperately trying to utter at least a sound. The spasm in his throat was gone, but the words struggled to come out.

- No! Go away! – The boy croaked, - Get out!

The voice hissed. There was no understanding or affection left in him. Only the icy cold. With growing horror, the boy felt the icy hands of the creature creeping up to his neck. He gathered his remaining strength and shouted with all his might:

– DAD!

His parents' anxious voices were heard in the next room, then quick footsteps and the door of his room opened, letting in bright light from the hallway lamps.

The boy's eyes narrowed. My father was standing in the doorway. There was worry and fear in his eyes.

"What happened?" "What is it?" he asked, looking around the room.

The boy also looked around. No one. He leaned back on the pillow with a feeling of incredible relief.

"Nothing, Dad, I just had a terrible dream," the boy replied.

His father came into the room and sat next to him on the bed.

"Is everything all right, son?" How are you doing?  He reached out and touched his son's hair. "My God, you're soaking wet!"

–It's... nothing, it's fine.

The boy felt completely exhausted after the experience and could barely move his tongue.

–Dad, really, I'm probably going to fall asleep right now," said the son.

– Of course you will, – the father got up with visible relief.

"Dad..." the boy said almost in a whisper, "just one request."…

"Whatever you say, son,– his father replied.

"Don't turn off the light," the boy said, already falling asleep.…

The Night Reader

 It all happened in my childhood. I was sleeping on the couch at the time, there was a door to the right of the couch, a closet against the opposite wall, and a chair to the right of the closet. So, for as long as I can remember, there was a man sitting on this chair every night. More precisely, not a man, but just a dark silhouette of a man. Moonlight was coming from the window, and he was sitting in the shadow of the closet. I never saw him appear there — my father or mother turned off the light, and the chair seemed to be empty, then I looked away for a second — and there he appeared. I wasn't afraid of him at all then, because I was little.

This man was always saying something. I understood that most of the time he was just reading random excerpts from books, although he had nothing in his hands. The books were completely different and unrelated. I also came across children's fairy tales, but he read them in such a way that later, when my parents tried to read the same fairy tales to me, I started crying. He spoke in a monotone voice, and pronounced the words abruptly, as if each word was a separate sentence. I remember reading something about Sherlock Holmes. Once I read a whole paragraph about sex from a biology textbook — of course, I didn't understand anything, but then I said the word "penis" in front of my parents, and my mother tried for a long time to find out where I learned it. I could not identify some of his texts, and I doubt that such books exist at all.

Sometimes he would start saying an endless sequence of numbers, right in the middle of a sentence, without any pauses. "Two." "Seven." "Four." "Zero." "Nine." Even rarer were the moments when he stopped. He would pause for about five seconds, and then say something about himself. "For me. It's boring." "For me. Nice to meet you." "I am. I'm tired." "I love you. I see it." Neither the body position nor the intonation changed. And so it was every night.

I usually listened to it for half an hour or an hour before falling asleep. At first, it just confused me, but as I grew up, I gradually realized that something was wrong. I tried asking my parents about him, but they just laughed and said there were no monsters. And then I realized that his parents never heard him, even though he spoke loudly enough.

So one day I went to bed, my mom wished me good night and turned off the light. Time passed, and I lay there and was afraid. It was quiet. No one was talking. I lay there and lay there, and then I turned my head and looked at the chair. He was there and he was looking at me— his head was turned in my direction. Then he stood up. But before, he barely moved! I immediately squeezed my eyes shut, clutched the blanket, and listened to his soft footsteps getting closer and closer, and then fading away. I couldn't resist opening my eyes. He was there, leaning right over me. There was enough light, but I still couldn't see the face: a dark, indistinct silhouette, and that was it. I was about to scream when he leaned even closer and said in his usual monotone voice, "You. Are you afraid. I'll leave. I'll come back." And everything. I immediately blacked out and only woke up in the morning. This silhouette has not appeared since.

I think about it now and I think that I probably made it all up. You never know what was there, right? Nevertheless, every night I nervously look around the chair in front of the computer. Maybe he'll be there. He promised to come back...

A strange friend

 - Let's play! - Said six-year-old Olya sleepily, I will say that she is about to wake up after a long night.

"Why would that be?" - said her older sister Katya, who apparently still wanted to sleep.

- Let's play with dolls, otherwise I'll tell Mom that you don't pay attention to me! You'll get it from Mom.

- I hope she understands me, okay, I'm coming.

Katya got up, somehow lifting her body, she would have slept a lot more if it hadn't been for her sister complaining about the games. Of course, Katya went to wash up before the games, hoping that Olga would stop asking to play. But this nightmare girl's wish is the law! The fact is that mom loves her little daughter Olya very much, and Katya, apparently, is just a cover for this girl, and Olya may cry for some reason.

Sitting on the sofa, Olya brought her pile of dolls, Barbie, Moxy, Brats. There were also boys - Ken, etc., Olga gave Katya a rather strange doll with a sad face.

- Where did you get this doll? There's something else I don't remember.  Katya said and yawned.

"It's a Ghoul doll, don't hurt her!" - Olya obviously raised her voice.

"What Ghoul?" Do you have a friend named Gulya?

Olya wished to remain silent. She just gave the doll to the chair, now I'll tell you how. From the very beginning, Olya put a high chair in front of the sofa, for someone, because she was sitting on the sofa. And she put a Moxy doll on the high chair and smiled a bright smile. Katya didn't understand the humor and looked at her sister very strangely - was she completely?! There's no one in the chair... It's empty.

Katya has spoken out:

- Why are you putting a doll next to a chair, there's no one there.

- Gulya, don't be offended by her, not everyone is friends with you. And you, Katya, should be ashamed, you can't hurt my friend! She can get offended very easily...

- Olya, I personally don't see any girls here, as you can see, Ghouls.

Olya was offended and took the dolls, snorted at Katya and made an angry face, Olya's resentment was on her face, she went to her room, and Katya was sitting on the couch and thinking what was wrong with her sister.

Day. Lunch. family members are sitting at the table: dad, mom, Katya and Olya, but Olya clearly sees Gulya here too. Mom is sitting and eating potatoes, and Olya is still snorting to herself, but then she ran to her room, ran back to them and shoved a drawing in Katya's face. In the drawing there is a girl in a red dress, her face is strangely curved, and her arms are lowered, her hair like Baba Yaga's hangs down and causes disgust. There are scratches and abrasions on the skin, which is clearly expressed on the face, the girl's eyes are strangely glowing scarlet and she gives a little smile.

"Who's that?"  Katya asked Olya.

- This is Gulya, now you know each other.

Katya began to squint at Olya strangely, what kind of Ghoul?! And so, family day has come when all the members go to the river, swim and take pictures. Katya began to watch her sister, who took with her only two pairs, two pairs of slippers, two pairs of swimsuits. It seemed strange to Katya, but then she remembered about Olya's friend, everything is clear. The next day, everyone went there, where mom took a lot of photos, Katya didn't like to be photographed.

Olya poured two glasses of water and lemonade and went to her bedspread, which was too big for one, Katya no longer paid much attention to all this nonsense and just lay down and sunbathed in the sun. The next morning, my mother developed the photos and immediately tore them up, in the photo Olya is holding the hand of that girl, Gulya, she is in that swimsuit that Olya took two pairs each, in those slippers.

But the very sight of the girl makes you vomit, her skin is blue like the dead, she herself is covered in scratches, wounds to the point of blood and abrasions, she has four fingers on her hands, and she smiles. She also stands strangely, her body is arched and her waist is on her side, she stands like a zombie, her eyes... without pupils, there are none, But Olya is smiling at her, smiling! Also, the Ghoul has strange hair, pulled out in some places, as if it had been cut off with a razor or scissors, but she can see it anyway.

Katya was terribly scared herself, and her mother, with the last of her strength, offered to move out of this house. The whole family agreed, but Olya was against it, she insisted that Gulya would not like this idea.

When the family moved, Olya constantly waved and smiled at someone...

The second girl

 I was quite skeptical about the existence of the other world in general and ghosts in particular. Obviously, the technical mindset is affected here — if you haven't seen it, then it doesn't exist. But recently I have radically revised my views.

Our family — my husband and I, my daughter, and my six—month-old son - went to another city to visit their godmother and godfather to celebrate their birthday there. It should be said that our friends live in a house that they bought about six months ago. In general, the holiday was a success, we had fun, danced, drank, and walked. But my daughter didn't want to take a single step away from me. It surprised me at the time — our daughter is very independent, usually you need to keep an eye on her, but here she clung to her mother's skirt, and not a step away. They started asking her why she didn't want to play her games. At first, the girl didn't want to talk, but then she suddenly started crying and said, "Dad, please send the other girl away... I don't want to play with her, I'm afraid of her."

I even felt funny for a moment — my daughter had invented fears and fantasies, which means that the child is growing up. The fact is that only two of our children were in the house, and my son had been sleeping sweetly in the next room for a long time. But my daughter did not calm down, she did not lag behind us, and she did not go to sleep. And the next day we went home.

A couple of days after my arrival, I went to the darkroom, gave the film to the developer and ordered the printing of photographs. When I was reviewing the order the next day, I was almost speechless. In one shot where the women were photographed, there are two girls in the frame — our daughter in the foreground and another child's face, clearly peeking out of the darkness between my two friends. I won't post the photo — many people will think it's a montage anyway. It's important to me that I know that the girl was in the house. It turns out that the ghost existed, and my daughter saw it. I feel so sorry for her now—how much she must have been scared then!...

Trash

 I live in a 16-storey new building. I moved in there about two years ago after handing over the keys and repairs. We lived with my sister, but she got married and moved to Canada, ceremonially giving me her part of the apartment. As a result, I was left alone in a small town near Moscow, with a good job, a two-room apartment, a cat, and periodic bouts of acute loneliness. There are few residents, prices are rising, although our area is not the most convenient, so there are no people willing to move in. Only half of the 75 apartments are occupied by tenants. The house was built in 2008, all the people who moved in are no older than 40-50 years old, we don't have any old women or old people, and this is important. I'll explain why now.

One spring morning, I rode the elevator down to the front entrance of my building. An ordinary working day. But there was a bedside table in the corner of the small front room. It's an old one, from the Brezhnev era, plywood, covered with dark, even black lacquer, with a chipped corner of the bedside table. I smiled: someone has finally decided to throw out the old rare trash. But throughout the day, something inside me reminded me of that bedside table over and over again. By the end of the working hours, I was literally shaking from the visual image of this bedside table. I was really scared and worried. I even squinted as I opened the door. The bedside table was still there. I carefully walked across the room and called the elevator. It wasn't until I closed my eyes that I heard a screeching sound. He started up - of course it was the bedside table grating on the tiles of the front door. There's nothing else. I collapsed violently and literally ran into the elevator. Don't get me wrong: I understand how stupid it is to be afraid of old furniture, but the fear was deeper. He tormented me all day. It wasn't the bedside table I was afraid of, but something I didn't know yet. Instinctively.

The night passed in nightmares, and in the morning there was more than one bedside table in the entrance: an old bicycle, not rusty, but without tires on wheels, was standing next to it, skis leaned against the side of the bedside table. And there was a dirty rag under the bedside table. At first, I thought that someone was putting things away. Then he collapsed again and quickly went outside. On the way to work, I reasoned: who throws out this garbage, where does it come from? There are no old people, maybe one of the families started the renovation?

As I approached the entrance, I took a few minutes to gather my courage. Something was pushing me away, an inner voice was screaming: "Run!" But reason reasonably noticed that it was abnormal to be afraid of garbage, and I entered the entrance.

I wasn't alone. The husband and wife were standing in a corner and waiting for the elevator. When they heard me, they twitched, and then looked at me with relief. I stood next to him. We understood each other without words. The elevator didn't arrive for two minutes, and we stood there in silence. After entering the elevator and driving away, the man finally said: "I do not know whose things these are." And he said it as if you can only talk when you're not with them. I said I didn't know either. His wife promised to find out. Then, after exchanging fearful glances, they left. I went home.

I decided to spend the weekend at home. I ordered food and seemed to calm down, but the nightmares still happened again...

Monday morning was bad: I was twitching at work from any sound. Because in the morning there were rows of old things in the front room, almost half of the room was littered with cabinets, TV boxes, a refrigerator door with some cans, an old bathroom... I screamed when I saw this junk. Now I began to understand what I was afraid of: my mind had given out the theory that something was weaving a nest in our house. And I was afraid of the master.

In the evening, a crowd stood at the entrance to the entrance, cursing and blaming everything on each other. I just watched and listened as several residents of the house looked for someone who was littering and someone who would clean up. Everyone agreed that it was necessary to remove the garbage. But no one dared to volunteer and at least take out the skis. And not because of principle. I would personally throw it all away if I wasn't afraid.

A week later, our front room looked like a jungle: chairs, tables, boxes, some rags, rusty basins and buckets, lamps, racks for clothes, a sideways sofa without pillows, rolled-up blankets... Trash. Everything was cluttered. The elevator seemed to be mocking: sometimes you had to stand for eight minutes to wait for it. I waited, pressing my back against the doors. The senseless fear and stupid mania disappeared. I was afraid of the junk and what was inside it. What's in these dark corners of things? Behind these rags, in these cupboards, under the bathtub or in the sofa? Everything was moving. Everything was grinding. One of the tenants called the housing department, who, having sent someone to look, refused to clean up, saying that the tenants themselves should clean it up. One of the neighbors, a forty-year-old architect, tried to take everything out and throw it away. He plucked up the courage and tried to pull a chair out of the trash, but everything was locked tightly, one on one. Pulling a chair, you pull the whole pile of garbage. Finally, spitting, he decided to smash it with an axe and throw it out piece by piece. I volunteered to help take out the trash, but not to chop. I was afraid that the one who carefully stored all this- and there was no doubt about his cunning in intertwining things-would take revenge on me for the destruction. I was well aware of how absurd and comical my fear was. But I was afraid. My bell, my gut, no matter what anyone calls it, at least a sixth sense - it screamed in me when I was next to the trash.

So, Sergey, a neighbor architect, was already raising an axe to strike when the closet door broke off and flew off, falling right on his foot. Dust fell from the cracks on the cabinet. Rags came out of the closet. The basins rattled. There was no fracture, but he got a bruise, but the scariest thing was that he jumped back to me, clutching the axe, and stammered: "You see, you see, it's there, it's crawling! See? Let's run!" And he flew out the door. Anyway, he left and went to live with a friend.

Then the little Yorkshire girl lost her temper and ran off into a pile of junk. No one came after him, but he didn't come out. Gradually, the pile shrank, and there was no more junk. Torn rags hung from the chair legs, the light bulb above the corner burned out, and no one volunteered to replace it. They even wanted to draw lots until no one realized that he might be the loser. That was the end of the idea of drawing lots. Movers were invited, but one of them, sawing through a piece of pipe, was seriously injured.

Soon the growth stopped. The clutter was a dense dark mass, and the front door had become very tiny. A small lamp above the elevator barely saved the light. The nightmares were rarer, but scarier.: I saw something big, like a dog, but slippery, with teeth like a giant leech. It was crawling all over me and threatening to bite me. I would wake up and know that down in the darkness of the junk, this leech was crawling among the old things. Then the feeling passed. I calmed down until the next night.

And then there was a stink, like someone had died. Everyone said he must have been stuck and finally starved to death. But wouldn't he be whining? That stink was killing me personally. A thick, sweet, penetrating smell... I was spitting, and considering how long I had to wait for the elevator, I was just suffocating. I started taking a small can of air freshener with me and sprayed that piece of freedom next to the elevator with a thick jet.

But one day the passenger elevator broke down, the doors wouldn't open, and I moved into the freight elevator. But he didn't say anything either: the lights were on, the doors opened, but he wasn't driving. Broken or not, the silence was eerie. I stood in it, poking at the buttons, cautiously looking around at the trash. And then something flashed inside. A spot flashed where the barely visible plastic tray was... No, not a spot, but a mass. I automatically pressed myself against the inner wall of the freight elevator. Something rustled, then moved. The sound was like saliva going through your mouth-not a slurping sound, but a wet, sticky sound. Something was crawling. I hit the buttons, but the elevator didn't even move. He was standing in place, the light was on. I was trembling. He felt a piezo lighter in his pocket and automatically held it in his hand. Then something flashed closer - it crawled across the basin, hitting a bunch of fused wrenches due to rust.

It dawned on me that I had to run. I looked at my lighter and, realizing that it wouldn't help, threw it on the elevator floor. I rushed to the exit, but before I could reach it, boxes and pots fell on me, showering me with dust and earth. I fell and a heavy cabinet fell right in front of the door, almost breaking my legs. I screamed. There was something on it. I can't tell if it was sitting or lying down, because the shape was amorphous. The light bulb above the elevator buzzed and burst. I slid across the tile on all fours and ran into the elevator. It took its time. I hit the keys, shouted "help," but nothing happened. No one rushed to rescue me, the elevator was not moving. There was nothing to be seen in the front door. The elevator's weak orange lamp barely illuminated her. I babbled in the corner of the elevator and heard the mass crawling on the tiled floor. To me...

I found the lighter I'd thrown away on the floor, gripped it tightly, and lit it. For some reason, it seemed to me that the fire would save me. The creature did not hiss, growl, or even breathe. All I could hear was the sound of slow crawling, getting louder and clearer and closer by the second. I remembered the can of air freshener. I pulled it out and pointed it at the elevator doorway. He put out his lighter and waited.

It crawled to the door. I was waiting. And then it crawled into the elevator; with one or a hundred movements of its mass, it was inside and distorted me. The bladder immediately gave out everything in it into the jeans. The leech, about the size of an average dog, opened its mouth and prepared to pounce on me. Small teeth of some unknown substance moved in time with the muscles on this part of the creature. I screamed and, turning on the lighter, pressed the canister. A ball of fire flew into the creature's mouth. It silently, without a sound, bounced into the front door and disappeared, and I sat in a puddle of urine and waited.

Ten seconds later, piles of trash and rags began to fly into the elevator. Pieces of wood, dust... I automatically fired at the things. But the critter wasn't there, the trash continued to fly into the elevator, and I kicked out the burning rags...

It jumped on my foot again. I screamed again and pressed the can again. The creature jumped back into the entrance, the rags next to it caught fire, I jumped up and started pushing them out of the elevator with my foot. One of the rags flew into one of the cupboards and, hissing, set fire to the contents. When I saw the start of the fire, I continued to push the burning dust out of the elevator, but now I was still banging on the elevator buttons. Something happened: the elevator shook, the doors began to close. The fire spread through the trash, something burst, hissed and cracked, I let jets of fire into the closing door. The elevator moved. Smoke began to fill the mine. I covered myself with my sleeve and went out a couple of floors later. I went up the stairs to my floor. He locked himself in the apartment and sobbed. Dirty, dusty, in his urine, with burnt hands, crying man...

Firefighters raked through the rubble, cursing us idiotic residents. They found a lot of bones of small animals and even poor people. Who stole so many things remained a mystery, the investigation yielded nothing. The things didn't belong to anyone. The owner could not be identified. My nightmares have disappeared, although a lot has changed: there are almost no clothes and furniture in my apartment now. The clothes are neatly folded in one corner. Just on the parquet floor. The computer is on the floor next to the mattress. There's one chair in the kitchen, and there's a microwave on it. And there are always some semi-finished products in the mini fridge. I'm afraid of landfills, I'm afraid of garbage, I'm afraid of apartments filled with furniture. It makes me nervous if I see a lot of things in someone else's entryway. The few friends I have are trying to help me. I didn't tell anyone what happened. But when someone tells me that I'm paranoid and crazy, I just have to look at my hands. The burns have healed, but the scars from them are perfectly visible.

Choice

 The dark room, which looked like an old warehouse, was illuminated by the dim light of the moon peeking through the broken windows near the ceiling. There was an operating table in the center. There was a man lying on it, a girl, still alive. Dina sat in the shelter and was afraid to even move. Fear literally paralyzed her, she tried to hold back the nausea that kept coming up. She could only watch and hope that she would not be noticed, that everything would be over and she would be able to get out of here...

Meanwhile, a creature appeared who was running the action in this peculiar anatomical theater today. It looked strange and frightening: 180 centimeters tall, a wide dark cape with a hood, only his hands and face peeked out from under the cape. Face… It was difficult to call a huge bird's skull a face, so white that it seemed that even in absolute darkness it would glow with a dim inanimate light. The long beak was constantly ajar, revealing a row of sharp teeth. Red lights danced in the depths of his eyes. Dina was ready to give anything just to be away from this "bird" now.

The performance began: the creature made sure that the victim was alive, ran its bony hand-paw along the entire body of the unfortunate woman, bent lower and began to whisper something. It was impossible to make out the whispers, but the unwitting spectator did not want to — she already guessed what would happen next. It was impossible to move — there was a ringing silence around, broken only by eerie whispers, and any extraneous sound, even a slight movement, a turn of the head could betray Dina. All that remained was to sit behind two tin cans and watch.

The girl lying on the table started crying. She could only say through her sobs, "Shut up, please, don't." The scary bird bared its teeth, its beak spread into a kind of creepy toothy smile. Then everything happened very quickly: the white beak struck the victim several times in the heart area, and then the creature began to tear small pieces out of the body and eat them. Tears began to flow from Dina's eyes. She was so terrified that she couldn't do anything — she just sat in hiding, afraid to move, and watched the creepy performance.

Suddenly, the bird-man froze, tilted his head a little to the side and listened. After a moment, the eyes with red lights stared straight at Dina. She was noticed. The creature bared its teeth again, cocked its head to one side like a bird and slowly walked towards Dina.

—Dee, honey! Dee, I'm here, you're home, everything's fine!  Oleg took his wife by the shoulders and shook her gently.

"This dream again, this terrible dream! Everything is more real every time! It saw me, it noticed that I was there... — Dina was crying, sobbing, her whole body was shaking.

— Dee, calm down, it's just a dream, just a dream, you're at home, next to me, everyone has nightmares from time to time.

— Oleg, this is not just a nightmare, it's something more! I had never felt such horror before these dreams. I still feel like I'm there, I'm going to throw up from fear, I feel bad...

—Honey, let me get you some water." When did you take your medicine? I'll get you some water and medicine, you need to calm down.

— Oleg, I don't need medicine, it doesn't help. I think it only makes it worse. Please, just give me a hug.

"You're like a child." I'll hug you, of course, but you need to continue your treatment. You'll feel better soon, and then the nightmares will go away. Baby, I love you, I'll be right back...

My head was buzzing, and my arms and legs felt like they were made of monolith pieces. The white light shone directly into the eyes. It was very cold. Directly above her, Dina saw a bird-man. He was even more intimidating up close. His bony hand ran along her body. The bird knew that Dina was alive, alive and conscious.

The creature bent over the girl and began to whisper. Dina didn't just hear that whisper, she saw everything the bird told her, and it was terrifying.…

Dina woke up in her bed, Oleg was not there — he had left for a business trip yesterday. The girl was completely calm. She knew exactly what she had to do to stop this whole nightmare. Dina carefully got out of bed and went to the window. One of the reasons they (or rather, Dina) bought this apartment was the beautiful view: from the height of the fifteenth floor, the park and the river were visible, the bedroom windows faced east, and in the morning you could watch the sunrise. The girl opened the window and took a deep breath of the predawn air, then she stood on the windowsill and stepped forward.

"You're a genius, honey, just a genius!"  Oleg hugged Irina and kissed her.

— Yes, yes, I know. Thank you, my love. Let me go, let me change my clothes and let's go. I hope the champagne is already cold?

— Champagne, strawberries, caviar, whatever you want, Irochka! Aren't you bringing a white coat with you?  Oleg was beaming with happiness.

"I'll think about it,— Irina purred.

— I'm so tired of her tantrums lately. It's good that your medicine worked faster than we thought. And the most remarkable thing is that no one will ever guess that it was because of him that she began to suffer from nightmares and hallucinations, and with her impressionability, it could not have led to any other outcome. You are a genius, Irinka is a medical genius, and I am an inconsolable widower and the heir to a huge fortune!..

With her head slightly bent to one side, as birds do when they look at someone, Dina looked out from her hiding place at Oleg and Irina. Dina wouldn't have been able to live a normal life anyway. The medicine, developed by a talented doctor, her husband's mistress, had damaged her body too much. But there was a way out — to take revenge. To become one of... well, she didn't really know who she was yet. To become what she has become, or to die. She chose the path that was offered to her. Resentment, anger, and pain forced her to make this choice. Oleg and Irina didn't give her a choice themselves.

Now they will pay. They will pay cruelly. In the near future, they will only have nightmares, and then death — a painful death without a choice and alternatives.

Short stories

I woke up in the morning, went to the closet and noticed the prints of children's hands on the mirror. But I live alone and the children did not come to visit me. I was really scared and wiped the prints, but first I took a photo.

***

I worked as a security guard at the school, and my duties were so-so: to make sure that the children didn't run around much during recess, and to go around all 3 floors of the school at night. The guards were supposed to sit in a small booth made of glass and boards near the entrance to the school. And then one night I was sitting and there was a terrible crash all over the school. It feels like a rebar is hitting the wall right next to me. And this sound is gradually approaching my room. And then, about 5 meters before me, the rumbling stops. In the next shift, these sounds were repeated. And the next day I find out that my replacement quit because there was a knock on the glass door of the security room. Needless to say, it was at night and there was no one at the door.

***

Often, when I enter the entrance, the elevator opens the doors without calling. And always after that, he stops on the 6th floor, opens the doors, as if letting someone out, and then goes on to my floor. Every time I say "thank you" and "goodbye" to my invisible neighbor

***

I'm always skeptical about such stories, but something similar happened to me. They went to live in the country. A neighbor brought a bunch of fresh manure in the spring and dumped it in the yard. Early in the morning, I watched from the porch as the watchman's dogs made their way onto the pile and frolicked in it. I didn't want to interfere, but I heard someone banging on the glass next door. Well, I think Granny Zhenya is chasing away the dogs. We have to go help, she can't do it alone. I went to the neighbors, but there was no one there, everything was locked. And I felt uneasy — a couple of months before, the neighbors' second grandmother had passed away.

 

***

 

We're sitting in a room with a friend, playing. We see her mom pass by the door and go into the kitchen. I distinctly remember that she was wearing such a light green dress. A friend says, "Mom, give me some water." There was no sound in response. She called out to her a few more times. We go into the kitchen with a friend, but there's no one there. We screamed in horror. At that moment, her mom came into the apartment, in completely different clothes. It's been more than 20 years, and we're still remembering.

***

When I was 9 years old, my family and I moved in. After a while, I became afraid to fall asleep without light: in the kitchen at night, I often heard the soft voices of 2 people. My parents didn't believe me. She grew up and moved away from her parents. Dad recently called and said: "Daughter, I'm sorry for my disbelief. I woke up at night and heard them." We exchange impressions.

***

She worked as a nurse. At night, the patient started fussing, so I went to check. I walk in, and he asks why I didn't let the dog in. I reassured him that there were no dogs here. Then it turned out that he was telling everyone that a red-haired dachshund was following me. I didn't fall asleep that night. That's because at that time I had 2 months since the dog died, a red-haired dachshund. The nurses didn't know about it.

***

My father set up a camera on the porch to track down the fox. But instead, I filmed Koda visiting her mom. " Koda" is our dog, who died many years ago.

Rotten photo

 I'm an ordinary Internet dweller — I keep a blog, sometimes I write fan fiction based on my favorite works, obeying popular trends, for some reason I even started accounts on Twitter and Facebook - in general, I lead an active online life. And nothing, as usual, foreshadowed trouble, until one morning a reader from the blog joined my ICQ. I was kind of surprised - I didn't think we'd ever talked to her, even in the comments, and anyway, she was one of those people I thought she was just shy about unsubscribing. In general, she added and writes: "Do you want a joke?" And who refuses to joke in the morning? Of course, I say I want to. She sends me a picture file in response. And the morning, you know, is a busy time, and between checking your mail and reading new comments, you still need to have time to drink tea, wash up, get dressed, and, preferably, put on makeup. And, of course, I was constantly distracted. I go to the computer once again, and the ICQ window is already bursting with questions: "Did you look?", "How are you?", "Did you open it?", "Hey, where are you?". I must admit, I was even surprised by such a stir from a stranger, but I opened the file, why should people be upset? I opened it, and there was an ordinary room with all my favorite carpets on the wall and geraniums, only in the corner there was some kind of cloudy dark spot - clearly either a shooting defect or a crooked "photoshop". "So what? — I'm writing. "Where is there to laugh?" And she said to me, "Oh, forget it," and went offline, and I had no choice but to add her to my mental list of potentially inadequate, turn off the computer and go to work.

In the evening, I remembered about this "joke" again, found a photo, looked at it again. The room is like a room, and the stain is no longer there, it must have seemed like a dream. In a word, it's not funny. I wanted to find this girl and interrogate her, but she was offline. And then I completely forgot about her, because the apartment was suddenly devastated.

At first, it began to stink terribly from the drain in the sink, some kind of rot and dampness. We probably took the entire household chemicals department out of the store, and nothing helps. In the end, Dad couldn't stand it and called a plumber. The plumber came, fiddled with the riser, looked at us like we were idiots and said everything was fine. But there was nothing wrong, because after a couple of days, the bathroom started to stink. And sometimes it seemed that there, in the drains, as if something was scratching and rustling. Crocodiles from the sewers, or what?

And after a while, I go into the kitchen in the morning, as usual, and the ventilation grate is lying on the floor. I put it back in its place and would have forgotten it if I hadn't discovered the same thing the next morning, and the next, and the next. But a person gets used to everything, so putting the grate back in place quickly became my personal ritual, until wet footprints began to appear on it: first a few drops, and then real puddles, muddy, as if a dirty rag had been squeezed out. Well, the smell is appropriate. Then I got a little nervous, but Dad and liquid nails came to the rescue — they glued this unfortunate grate, and it stopped falling off.

But it would have been better if it had kept falling off, because after that everything got even weirder. Muddy puddles began to form under the ventilation, which was glued tightly, and at night the noise of footsteps began to be heard in the apartment. It's like someone is slapping bare feet, first only in the kitchen, then also in the living room. Somehow I plucked up the courage, turned on the light and ran to see what was going on there — there was no one in the living room, only wet spots on the floor. Meanwhile, the drains were already scratching very clearly, and one day, when I was taking a shower, the water suddenly stopped flowing, but a painfully familiar rustling sound was heard from the shower, as if something was trying to get out. I didn't wait for the incident to end, I just flew out of the bathroom as if scalded.

I thought I wouldn't sleep after this, but man is a strange creature — I passed out instantly, but I dreamed all night that I was drowning in some kind of swamp: muddy water, mud and a terrible stench. And guess what the first thing I discovered when I woke up? Puddles near the bed. It happened literally every other night, and the parents became kind of weird. Of course, the first thing I did was run to them to share my nighttime experiences. And Mom and dad smile, look at me like they're blessed, and respond almost in unison— that you're okay, honey. I've never been called cute in my life, and Mom adds, "Go take a bath and relax." What kind of baths are there? By that time, I was just afraid to brush my teeth, and only the fear of getting completely lousy somehow outweighed the fear. But I was already an inch away from asking my friends for a wash by lying about the water being turned off for a month.

And then it all ended abruptly. And the pipes stopped stinking, and the ventilation stopped dripping. And I began to have such good dreams — as if I were lying in a bathtub, warm, good, surrounded by goodness and peace. And life flowed on as usual — the Internet, work, friends... But now the parents were almost fighting in the evenings about who would go to the shower first, and they sat there for almost two hours — they must have seen enough anti-stress drugs on the Malakhov+ program.

In general, everything was fine until I decided to update my photos on Facebook, that is, to take a picture of myself. I've photographed it a couple of times, and I'm looking at what happened. And then I didn't feel like looking at myself, because behind me, somewhere in the area of the wall, I saw the same spot, exactly the same as in the photo I sent. It was in all the photos, and I snapped about ten of them. Having overcome the desire to escape, I began to take pictures of my native interiors with shaking hands. There was a stain everywhere, I photographed the kitchen — it was there, the hallway — another stain, and in the bathroom it was as if the entire ceiling was covered with some kind of smoke.

That night, I was drowning in a dream again. I wake up, and the whole pillow is covered in some kind of mud. And the parents are walking around, smiling, as if under hypnosis.

And here I found nothing better than to grab my laptop, shamefully run to the nearest cafe with Wi-Fi and, after drinking for courage, climb into the blog in search of this unfortunate reader. When I was thrown onto the "diary is closed or not kept" page, I wasn't even surprised, but I had one last trump card up my sleeve — an acquaintance who seemed to be in the same year with that girl. And, oh joy, there's a green flower in front of her nickname. After the usual hello-how-are-you, I decided to casually find out why her classmate's diary was closed. And I heard something like this — she decided to leave the Internet, said she was tired of wasting time on it, youth is passing, and the session in general... Besides, she became quite withdrawn after her brother fell asleep in the bathroom and drowned.

After finding out when my brother drowned and comparing all the facts, I realized that it happened a few days before I agreed to watch the "joke". And I already knew what to do next. But the trouble is, ever since watching all sorts of "Calls," I've been trying on a situation, realizing that if necessary, I just couldn't do this to people I know, see, or at least communicate with online. I can't live with the feeling that I'm to blame, that something terrible happened because of me, even if I'm just a victim myself. But I can't go on living like this either. This morning my bed was completely wet, as if the blanket had been rinsed in a swamp, and Dad had locked himself in the bathroom and wouldn't come out.

Forgive me.

The horror of the bed

 I turned seven then, and school had just started. My father left us, and my mother and I moved to another city to live with my grandmother. I was very afraid of the dark, and my mother slept in the same room with me. But I was scared anyway, so my mom left a small lamp on at night. A cozy semi-darkness was created in the room. And my fears never went away. I had nightmares, it was scary to sleep alone, and I ran to my mom in the middle of the night.

I was sleeping on the children's corner. It's such a thing — there's a desk and a wardrobe at the bottom, above them is a bed with a sideboard. There's a ladder on the side to climb up. The design turned out to be high, almost two meters high. So much so that my mother couldn't even reach me when I was sleeping. And in the mornings she would wake me up by standing on a stool, or just gently calling from below.

It was late autumn, the time of the darkest nights. In the early morning, it seemed that you could still sleep and sleep. When I woke up at night, I thought it was time to get up for school. I was sure I heard my mother's voice. And sure enough, my mother called me softly again: "Kotka, honey, get up! Get down, let's eat, and go to school."

Sleepy, I sat up in bed and looked down, expecting to see a smile on my mother's face. But Mom wasn't there. I looked over the edge of the bed. Mom was sleeping peacefully.

My first impulse was to get down and crawl under the covers with her, to fall asleep next to her in the warmth of her body. I had already opened my mouth to ask, "Mom, can I come to you?" when my mother's voice came from below again: "Fuzzy, come here."

But I saw that Mom didn't say that. Her eyes were closed, and her lips didn't move. My skin was covered with goosebumps, but I wasn't so scared from sleep. It was more of a perplexity.

I looked more closely at the shadow at the head of my mother's bed. Something was wrong there... The bedside lamp was on the shelf above Mom's bed, at the foot. So there was a thick shadow on the side of the bed. And in that shadow, I was horrified to see an even darker spot. It looked like a blob with blurred edges. Cords extended from the spot like tentacles. And some of them reached out to my mom, disappeared into her hair. Tiny golden sparks ran along these cords from Mom's head to the center of the blob.

When I looked down, my head was over the edge of the bed. And the blob seemed to "see" me. She crawled closer to the stairs leading to me. Several tentacles reached out in my direction. Terror flooded me, and my heart seemed to stop beating...

Mom moaned in her sleep, turned her head. The tentacles attached to her tightened. The blob moved away from the ladder, and the free tentacles bent toward Mom.

I clamped my mouth shut so as not to scream, and huddled in the corner of the bed away from the stairs, pulling up the covers. I wanted to rush to my mom, tear those creepy tentacles away from her, but fear held me down. I was crying, shoving a corner of the blanket into my mouth, trying not to give myself away with sobs. I was scared, so scared...

There was no sound from below; I didn't know where the thing was. Is it still near my mother, or is it crawling towards me, clinging to the stairs with tentacles? What did I want then — for it to forget about me, or, conversely, for this thing to switch to me, leaving my mom alone? I don't know. I was dying of terror. I was afraid for my mom, and I was afraid of that thing. I was trembling, and I cowered under the precarious protection of the blanket, trying to make myself as inconspicuous as possible.

Nothing was happening, and I probably passed out from the strain. When I woke up, it was already dawn. Streaks of light filtered through the bamboo curtain. The horror of my experience hit me with renewed force. But I was very thirsty, and the bed was wet—I wet myself in my sleep.

In the morning light, I wasn't so scared anymore, and I decided to look out. The room looked familiar, there were no dark spots, Mom was asleep. A glass of water was on the dresser, and my thirst became unbearable, so I ventured downstairs.

When I got drunk, I thought — should I go to sleep with my mom or wake her up? We obviously overslept. I didn't really like school, so I carefully climbed up to my mother — I wanted to lie down against the wall.

At first, I was confused by my mother's strange immobility — she usually felt that I was sneaking towards her, and hugged me, wrapped me in a blanket. She seemed to be fast asleep now... Snuggling up to my mom, I was scared again—she wasn't as warm as always. In fear, I began to shake my mother, calling out to her —to no avail. I ran to my grandparents with a roar and woke them up.

An ambulance arrived, and my mother was taken away. I kept asking what was wrong with my mom, and Grandma was crying. Then they told me that my mother had died in her sleep at night.

I am haunted by questions: What happened then? Maybe I felt my mother's death in my dream and saw an overly vivid nightmare? Or was something attacking us, and Mom was holding it back, preventing it from reaching me? I don't know.

But I still don't fall asleep on low beds.

Сreature

 There was a family in one village. Mom, dad and daughter. Everything was fine, the family was quite financially well off, they lived in a two-storey house on the shore of the lake. That's just one problem. My daughter cried all the time at night. She didn't just cry, she didn't even throw tantrums, she screamed. At first, when Masha (that was the name of her daughter) was little, she wasn't scared yet, everyone says, like a child, all children scream at night at that age. But as the child grew up, he didn't stop yelling. They took me to the doctor, to fortune-tellers, and so on, but all to no avail! Masha is already going to kindergarten, but the child does not get enough sleep, walks pale and with huge bags under his eyes, does not want to sleep during the day, lies in bed and looks at the ceiling. Parents ask their daughter, "What's the matter? Why? Do you need any help?” But in response, my daughter just shook her head and said that if she told everyone, it would be bad for everyone.

We decided to get a dog. The Great Dane. They tied me to the bed for the night, let him guard me. But that was not the case. The dog disappeared in the morning. Gone, that's all. Everyone thinks, how is that? The dog is not small, it cannot fit under the closet, but all the searches were in vain. We asked the neighbors and the children on the playground if they had seen a dog (after all, the dog was not cheap, and my daughter liked it too..) but they never found it. But my daughter's sleep problems did not disappear, but became even worse. She started not only screaming, but also throwing objects! The parents decided that their daughter would sleep in the room with them. But in the middle of the night Masha fell out of bed and ran to her room. There was a scream. The parents came running.. Musya was sitting on the nursery floor. (that was the name of the Great Dane who had mysteriously disappeared last night) and in her teeth she held a piece of black wool, a piece of skin.. They didn't investigate. Everyone was glad that the dog was found.

We decided to install cameras in the child's room. And so they did. The next night, the screams and all that sort of thing happened again . In the morning, the whole family watched the recording. Everyone except Masha, who was in kindergarten. There was nothing like that on the record. Masha is lying in bed, trying to fall asleep... and then the eye opens. The euro window, and try to open them on purpose, but in order to get a draft… A shadow flies in through the window, somewhere up, apparently onto the ceiling (the camera was shooting only in front of itself, the ceiling was not in sight) and then the daughter starts yelling, throws her slippers, a lamp, everything that was at hand somewhere, and then something falls on the bed. It's hard to describe it. It was as if someone had only seen a man in a movie, sewed a costume from memory and put it on a spider. The head is narrow, with a triangular chin, pieces of skin or wool hang in rags, claws, long thin fingers..

And then IT turned to face the camera. It was just terrible.. The eyes are large and black as beads, without a pupil, the hole (in place of the mouth) accommodates several rows of sharp teeth, or rather fangs, and the most terrible thing is the complete absence of a nose. It was crawling towards Masha. She screamed louder and louder, and the pillows and the rest of the contents of the bed were used.… And then it turned its head. 360 degrees, jumped off and flew out the window. My parents were shocked! We agreed that Dad will sleep in his daughter's room tonight. And so they did. In the morning, Dad was nowhere to be found. And the whole window was stained..

Right. With blood. Mom watched the recording. In the middle of the night, it all happened again. Only this time with Dad. My daughter was fast asleep. Dad was thrown all over the room, and then dragged out the window. And all this is accompanied by the sounds of this creature's speech. But not just talking, but singing something like a lullaby, but in three voices together. His facial expressions were inimitable. He moved all the muscles of his face at once. After that, Mom called the police.. But it was all in vain. He was never found, and mom, daughter, and dog moved to the city.

At first, I thought it was all a silly horror story, until I read five more stories where the same noseless creature fits the description of the creature.…

Camping

 I've been used to hiking since I was a kid. It doesn't matter if you go on a picnic for a couple of hours or go for a few days on a free route with serious equipment — it always seemed to me that this was the best pastime. You don't get bored, you do something all the time, you don't sit still - that's the most pleasant thing about such trips. And you're learning a little bit to figure out completely different things — how to light a campfire, how to set up a tent, and how to walk properly so as not to exhaust yourself, but not to circle around the forest, and go back to your start. In general, there are solid advantages and a feeling of pleasant fatigue at the end of the hike, thanks to which plopping down on the sofa after a bath turns into an unearthly pleasure and serves as almost the highest reward. Every year, from the moment of the thaw until late autumn, I go out into nature as much as I can, whether alone or with friends, but I definitely go to the forest.

It was in 2007, at the beginning of July. We agreed to gather at our favorite place, a small clearing with oak trees, since it takes only forty minutes to take the train, and it's close to seven or eight kilometers. The gathering was timed to coincide with Ivan Kupala, everything was one to one — and there was an excuse to meet to sit around the campfire, and to celebrate the holiday and take a day off, and almost anyone can go on the route — to anyone who likes more.

In order not to waste time, we decided: those who were free to leave in advance, put the clearing in order, prepare for the arrival of the rest of the people, prepare firewood, put tents. It doesn't seem like much time is needed, but one by one, the day flew by unnoticed. It was getting late. We decided to make a last pass through the forest, around the camp, and gather dried wood for a fire and remove driftwood from under our feet at the same time. By the way, we were also waiting for nonresident friends, we expected to gather 40 people then, but we didn't specifically discuss who, when and from where to get to the camp: something like a competition — who would approach better unnoticed, or they would still be welcomed at the approaches. One case was considered the ultimate chic — a huntsman nicknamed Leshi managed to put up a tent in the middle of the camp before he was noticed and identified; so now everyone was trying to repeat this "feat"...

To be honest, I really love blueberries, but here, as if to order, one bush with berries filled with juice, then several at once stretch out in a chain... And so he wandered, picking bushes, rejoicing in life. Everything inside me was already ringing with happiness — no thoughts of work, no worries — babble! However, it didn't last long — until it finally got dark. It was only then that I discovered the absence of a flashlight in my pockets, as well as a mobile phone. It's not fatal, but with my "chicken blindness" it's very unpleasant and annoying to poke through the vague outlines of trees, bushes and paths... I didn't seem to be poking for long, but I realized from the subsidence of the moss that I was no longer in the forest, but in the swampy part of it, making circles. I tried to find at least some positive moment in this idiotic situation - I found it! I was pleased with my equipment and foresight, but immediately lost myself in black melancholy about the same foresight — I took the flashlight, but left it in my backpack — THEN WHY did I take it?!

By the reflection of the lights, I knew where to go, and I went. I didn't go far, because almost immediately I fell into some kind of hole flooded almost to my waist, which didn't cheer me up at all. Cursing and somehow shaking off the fallen leaves mixed up with something, he moved on. Right up to the next pit! Nature finally lost all its charm in my eyes, and I lost the feeling of dryness and warmth, because I managed to practically "dive" into this stagnant "font". Twenty minutes later, the roar of a savage Homo sapiens was ready to burst out of my throat, I just wanted to break something, or better yet, kill someone! My feet seemed to "find" roots and slippery gnarled sticks on their own, the stick-stick stuck into the "strong" bumps as if alive and could only withstand pressure, but not my weight, but the reflections of the lights, which I was guided by, as if they began to dance around me — so often I lost sight of them. kind of... He was silent only from a sharp sense of shame and fear of "becoming famous" — so many years had passed like a campaign, and now — on you! — I got lost in the swamp near the camp!

Gritting my teeth, through which an irritated growl still sounded, I moved on, and then... A miracle! A miracle has happened! A friend saved a friend! One of the guys from other cities was standing in front of me. They usually go out into nature, some in armor, some in their costumes, role—playing games. Even now, some kind of role-playing player in the form of a monk goes into the water and holds a staff in his hands. I tried to turn my grin into at least some semblance of a smile - it's dark, suddenly it doesn't look scary? And with the air of a "cunning partisan" he asked:

— What, you decided to cut it too?

The answer just "killed" me:

— No, I came out at your splash, follow me and I'll take you out.

And off he went, my good bastard guide, without even turning around! And I'm almost steaming out of my ears with anger. Well, I guess it's okay for you, we're not made of anything ourselves!

— You go, and I'll walk myself, I'm not a kid anymore, I won't get lost!

I got it, I see, I've already turned around.

— Don't worry, but follow me, I see a path, but judging by your appearance, you're looking for it!

It became a shame — a man helps a fool out, and he spits into his helping hand.

— I'm sorry, I just can't see very well in the dark, I can almost feel my way...

"I can see that... Let's go already.

They moved. But somehow we moved strangely - the "monk" walks easily, as if on a sidewalk, and not on a swamp, and my legs go up to my ankles! Although maybe he's not wearing boots like me, but moccasins of what kind? And you can't tell by the look of him, maybe it's just that his cassock is hanging on him like a hoodie, and he's thin as a roach?

"Listen,— I say. — I have a request for you: don't tell our people that I got lost in the swamp, okay?

— Don't worry, I won't tell anyone.

And then I just failed. It happened so suddenly, as if I had jumped from a tower into this swamp! I'm trying to swim out, but I'm being pulled down by my legs. I panicked, of course, and tried to shout, but stale water and duckweed were climbing into my mouth, I couldn't see anything, I didn't understand where I was or where I needed to move, and my heart was beating like a crazy drummer, as if it hadn't jumped out of my chest! I'm floundering, waving my arms in all directions, kicking my legs like crazy — and above me, the voice sounds so calm:

— Have you eaten too much fly agaric?

Lo and behold, I'm not in a barrel, but I'm not drowning in a swamp, but I'm sitting in a deep puddle and slapping my hands on it, and I put my feet in a hole with green leaves. And the "monk" stands and looks at me in a characteristic way, with a squint.

— Do you like it here more or will we go further?

I feel the blood rushing to my face — it seemed to me that I began to glow in the dark.

— Let's move on...

Let's go... Again, the "monk" is like walking on the sidewalk, and I'm swimming. And that's when I realize that I don't recognize my "guide" at all. We don't have such guys. And, as I notice, we are not walking towards the campfires, but somewhere sideways... I twisted the cookie in my pocket and poked the guy in the back:

— What's your name anyway, Susanin the hero?

— They call you a swamper...

And that's when I got really scared. Instead of a guy, there's a guy in front of me, overgrown like a guerrilla and puffy like a homeless alcoholic. And he turns around and stares at me.:

"What are you doing," he says, "you're all green?"

"Look at you,— I mutter. — His beard is already overgrown with mud...

I'm afraid to look, and it's impossible not to look, I'm backing away like a crab, I don't even think about the swamp... And then the Swamper exhaled sharply... and burst! He exhaled as if the whole swamp had been stirred up at once — the stench was suffocating, his eyes were watering, he couldn't see anything, and his head was buzzing from lack of air, as if with a concussion... And a piece of ice just formed in my stomach, and my legs, I feel, began to give way... That's when I screamed. I ran so fast that it didn't matter to me whether it was a swamp, a forest, a sidewalk, or even an abstract nothing at all — I had never run like this before or since...

I ran to the camp in a demented state, where they gave me tea and tincture for a couple more hours... I went home on Kupala, and I had absolutely no energy or desire to stay... At first, the guys thought that I was trying to intimidate them before going out at night, but when I just packed up my things and walked along the path to the village, and not directly through the forest to the station.,

At first, the guys thought that I was trying to intimidate them before going out at night, but when I just packed up my things and walked along the path to the village, rather than directly through the woods to the station, they tried to hold me back, but I couldn't stay — I'd never had such anxiety, I felt like I could just break into any moment now, if I stay here a little longer.

Upon arrival home, I started looking for information on the Swamp and this is what I found:

"A swamper is one of the atypical representatives of the evil spirits living in a swamp. There are some differences in the description of the appearance of the marsh, which is mainly due to the sedentary lifestyle of this creature in extremely inaccessible places. According to some reports, it is a sedentary bottom creature, a sullen and eyeless fat man with matted hair, a body covered with a thick layer of mud, fish scales, snails and the like. According to other descriptions, he is an old man with gray fur, long arms and an equally long curled tail with a wide yellowish face (the color of swamp mud) and goose (according to other descriptions — toad) paws instead of legs. The swamper always has big bulging eyes, the same big belly and a huge, matted, tangled beard.

An important fact is that, unlike most other representatives of the evil spirits, the swamper does NOT know how to change his appearance, but he knows how to cause great trouble, and often an unlucky lover of swamp walks sees a monk or a lonely traveler. However, most often it is a black man with a lantern in his hands, moving along the edge of the swamp."

.. Already in August, I went hiking again, as I continued to do in the future, but now, before entering the forest or swamp, I pray and check if the amulet and cross are in place.