Nightlight

As a child, I had a nightlight. I really liked it because, as it spun, it projected a beautiful colored pattern onto the walls, making me feel like I was somewhere in space. We lived in a two-room apartment in a very old building. I had my own room, located at the end of a long hallway leading from the front door. Every night before bed, I loved to turn on that very nightlight, which sent me on a little "space adventure."

Then one day, there was another malfunction at the station (which was common back then), and the power went out in the entire neighborhood. As always, after sitting in the kitchen by candlelight with the whole family, scaring each other with scary stories, we went to our rooms. Since there was nothing else to do, I decided to go to bed early. Out of habit, I went to the nightlight and flicked the switch, but then I realized there was no light and headed to bed with a smile.

 I woke up in the middle of the night feeling incredibly hot (which was odd, considering it was winter outside, and the house, as I mentioned, was very old and therefore poorly heated). I didn't think much of it at the time, just threw off the blanket and tried to go back to sleep, when suddenly I heard an incomprehensible whisper coming from the opposite corner of the room. An unpleasant chill ran down my spine, but I convinced myself it was just my imagination after the horror stories I'd heard in the kitchen, covered my head with a pillow, and fell asleep.

The next day, the lights weren't turned back on—they said there was some serious problem and they'd turn them back on as soon as everything was fixed. I spent the whole day outside, and when I got home, I wanted to go straight to bed, since there was nothing else to do at home anyway. That night, I woke up again feeling incredibly hot. But, besides that, I felt like I had trouble moving. Opening my eyes, I froze in horror and couldn't even scream: a figure hung on the ceiling directly above me, black as a shadow, like a cross between a man and some kind of animal. It was unnaturally curved and stared at me with its large, whitish eyes. This lasted for perhaps half a minute, but it felt like an hour. Then it suddenly tilted its head to the side—it seemed to me it was preparing to pounce... And then the room was suddenly illuminated by the glow of my nightlight, which I'd turned on the night before, and the creature dissolved into it.

I've never told anyone about this incident, but now I'm afraid, because we moved out of that apartment a long time ago, and I'm already 25 years old, but I still hear strange whispers at night from a corner beyond the reach of my old nightlight...