Scared To Death, Literally

"HAH!" I shouted as my sister dove into the living room and fell on her face.

"It's time to go to bed, man," my sister groaned as she rubbed her sore chin.

"MehÐ'..." I shrugged and embraced the inevitableness of the thing they call Ð''sleep.' She swiftly shut off the illumination, causing an eerie shadow to flicker about. The mood swing hit me instantly; I felt an empowering darkness and fear engulf my fragile body as I stared down the forbidding staircase. Something wasn't right.

Only a month ago had I viewed the lifeless body of my best friend in his formidable coffin. His despairing face has been fixated into my mind even to this day. Recently, I have been struggling with hallucinations of the unknown. God bless his soul.

BANG! The sound of a door slamming instantly jolted me back to reality, leaving me with the paranoia of being alone in the dark, damp living room. I quickly sensed my way through the shade that was cast upon the entire dwelling. Before entering the long hallway leading to my room, I peered down the flight of stairs once more, only to catch a glimpse of a mysterious scarlet silhouette stirring at the bottom. The inexplicable shadow was ensued by a faint scraping noise.

A sudden chill rushed up my spine like a bullet train. Fear clouded my mind, causing me shout in terror.

"Mom? Dad? MOM? BABA? Help!"

I charged down the extensive hallway towards my destination, only to trip on the well-placed telephone cord. Skidding down the passage uncontrollably, I smashed my head into the door. The world spun wildly before my eyes, triggering my system to regurgitate and retch all over the plush carpet.

Moving my fingers up my forehead, I felt a warm fluid trickling down. "Blood?" I thought to myself. "It's coming, there's no time to think." Crushing the unblemished vomit between my fingers, I unstably rose to my feet. Ignoring the putrid smell, I continuously knocked on my parents' bedroom door, but to no avail. There was absolute silence on the other side. My sweaty palms tried the doorknobÐ'... it was locked. My brain went haywire with swirling, confused thoughts: "How can they still be sleeping? Can they not hear me? Are they even..there..?"

When someone is in an extreme state of fright, they see things, hear things, and even feel things. Unexpectedly, I heard a subtle scratching right behind me. Whirling around, my mouth opened in disbelief. At first, it seemed like a prehistoric creature, something millions of years old that had somehow dropped through a time warp and into my house. But that was crazy. It was crawling towards me, step by step. Closing in. Quick as a panther, it leaped on me and began tearing away at my flesh as if I was merely a ragged doll. It was