I can’t remember exactly when this started, but I remember how it did. I moved to a new city for work, one far away from the social life I had built.

My eyes are heavy even though I spend most of my time in bed. My back and legs are sore, despite the fact that I hardly use them anymore. My joints feel creaky and old, even though I’m under 30. All of this I could manage if it weren’t for the fog of apathy in my head. My life is good, or so I keep telling myself. I have a job, a degree, a girlfriend, and a friend group. So why am I letting it all fall apart?

I can’t remember exactly when this started, but I remember how it did. I moved to a new city for work, one far away from the social life I had built. My apartment, frankly, isn’t nice. It’s a small, dim room with shoddy plumbing, musty carpets, and thin walls. Despite that, I was optimistic when I moved in. My new life was here, and even with humble beginnings, I knew I could make something of myself. I was ready to take on the world.

The first night in my new home was mildly strange. I woke to a shuffling sound coming from my closet. I checked the time on my phone, the bright screen blinding me for a moment. 1:34 a.m. I groaned and rolled over in bed, but sleep refused to come. By 4 a.m., I gave up and got out of bed, deciding coffee would have to get me through the day. It did well enough. I spent my first shift at my new graphic design job exhausted, but the shift was relatively productive. That week, sleep only came in sporadic bursts. The most I got was 3 hours at a time. By Friday, I was so drained that I canceled my plans to see my friends and family just so I could sleep.

This exhausting pattern went on for another week. I’d had enough and decided to see my doctor for sleeping pills. This only partly helped- they helped me fall asleep, but I woke up feeling as if I had stayed up all night.

After that, the noises changed- shifting from my closet to my roof, then to the adjacent wall. Surely rats were common in an apartment complex like this one. I sent my landlord a message, which he either ignored or didn’t see.

At this point, my exhaustion was affecting my work, and I received a warning from my boss. I explained the situation to her, and she was kind enough to give me two days off. I almost wish she hadn’t.

The first night, I slept soundly until 2 a.m., when I woke up suddenly, as if from a night terror. My body jolted upright, facing the closet across the room. It stood open even though I remembered closing it before I got in bed. The smell of stale stomach acid and ammonia wafted from the darkness behind the closet doorway.

I was fully awake now, my eyes wired and my heart pounding.

In my closet, I saw a silhouette. Someone was hunched over, squatting down and facing the wall, their back to me.

You know how, when it’s late and your eyes aren’t fully awake yet, simple objects can seem like something more threatening? A coat can look like a burglar, a hat like a giant spider.

This wasn’t like that.

I could see it clearly- a thin, slender humanoid thing was scratching at the wall with jagged, claw-like nails. I turned my lamp on, praying it would vanish.

Not only did it not vanish, but the light caused the thing in my closet to snap its head toward me. With a sickening pop crack, its neck turned almost fully backwards to glare at me from the floor.

I could see it clearly now—emaciated, pale, gaunt, and hairless. Its sunken, black, beady eyes glistened hungrily under the light. Leathery gray skin was pulled taut over its jagged bones. It wasn’t a man. It couldn’t be. It was far too tall, and its bones weren’t entirely human. They jutted out abnormally, as if they had grown too long in both directions.

I was frozen in fear.

The monster hissed like a snake, showing me its needle thin teeth as it scuttled across my floor toward the bed on all fours. It leapt onto the foot of my mattress, crouching down over me.

Still, I couldn’t move.

Clear spit and drool oozed from its lipless mouth like a starving dog. It raised a hand to the ceiling, long claws glinting in the light of my desk lamp.

I squeezed my eyes shut, knowing at that moment that I would die. But the end didn’t come.

Instead, I felt a sharp, stabbing pain in both my calves—like something was boring into me, digging into the muscle and bone of my legs.

When I opened my eyes, the room was empty. My closet was closed. Everything was exactly as it had been before I went to bed. Surely it had been a nightmare- a side effect of the pills or some mental manifestation of my fears and anxieties from starting a new life.

I didn’t sleep that night, nor the night after. In fact I didn’t leave my room until the next Monday. I spent my weekend laying in my bed, staring at my ceiling. The terror I had felt eventually gave way to exhaustion once again. The sun would set and rise again but I couldn’t tell how much time had passed. When I did leave my bed, every step I took felt heavy- like I was dragging a ball and chain across the floor. I was exhausted, even responding to my friends and family on my phone felt like an impossible task.

That next week at work was hard on me, but I was glad to leave the apartment. Somehow, I felt slightly less dead when I was away from it. Still, my mind and body were both tired. Despite this, I was able to go through the motions at work well enough to get me to Friday.

I dreaded the weekend because I knew what it meant- going into hibernation for 2 days only to feel more tired than I had before. However, my dread lifted a bit that afternoon when I heard a knock on my door. I smiled for the first time in a long time. Standing at my door were my 2 best friends and my girlfriend. They dragged me out of my dark room and took me to a club. I had never really liked clubs, but I was glad to go this time. The exhaustion I had felt- the melancholy and apathy- left me while I was with them. I had fun drinking, talking, and making up with my loved ones. I explained my situation to them, and they suggested therapy. Unfortunately that’s not an option with the current state of my bank account. Besides, I don’t really believe in that anyway. By the end of our night, I felt like my old self again. The dragging, painful weight had been lifted from me, at least for a brief moment. But it was only temporary.

The night became early morning and my friends needed to go home. As I said my goodbyes, I felt an overwhelming dread for what I knew was coming. As soon as I crossed the threshold of my apartment, that heavy weight came crashing down on me so hard that I thought it might knock me off my feet. I could feel the energy drain from my body like air rushing from a punctured tire. My arms became limp at my sides, my knees buckled, and I hunched over as if gravity had intensified on me. My feet were concrete slabs and my arms were anchors. I took 2 doses of sleeping pills, collapsed onto my bed, and slept a restless sleep.

The next morning, I woke up at noon, blinking the sleep from my eyes. I took a cold shower in an attempt to wake myself, but that too proved ineffective.

At this point I became angry. Angry at myself, at my own body and mind that had been tormenting me ever since I moved here. I’d had enough. If my body refused to sleep, I’d exhaust it with physical activity until it had no choice but to rest.

That day, I lifted weights until my muscles screamed for rest and my bones clicked with every movement. After that, I ran until my lungs burned and I felt like I’d vomit if I took another step. I was still tired, but I felt good- like I was fighting back against whatever malevolent force had been plaguing me. I figured I wouldn’t conjure up anymore dream demons if I settled into a normal routine and laid back on the pills, so not even the monster I thought I had imagined could dampen my spirits now.

It worked, and that night I slept soundly through the entirety of the night. I was overjoyed. If I could get past this hurdle, I could continue with my life. I’d have the energy to perform at my job and maintain my social life at the same time. For 2 months, it worked wonderfully. I was in better shape than I’d ever been, my work was back on track, and I spent time with my girlfriend and friends weekly.

But things often have a way of falling apart just when you think you have it all together.

It was a Wednesday night. Once again, I was jolted awake by a noise from my closet. It was wide open again. I wanted to scream in frustration and anger. To cry in sorrow and outrage. This couldn’t be happening again.

But there was one overwhelming emotion that crushed these feelings like a landslide- terror.

The first demon had returned. Rather, I don’t think it had ever left. It was still on me, its razor-like talons were skewered into my calves, yet there was no blood. It was latched onto me like a parasite, using even its teeth to fasten itself to my flesh. It was even uglier than I remembered: it had become even more frail and sickly. Its eyes gleamed with a ravenous hunger.

But arguably worse than this was the other monstrosity I saw in the closet that night.

Bloated like a waterlogged corpse, it had gangrenous skin. Its lips retracted far away from its mouth in a twisted smile, revealing black gums and decaying teeth. Thick streams of yellow bile ran from its mouth, down the rolls of its flesh, and onto the floor like a rotten waterfall.

Like before, I tried to run. I willed my body out of bed but it refused to respond to my command.

The abomination lumbered out of the closet. I could feel its putrid breath hitting me from across the room. The smell was a sickening mix of spoiled dairy and excrement.

It stood by the side of my bed, smiling down at me. The monster gripping onto my legs let out a high pitched cackling noise, its teeth still latched to my calf. The bloated thing’s mouth stretched open far wider than it should have been able to. The river of mucus and filth that had been trickling out now poured out onto my chest and neck. It put a rotten hand to my jaw, forcing my mouth open with unnatural strength. Bile poured down my throat in thick globs. I wanted to vomit, but the stream of slime forced itself down into my body. The taste of rotten meat overwhelmed my senses.

My lungs were filling, preventing me from breathing. I choked and gagged, gasping for oxygen to no avail. My vision began to swim. The last thing I remember seeing before I blacked out was that rotted, corpse-like face smiling down at me.

When I woke, I felt worse than I ever had. My eyes wouldn’t open for what felt like at least 10 minutes. I could see light through my eyelids so I knew it was day. I was supposed to be at work, but I knew I wasn’t going. I remembered the night before and gathered the strength to open one eye. Just like the last time, there was no sign of the monsters- no bile, nothing in my closet, no demon attached to my legs. These nightmares were too much for me. I decided to stop taking the pills. I know I should have gone back to my doctor, but I had nowhere near the energy or willpower to attempt such a feat.

I was so tired I spent that day in bed, not even having the energy to get up to eat. The sun set, then it rose again, but rest still eluded me. I stayed in a middle ground between sleeping and waking for an amount of time I’m honestly not sure of. I blinked, the sun had gone down. I rolled over, it had come up again. A repeating cycle of days, months, years, or even decades could have gone by. I have no idea how long it’s been. To me, it could have been a lifetime, or it could have been a few minutes.

I mustered up the will to roll out of bed to eat and shower. I shuffled my feet and didn’t swing my arms, it was too difficult. My breaths were paired with long, melancholic sighs that felt involuntary. My body felt sticky and slow, as if my veins were filled with glue. I got to the kitchen after what felt like ages, only to find I had no appetite. In fact, the idea of eating disgusted me.

Skipping my meal, I shuffled to the bathroom. I showered, but it didn’t help much. My eyes still felt crusted over and heavy. My body was still achy and sore. I caught my reflection in the mirror and I saw how awful I looked- my hair was peppered with grey strands and my eyes were sunken and baggy. The skin on my face was wrinkled and leathery.

I don’t need to check my phone to know that any semblance of a life I had outside has crumbled by now.

My life was good. I had a job, a degree, a girlfriend, and a friend group. How did it all fall apart so quickly?

I’ve written this out with great difficulty as a first step out of here. Maybe if I can gather up all these pieces, I can convince myself to build up the energy to leave this room. I know I have to. But my bed is safe and comfortable, and I’m so tired.

There’s a saying, “Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.” But what good does it do me if my chains are my own limbs? If only I could get some sleep, maybe I could have the strength to save myself.

Maybe I’ll lay down again, just for a few moments.