The Nightmare, 1962

 The Nightmare/Fuseli

When I was a little kid and the old man was still alive, we lived in a house at the top of Queen Mary, right at the end of the street, by a copse of trees and directly across the road from the ravine leading down to the creek. I was told there were “things” down there and to never go across the road, but my parents never had to threaten to tan my hide to anchor me to the yard – for I was sure there were “things” there and I was very, very afraid.

I was especially afraid at night.

The nightmare began with me standing out on the front lawn with the old man; it must have been fall, because he had on the suede jacket he used to wear.  The nasty old man who lived next door, Mr. Cushing, called over to Dad in his loud voice “I see the Floaters got another kid last night, eh?”

The old man’s face flushed red with anger. “Not in front of the boy,” he said curtly. “You’re a fool to believe in those stories anyway.”

But I believed, even though I didn’t know what a “Floater” was; I only knew they “got” kids.

And there was no doubt in my mind that I was the next kid they were going to get.

Then it was night and I was in my bedroom, alone, in the dark. My parents had taken away my night light, as I was a big boy now,  and they insisted on opening my bedroom window, even though the trees came up to it and anything could sneak up and get at me.

The scene shifted, as they do in dreams and I could see the edge of the ravine, illuminated by a nearby street lamp, which cast a pool of tepid, sepia light on the bushes and the crowding trees.

For a time, which might have been a moment or might have been an hour, nothing happened – nothing except a heightened sense of both anticipation and apprehension – but slowly I became aware of a white, spherical object flitting through the shadows between the trunks of the oaks and maples, drawing closer and closer until suddenly it bobbed out into the pale, amber light.

It was a human head.

It has stopped moving, hanging suspended in the murky light, about five feet above the asphalt. Slowly, it turned from side to side, as if sniffing the air for an unknown scent, before freezing again, going rigid with attention.

It was facing the house.

I could see it then, a boyish, almost babyish face, freckled, the pale cheeks yellowed by the street light, the longish hair greasy and disheveled. The eyes were wide and I was sure I could see a glint of red as it looked across the road, as if it knew I was there – and I was sure it did.

And then it began to move, drifting gently across the road, like a balloon carried on a mild breeze with neither hurry nor care – but still getting closer with each passing second.

I could see myself in my bedroom, see myself lying under the covers in my blue Dino pjs, mouth open, sound asleep, asleep, even though I was conscious and observing the scene as if I was a disinterested bystander.

“Get up, get up, get up,” I wanted to scream – but was unable to make a sound; all I could do is watch in horror as my sleeping body slept on.

The scene shifted back to outside, where the head, wafting gently like a large soap bubble, had finished crossing the road and was now heading (no pun intended) for the trees on my side of the house.

“Get up, get up, get up,” I screamed in my mind, “you have to close the window, quick.” I willed myself to wake up – normally I had trouble going to sleep, not trying to wake up – but I just lay there, helpless, dead meat on a platter.

I saw the bark on the trunks of the trees in the grove, as if I was walking – or floating – through them, then the light blue paneling along the side of the house, then the dark cavity of an open window, which I – or whoever – immediately headed towards.

It was my window; of that, I was positive.

I saw myself back in bed and still unconscious, the scene morphing into a view of the open window, as seen from the interior of the room and revealing the shadowy outlines of the encroaching thicket – and then suddenly something white was there, momentarily hanging in the air and then coming to rest on the window sill.

The head.

For an unfathomable time, the head lay there, as if it too was asleep, but then I became aware that the reddish, slightly protruding  eyes, were moving around in their sockets, surveying the room and all its contents, before coming to a sudden stop – and staring directly at the my inert form, lying innocently in bed.

I was beside myself with terror, wailing in a frenzy of sheer, unadulterated, panic, knowing, in the iciness of my heart, I would not wake up.

The head rose off the windowsill, and, as if blown by a gentle, nighttime breeze, came slowly towards me, reaching the bed, hanging motionless some eighteen inches above my face:

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEENNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I threw myself out of bed with a shriek, flailing madly in the direction of the door, bawling hysterically at the top of my lungs and crashing through the door of my parent’s  bedroom where my mother was already calling “What’s wrong, what’s wrong,” while the old man, cursing, was fumbling for the light. Everywhere, in my bedroom, the hallway, my parent’s room, I could see scarlet eyes staring towards me from out of the shadows; the only escape from them was to burrow between Mom and Dad and hide underneath the covers (although I thought they might follow me there too).

Eventually, between bouts of hysterical crying, I managed to gasp out my story about the “face” as I persisted in calling it, finally falling into a troubled sleep.

Just before I slipped away, I heard Mom say “You don’t think…”

“I checked – there’s nothing there,” the old man said irritably. “That stupid bastard next door put it into his head.”

I must have slept with my parents for at least a week, which didn’t improve the old man’s disposition; eventually, they managed to coax me back into my own room, but for weeks I slept with all the lights on and the window firmly shut, drapes drawn tight. In the end, my folks installed a pale blue night light and I used it until we moved to the apartment years later.

I had been persuaded that it was all a bad dream, but when I started school, the other kids in the schoolyard soon put me right as to the nature of my nocturnal visitor.

It had been a Nightfloater. A Floater.