One of the most popular and active subreddit communities is “Nosleep” and it’s the perfect place for people who love to read thrilling short stories and scary encounters people had. Following is our pick from the latest entries of Nosleep. Whether you’re a seasoned horror surfer on the internet or a newcomer, these creepy stories will leave you chilled to the bone and eager to read more.
- That Thing. (/ErasmusGeisler)
I enlisted into the marines a few years ago, I undertook basic training and received my first order of deployment outside the country. I was deployed to South East Asia, I can’t specify where due to confidentiality.
We were stationed in a jungle, and laid there to rest for the night. We took turns for sentry duty, 1:30 AM, it was my turn.
I picked up my rifle and stood around the area strolling, I suddenly had the urge to pee, so I decided to go in one corner of a tree and do my business. After that, when I went to patrol an area much farther then where we were staying, I heard something crunching behind the trees but dismissed it as some wild animal.
But there was something unusual about it, it sounded different. The crunching noise went on for 6 minutes, and I decided to take a peek, and I remember having a weak gut before checking it, a premonition.
I looked through the trees with my flashlight and my face suddenly froze, my stomach dropped, my knees felt weak, and the grip on my rifle grew weak. I saw what I could describe as a 6’1 tall, bald, naked humanoid with the reddest eyes I have ever seen, with long fingernails eating the insides of a dead stray dog.
I remember I couldn’t make any sound, and the both of us were frozen. That thing’s teeth smeared with the blood of the dead dog. It then took the cadaver of the dog and ran away into the deep jungle never to be seen again. I proceeded to stand there, frozen for 10 minutes, until a fellow soldier told me that my duty was up, it was 3:00 am.
I headed back to my tent, laid down my rifle close to me and tried to get sleep but I couldnt. That things eyes, it was permanently etched into me. Even until now, in my bedroom thousands of kilometers away from my first tour, I could still reimagine the eyes.
14 days later, after training with the local troops in the jungle, we headed back to the city. I ate in a restaurant, and luckily for me it was broad daylight. I managed to then converse with the restaurant owner and start a conversation. I then told him about my encounter with that thing I saw.
The restaurant owner’s face then fell cold and frozen. I noticed his eyes, and asked him what was wrong. He told me that thing I saw, was an escaped mental hospital patient, who was missing for almost 7 years. I remember me falling silent.
I asked the restaurant owner which mental institution, of which he was oblivious to. I then headed back to base and reflected on my own self. After a few years, I was honorably discharged since I served my time already.
I was finally thankful and returned to my home. While I took a car ride to my home, we passed by a forest, and I could swear to God, I could see those red pairs of eyes.
I then greeted my mother and my family a happy one, and sat on my bed, ever so rethinking of my experience with that escaped mental patient.
Since then, I tried my best to avoid areas full of trees, in fear of what lies beyond that. I never told any of my fellow friends of my experience, and I only entrust my experience to that restaurant owner, to God himself, if he knows what that thing is anyway, and to strangers in Reddit.
- I Died Last Week (by u/the-third-person)
I died last week.
Not for too terribly long, in the grand scheme of things. Thirty-eight seconds. That was all it took until the doctors restarted my heart and I came back. It felt like a lot longer to me, though.
I never really thought about the afterlife much. If I’d been asked about it, I would have said that there wasn’t one, that it doesn’t make any sense for there to be some intangible part of ourselves that carries on after we die. That’s the only logical answer.
Turns out death isn’t logical. What I experienced while my heart was stopped convinced me of that.
The experience was, in a lot of ways, shockingly generic. Everything just stopped. The world went silent in a way I’d never experienced before. The blackness around me slowly brightened into a dim grey, and I was standing in an endless plain. It stretched out all around me like an ancient sea bed, featureless and eternal.
Up ahead there was a bright light, the source of all of the ambient light around me. It called to me, beckoning me forward with a sense of peace and acceptance. My footsteps made no sound as I walked toward it. I left no marks on that forgotten land. My shadow stretched out behind me, wiping away any trace of my passing.
As I drew closer to the light, I began to feel a slight discomfort. Something was wrong—not with the light, but with something the light could not see. My feet continued to carry me forward; they were moving automatically, and I don’t think I could have stopped if I’d wanted to. But I began to look around, trying to find the source of this unpleasant sensation.
There was nothing to my left, nothing to my right. The plain faded out into the darkness on both sides. There was no place for anything to hide. There was nothing at all.
Behind me there was only my shadow, moving as I moved. And yet—was it mine? It was here that I felt the discomfort most keenly, craning my neck back to watch the dark, distorted version of myself dragging along the ground behind me. There was something concealed within the shadow, something disguised and disgusting. It was following me, using me to get close to the light. It would use me to get inside.
I tried to stop walking, but the pull of the light was too powerful. I looked desperately around for something to grab onto to stop myself, but there was nothing. I drew closer and closer to the light. I could feel its warmth and radiance on my face, but at the same time I felt the coldness and anticipation of the thing behind me like iron nails on my back.
I knew it should not be allowed into the light. I knew it was a thing of destruction. I simply had no way to stop it.
Its claws dug into my back in preparation. I could feel it coiling to spring free. I flailed my arms behind me, trying to grab it, but touched nothing but air. The light was in front of me, almost touching me. I took the penultimate step.
Abruptly I was awake and in pain again. Medical personnel leaned over me, shining lights into my eyes. I was back in the world, where things were loud and complicated and beautiful.
I didn’t tell anyone about my experience. Why would I? Near-death experiences are so common in hospitals that they’re just another acronym, NDEs. It’s just something dying people go through,the final spasms of a brain refusing to admit that it is on its way out. A psychologist would probably have a lot to say about what I thought I’d seen, but the medical doctors wouldn’t even make a note on my chart.
They discharged me from the hospital two days later. I was fine when I went home. I nearly sideswiped a car getting onto the interstate, but I was fine. For all that it could have ended badly, it was a minor mistake. The other driver had been more attentive and all it really meant was that I should not have been driving myself. I slowed down, focused my attention and made it home safely.
I tripped going up the brick staircase of my house, nearly braining myself on the baluster of the railing. I flung my hands out and caught myself in time, though I threw my keys into the bushes in the process. As I hunted for them, I berated myself for my clumsiness and swore I would get some rest as soon as I made it inside.
I reached my bed without further incident, and settled gratefully into its soft and non-dangerous embrace. I tossed my clothes to the side and let the glow of the television lull me to sleep.
Dreams of being buried alive plagued my sleep. I woke to find the sheet wrapped around my head, stifling my breathing. It was twisted tightly enough that at first, I could not find my way free. Adrenaline spiked in my system as I clawed at my face, finally finding the loose end of the blanket to free myself.
It was too early to be awake, but going back to sleep was not in the cards, so I made my way blearily to the kitchen and poured myself a bowl of cereal. I was at the table, spoon halfway to my mouth before it finally registered that I had never opened the refrigerator. Whatever I’d poured on my cereal had not been milk.
The chemical smell rising from the bowl suddenly hit me. I looked down in horror at the spoonful of corn flakes and Drano that I had been about to eat. Somehow I had opened the cupboard under the sink instead of the refrigerator. I had not noticed as I poured toxic chemicals onto my food. I had almost eaten it.
I called the hospital. They told me that I had had a traumatic experience, and mild confusion was nothing to be worried about. They said I could come back in if I was worried. I remembered the car I had almost hit on the way home, the one I had totally failed to see, and told them I’d think about it.
There were far too many cars on the road for me to even consider driving myself in this state. I considered calling for a ride share, but put the phone down with the app unopened for some reason. I wasn’t sure why. I knew going back to the hospital would be a good idea. I just couldn’t seem to muster up the energy to do anything about it.
Not that I was lethargic, mind you. Despite the early hour, I could not stop thinking about all of the things that needed to get done around the house. Minor chores, like sharpening the knives, cleaning the bathroom and clearing the gutters.
Or, to put it another way, playing around with sharp objects, dangerous chemicals and high spaces. I firmly put myself back to bed.
I couldn’t sleep. I was antsy. I kept thinking about that light. I wanted to get back to it.
My motivation disturbed me, though. When I had been caught up in the light, it had felt pure and natural. Stepping into it would have been a gentle, inescapable act. What I felt for it now was eagerness laced with greed. It was a perversion, tainting the memory. It made me feel unclean.
I took a shower to wash off the sensation. I was careful in the bathroom, checking the water several times to make sure I had not turned it to a scalding level, ensuring that I had not somehow replaced my shampoo with a bottle of bleach. Everything was fine, so I stepped into the shower and let the water wash me clean.
As I reached for the soap, my shadow slid across the shower wall. I stared at the path it had taken and slowly waved my hand again, disbelieving what I had seen. The shadow moved back, repeating what I had noticed: droplets of water were dislodged in its wake.
I tried it several more times. Each time, the result was the same. My shadow had a small but undeniable physical presence. I could not feel it on my skin, but I could see its effects. Something was hiding within.
I spent the rest of the day trying to make my house safer. I tied shut the cabinets with the cleaning chemicals. I locked up the contents of the medicine cabinet. I disconnected the garbage disposal.
Over and over again, I thought about calling for help. I could never quite make myself do it, though. It bothered me less than it should have, which was itself a concerning sign. I am not alone in my own self.
I’m glad the doctors brought me back. I don’t know what manner of creature has attached itself to me, what sort of thing could exist on that vast, unmarked plain at the end of life. I know that it should not be allowed into that light, though. It’s far too gleeful at the prospect. It has to be kept out.
My mind is wandering more and more. I found myself absent-mindedly pressing the tines of a fork into my skin yesterday. I wake up in the middle of every night with the sheets wrapped around my head. Today, I felt my own hands holding the knot in place.
It has to be kept from that light.
I just don’t know how much longer I’ll be able to do it.
- Scared to Death (/DoctorRot)
My ex-husband always used to jumpscare me. It was one of the things I hated the most about him. Well, he’s doing it again. The most frustrating part is that he’s been dead for five years.
At first I was just slightly put off by it. It was in the earliest days of dating him. If he’d be at my apartment and maybe I excused myself to use the bathroom, he’d be waiting in some doorway or shadow to jump out and scare the shit out of me. It was even worse at his house. He lived way out in the middle of freaking nowhere and I was pretty much always low level freaked out there. But then he’d leap out from around a corner and I’d be so scared and pissed off, I’d be ready to break up with him then and there.
In retrospect, that’s obviously what I should’ve done. But, I guess we all ignore our own inner voices sometimes, don’t we? Well, obviously, or there wouldn’t be so many people posting on NoSleep trying to get other people to help them with some dire problem they created by doing something stupid.
And yet, here we are.
I don’t know why I let it slide, honestly. And that was only one of the many things about him that were… Terrible. Nonetheless, I repeatedly told him to cut that shit out, and I repeatedly did nothing when he failed to cut that shit out. Eventually, I even married him.
He had two kids from a former marriage who stayed with us a lot, and then when they were there, there were also nieces and nephews staying over too. I always liked when there was a house full of kids. It made the old drafty falling down farmhouse we lived in slightly less terrifying. But, count on my ex husband to fuck up a good thing. We were in the living room with all the kids, it was late at night. The kids were all still rowdy and playing around, he and I were on the couch. There was a scary movie playing which nobody was really paying attention to.
But, Eric, my ex, got this funny look on his face and said quietly to me, “Watch this.” Then he put his finger to his lips to express that I should keep quiet. I instantly knew he was probably thinking of orchestrating some huge jumpscare on all these kids. Even though he had actually given me warning at least, I just didn’t want him to do it. The youngest child there was only four. I knew it would immediately kill the good vibes. I tried to protest, but he shushed me again and then scurried off to some other part of the house, unnoticed by any of the kids.
I sighed angrily. I even tried to warn the kids, but they were all hyper and not listening. Seconds later, Eric showed up outside the screen door and revved his chainsaw.
The kids LOST it. One of his daughters actually blasted backwards and got airborne in her desperation to get away from the door. The four year old (of course) burst into hysterical tears, and soon they were all crying.
Now, some of you reading this are probably laughing and thinking, that’s actually epic. But, the thing was it was just so damn OLD. He did this dumb shit ALL THE TIME. Plus, the world can really be boiled down into precisely two types of people. People who think it’s funny to scare four year olds so they cry, and people who don’t. So, readers, I suppose you’ve sorted yourselves into teams at this point.
Fast Forward a few years from the dumbass chainsaw incident, and Eric and I had our own son. The thing about our son was that he had major, and I mean MAJOR, heart problems at birth. He had to have open heart surgery and also had a whole shitload of other complications. Now, that’s not the point of the story, but just know that the first eight months of his life were VERY touch and go. Then he was finally doing better, stronger, able to do more.
He was nine months old and sitting on my lap, facing me. We were just playing and chattering at each other, when Eric lunged up behind him, grabbed him, and shouted.
My little son did that thing little kids do where for one full second you don’t know if they’re going to burst into hysterical tears or burst into laughter. In the end, my son burst into laughter. And so did Eric. I, on the other hand, was livid. Who jumpscares an infant, first of all? And secondly, who the hell jumpscares and infant HEART PATIENT?
That was probably the rudest I’d ever been to Eric about the jumpscare thing, but he just kept laughing. Laughed the whole thing off, like he always did.
Anyway, that wasn’t why I divorced him, but we were divorced by the time our son was three. The shared custody arrangement of our son went about how you’d expect things to go with a douchebag. But, life plodded along.
When our son was about 10, he went through this phase where he started getting insanely jumpy. I mean, he just seemed incredibly paranoid. If I walked close to him, or made any sudden movements, he would flinch. Almost like he thought I was going to hit him. At first it actually sort of hurt my feelings because I had never hit my son, I didn’t understand why he was being so jumpy with me.
Then it started to scare me because I wondered if someone else was hitting him. Maybe he was being bullied at school. He didn’t go to his father’s all that much, and I didn’t imagine Eric would ever hit him, but what if?
But then I remembered the jumpscaring. I finally thought to ask my son about it. He immediately revealed that yes, his dad jumpscared him all the time.
“It’s kind of annoying, Mom,” he told me.
Well yeah, no shit, I thought. I couldn’t believe I’d forgotten about it. I was so mad. He only spent limited time with our son. Why was Eric spending it jumpscaring him so much that it was making him nervous and anxious ALL the time? What a shit heel.
The problem was that Eric was the sort of “co parent” that if I asked him for help with anything, or to back me up on anything, he would do the exact opposite, just to be spiteful. Asking nicely never worked with him. So if it wasn’t something a court would force him to stop, I really didn’t even bother asking, because I knew he would just get worse. And let’s face it, no family court is going to give a shit about jumpscaring. I was mad as hell, but there wasn’t much I could really do about it.
Fortunately, he took the liberty of dying, and that took care of that.
I don’t mean to sound callous. Obviously my son struggled with the death of his father. But the jumpiness subsided basically instantly after he found out his dad was dead. Now, if your child’s mental health IMPROVES because you died, it’s possible you were a shitty parent. I’m just saying.
Anyhow, another five years went by and then I wrecked my car because a cat jumped out in front of me.
I sat there in shock, gripping the steering wheel of my wrecked car. As I tried to catch my breath and make sense of what had just happened, I noticed something strange. The air around me had grown cold, and a chill ran down my spine. I looked around, but no one was there. I tried to shake it off and focus on getting out of the car, but then I heard it.
A low, guttural laugh echoed around me, and I froze. It sounded like my ex-husband’s laugh. The man who had tormented me for years, emotionally and physically. I felt a surge of anger and fear wash over me, and I knew I needed to get out of there.
I managed to escape the car and run to my house, but the eerie feeling never left me.
Over the next few days, strange things started to happen. I would hear footsteps in the hallway, even though no one was there. Objects would move on their own, and the temperature would drop suddenly. As I walked by the window glass of a shop on a sunny day, my own reflection seemed to lunge at me and scared the life out of me.
A drinking glass exploded on the counter.
Doors slammed at night.
Books fell from the shelves landing with a thunk in a plume of dust.
As the days passed, I realized that it wasn’t just any spirit haunting me. It was my ex-husband, and he was using his ghostly powers to jump scare me from beyond the grave. The realization left me terrified. If he could do all of this, what else was he capable of?
I tried to find help, but no one believed me. They thought I was just imagining things or suffering from post-traumatic stress.
Sleep deprived and desperate, I found myself in a police station explaining the whole thing to a frazzled cop. He glared at me tersely and I felt like an idiot.
A gunshot rang out even as I told my story. The entire precinct jumped at what ended up being a gun going off by accident. Even so, the cop didn’t believe me (of course) and sent me out into the rainy night, terrified of my own shadow.
I was alone, trapped in a nightmare that I couldn’t escape from.
Now, as I sit here in my dark and silent house, I can feel his presence all around me. I was awoken moments ago when my bedroom door cracked violently into the wall.
I know that at any moment, he could jump scare me again. And this time, I fear it won’t just be a harmless prank.
I’m sitting here curled in a ball, shaking as I type this. I’m just trying to get it out. Trying to leave behind my story because I know it’s only a matter of time… Until he scares me to death.
- I convinced my wife she only had a few weeks to live. She didn’t react the way I expected..
(by/lightingnations)
I convinced my wife she only had a few weeks to live. She didn’t react the way I expected…
Okay, so before you go calling me a complete asshole, you should know my wife, Stacey, has pulled some seriously fucked-up pranks in the past. Like last August, after my mom got hit by that eighteen-wheeler, she secretly signed up for Ventriloquism lessons so that during the funeral she could throw her voice and yell, “Get me out of here, I’m still alive, dammit,” while the pallbearers lowered the casket.
Or there was the time she tricked me into thinking I’d won the lottery. That alone I might have laughed off, except she also convinced me to call my—very married—asshole boss and tell him the whole department knows he fucked his secretary at the office Christmas party.
So I’d been looking for a little payback, you might say.
Just last week, Stacey came down with a ferocious migraine, and three days in bed with a damp rag across her head didn’t help one bit, so off to the hospital we went.
From across the desk in his cramped office, Dr. Mercer said she needed a brain scan. He also suggested that, in his professional opinion, we should brace ourselves for the worst.
Time slowed down while we waited for the diagnosis. Adrift and forlorn, we held each other for hours on end while the seconds ticked by on the clock above the mantelpiece.
Oh sure, my beloved kept a brave face, but anytime she returned from her solo walks, her eyes would be all red and puffed out.
Well this morning Dr. Mercer finally called while Stacey was at the store. He used the landline because she hadn’t answered her mobile.
“So what’s the diagnosis?” I asked, my stomach folding itself in knots.
Again and again he insisted he couldn’t discuss the case with anyone besides the patient, although ten minutes of grovelling wore him down. He sighed, lowered his voice, then said he had a ‘hunch’ Stacey and I would have cause for celebration this Valentine’s Day.
All joy seeped back into the world. I thanked the doc a million times before collapsing into the chair, an idea for a prank already blooming in my mind. And boy, was it a doozy.
At the lounge table, I rubbed my eyes until they turned all bloodshot, and then practiced my sullen face. Soon I heard little miss ‘loves-to-prank’ come through the front door, kick off her shoes, and shuffle along the hall.
As she stepped into the room, I looked up without saying a single word. A hand shot up over her mouth.
I swallowed a gulp. Then, in a thin, weak voice, I said, “Dr. Mercer called.”
“Is it…bad?”
Rather than answer, I simply pretended to sob into my hands.
Stacey didn’t burst into tears or scream, nor did she collapse on the floor. Instead, she let out a deep sigh and threw her head back.
On the wall beside the window stood a dark wooden cabinet. She went over to it, slid open the bottom drawer, and lifted out this huge, metal trunk.
I stood up. “Everything okay?”
The trunk had a combination lock. Once Stacey rolled the numbers into place, the latch opened with a little click. “Do you love me?” she asked over her shoulder.
Still in character, I said, “Of course I love you. I’ll always love you. And we’re gonna get—”
“Then drink this.” She spun around, holding out a whiskey bottle. I craned my neck to peek inside the trunk and glimpsed a pair of handcuffs and a red bow-tie before she blocked my view. “I bought it for a special occasion,” she said.
I stepped forward, arms outstretched. “Listen, no matter what we’re gonna get through this mess togeth—”
“Just drink it,” she snapped. “Please. It’s important. If you love me, you’ll drink it.”
Was this a joke? I searched her face for answers, finding none. But hell, who was I to judge? Everybody processes grief in their own individual way.
“Sure honey.” I grabbed the bottle from her and took a long swig, my insides already warming.
Five seconds later, the floor rose up to meet me. Darkness swallowed the lounge and everything in it.
My next memory is of the words, “I love you,” drifting toward me from the end of a long tunnel.
There was pressure inside my skull. I tried moving, couldn’t.
My hands had been cuffed behind my back, and my ankles were bound together by a length of rope. I was propped up on the sofa in a tux.
Through the haze, I saw two Stacey’s orbit one another, both wearing her favourite dress—that red off the shoulder number. In her right hand, she had a pistol. Where did that come from?
Her voice echoed on and on as she told me she’d prepared for this day years ago—that she couldn’t bear the thought of me carrying on without her and starting a new family. Although I dipped in and out of consciousness, the words, “We have to go together,” kept stinging my ears.
I thrashed around, unable to speak. The best my drooling mouth could manage was slurred, random syllables.
Stacey sat beside me and pressed her right temple against my left, the pistol angled in such a way one shot would tear through both our frontal lobes. Oh fuck, did she plan on killing us? My attempts to beg her to wait came out as a nonsensical gurgle.
Squeezing those beautiful green eyes of hers shut, Stacey said, “Goodbye Frank. I love you so, so much.”
By now enough of the brain fog had lifted that I could mutter, “It was a prank.”
She stopped breathing, tensed up. “What?”
I took several quick, short breaths. “It’s a prank. Dr. Mercer said you’ll be fine…so I set you up…as payback for the lottery thing.”
For almost a minute, neither of us said a word, the room thick with tension. Then, forcing a smile, she said, “Well duhh.” She stood. “Did you really think I was gonna kill us both? I knew you were full of crap the second I walked in. You’re the worst actor in the world. I just turned the prank around on you. Ha ha…ha.”
The way she said this, every word steeped in sincerity, made the statement swing all the way back towards hollow. She crossed the room and slipped the gun into the trunk before returning with a key to unlock my cuffs. “Well, that’s a relief about the diagnosis. We should celebrate. How about we order Thai tonight?”
After she loosened the rope, I got up rubbing my chaffed wrists, my vision blurred and my throat dry. “Sounds…great.”
“Perfect.” With that, she smiled, stood on her tiptoes, lifted my chin with a finger, gave me a quick kiss, and then disappeared into the kitchen.
My shirt was a drenched rag against my chest. Had it really been a prank? Surely drugging me was a step too far, even for her.
Just then, the phone wailed. It sounded painfully loud inside my aching skull.
Dr. Mercer was on the line. And this time, his voice carried a distinct sour note. “Frank, I’m really sorry, but there’s been a mix-up with the results. Can you have Stacey call me as soon as possible? It’s urgent.”
The room tilted from side to side, the ground shifting beneath my feet.
My better half came back through the door and said, “Who was that, honey?”
I hung up and swallowed the lump in my throat…”..Wrong number..”
- I wish I never restored this piece of art (/seeaitch)
I’ve often been asked to recall the most famous or valuable painting on which I’ve worked, and while that list is long and those names illustrious, the piece that stands so singularly in my memory carries neither fame nor fortune.
At the heart of all art is magic. The artist’s task is to stir within us an emotion we may never expect. To be responsible for restoring any work, whether historical pieces or honored family heirlooms, preserving the magic of the artist’s vision is a great honor and a tremendous privilege. However, in my last restoration, I can’t begin to explain what dwelt inside the soul of the artist who created such a piece.
I am Christopher Gardener of Gardener’s Fine Art Restoration, a second-generation studio in London. We employ the finest archival materials and techniques to conserve and restore artworks for future generations.
It was late afternoon on March 18th, 1946, when Mr. Utterson visited our studio. I can recall the precise date as it was my wife’s fortieth birthday. It chanced that on the same morning, an earthquake shook the city of London for two fear-filled minutes, the first and only in the region.
The Fake Quake, as we called it, was explained by the government as a controlled detonation of an unexploded bomb from the war. A conclusion which, for those of us who felt the force and duration, knew was highly improbable.
The truth of the phenomenon remains a mystery. However, as I reflect on the arrival of Mr. Utterson and the occurrence of the quake, I wonder if a nightmarish thing had fallen upon us that day. Had that been the beginning of it all?
He was a lean, long man, anxious in discourse, cold, even to the touch, and had hurried from his home in Dartford carrying something wrapped in an overcoat. He dripped with perspiration and relayed a peculiar tale that his most precious painting had fallen into the fireplace after the tremors of the morning. I asked to remove the overcoat, so my apprentice, Claire, and I could assess the damage. He insisted he must leave at once, assuring the restoration price was no issue. Mr. Utterson left as suddenly as he arrived, and I transported the painting to our workshop to determine the piece’s condition.
In addition to researching the painting, it’s our practice to explore the artist to learn about their working process and the materials they may have used. Due to Mr. Utterson’s swift departure, we were blind to such information. However, he referred to a woman in the painting, which we were under strict instruction to restore precisely to her original condition.
The first step of any conservation is a visual examination. Looking at the painting to gather as much data as possible, even before touching it, is essential to understanding the piece.
When I removed the overcoat, I was impressed with the extent of damage and just how precarious the piece was. The entire painting was extremely dirty, covered by a layer of soot, leaving the image beneath a mystery. There were large sections of loss across the surface. Flakes of soot-covered paint had detached away from the canvas, and there was fire damage to the lowest corners of the wooden frame. My apprentice made a list of the tools and materials required for restoration as I began the first step of conservation.
I used tweezers to carefully remove flakes of detached paint from the canvas and placed them on an acid-free foam board. After removing the fragments and seeing the wooden canvas beneath the paint layer for the first time, I discovered a peculiar arrangement of foreign lettering. The pictograms were sharp, angular, and drawn by a skilled hand. Their striking beauty resembled Egyptian hieroglyphics, and I was intoxicated by their exotic design.
After the visual observation, we performed an x-ray examination, allowing us to observe more information that may not be clear to the naked eye. As I suspected, hidden beneath the visible paint layer, the entirety of the canvas was covered in fascinating hieroglyphs, written, I presumed, vertically as though in an ancient Chinese poem.
I was insistent we worked overtime as our discoveries were becoming most exciting, and I was eager to unearth what lay beneath the soot. My apprentice reminded me it was my wife’s birthday, and I reluctantly closed the workshop for the evening and returned home.
It was that night the dreams began. I remember feeling alone. It was dark. Utter blackness, like all the light in the world had never existed. Wherever I turned, nothing awaited. I fumbled through the void, arms outstretched, until my hands found a cold wall. I blindly patted the smooth surface when I located sharp, angular carvings that were strangely familiar. An awful feeling overcame me. I was not alone in that darkness. Something was standing close behind me.
Homer’s Odyssey recalls two gates through which all shadowy dreams pass, one fashioned in ivory and the other in horn. Those dreams that pass through the gate of ivory offer no fulfillment and are to be dismissed as fictitious ramblings of an unrested mind. But dreams which pass through the gate of polished horn, those dreams are true tellings.
The following morning I considered the dream ivory-passed and focussed on the intricate process of cleaning Mr. Utterson’s painting. Typically, particulate matter, including dust, dirt, and cigarette smoke, forms a stubborn glaze across a painting’s surface as it ages. However, in this case, the layer of soot made cleaning this piece particularly difficult.
To find the least aggressive solvent, reducing any potential damage to the paint, I began with distilled water, working through various detergents, enzyme solutions, and soaps. I used cotton swabs to apply the most effective formula, employing delicate circular movements.
With each gentle stroke, the image beneath the darkness became clearer, revealing to my excitement, a single eye peering from the sea of soot. The dark, lifeless eye produced a sense that it was not a restoration I was performing but an exhumation.
I took another swab, and beneath my next effort, I discovered a second empty eye as though I instinctively possessed the knowledge of its whereabouts. It’s not uncommon to hear of portraits whose eyes follow the viewer around the room. However, the eyes peering at me from behind the soot-covered painting felt like they were communicating with me.
I remember feeling like I had in the dream and that my solitude had suddenly been disturbed. It was as though I was being watched by an unexpected and unwelcome presence. I first heard the whispering as a faint feminine utterance. I naturally assumed my apprentice had arrived at the workshop. Registering the day, I knew that couldn’t be true.
The voice grew louder, spitting in haste with an unintelligible tongue. I tried to ignore my lunacy and explain the phenomenon as a result of a poor night’s sleep, yet the voice was as clear as yours or mine. It resembled a middle-Eastern tongue, perhaps an ancient Arabic dialect. The quickening speech seized my mind as though parasitically possessing my thoughts while simultaneously circling the shadows of the workshop. I thought I was going mad. I was going mad.
I tried to ignore her, but I became acutely aware of the evil and repetitious nature of the language. Recurrent, over and over again, like foreign verses from an incantation. The hostile manner of their recital sent a shivering sense of fear through my entire being. In one final, deafening release, she spat her last breath, and then there was silence.
My panicked thoughts returned, and a deadly chill crept over me. For the longest time, I remained in limbo between consciousness and the bewildering delirium I had suffered. The anguish at what had occurred was too overwhelming, and I returned home, though I don’t recall how.
I spent several feverish days bound to my bed. My wife cared for me as best she could, knocking gently from behind the door to bring me soup and wipe my brow. Her tenderness was touching though it was solitude I desperately desired. I was tormented by a persistent malevolence intent on making its presence felt.
Now and then, I’d wake, dazed from my recent oblivion. My wife found a scrap of paper beside the bed with a note written by my hand. I must have made it during one of my wakeful periods, though I have no recollection of writing such a thing. I have since committed the lines to memory:
I woke to hear a knocking at my door. The sound that haunts my soul returns once more. I close my eyes although I’ll never sleep. That knocking, knocking, knocking, stirs me deep.
Still, as stone, I long for life alone. In me, that frightful knocking found a home. Alone, alone, alone, alone, alone. I’d flee if all my courage hadn’t flown.
Then all at once, a silence in my room. No wicked sound. No siren of my doom. Deathly drained I drift to dreamless sleep. When out the dark, a knocking from the deep.
I am not an aggressive man. I am meek-minded and make excessive efforts to avoid confrontation. Even as a child, I shied away from conflict, and it is not my nature to harm another. I have never fought. I have never lashed out at anyone before or after the incident. I have spent years after what happened on March 23rd, 1946, trying to piece together the events which led to that awful day. What remains are a series of out-of-focus images, like saturated watercolor paintings, hanging in the gallery of my mind.
My wife’s timid frame appearing around the door… Her puzzlement at the empty bed and scanning the room’s chaotic state… The look of terror when she found me, crouched in hiding atop the bookshelf… Her eyes, those lifeless, soulless eyes as those that once stared up at me from the darkness, willing me to madness… The feeling of weightlessness as I pounced… Her trembling limbs as we wrestled and rolled under the bed… The compliance of her eyes beneath my thumbs… Biting at her throat until her trembling subsided.
There are no punishments equal to my crime. My lawyers advised I plead temporary insanity or I would be hung. You may think that death is fitting for my actions, and on the surface, I, of course, agree. Yet, I did everything in my power to avoid my execution out of youthful fear and man’s primal desire for self-preservation. I am confined to a room at Broadmoor Psychiatric Hospital and have been a resident here for over thirty years.
I understand the painting was returned to Mr. Utterson though I have no knowledge of what happened to either of them.
I live only to dedicate my pain, grief, and loneliness to the memory of my wife. There is no forgiveness for what I have done, not in this life or the next.
As I sit here, an old and anguished man nearing the end of his life, it is not death, I fear. It’s who waits for me on the other side of death. The shadow in the void. She, who appears each night, in the horrifying dreams which pass unquestionably through the gate of horn.
