u/Top_Satisfaction_800

To start off, I tried texting my parents as to not alert whatever is in the room with me but neither of them are answering. Now I don’t know what to do.

Me and my sister share a bunk bed together but sometimes when my sister gets scared she comes up to the top bunk with me. She use to just go into my parents room but they would get annoyed by the constant interruptions at night pretty quickly.

Tonight wasn’t any different. I was scrolling on my phone, reading Reddit posts and getting ready to fall asleep when I hear a familiar voice from below me.

“Hey can I get on the top bunk with you, I can’t sleep?

“Sure, sure. Come up here” I said turning from the wall to face her as she climbed onto my bed. She snuggled in next to me and whispered something in a hushed voice.

“Something is in my bed sissy, I’m scared.”

I looked away from my screen to see her beady eyes glistening at me. I huffed knowing she was eventually going to make me go down with her and check.
“You always say that and every time I check, there’s never anything there. Aren’t you getting too old for this?”

“Im only nine” she rebutted as she crossed her arms in exaggerated anger. She then added, “But this isn’t like the other times. I actually felt it get into bed with me.” I figured it was another one of her nightly terrors getting to her so I started moving over her to get off the bed and finally put an end to this charade.

“DONT”, my little sister whispered yelled to me while having an ungodly grip on my arm. In that instant I heard a grown and a shuffle from under the bed. I jumped back into my previous position on the bed wide eyed.

“What the fuck was that” I whispered back to my little sister.
“Stop using swear words or I’ll tell mom” she demanded back. “I told you. I don’t know what it is but I felt it get into bed with me. See I’m not just seeing things”

I then told her to just lay down and I’ll handle it. I didn’t know why but for some reason I decided that needed to actually see if something was down there or if her fear mongering suddenly rubbed off on me.
So I decided to grab my phone, press record, and slowly shuffled my arm down to the bottom bunk. I did so until I felt my shoulder grind against the wall signaling that’s as far as it could reach.

I kept my arm there for a good 20 seconds praying that I wouldn’t see anything and I could laugh this off with her later. I pulled my arm back through the crack and shuffled under the cover as to not wake my sister as she seemed to doze off not long after I told her to lay down.

What I saw on the recording made my jaw drop and heart stop. As the video was playing it showed my phone squeezing between the metal of the bunk bed and the wall then adjusting to the dark as it slowly went down the wall. When the phone stopped it adjusted to a little girl. Sound asleep in the bed. With their steady breathing and I noticed that this was my little sister.

The horrible realization made me hyper aware of how close I was to whatever it was in the bunk with me. I also don’t think this thing was ever asleep cause soon after watching the video it asked what did I see down at the bottom bunk in voice that most definitely wasn’t of anyone I knew or any sound that could possibly come from a human.

What do I do now? No one I’m texting is answering and I’m scared that if I call this creature laying next to me won’t be laying very soon.

To start off, I tried texting my parents as to not alert whatever is in the room with me but neither of them are answering. Now I don’t know what to do.

Me and my sister share a bunk bed together but sometimes when my sister gets scared she comes up to the top bunk with me. She use to just go into my parents room but they would get annoyed by the constant interruptions at night pretty quickly.

Tonight wasn’t any different. I was scrolling on my phone, reading Reddit posts and getting ready to fall asleep when I hear a familiar voice from below me.

“Hey can I get on the top bunk with you, I can’t sleep?

“Sure, sure. Come up here” I said turning from the wall to face her as she climbed onto my bed. She snuggled in next to me and whispered something in a hushed voice.

“Something is in my bed sissy, I’m scared.”

I looked away from my screen to see her beady eyes glistening at me. I huffed knowing she was eventually going to make me go down with her and check.
“You always say that and every time I check, there’s never anything there. Aren’t you getting too old for this?”

“Im only nine” she rebutted as she crossed her arms in exaggerated anger. She then added, “But this isn’t like the other times. I actually felt it get into bed with me.” I figured it was another one of her nightly terrors getting to her so I started moving over her to get off the bed and finally put an end to this charade.

“DONT”, my little sister whispered yelled to me while having an ungodly grip on my arm. In that instant I heard a grown and a shuffle from under the bed. I jumped back into my previous position on the bed wide eyed.

“What the fuck was that” I whispered back to my little sister.
“Stop using swear words or I’ll tell mom” she demanded back. “I told you. I don’t know what it is but I felt it get into bed with me. See I’m not just seeing things”

I then told her to just lay down and I’ll handle it. I didn’t know why but for some reason I decided that needed to actually see if something was down there or if her fear mongering suddenly rubbed off on me.
So I decided to grab my phone, press record, and slowly shuffled my arm down to the bottom bunk. I did so until I felt my shoulder grind against the wall signaling that’s as far as it could reach.

I kept my arm there for a good 20 seconds praying that I wouldn’t see anything and I could laugh this off with her later. I pulled my arm back through the crack and shuffled under the cover as to not wake my sister as she seemed to doze off not long after I told her to lay down.

What I saw on the recording made my jaw drop and heart stop. As the video was playing it showed my phone squeezing between the metal of the bunk bed and the wall then adjusting to the dark as it slowly went down the wall. When the phone stopped it adjusted to a little girl. Sound asleep in the bed. With their steady breathing and I noticed that this was my little sister.

The horrible realization made me hyper aware of how close I was to whatever it was in the bunk with me. I also don’t think this thing was ever asleep cause soon after watching the video it asked what did I see down at the bottom bunk in voice that most definitely wasn’t of anyone I knew or any sound that could possibly come from a human.

What do I do now? No one I’m texting is answering and I’m scared that if I call this creature laying next to me won’t be laying very soon.

I don’t know what to do. I’m freaking out. Just earlier today I was playing video games after a draining day of work. Reminiscing on how comfortable I was on my vacation and wishing that comfort would’ve lingered a little while longer. Now I’m in my car in an abandoned parking lot waiting for the cops to show up.

Let me start off by saying me (Sam) and my friend (Jerald) are close. Our mothers were childhood friends so naturally this closeness was passed down a generation. He doesn’t keep any secrets from me and vis versa. So as soon as my vacation was over and it was close for his week and a half stay at the luxury hotel resort to begin. He didn’t mind letting me know that the work place won’t be missed while he’s gone.

He left for the airport today and should have already landed if not close to the end of his 10 hour flight. He sent a message to me this morning talking about how beautiful the view was going to be. Here was how the morning messages played out.

“Hey bro, we’re about to head onto this plane soon. I’ll send you pics when we land so I can rub the view in your face while your deep in paperwork”

“LMAO, I’ll keep that in mind when I plan a trip to Tokyo. By myself. I’ll make sure to send you a pic of some nice ramen stew. Yum.”

“I see how it is. But next year let’s plan our vacation together”

“Yeah if they let us, you know they need at least one of us there to keep the building up float.”

“You’re so right, it gets tiring carrying everyone on our backs huh?”

“Lmao you alr know”

“Okay they’re calling our numbers now. I’ll text you when we land ttyl”

“Gotchu, don’t forget to send pics!”

Up until that point I hadn’t gotten any message back. So imagine my surprise when I got a knock on my door at 8pm and when I looked through the peep hole to see Jerald. His hair was messy and growing into different directions. He had dirt on his face and his clothes looked like a messier version of an outfit he wore two years ago. The only reason i remember the exact outfit was because I bought him the outfit and he only wore it once. I took a picture of him in it that day.

I said hello, to only get a frantic, “let me in bro, I need help. I can’t believe this just happened to me”

“Aren’t you suppose to be on your vacation right now what happened?

“What? My vacation isn’t for another few months, what are talking about let me in” he yelled through a horse voice as if he overused his vocal cords and could no longer continue to do so.
It looked like him, down to the annoyed mannerisms.

And I know this was dumb on my part. But I had unlocked the door to let him in. I had no reason to assume he was anyone else and just thought he might’ve been in an accident and become disorientated. He frantically ran to the living room and paced around. He was biting his nails like he usual does under immense stress.

“What happened to you bro, you good” I asked in a concerned tone trying not to overacted.

“Dude you remember when I said I was gonna go hiking in the woods near b road? I ended up getting really freaking lost there for like 7 hours. My phone died and I was freaking out!”

I had remembered him hiking quite a few times. He started up the hobby a few years ago and he’s managed to do so up until this point. But something wasn’t adding up. He went hiking yesterday. Why would he be at my house now if he already said he was at the airport.

“Bro, did you like, hit your head on a rock coming back down from the forest trails, you texted me earlier this morning about getting on the plane?”

“What? No I didn’t? My phone is dead. Remember? I told you it died while I was lost. There’s no way I could’ve texted you.”

“Here’s the messages dude, if you don’t believe me.”

I then went back to our messages and shoved the phone into his face. He scrolled. And scrolled. And scrolled. A hint of confusion growing with each thumb flick.

“Dude, who is this?”

“It’s you dummy, do you not see the contact number?”

“This isn’t me.. this isn’t even my number”

“Bro yes it is? Are you joking? You can quite now, I have to be at work at 6am”

“I’m not joking. This isn’t me. At all”

I was getting steadily frustrated with his constant lying so I went to our picture tab. And started scrolling.

“See!, this is you.”

His face of confusion turned into horror.

“Who the hell is this?”

Pushing my breaking point I snatched the phone away from him and showed him a picture of me and him a couple weeks ago.

“This is you, why are you so committed to the bit bro, give it up.

While I was scrolling to look for more evidence of me and him together I seen a message bubble pop up and my heart sunk.

“Hey bro. Sorry my flight got delayed but look at this view. Hot babes here I come!!”
There was an attachment of him with his luggage. And the view was indeed beautiful but now I didn’t have any explanation for this and I looked back up at the “other Jerald” in-front of me.
He looked at me with so much confusion like something was on his mind but he didn’t know how to express it.

“Sammy. I don’t know who that person is.. but that isn’t me.”

I looked up at him in horror. Jerald hasn’t called me that in two years. It was weird hearing him say that again. I looked back at the photo that was just sent and looked back up to see if I could find any difference. Outside of the obvious dirt and hair maintenance issues he looked completely normal. Just like him. So much like him in-fact it got creepy.

“What? Did that person text you again? Let me see?” I jolted back from him instinctively. This Jerald in-front of me looked visibly shocked then offended at the sudden reaction.

“Dude.. that person is obviously impersonating me! Give me the phone so I can give him a piece of my mind” he said as he reached his hand out to take the phone from me. I then stepped back again but this time with a few more steps. He was disbelief. He looked like I betrayed him.

“This is irritating me, why are you being so damn scary? It’s me. Look!”

He yelled visibly getting more aggressive. Out of the corner of my eye I seen my car keys and made a mental note of it.

“My bad, my bad” I said as I relaxed my body. I thought you were pulling a trick on but now I think this dude is just a scammer” I said forcing out a chuckle to ease the dense tension between us.
Jerald seemed to relax as well and chuckled a little too.

“Thank goodness, for a second it seemed like you were scared of me.” We both chuckled a bit before dialing down to make it seem less awkward.

“I’m gonna go to my car and get a kit so you can clean up those wounds on your legs bro.” I said as I grabbed my keys and headed for my car. While inside my car I immediately started up the ignition. This must’ve alerted the other Jerald because he then ran to the entrance of the door and stared at me. His face creased in confusion then realization as I sped off. I only faintly saw as the light from behind him made him look like just shadow figure.

I then sped dial the real Jerald and waited impatiently as the phone ranged.

“Come on, come on, answer!” I said as I was hearing the familiar ringing sound from the phone.
“The number you have dialed is not available at this time”

“Damn it!” I yelled as I slammed the phone on the steering wheel. I then texted him and said
“Bro answer me back when you can! Someone at my house is claiming to be you. But that’s not possible”
I pressed sent then sat there contemplating on what does one do after experiencing this? I kept replaying the event in my head over and over until I realized something.

“Remember when I went to the trail by b road earlier” that sentence replayed in my head. I thought he said he wasn’t stepping foot back into that trail again because of all the unnecessary cuts he got from walking the partially developed trail? I looked up b road in the messages and sure enough. The message from two years ago popped up of him saying he wouldn’t go back there again. But that’s wasn’t all that showed up. Another message was above it too. This was also around the time he changed his number. He said because he lost his old phone and didn’t feel the need to swap numbers over. I then tracked down his old phone number and sure enough. The last picture I sent to him on that number was a picture of him and I together. Me in casual attire and him in the outfit I gave him that day that he wore for the first and last time.

I ended up getting another message bubble popping up from Jerald

“What? I’m all the way on vacation dude, get out the house”

A thought came into my head and I ended up typing this out before I could even process what I was doing.

“Jk Jk I’m joking lol”

“Lmao. Scared me for a second. Good thing your safe”

“Oh but anyways dude I had a question to ask you?”
My fingers hovered over the phone as I was prepared to type this out. But I needed to test my theory.

“So you remember that time we went to that club out in Cville and I got drunk and puked everywhere a few months ago right?”

“Ofc, I had to clean you up?! Never drink like that again lol”

“I won’t dw, also dude I’m making banana bread in two weeks, you down to eat it with me?”

“You think imma pass up my favorite homemade banana bread? Hell yeah! You always make them the best!”

“Cool! I’ll let you know when I go to buy the ingredients, make sure to send more pics?”

“You already know bro”

I immediately dialed 911 and told them someone has stole my friend’s identity and has been for 2 years. And I know you guys are wondering “How the hell did you come to that conclusion?” Well for one, I have never in my life made banana bread and two. He’s allergic. Has been since we were teens. He’s never ate anything with banana in it since.

So if the Jerald that came from the woods is the real Jerald. Then why has the real Jerald been convinced he’s only been gone for 7 hours and who have I been friends with for the past two years?