The Danger in the Dark

l've been here a very long time. So long, in fact, that I can barely remember who I used to be. Every time I think about my life, it's like looking through a foggy sheet of glass. I feel as though l'm looking at someone else's life. Just observing.

I've been observing people for so long that it's the only thing I now know how to do now. It's the only thing I find myself capable of doing. Whenever I try to touch an object, I can't. My body phases through every physical object like I don't exist.

I suppose, in a way, I don't exist. Not anymore.

All I have is my ability to watch. And I have my own thoughts. They've kept me company for many, many years now. The dear Lord knows that I would have lost my mind if I did not have my thoughts.

I can watch the people who come into my home, and I can imagine what their lives must be like outside of my home. I listen to their conversations, and I have learned how much has changed in the world. Girls can go to school with boys, people can fly in strange contraptions called 'aeroplanes. The world seems to have gotten so much bigger since the last day I was able to leave my home. With each passing generation, I feel more and more insignificant in this increasingly advanced world.

Even my home has changed since my family lived here with me. I have lived in a castle, a hotel, even a family home. It seems each generation that has owned my home has wanted to change it in some form or another. And it certainly has changed since it was owned by my father, and his father before him.

But the bones of this beautiful building very much remain the same. Once everyone has left and the last of the sunlight has gone, the building comes back to life in the way that I once knew it. I can dance through the halls and watch the memories of the generations that have passed.

My existence has been peaceful, and I have never been bothered by the other inhabitants that have passed through these halls.

Until now, at least.

My peaceful existence has been disrupted. There's something else here with me. It doesn't belong here. It isn't human and it never has been. It hurts the people who visit us here. It makes people scared.

And I'm scared too.

It stalks me around my home. I have never seen it, but I can feel it. I can feel the dark energy that it possesses. I can feel it like a man who tends the land knows it will rain. I don't know what it wants or why it's so angry. It skulks in the corners, and it watches people. They feel it watching them. I don't ever let anyone know I'm here.

It hurts them too. It shoves them and scratches them. Sometimes it makes them do bad things. So much blood has been shed in my home since it came.

I can't protect them. I don't have the strength or the ability. And if I am to be honest, as I was always taught to be, then I shall say the truth.

I don't want to protect them.

I don't want to be close to that creature. It is evil and I want to stay away from it. I have been here for centuries and I have enjoyed being dead as much as a person could. But not anymore. Now I'm scared. I'm trapped.

And I'm alone.