The Demon Child

One of the earliest ghost encounters I had was back when I was still in kindergarten and was staying a couple of days over at my mom's friend's house. I was only five years old at that time but I can remember the details vividly. My mom's friend's house was one whose architecture dated back to the Spanish colonial times. It was a huge two-storey house made of hard wood cut down from our then-luscious forests in Mindanao. I loved the house's design especially the stairs since we didn't have one in my grandmother's bungalow-type house. The house was always cool but kind of dark inside. At night, the old television would cast light in the living room while the bulbs just above the dining room table would glow their eerie orange hue. Everywhere else in the house remained black as the night skies.

Now, remember when I said that I especially loved the stairs? I did. I was absolutely fascinated running up and down and staying right at the middle of the staircase playing with my pots and pans. The stairs were made of hard wood as well and polished a dark brown so that you can almost see your own reflection. If I wasn't playing hop up and down the stairs, I would be just at the bottom of the stairs daydreaming. That was the extent of wonderland that existed in my mind. As luck would have it, my imagination was to stretch a bit more when during one of my make-believe plays, I saw a sinister figure right on top of the stairs. It bore the resemblance of a child whose body was the same build as mine. Except this one had horns sticking right on top of its forehead.

It happened one night before I was about to retire for bed. I had been playing by myself outside the house the whole afternoon and felt really tired by eight o'clock. Right after dinner, I trudged right up the dark flight of stairs intent on getting some shuteye after a tiresome but fun afternoon. As I was nearing the last couple of steps, I looked up mesmerized by the yellow bulb that was glowing right outside a blue tarpaulin that was covering the wall. As I continued to stare, a child's dark silhouette comes into view. By now, I had already stood on top the last step when the child shadow also came to a halt right in front of me. I stood transfixed by what seemed like a couple of minutes staring at the unmoving shadow. It seemed it was staring back at me too.

I decided to move away from the shadow because sleep was threatening to take over my consciousness as I continued to stand there after some time. As I was starting to move, I was surprised to see the shadow move alongside me too as though we were just one. I decided to test if I was imagining things by stopping in my tracks and swaying first to the left then to the right. As soon as I did, the shadow did the same! I shook my head disbelievingly thinking to myself that this could not be my own shadow. I decided to leave it where it stood with its gaze following me into the bedroom and then it turned around and left. I thought about what just happened but chalked it up to probably sleepwalking due to my sleepiness. I slept peacefully that night though.