It started with a bruise.
A small, circular mark on my wrist.
Dark purple.
Neat.
Like someone pressed a coin into my skin and waited.
I don't remember getting it.
I didn't bump into anything.
Didn't fall.
But there it was, glowing slightly under bathroom light - like it was fresh from somewhere else.
That night, I went to sleep feeling… watched.
Not paranoid.
Just… observed.
Like something was leaning over me, curious.
Amused.
In the morning, there was blood under my fingernails.
And not mine.
Over the next few nights, it escalated.
I'd go to sleep in my bed.
Safe. Ordinary. Quiet.
But I'd wake up:
– In the hallway.
– On the floor.
– Holding my phone with messages I never wrote.
– With dirt on my shoes.
– With the shower running.
– Once… with someone else's tears on my cheek.
I set up a camera.
One of those motion-activated ones.
That night, I went to sleep like a soldier - tense, ready, alert.
The next morning, I checked the footage.
Nothing.
From midnight to 3:17 AM - black.
Just static.
Then, at 3:18, the screen flickered.
A figure sat up from my bed.
It was me.
But not.
I was smiling.
Too wide.
Like my face didn't quite know how smiling works.
And I whispered something to the camera before leaving the room.
I couldn't make it out.
Until I slowed it down.
Reversed it.
And heard:
"You're the dream, not me."
Since then, I've stopped sleeping much.
But sometimes I doze off… even just for a second.
And he takes over.
He lives my night-life.
He talks to strangers.
He enters places I've never seen.
He answers calls I don't remember getting.
And he's getting better at being me.
The bruise is gone now.
But this morning, I woke up with his smile.
Still stretched on my face.
Still warm.
He likes being out.
He's comfortable.
And I think…
Tonight,
he's not planning to come back.