I have not gotten a wink of sleep since the day I brought home this… _child_.

He is not a child. He is a menace. He cries but never utters a word. He whines but never laughs. On some nights, I’ll step out of the shower to find him staring at me at the end of the hallway. Just… staring. He does not move, does not speak, I’m not even quite sure he moves at all.

I always look past it for I remember the backstory I was told at the center. Abandoned by every family, selective-mute—for a reason apparently. He doesn’t trust me enough to speak up.

I really should start putting a bell on this boy. He will sneak up on me at any given time. Sometimes, I’ll be trying to sleep and I’ll feel a presence. I peek an eye open and I see his shaggy black hair falling over his eyes, it gives me quite a fright, to say the least.

Usually, he sticks his stuffed doll out for me to play with him. Silently. She is creepy as well but I don’t look her in the eyes for I fear what it could do to me.

But, he and her aren’t the only things who keep me from sleeping.

At night, I’ll hear this… clicking sound on my walls. All around me. It is never in just one place, it’s everywhere. Or sometimes, it will be heavy, ugly breathing. Like whatever it is, is regurgitating something.

When I go to check on the nameless boy, he is always missing or sitting up in his bed. He will never be laying down when I hear these noises.

Sometimes, it won’t be clicking. It will be scratching, or even slithering. You would think I had an animal I didn’t know about. I assure you, I do not.

One fateful night, it was storming quite heavy out. The lights go out. I run to the nameless boy, to see him not sitting in his bed nor lying, he’s standing front and center. I jump.

“Come, come to my room.” I urge him. He does not move.

“He is here. He can see you. He will come.” I flinch. He has never spoken a word to me in months since he came here, until now. Who is ‘he?’ I do not dwell.

I brush his words off for the storm was already making me apprehensive. “Come, now!” I drag his arm but his strength is unbearable that I stumble back for his feet unmoving.

“There.” He is pointing to the wall next to us.