Building 14 “Seeing Double”
“I woke up while it was still dark, a habit that started four months ago when my wife and I had our first child. Everything would get my attention, even if our daughter was fine. Every creak and thump the house would wake me up, and it became common for me to spend an hour or two at night wandering around the house. I stood up and went into the hall, passing by my child's room. A person with my wife's hair was there, which made me stop, as I had just left my wife sleeping in my bedroom.
I stopped dead in my tracks, my heart beginning to race. I couldn't grasp what I was experiencing, my only thought being the fact that I had to find out who was with my daughter. I entered the room, my voice cracking as I asked her if she and the baby were okay. The figure in the room turned around, and I was only partially relieved when it was my wife looking back at me.
“Everything is fine,” she said groggily. “You couldn't sleep again?”
I wanted to answer her, but my mind was on whatever I saw in the bedroom. I wanted to warn her, but I didn't want to scare her until I had things under control. I simply smiled and headed into the hall, moving quickly to the bedroom. Still in the bed was some figure, their breathing shallow and slow. I slowly made my way to the other side of my bed to retrieve my phone, hoping to call the police. But as I reached for the phone I heard the person shift in the bed. I looked down, only to discover that the person sleeping in my bed looked exactly like my wife.
My mouth went dry as I desperately began to think of how what I was seeing could be possible. Was I going crazy? Was I dreaming? I pinched myself hard and felt a rush of pain. Slowly, I made my way back into the hall and headed back into the baby's room, only to find the person still there, the one that looked like my wife, holding my baby.
I considered calling the police. I could always lie about what they looked like. They couldn't both be my wife. But I knew that it was crazy no matter how I managed it. What was happening just couldn't be happening. I asked the woman to give me the baby. She looked at me suspiciously, and said that she could handle it. I couldn't think of anything other than my baby. Crazy or not I needed to know that the baby was okay. I insisted, and finally they handed her over.
I turned and left the room and began heading down the stairs. I was crazy. I was sure of it. But if I was, or if I wasn't, I had to make sure my daughter was safe. Finally, I reached the bottom of the stairs, only to hear a voice calling down to me.
“Honey. Where are you going?”
I turned around and nearly screamed. At the top of the stairs were the two figures, both of them looking like of my wife, both looking down at me. I couldn't think. I could barely breathe. It was only then, in that silence, that I heard the faint murmur of the TV in the front room. I slowly backed away and looked off into the living room, only to see my wife asleep on the couch. My heart was thundering in my chest. I could feel my daughter sleeping in my arms, feel the heat coming off from her. I looked back at the woman on the couch, and back up to the ones at the top of the stairs. They no longer looked like my wife...
Their features were contorted, their eyes settled closer to the sides of the faces, their noses flattened and their lips without any definition. They began to head down the stairs rapidly, and I ran to the living room. I didn't know...I didn't know if the person on the couch was my wife. But I couldn't risk it. I could never forgive myself if I was wrong. So I roughly pulled her up and brought her to the back door. She complained and asked what was happening but I didn't have time. I saw the things running at us and I told her to go get help and handed her my phone.
She...left the house...and the things attacked me...their eyes, they still were the right color and shape.”
The man's wife escaped the house and called police. After getting their daughter to a neighbor, she went back to the house to help her husband. She found her husband on the floor of the kitchen with several stab wounds to the chest. Though the damage was extensive, emergency services arrived soon after and he was able to make a full recovery. However, the occurrences of that night have taken a heavy toll on him, and his wife reports that despite a great deal of therapy, he has continued to show signs of distrust and is overprotective, unwilling in some cases to let her care for her child. The assailants who assaulted him could not be located, though an unlocked window on the bottom floor is believed to be how they entered the house.
