Sleepwalking Part 2

Katie stood up and walked out of the apartment, in quick, jerky movements. I followed. Katie made her way to the end of the hallway, and into the stairwell. When she reached the first step, she dropped to her hands and knees and began crawling up the stairs. My heart leapt to my throat, the way she was moving seemed so inhuman. I swallowed my fears and followed her. When she reached the fifth floor, she walked into the hallway. She was going faster now, and I had to jog to keep up.

Katie reached the door at the end of the hall and paused. She turned her blank, staring face towards the doorway and slowly, oh so slowly, reached for the doorknob. I was suddenly terrified to find out what was behind that door. I darted forward and shook Katie awake.

She came to, and looked around. Several emotions flickered across her face: confusion, fear, and finally, anger. At me.

“You let me sleepwalk!” she yelled. “How could you? You said you’d wake me up!”

I apologized, as a couple people poked their heads into the hallway to see what the commotion was. One of them was an older lady, she came forward, arms crossed, and asked us why we were disturbing everyone.

“Sorry,” I said. “My friend was sleepwalking, we’ll be going now.” I paused. “Actually, could you tell us who lives in this apartment?”

“This one? It’s empty, a girl who lived here last year was supposed to get it again, but she never showed up.”

Strange, I thought, as we headed back to my apartment. Katie was still upset with me, but I promised to stay up the rest of the night and watch her. I stayed awake thinking of what could be drawing her to that room. When Katie left in the morning, I took a quick nap before my afternoon class, filled with nightmares of the apartment upstairs.

After class the next day, I took a walk with one of my friends around campus and told her about the sleepwalking. To my surprise, she was skeptical.

“It is strange that she’s never sleepwalked before and now she’s doing it every night, but college brings out new traits in people all the time,” she said. “And how can she be sure it was leading her somewhere, she even admitted not knowing where she ended up one of the night, she could’ve gone in a completely different direction.”

“You didn’t see the way she was walking though. It wasn’t normal. I can’t just ignore it, the girl’s terrified!”

“I’m not saying you should ignore it, I think you should do the opposite. Convince her to stay over again, let her sleepwalk, and follow her. You’ll see, when she gets to the apartment, nothing will happen.”

She paused, “Take your phone with you. If things get bad, call someone.”

I met Katie outside her apartment. I thought she wouldn’t want to stay over again, but when I saw her she was near tears.

“I’m so scared to go to sleep tonight,” she moaned. “I’ll do whatever you think I should, just please help me.”

My roommate was staying over at his girlfriends’s again, so Katie huddled on the couch, blankets pulled up to her chin. I was more than exhausted from the lack of sleep the night before, but I was determined to stay awake. I put my headphones in, grabbed a book, and sat on the other couch, facing Katie. My head began to nod, and my eyelids grew heavy, but I fought to stay awake.

I must’ve dozed off, despite my efforts, because next thing I knew, I awoke to Katie standing over me, her eyes open but glazed, just like last night. I felt my skin crawl: she was looking straight at me.

“Katie?” I whispered in a small voice. She kept staring, right into my eyes, and then turned and walked out of the apartment. I started to climb out of bed to follow her, but as she exited the doorway, Katie slammed the door behind her.