The Dresser’s Third Drawer

I’ve always been a collector of the strange, the uncanny. I’d pore over old folklore, listen to ghost stories with a kind of academic detachment, telling myself that my fascination was purely intellectual. But the truth was, I was petrified of the things I studied. Every creak in my old apartment, every flicker of the lights, sent a jolt of ice through my veins. Over the past year, that intellectual horror had started to bleed into my waking life. I’d see a figure in my peripheral vision that vanished when I turned, or feel a cold spot in a room that had no draft. It was becoming more frequent, and I was becoming less able to rationalize it away.

Last Tuesday, I went to bed after a particularly unsettling day. I’d been cataloging a collection of vintage postcards, one of which showed a woman with a severe expression, her dark hair pulled back so tightly it seemed to stretch her skin. I remember thinking she looked like she was holding back a scream. I shoved it to the bottom of the pile and tried to read something cheerful, but the image stayed with me.

That night, I fell into a dream about my own sleep paralysis. I was in my bedroom, but everything was slightly off, the colors drabber, the air thicker. I was lying on my back, my arms pinned to my sides by an unseen weight. I knew I was dreaming, but the fear was real, suffocating. And then I saw her, standing by the oak dresser that had belonged to my grandmother. She was the woman from the postcard, but older, her hair a tangled mess of brown and grey, short and curly as if she’d just been caught in a storm. Her eyes were fixed on me, blazing with a fury so intense it felt like a physical force. She didn’t speak, didn’t move, just glared. The hatred radiated from her in waves, making my stomach clench.

I tried to scream for my roommate, but my throat was frozen. I tried to move my arm, to knock over the glass of water on my nightstand, but my body was a leaden statue. In desperation, I focused on the clock, the mug, the book that sat there. I willed them to fall, to shatter, to make any sound that would break this spell. But even as they toppled in my dream, they vanished without a sound, landing on a carpet that soaked up all noise. The woman’s smile widened, a grotesque, knowing smirk, as if she saw my fading desperation.

The dream didn’t end until I felt a sharp pinch on my arm. I jolted awake, gasping, my heart hammering. My arm was numb, but I could move it now. I looked towards the dresser. The third drawer, the one that always stuck, was open, just a crack. I remember closing it before I went to bed. I tried to shake it off as a coincidence, my own sleepy movements. But the image of her fury stayed burned into my mind.

The next morning, I called my mother. She’s a practical woman, not prone to flights of fancy. But when I described the woman, she went silent. Then she told me a story I’d never heard. My grandmother had a half-sister, Clarissa, who died in this very apartment building back in the ’50s. She’d been a bitter woman, known for her fierce temper and her obsessive need for order. She’d suffered from a condition that caused her to wake up unable to move, a terrible affliction that fueled her rage at the world. She had a particular hatred for the tenants above her, who she claimed made too much noise in the night. One night, she went up to confront them, and in a fit of fury, she threw herself down the stairwell, dying on impact. Or so the story goes. Some said she didn’t fall, she threw herself in a rage, and her ghost never left.

Now, I can’t look at that dresser without my skin crawling. I keep the third drawer locked, but sometimes I swear I hear a faint scratching from inside, like fingernails on wood. Last night, I had the same dream again. This time, she was standing closer, her hand resting on the dresser. She didn’t just look at me; she reached out and touched the third drawer. It slid open with a grinding groan, and inside, I saw a collection of objects I didn’t recognize, an antique hairbrush, a cracked mirror, a yellowed envelope. She picked up the envelope and held it out to me. I couldn’t read the writing, but I could see it was addressed to my grandmother. When I woke, I checked the drawer. It was locked. But on the floor beneath the dresser, there was a piece of old paper, yellowed and brittle, with a single sentence scrawled in fading ink: ‘You cannot outrun what you are.’

I don’t know what she wants, or why she’s chosen me. But every night, the paralysis is a little harder to break. The figure in my room is a little closer. And I’m starting to wonder if, when I wake up, I’ll ever feel truly awake again.