The Invisible Sleeper

In the winter of 2021, my family and I traveled to a remote mountain lodge known for its natural hot springs. The lodge was an old, sprawling building with creaky wooden floors and narrow corridors. Our room was a two-story suite: the lower level featured a traditional tatami room adjacent to a large open-concept bath area, with only a thin rice-paper screen separating them. The upper level held a cozy bedroom with a single bed and a futon. My father and I took the upper level, while my mother chose to sleep on the futon downstairs, near the tatami mats.

That night, I woke up to the sound of trickling water. I assumed it was the hot spring circulating. I needed to use the restroom, so I grabbed my flashlight and descended the creaky stairs. In the dim light, I saw my mother’s futon empty and neatly folded, as if she had never slept there. A cold draft swept through the room, and I felt a presence behind me. I turned but saw nothing. I hurried back upstairs, and to my shock, my mother was lying on the floor beside the bed, her eyes open and staring at the ceiling, motionless. I froze, whispered ‘Mom?’ but she didn’t respond. Then she slowly turned her head and smiled, a smile that didn’t reach her eyes, and said in a flat tone, ‘I’ve been here all night.’ I didn’t believe her, but I was too scared to argue. I went back to bed, my heart pounding.

In the morning, I confronted her. She insisted she had never left the room, and that she had slept soundly on the futon. My father backed her up, saying he hadn’t heard anything. I thought maybe I had been dreaming, but then I noticed something under the bed: a small, wet footprint, as if someone had stepped out of the hot spring and walked barefoot. The print was too large for any of our feet, and it wasn’t there the night before. I tried to brush it off as a plumbing leak, but the lodge staff confirmed that no pipes ran under that room.

That night, we all slept downstairs together. I couldn’t shake the feeling that we weren’t alone. At 2 AM, I woke to the sound of water splashing in the bathtub. I crept over and saw the screen slightly ajar. Through the gap, I saw the silhouette of a figure sitting in the tub, its back to me. Its hair was long and dripping, and it seemed to be humming a lullaby I didn’t recognize. I called out for my parents, but they wouldn’t wake. Then the figure turned its head, and where its face should have been, there was only a dark hollow, like a void. It raised a wet hand and pointed at me, then dissolved into steam.

After that, the disturbances escalated. Each night, I would find small objects moved, or hear soft footsteps on the stairs. My mother started sleepwalking, and I caught her standing over my bed, staring at me with the same hollow gaze. My father grew distant and wouldn’t speak, just stared at the corner of the room. On the last night, I woke to find both my parents standing at the foot of my bed, their faces blank. They spoke in unison, their voices echoing: ‘You must join us.’ I screamed and ran out of the room, and they followed, moving in an unnatural, jerky way.

I managed to escape the lodge and drive to the nearest town. I haven’t spoken to my parents since, and I later learned that the lodge had been built on the site of an old asylum, where patients had been subjected to ‘hydrotherapy’ in similar pools. The authorities found nothing, but I know what I saw. The invisible sleeper in that room was not my mother. It was something that had learned to wear her skin, and now it’s wearing my memories, waiting for me to come back.