VI

I took a picture of my bookshelf before I went to sleep, difficult as it was with the shadows staring at me and my inability to move a muscle.

Ex Umbrae was written in English when I woke up and went back to it. It's titled Out of the Shadows, just like I thought. And now I know why it's been placed between Poe and Smirke.

The author is listed as George Roscoe.

You have to understand. This wasn't just another book that looked similar to Ex Umbrae. Ex Umbrae is gone, and this new book is here instead, in the exact same place. I've scoured the entirety of my apartment for Ex Umbrae and found nothing. All I've found is a book with the exact same leather binding and the exact same bookplate and a title that means the exact same thing.

I opened the book and flipped to the last few pages, which had been blank when the book was still written in Latin. Ink flowed across them to form letters describing my actions at that very moment. When I touched the ink, it didn't feel right. It didn't come away on my finger. It was at that point that I realized the book wasn't written in ink at all, but in shadow.

I don't know what these things are. I don't know why they've chosen to haunt me, or why they've chosen to do it like this. I just know that I want it to stop.

V

As of last night, all my books are sorted by author, then by title. Thanks, I guess, to my oddly-helpful stalker. (Someone else in my apartment building, maybe? Me sleepwalking? Nah, probably not that second one.)

I bring this up because, while I was looking through my collection, I noticed a particular book. It's easily the size of a brick and about as heavy, and bound in leather. It looks old and expensive. On the inside is a bookplate reading "Library of Matthias Clark." From what very little digging I've done, Matthias Clark was a private collector of rare books from here in Atkins. He died of a heart attack in 2012.

Poor guy. Not sure what he has to do with this whole thing, though, other than that the book apparently belonged to him at some point.

Point is, I know for sure that Ex Umbrae wasn't there before last night, although the pictures I took show it clear as day right where it is now, just like all the other changes have shown up in my pictures. It's called Ex Umbrae, and it doesn't have an author listed that I can tell. For some reason, rather than being placed between Bulfinch and Frost, it's between Poe and Smirke. I guess the author's name is somewhere from P to S, whoever it is.

I feel too exhausted to look into it more, but it looks like Ex Umbrae is written entirely in Latin. Unfortunately, none of the schools I've gone to offered any Latin classes. As it stands, no clue what it says. I think "ex umbrae" would mean something like "out of shadows," though.

Is my stalker reading this, or is this just some weird coincidence?

IV

More sleep paralysis last night. Lovely. Went to sleep with my shoes left messily on the floor and they ended up on a shelf in my closet, perfectly parallel to one another.

I saw the shadows of people creeping across the walls and towards my bed. I wanted to get up and run away, but of course I couldn't. I couldn't do anything but watch as they moved towards me.

I knew they were just hallucinations, but something about them creeped me out. It was like they were perfectly uniform and had a distinct presence at the same time. They were at once completely flat against the wall and clearly not just a part of it.

I don't know how else to put it. They were just... wrong in a way that I can't possibly explain.

And there were so many of them.

III

Like I said, I live alone. More specifically, I live in a one-person apartment in a city in Michigan.

One of my friends, Shan, lives in the same apartment building as I do. I started this blog because she suggested that I could write about my experiences with sleep paralysis. She thought maybe it would help me vent or something.

By the way, my name's George Roscoe. Gerry for short. I work at Barry's, a local diner owned by a family friend.

(And by "family friend," I of course mean a friend of my parents'. Sure, he's a nice enough guy, but you don't call someone a family friend if you consider them a personal friend too, and... well, I've only turned twenty recently, and Barry's somewhere in his fifties. Too much older for me to connect with him, not old enough to offer the wisdom of an elder.

Or something.)

II

I've heard that sleep paralysis can cause hallucinations sometimes. Fortunately, I've never had to deal with any of them myself. They sound pretty nasty.

But strange things are happening to me. They all started happening at about the same time as my sleep paralysis came back. Specifically, I'll go to sleep, wake up, and find my things in the wrong spots. My posters will be on the wrong walls, my things will be in different drawers in my desk, that kind of thing. It usually ends up looking much neater, as well. The trash I sometimes leave on the floor end up in my trash can, my clothes will be sorted by color, the things I forget to pick up off the floor will end up where they're supposed to be.

Last night, I took pictures of my apartment before I went to sleep. This morning, the pictures changed to match things as they are now.

I'd be worried someone was gaslighting me if I didn't live alone.

I

I've been having some experiences with sleep paralysis recently. I had it a lot when I was younger, but it went away when I was a teenager. It came back the night before my twentieth birthday.

I was lying in bed, trying to go to sleep, when for the first time in seven years, I felt that complete inability to move, that sense of panic that comes with realizing you are no longer in control.

I don't know why it's back. I just know that I want it to stop.