They were here tonight, visiting her without her consent. She could hear them in the rooms she passed by as she made her way to the kitchen, luring in the dark and watching her. Her fingers trembled when she filled up her cup of tea, the spoon clattered loudly against the porcelain in the silence of the house.
She focused her attention on her breathing, trying to keep calm despite her hammering heart threatening to jump out of her chest. Her mind was blank but for that overwhelming terror. It possessed her, made her knees buckle. She could only let the cup on the counter before falling on the wooden floor. One of the monsters was right behind her, breathing down her neck, and she didn’t dare to move. Not yet.
She waited, shivering. After a few minutes, she crawled underneath the kitchen table where they wouldn’t notice her as much. It was quite cold in her apartment, but she was sweating buckets as she staying in a foetus position, trying to make herself as small as possible.
They never said anything, and that was the worse. If only she knew why they haunted her.
She was alone in the dark with the monsters.
She closed her eyes and breathed deeply. The floor creaked nearby and she hid her head with her arms. The same thoughts kept running in her mind; that she deserved what was happening, that she couldn’t control her life and that she never would succeed at anything.
Finally, she sensed the monsters retreat to their lair. Hot tears ran down her face, and she stayed a moment longer sobbing before making her way out from under the table.
She wiped her eyes the best she could and turned to the fridge, reading the quote which usually helped her when the monsters crept at the edges of her mind. You’re alive, you’re okay.
Conatus 
Makes me think about the way Balzac or Poe use to instill terror and angst: with few words, and with maximum efficiency.
LikeLike