Possessed

         An ocean vast. Waves reached out and glided across the sandy shore. The water touched Daisy’s toes ever so lightly before retreating down the beach. Daisy stood in the sand; her light blue night gown dotted with yellow flowers. She looked out upon the shore watching the sun dip and caress the horizon into an ever-deeper embrace.
         A shape of something human stood in front of her. A hooded figure in all black.
         “Hello little one,” said the hooded figure, its voice of a man. He reached his hand out. His porcelain skin gleamed in the dying light of a sinking sun. “Come with me and we shall walk the beach.”
         Daisy took a half step back, “I don’t know you,” she said.
         “Come now little one. You’ve always known me.”
         “I’m dreaming, aren’t I? You aren’t real. None of this is.”
         “Dreams can become more if we believe in them,” the man’s voice hissed.
         “I don’t believe in you.”
         “You must, for if you didn’t, I wouldn’t exist.”
         Daisy stood her ground for a moment sizing up the man. The dark robes were tattered around his ankles. As if he walked for an eternity but his feet were clean. His hood drew a despairing shadow across the face and all that could be made out was a glint of light that refracted from his horrible eyes.
         “Why are you here? This is my dream.”
         “I just want you to believe. Make me real,” said the man, a grin sliding open from the dark veil of his hood.
         Daisy turned and began to run. The ocean turned black in a snap as it swallowed the sun. She ran as hard as she could and with every step her feet sank lower and lower.
         The man with a frozen grin now stood in her path. The sand now up to her hips she began wading. With every step up out of the sand it swallowed her two fold. She struggled and thrashed. Deeper into the sand. The man approached. With every step he took the earth took inches from her.
         She peered up as the hideous moonlit feet stopped in front of her, sand now up to her neck. “Let me go,” she shouted.
         Her stomach rolled just looking into the nothingness of his eyes as he knelt, grin still gleaming now in the moonlight.
         “Little one, I own your dreams. I’ve always been there, watching, waiting. Hiding behind your deepest thoughts and darkest secrets, I’ve been there. Whenever you feel doubt, feel hatred or anger, that’s me beating on the walls of this cage. Now I want out.” the words spewed from the demon’s mouth as if being strained through his hideous teeth. “You say this is your dream, but this is my world. I own the subconscious, and I am soon to own you.”
         Daisy screamed and just as she did the black ocean washed the beach reaching its cleansing arms closer and closer to her head that poked out of the sand. As she screamed the demon stood and walked out into the void eventually wading through its icy waters. His robes floated on the surface briefly until he was consumed. The ocean ebbed and began to wash over Daisy’s head. She screamed in between breaks in the tide until eventually her screams were filled with the gurgling sound of inescape.
         Daisy gasped. She gulped in air as she sat up from her bed. Drenched in sweat felt akin to being dunked in the sea. She shoved the covers off her and they slithered onto the floor where they rested in a clump. Her eyes darted around the room, and she scrambled to click on her lamp. The light filled the room revealing normalcy. She took a few deep breaths.
         She looked around the room as her breathing steadied. She studied every inch of the room and as she glanced to the floor, her lump of covers was a dark tattered robe. She started to scream but her eyes rolled back into her head. She went back onto the bed and convulsed until her body laid still.
         Daisy sat up. No longer did she have terror in her eyes but a void of deep nothingness. Her breathing was no longer shallow and panicked but completely non-existent. She stood and her mouth ripped into a grin as she exited her bedroom.