The wind rustled off the surface of the window, making thin screeching sounds.  The bed, about five feet across the room from the window, let out sharp hollow creaks.  The tall gangly teenage girl on the bed emitted small short breaths, and her heart pounded to no rhythm.  She lay on her back in the middle of the bed, eyes flittering around the room.  Every minute or so she turned her head; to the window, to the door, to the window, to the door.  The room was dark.  She knew it wasn’t anywhere near dawn yet, a time she considered to be safe; her window revealed a quiet type of darkness that could only come with the middle of the night.
A black shape resting in the edge of the doorframe.  Window.  No!  Back to doorframe.  She stared at the black shape, her brain knowing it couldn’t possibly be a person but her mind unsure.  The black shape didn’t move.  She was safe. She was safe?  She tried to let her mind wander, journey to a dream that provided an egress from her fears. Her fears.  What were her fears?  More importantly: What weren’t her fears?  In bed during the middle of the night, her house in total darkness, anything in her room was a potential threat.  The piled up clothes strewn across her floor, the sweaters dangling on the back of her door, the sharp-edged picture frames on the wall.  Anything could become the silhouette of an intruder.  The window, the door, the window, the door.  The window!  The blinds flapped angrily against the pane, making sharp tapping sounds.  The door!  The door gently blew open.  The window!  The sounds didn’t die down.  The dark didn’t go away the thoughts didn’t go away the fears didn’t go away the sounds didn’t go away.  The window, the door, the window, the door, the window, the door.  Which one?
The girl bolted upright in her bed.  She scanned the room for her glasses.  They lay on the other side of her pillow; she had fallen asleep writing again.  The blinds stopped flapping against her window. The draft that blew her door open didn’t come back.  The girl lay back down.  The window, the door, the window, the door.  Stop.  Just choose one.  The window or the door.  The door.  A sound.  A loud sound, any sound.  The sound of the wind.  The wind rustling, the bed creaking.  Her heart slowed.  The sounds, the wind rustling, the bed creaking, her now steady breathing.  The thought of tomorrow.  Just make it through the night.  Soon the night will be over.  The door.  No silhouettes.  The door.  Finally she could rest.
The wind rustling, the bed creaking.

The wind rustling.  The cloak flapping against the wind.  Thin screeching sounds. The long yellow nails scratching against the window.  The blinds stopped flapping.  It looked for another entrance.  The window was locked.  What about the door?  No, the window, the window.  The wind rustling off the surface of its cloak, its fingernails against the glass pane making thin screeching sounds.
The creaking of the bed.  The bed frame flat on the floor. The hollow creaking of the bed.  The hollow bed frame, the hollow inside of the bed frame.  The hollow sharp creaking of the bed. It had been trapped long enough.
The wind rustling.
The bed creaking.