The scared Little Girl

The little girl could not sleep. She did not know why. Everyone in the house was fast asleep. The dogs' howling did not scare her. In fact the sounds calmed her as she knew they were dogs. Even during day, when many of her friends screamed or stood in fright on seeing a dog, she calmly walked past as if knowing by instinct that keeping calm was the best thing to do. But tonight like many nights; she slept still as, if shifting even slightly would bring the focus of the face at the window on her. She slyly squinted one eye and tried to focus into the darkness through the windows. Now she was sure no one was there, but then again there was a doubt. So she quickly shut her eyes and sometime must have fallen asleep as she heard her mother shout out from the kitchen to wake up and get ready for school. Some days she mustered the courage to close the window but it did not help much. She still could see a man. Sometimes with a moustache and sometimes not. The glass distorted the face and it looked disgusting. For some periods during the year, a mosquito net was draped over the bed in protection against mosquitoes obviously, but the little girl was not free from the man at the window. The net only made her squint harder to check if the monster man was there. Sounds of leaves, wind or rain did not chase this obstinate man away. Sometimes she shivered in fright under the blanket. Going to the bathroom required a great deal of courage and her eyes would be fixed on the tiny windows all the time. But she thought she was lucky as the face never appeared in her bathroom window. As she grew, she started assuring herself that the face was imagination after all. She sometimes rebuked herself for having been such a stupid. Once in a way, she would bravely go to the window and look out nervously daring the man to appear. This helped and she could read novels into the night. But there were still times, of the frightening lurch in her heart as she looked at the window. When the lights were out, she would suddenly wake up from sleep with a lingering sense that the man had appeared and had stared at her again.....