Reader Submission: The Clown

“Ever since I was little, I’ve been afraid of clowns. Supposedly, it all started in 1995, when I was about two. We’d just moved to Ohio from Rhode Island, and were at the local carnival our new town has every September. As my mom tells it, I was sitting in a stroller, and my mom told me not to turn around. Of course, I did. Apparently, there was a clown behind me and I screamed loud enough to scare him off.

I’m almost 21 now, and live with my aunt, uncle, and 18-year-old cousin. It was trick-or-treat night this past Halloween, and what do you know? My cousin was a clown! I was ‘A’ from Pretty Little Liars. We got candy duty. I was not looking forward to sitting outside all evening with a kid in a clown mask.

After Halloween, my cousin tormented me with the mask for weeks. He would come upstairs and hug me with it on until I’d cry. I’m not only afraid of clowns, I’m also claustrophobic. I eventually got used to it…while awake, anyway.

One morning in December, I woke up to someone tapping on my leg. I turn around and see a clown staring back at me. I scream, and that’s the last I remember. A few hours later, I find out it was my cousin looking for a laugh.

Fast forward to early February of this year. I was sleeping when I felt someone staring at me from behind. It’s funny how your brain works. You can feel someone’s eyes fixated on you even while asleep. I open my eyes and cock my head up to look behind me. Guess what I see? A clown…THE clown. It was the same mask my cousin owns. Once again, the last thing I remember is screaming.

I woke up again to the light streaming in through the window to my right. I sat up and realized there was no way my cousin could have been the one behind me. I sleep on a couch in my aunt and uncle’s computer room. Behind me is a gun safe. Between the couch and safe are piles of my stuff, guns, hunting gear, and a lamp. There isn’t any room for someone to stand there, for one. The place the clown was standing was the same place a backpack and guns are resting. It would have to have been standing awkwardly on top of them. It was standing straight. Two, if it was my cousin, he would have had to get up at two or three AM, go downstairs to the closet in the living room, get the mask, come back up, put it on, and get in position quietly so I don’t wake up right as he was doing so. Not only does that sound like a lot of work for a middle of the night prank, but I would have heard the rustling of guns and other things.

It may or may not have been a dream, considering I screamed and no one came to see why, much less woken up. Or it could have been something from my worst nightmare.

I should probably mention that this ‘dream’ happened in the same room my cousin and I have heard footsteps walking from the computer chair to the stair case, and down the stairs when his parents were in bed. He and I think it’s each other at first. I open my eyes thinking it’s him going downstairs to go to the bathroom or something, just as he comes in the computer room to ask me if it’s me walking around up here.

It just might have been a harmless nightmare. But it might also have been the same thing walking around at night thinking of ways to scare both my cousin and me. It might have seen an opportunity and taken it.”

Have you had a frightening encounter with a clown? Share your story here!