For ten years, the calendar had a shadow. Once a month, like a dark lunar cycle, I would fall asleep and wakeup in the same house.

The architecture was never quite clear, a blur of beige hallways and heavy oak doors but the atmosphere was razor sharp. It was the scent of cold floor wax and the crushing weight of pure, primal terror.

THE DECADE OF FLIGHT

Every time I arrived there, I was already in motion. I was the hunted. I never heard footsteps, and I never saw a shadow stretching under doorframes but the knowledge was absolute: He is coming. I spent a decade of nights pressed into the back of closets, curled under dusty bedframes, and holding my breath until my lungs burned. My heart would drum against my ribs in a frantic, syncopated rhythm that I was sure would give me away. The fear wasn't just a feeling., it was a physical wall that kept me trapped in that house, month after month, year after year.

THE FINAL DOOR

The last dream began exactly like the others. The same cold dread, the same frantic search for a sanctuary. But this time, the house felt smaller, as if it were finally tired of the game.

I found myself in a hallway I hadn't noticed before. At the end stood a pair of double doors. I pushed them open and slipped inside, realizing too late that I had cornered myself in a formal home office.

I turned to find a hiding spot, but my breath caught in my throat.

THE FACE OF FEAR

He was already there.

He wasn't a monster. He wasn't a shadow. He was a man in his mid thirties, sitting calmly behind a wide mahogany desk. He was striking, handsome, with deep set eyes and a well groomed beard. He wore a crisp, tailored suit that looked like it belonged in a boardroom, not a nightmare.

He didn't move. He didn't reach for me. He simply sat there, looking at me with a quiet, expectant intensity.

The shock of his normalcy was more violent than any blow. The decade of built up terror finally broke. A jagged, startled shriek tore out of my throat, echoing off the office walls.

THE SILENCE

The sound of my own voice snapped the dream like glass. I sat bolt upright in my actual bed, gasping for air, my skin damp with cold sweat.

I waited for the lingering dread to settle back in but it didn't. For the first time in ten years, the air in my bedroom felt light. By seeing his face, I had somehow broken the circuit.

The man in the suit never returned. The house vanished. After a decade of running, I had finally looked at what I was afraid of and found that the hunt was over.

This story is about a recurring dream I had once a month for over a decade. The dream finally came to an end after I came face to face with the monster I had been hiding from.