The Eyes

By Daniel Dow | Editor-in-Chief

“Ring-a-ring-a-rosies, A pocket full of posies. Ashes! Ashes! We all fall down!” A simple nursery rhyme, but the first time I heard my daughter sing it, it sent shivers down my spine. My daughter, who is nearly three, shouldn’t know this song and yes, a children’s playlist put on shuffle could easily play it. But I do not recall her ever hearing it. That being said, I still find it strange that this is the song she regularly runs up to me and sings.

I know it is just a nursery rhyme, but it does have a strange history. One that is surrounded by some of the world’s darkest days of death and disease. An interesting fact I learned many years ago was when I studied the Black Plague during high school history class. Thinking about this vivid memory and where the world finds itself now–dealing with a mass pandemic–certainly emphasized that eerie feeling. Every time I heard it, I just thought of all the negative connotations the song held. However, I tried to ignore it. It made my daughter happy and that’s all that mattered.

I would grab my little girl’s hand and sing along with her merrily, and while doing so try to introduce different songs. But like any three-year-old, she just wanted to sing that song, and as a loving father, I accepted it–holding her in my arms as we sang together. That was until I asked her where she learned the song and she replied by pointing to the corner ceiling in her room. I tried to find out more as I repeatedly asked her about where she heard it, hoping for an answer. But in toddler style, the more I wanted her to do something, the more she would ignore me.

That was the evening of the first-night terror.

I awoke to my daughter crying, and I rushed to her room. Not fully awake, but not completely asleep, she lay in her crib, mumbling as toddlers do and occasionally letting out a cry. Sweat covered her forehead and tears streamed down her face. I grabbed her in my arms and tried to console her. She eventually came to and started to calm down. I put her back in her crib, but I was she would not allow me to leave her room. She started to cry any time I made for the door as she watched me intently. So I curled up next to her bed and spent the night on her floor.

This continued for weeks, not every night, but often enough that the thought of sleeping on her floor made my back scream and where the two ritual morning coffees were not cutting it anymore–it was all starting to catch up to me. As I continued to consider the situation, it appeared there was not much I could do. My toddler would act like nothing happened the following mornings of a night terror and when I spoke to the doctor about the situation, she did not indicate a real solution. She would say, “it is just a phase.” She would say, “It is just one of those things toddlers can go through.”

I continued to tell myself this until I saw the figure.

It was another tears and night terrors and the exhaustion had caught up to me. I grabbed my phone from the nightstand when I heard the first cry to check the cameras for once–wishing she would just fall back asleep. That’s when I saw…it. A figure…a shadow, in the corner of her room, above her bed. I rushed in–staring at the corner. Nothing except a stirred, upset daughter, dealing with another night terror. I flicked on the lights and searched the room. Of course, I found nothing. I told myself I imagined things, that it couldn’t be real. But that shadow, the outline of the face, It was so vivid that I knew I couldn’t have imagined it. 

I took her to my room and slept on the situation–trying to find some explanation for the night’s events. And when the next morning came, I did what any rational parent would do, turned to Google.

After multiple Google searches and a cup of coffee, and only finding results explaining “How to explain that there is no monster in your children’s bedroom” I started to feel mocked. But after thinking about the situation, some relief overtook me. I must have been imagining it. “This is ridiculous,” I told myself.

I tried to talk to my daughter about the near-nightly events, but she didn’t have much to share. Today she had no interest in nursery rhymes, and just wanted to play outside. She seemed her normal self. It just all seemed like a bad dream.

We proceeded with our nighttime routine as usual, and although I had some reservations, I continued to tell myself it was nothing. We read her favorite book, exchanged hugs and kisses, and she smiled as she went off to bed. It was all reassuring.

Leaving the door propped open, I went about my nightly routine and found myself falling asleep on the couch. I felt reassured.

That scream…a scream like I have never heard before. I ran into the room and found her wide awake, unlike before. Picking her up, pulling her close to me, she whispered, “The eyes.” That was all she said as I pulled her toward me. I looked at her briefly and saw her staring above her bed.

I calmed her and brought her to bed, trying to make sense of it all, and that’s when she started to sing to me: “Ring-a-ring-a-rosies, A pocket full of posies. Ashes! Ashes! We all fall down!”