I was walking home from work on a normal Friday night. I worked until 8:00 pm and walked home everyday, but this day was unusual. For the first couple minutes everything went by normally. Just me walking without a care in the world. Until, I started hearing a small tapping sound behind me, like footsteps. It sounded fast, so the footsteps would be running. But, I looked behind me and saw no one. Just the empty dark street only illuminated by the streetlights that line the sidewalks and the bright full moon. But overall, nothing completely out of the ordinary. I brushed it off as a small animal, like a squirrel or raccoon and just continued my walk home. Again, a couple minutes later I heard the same sound. But it sounded bigger than last time and louder. I turned around and again, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. All of it looked the same and it was just a normal night. That was until I saw a figure in the distance. It was a dark and skinny figure. It was just staring at me from the end of the street with not an inch of movement. As I got closer to the figure I could see it’s face. It had a large smile plastered on it and blood-shot eyes that sent a chill down my spine. I yelled out “Who are you! What do you want!” But the figure just continued to stare at me with its head tilted and its large unsettling smile. “Who are you?” I yelled. But again, there was no response. Just him looking at me. *What do I do?* I thought. I decided just to walk past the figure in hopes it would just leave me alone, but as I got even closer to passing it, it moved in front of me blocking my path. I swear I heard a giggle when it did that. “Leave me alone!” I yelled, my voice breaking due to my fear. It let out a high pitched scream, one that made my ears bleed. I tried to cover my ears but it didn’t do anything. The scream continued on and on. I fell to the ground as the scream got even louder and my ears were literally bleeding. “Please!” I yelled, but my pleading seemed to encourage it as it screamed even louder. I was on the ground now in utter pain. It felt like torture and I couldn’t stop it. Last thing I heard was a loud pop in my ears, until I couldn’t hear a thing. I looked up at where the figure was just to see it gone without a trace. I inched closer to my house and unlocked the door before I reached for my phone and dialed 911. I had to use subtitles for the phone call, but I got my message out. I still don’t know who it was to this day, but the good news is that the rupture healed. Luckily it wasn’t serious… but the trauma of that day was.