The book fell with a thud, but failed to kill anything.

“Crap!” Kayla Swanson shouted as the cockroach skittered across the floor of her bathroom in a beeline toward the cabinets. Kayla picked up the dictionary and brought it down again. It landed with a satisfying thump, but the cockroach managed to skitter out of the path at the last second.

“Oh, come on!” she exclaimed. How was the little bastard so fast?

The insect had taken refuge along the cabinet edge, where a small overhang prevented Kayla from taking a good swing at it. The dictionary was too thick to fit under the lip, too, and Kayla huffed in frustration as the cockroach ran to the corner and squeezed through a tiny gap between the wall and the cabinet.

“Hey, Siri,” she said into her phone. “Make a note to putty the bathroom crack.”

She knew it would be futile. She had seen cockroaches slip into holes much smaller than the one her latest quarry had escaped through. She didn’t get many of them—maybe one every couple of months—but the few that managed to invade her apartment were a few too many.

While she wouldn’t call maintenance to fill the hole—she could do that herself—she would have to make an extermination request and get it taken care of early, before more roaches followed their friend.

“Hey, Siri,” Kayla said. “Make a note to call maintenance tomorrow at 9 a.m. about the cockroaches.”

She sighed. So much to do, so much to do. She put the dictionary on the counter and picked up her toothbrush. She looked at herself in the mirror as she brushed her teeth and didn’t like what she saw. Dark purple rings under her bright, brown eyes. She had been pulling too many late nights, and tonight was no exception. Kayla spat out the toothpaste, rinsed, picked up the dictionary, and brought it with her into her bedroom. She set it down on her end table, swapping it for a case file.

One of Kayla’s clients had an appearance before the city zoning commission and needed her to work her magic in getting them the legal easements they needed for their new office complex. It was straightforward work, but tedious, and she needed to do it now since she wouldn’t be in the office tomorrow. Which reminded her…

“Hey Siri,” she said. “Set an alarm for 7 a.m. tomorrow.”

Her doctor’s appointment meant she could sleep in. Appropriately, she was seeing a sleep specialist. She had developed a rather troubling case of sleep paralysis. She already knew what the doctor would tell her: get more sleep and cut down on stress. Easy for her to say. She didn’t have a half-dozen clients breathing down her neck at any given time, all demanding that they be her only focus of attention. Still, even though she knew what the likely diagnosis would be, Kayla wanted the peace of mind of knowing there wasn’t anything more serious going on.

She yawned and glanced at the clock. It was after midnight already. Screw it. She was tired and wouldn’t do her client any favors if she made an exhaustion-induced error. She put the legal briefs aside, turned out the light, and was asleep almost instantly.

~~~OOO~~~

Kayla dreamed.

It was a troubling dream, of stress and running from a monster she couldn’t see. The faster she ran, the less distance she covered. She could feel the monster, never seen, always on the edge of her peripheral vision, always growing closer. It brushed against her. Her anxiety grew as it brushed her again. It brushed her cheek and caressed her skin with its fingers and –

~~~OOO~~~

Kayla woke.

Or did she? She was no longer running. She was on her left side, facing the far wall of her bedroom. Her right arm lay draped over her stomach. She was in pitch black. But she still felt the monster. It was still grabbing for her, reaching for her, caressing her check.

I’m awake, Kayla thought. I’m awake but I’m paralyzed again,

But something was still there, she knew. She knew. It was going to drag her into the darkness and tear her apart and eat her and her remains would be…

Stop it, Kayla commanded herself. You’re awake. You’re alone.

Hallucinations were sometimes a symptom of sleep paralysis. That’s what the Internet said. But Kayla had never hallucinated before. She must be now. She must be.

Her eyes adjusted to the dark. She could see the edges of her dresser, the outline of her closet door, the contours of her end table. She could make out the books on the table, the pants she dropped on the floor, and the picture frame atop the dresser.

Kayla was awake. She was in the real world. So why the hell could she still feel the beast? Why could she still feel its six hideous fingers on her face?

She realized with a chill that they were far too small to be fingers. And they were very close together. And as she looked down and saw two long, thin antennae, she realized it wasn’t an unknown monster of nightmares, but one that instilled a very real terror in her.

It was a cockroach.

Still unable to move, Kayla nonetheless sucked in a breath of shock. While she couldn’t actually see the insect’s brown carapace or nightmarish head as it crawled down her cheek toward her mouth, there wasn’t a doubt in her mind that it was a cockroach. Kayla was never gladder than at that moment that she wasn’t a mouth breather. She tried not to think of the bug crawling into her mouth and slithering down her throat. She dared not gag. She didn’t know if she’d aspirate if she threw up.

The cockroach paused, its front legs on Kayla’s top lip. She tried breathing harder through her nose, hoping against hope that she’d create enough of a gust of wind to blow the bug off her face. Then, with a panic, she stopped. She didn’t want to draw attention to her nose. What if it tried crawling inside? She saw it burrowing into her nose, its body blocking her nasal passages and slowly suffocating her while it…

Mercifully, the cockroach turned toward her chin. Even in the gloom she could see its twin antennae twitch back and forth, searching for something only it would understand or recognize. It stood there, waiting for a signal, waiting before it decided what to do next.

An idea occurred to Kayla. Maybe if she could turn her phone on, it would make enough noise to startle the insect into flying away.

“Hey, Siri,” she tried to say.

She did not succeed. Her vocal cords were as paralyzed as the rest of her. All that escaped through her clamped teeth was a breathy, “Ahhhhhhhh.”

The cockroach, oblivious or indifferent to Kayla’s struggle, turned once again. It slowly marched up her jawline. Was it searching for food? A place to lay eggs?

Oh, please, God, don’t let it want to lay eggs.

A memory came to her, unbidden. She was having a late lunch in her law firm’s conference room with Matt Mahoney, an attorney she was stuck working with on a new residential development case. Matt was a creep who loved to push people’s buttons just enough to get them mad, then say he was “just making a joke” when called on it. Matt was eating a sandwich while thumbing through the news on his phone. Kayla was eating a salad and trying to ignore Matt.

“Hey, Kayla, did you hear about this Chinese guy who felt this weird, crawling feeling in his head?” Matt asked. “He went to the doctor and it turns out a spider was spinning a web in his ear!”

“Gross,” she said, hoping he’d stop there. Of course, he didn’t.  

“They couldn’t get it out with tweezers, so they had to flood his ear with drops.”

Kayla ignored him. Matt hated being ignored.

“Not the only story I’ve heard like that,” Matt said. “There was this one time a spider laid a whole nest of eggs in one guy’s ear. They hatched and just started pouring out. Or there was this other person who had all these ants in their ear, and they kept laying eggs and hatching new ones, and no matter how hard they tried, they couldn’t clear out his ear. Dude was a living anthill!”

“Gah!” Kayla shouted. “Will you shut up?”      

“Geez, lighten up,” Matt said. “I’m just messing around.”

“Mess around by yourself,” she said, picking up her lunch. “I’m eating at my desk.”

Kayla hated bugs more than anything. She hoped Matt didn’t pick up on that.     

The memory of that early October afternoon played through her head like a movie streaming in 4K. It was like the cockroach was there that day, sitting on the walls, listening to Matt talk, watching Kayla react, just biding its time until it could strike her at her most vulnerable.

Calm down, she thought. You’re being ridiculous.

But calming down was the last thing she could think to do. The cockroach had reached her earlobe. She could feel its antenna tickle where her three piercings normally held earrings. The thought of Matt’s stories of insects making homes in people’s ears ricocheted around her head like a ping pong ball.

The cockroach was going to crawl in her ear. It wanted to crawl into her ear. Kayla thought about the crack in her bathroom cabinet where she had chased what was probably this same insect. She couldn’t help but remember how small it was. Despite her best efforts, she couldn’t help but compare it to her ear. It was the same size, she was sure of it. The bug would have no problem crawling into her ear, just as it had escaped into the bathroom wall. It would crawl into her ear and make a home and lay eggs and eat her earwax because cockroaches just love eating filth and she would never get it out and oh God did she feel another one crawling up her leg up her arm along her forehead along her—

Stop it, she commanded herself. Stop it right. Now.

There were no other cockroaches. Her fears and her sleep paralysis were transforming her worst nightmares into full hallucinations at the most inopportune time. And if sleep paralysis was triggered by stress, then she was never going to free herself in time to do anything. She forced herself to breathe slowly and deeply. That she could only breathe through her nose was an accidental advantage.

In… two… three… four… Out… two… three… four…

Slow, steady breaths. Ignoring the wisps of antennae as they waved back and forth. Forgetting the legs as they kneaded her flesh under those tiny, clawed stalks. Trying not to think about that bulbous, chitinous body as it contorted improbably into a shape that would slide into her ear with ease.

Kayla tested her fingers. Still frozen in a somnific rictus. She tried blinking her eyes. They, too, were stock still. She tried her toes. They didn’t move either.

Except one of them did. The big toe of her right foot. It wiggled. Then the other toes on that foot followed suit.

Kayla tried the other foot. Those toes had been released from her paralysis. Her feet moved. So did her fingers. She could have wept with joy. While she knew the condition could last a few minutes, she personally had never experienced it for more than fifteen seconds. She cursed whatever combination of mental and physical factors led to tonight being the first time it happened.

As much as her instincts screamed for her to swat the cockroach off her head, a vision of the hole in her bathroom where the damnable bug had first found sanctuary floated to the front of Kayla’s memory. She needed to be slow and careful.

Gently, ever so gently, she lifted her right arm off her stomach. Kayla was never more thankful than at that very moment that the night was warm and she only needed to wear her beloved University of Connecticut basketball t-shirt to bed that night. She didn’t want a long sleeve brushing against the bug and sending it scurrying into her bed, or worse.

Her shoulder at ninety degrees, her forearm parallel with the side of her head, Kayla slowly rotated her arm toward her ear. Had the cockroach moved closer to the hole? She wasn’t sure, but it was still there. She was certain of it. She could feel it exploring, probing, feeling around for safe passage off the firm yet pliable terrain where it found itself standing.

Kayla turned her eyes as much as she could. Her hand, as best as she could tell, floated right above the bug. She would only have one chance at this, she knew without a shadow of a doubt. If she missed or brushed against it, it was going for the first safe spot it could find, and it wouldn’t be under her bathroom cabinet.

Kayla breathed in. She breathed out. She breathed in. She breathed out. She dropped her hands and closed her fingers and…

And she touched it. It had somehow sensed the motion—its antennae, maybe? —and was already scrambling for her ear. But it was too late. Kayla ignored how waxy and off-putting the cockroach’s carapace felt as she clamped her fingers firmly around its body. With all the movement denied by her paralysis and all the force of someone fighting against panic, she flung the insect as hard as she could.

In another smooth motion she switched on her light and swung out of bed. She saw the cockroach on the floor next to her dresser. She must have flung it hard enough to strike the large, wooden piece of furniture. It was stunned, but it was already moving and trying to flip itself back onto its legs.

Kayla wasn’t going to give it the chance. She grabbed for the dictionary, but the left arm she had been sleeping on had the rubbery, lead feeling that limbs get when they’ve fallen asleep. In the second it took her to learn that her left side was useless, the cockroach had fluttered its wings enough to get the momentum needed to right itself.

“Like hell you will,” she said, grabbing the dictionary with her right hand. With a yell, Kayla swung it around and lunged forward and brought the heavy book down on the cockroach. But that wouldn’t be enough to kill it. Cockroaches were notoriously tough sons of bitches to kill even when pressed between two hard surfaces. The plush carpet that covered her bedroom floor gave it too much wiggle room.

Kayla leaped up slightly and, putting both hands on the book, forced her weight down. It still wouldn’t be enough. She lifted the book and saw the cockroach, its legs splayed but otherwise unharmed, scramble up and try to get away.

“Yrrrr!” With that guttural cry, Kayla brought the corner of the dictionary down on the cockroach. The force directed into the much smaller surface area was far more effective. The cockroach’s shell crushed and split, its white insides oozing out. Improbably, the thing was still moving. Kayla brought the dictionary down again, and again, and again, grinding it into the floor with each blow, determined to smear the cockroach as much as she could, her security deposit and cleaning bills be damned.

And then, it was over. Kayla sat on the floor, panting. She clutched the dictionary to herself, mindless of the cockroach remains caked on one corner. She was both wired and tired, and suddenly had no idea what time it was or if her shouts might have awakened her neighbors.

“Hey, Siri,” she said from the floor. “What time is it?”

“It’s 4:02 a.m.,” her iPhone said.

Four a.m. Three hours until she was supposed to get up. She looked at the remains of the cockroach. She looked at the light that she knew she wouldn’t turn back off that evening.

Forget sleeping in. Kayla wasn’t sleeping at all.