My greatest fear is of the dark. It started when I was three years old, right after I watched a horror TV show without my parents’ knowledge. I had sneaked out of bed and watched it while they were asleep. Unfortunately for me, I soon regretted my decision of defiance. I would wake up from nightmares from whatever character haunted me from the TV.
Later, my mind would play tricks on me whenever I was in the dark. I could be walking down the stairs in my own house, but my brain would whisper into my mind, “Quick! Run! There is a ghost with a knife!”
I know it doesn’t particularly help that I love to watch horror movies—at night.
After watching such movies, clowns with hammers hide around the corners, and the headless man peeks into the windows at night. But I can’t seem to get over it. Especially since my imaginative brain seems to cook up many different fears.
It got so bad, that even if it was two steps in a dark place to reach a lighted place, I would switch on all of the lights, or I would make my brother come with me. It went on for a few years until my brother started teasing me for it. I decided that I would prove to him that I was no longer that scared 3-year-old kid who ran away from a shadow. So, I came up with an idea to stop my imaginative brain from imagining all the scary things when I was in the dark. I hummed.
At first, I felt like I had gone mad. I just straight up hummed out of nowhere. I hummed everything from Twinkle Twinkle Little Star to the Star Spangled Banner. The darkness seemed to retreat every time I hummed. It helped me cope with my fear. Years passed and I kept on humming. The dark didn’t bother me anymore. Well, not much. I found other ways to keep myself entertained as I had to cross dark places, from reading books to— once I got my phone— playing games, movies, and music.
But once in a while, my brain will imagine a clown just on the opposite side of a corner behind me, whispering, ”Run! A clown’s out to get you!”
I would do exactly that. I’d run.

By: Debkonya Banerjee- Online Editor