For a long moment, the room felt smaller, heavier. I hovered over that strange, shriveled thing like it might suddenly move. My family gathered around, each of us quietly measuring our distance from the bed, trading theories that only made the tension worse. Insect. Parasite. Something from the ceiling. Something from my back. The more we stared, the less it made sense, and the more my skin crawled with the idea that it had shared the bed with me all night.

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Only later, after zoomed-in photos, online searching, and comparing images, did the truth sink in with almost embarrassing relief: it was just a dried piece of cooked meat, probably chicken, that had somehow ended up in the sheets. No monster, no infestation—just a forgotten scrap turned horror prop. The fear was real, the threat wasn’t. But that feeling of not knowing? That might haunt me longer than any actual bug ever could.