The People in the Trees

   This is not a story exactly, but more of a plea for help.  I have a family member who has talked about seeing “the people in the trees” since he was very young.  The young man is an adult now, but the stories began when he was only five or six years old.  There was an old catalpa tree (Indian cigar tree) in his back yard and he suddenly became very afraid of it during the twilight hours at night.  He informed his mother that he didn’t want to go back there because the people in the trees watched him.  She thought it was just a childish fantasy but later on she would reconsider.

   As the boy grew, he continued to talk about the people in the trees.  He described them as gray shadowy figures.  They were abnormally tall (well over 7 feet) and very thin.  The only color on them was their eyes.  Some had red luminous eyes while others had yellow luminous eyes and they blended into the shadows in the leafy branches of the trees until they blinked their eyes. 

   The boy claimed that at night they’d climb out of the trees and watch the people inside their homes.  He shut the curtains and pulled shades when nighttime came.  The young boy was perfectly normal all day, but when darkness fell he did not feel secure until he was hidden from the prying eyes of the people in the trees.

   When the boy was sixteen years old, he was talking to his family about the people in the trees one afternoon when his oldest brother suddenly grew very still.  The boy was talking what he had seen at the old house under the catalpa tree.  His brother turned pale.  “I thought I was the only one who ever saw them,” the brother said in awe.  The brother proceeded to talk about seeing the blinking lights of yellow or red in the old tree.  He went further, though, and said that one night he had parked his car out below that tree and when he went to get in late that night he felt something grab his ankle as if someone were under the car.  He stumbled and looked but there was nothing there that could have tripped him.  “That old tree creeped me out,” the brother said.  “I was always feeling like someone was grabbing at me back there.  Why do you think I started parking near the front of the house instead.  I didn’t want to say anything, but something back there scared the crap out of me.”

   The boy is an adult now but he stills sees them.  In fact, recently he and a friend went for a walk and the friend was terrified when the boy pointed out that there were shadows in the trees.  As the two watched, they saw the shadows blink their eyes and as they ran back down the hill toward the house, shadows peeled away from the trees and came after them.  The boy and his friend were nearly breathless with fear when they arrived home. 

   I have found references to demons who hide in trees, but I shudder to think that demons have been following the boy for the past fifteen years.  I pray that there is another explanation.  I come to you today with a request for information.  Has anyone out there heard of such stories before?  Has anyone out there experienced this for themselves?  Are there any suggestions?  The boy has learned to cope with these happening, but he still longs for conformations and explanations.  Any input would be most welcome.