Showcase Magazine - Central and Southwest Virginia's Exclusive Entertainment Magazine

July 28, 2005

For the next few weeks things were pretty quiet. Jess had recovered from the accident. I decided to wait to tell her about the conversation with Cassandra. She was finishing up some projects for school and I did not want to add more clutter to her mind. I didn’t want to confront this new knowledge myself. I figured maybe if I blocked it out that it would go away. It seemed to work. There had been no strange noises other than the clumsy cat knocking the occasional thing over.

That changed on the night of the 28th. Around 7 pm I heard a loud crash that resembled breaking glass as I packed for the trip. Jess and I were going to take a mini vacation to the beach before she had to get ready for fall classes. The noise sounded like it came from the living room, as I went to investigate I noticed the cat cowering in the corner. I assumed that he had knocked something again during his evening ramblings. A picture of Jess was lying in the floor, the glass in the frame shattered. I picked the picture up, placed it back on the mantle and fussed at the cat as he high tailed it down the hall. As soon as I got to the hallway I heard a crash again. This time without the sound of breaking glass, I knew that it was the picture of Jess again. Could it be that the frame was no stable or was it starting again? I returned to living room. This time I laid the picture on the mantle. I returned to the bedroom to continue packing. The picture did not fall again, so I did not think anything of it.

My phone rang around 11 pm. Jess’s number was on the caller id. I answered the phone to a dial tone. Several times I tried to call her back but her line was busy. Again my phone rang and Jess’s number was the id. I answered to the same dial tone, but this time when I called back I got Jess. She told me that she had not tried to call and that she was in the bed. I got that sick feeling again, knowing things weren’t at rest. I told her that I must have read the caller id wrong and that I would see her in the morning.

I tossed in bed for what seemed to be hours but in reality it was only around 30 minutes. My mind was turning circles. I had no idea how to handle what was happening to me. There was no one I could talk to either other than Jess. I didn’t want to worry her with this anymore. It seemed as the odd occurrences had stopped for her, and I wanted to do everything in my power to keep it that way.

I finally dozed off. I guess it was right around 1 am. Then at 3 am I was awoken by the bed shaking violently. At first I had no idea what was happening. I was trying to get my bearings together when the comforter was thrown from the bed. At that point I sat straight up and saw this translucent figure sitting in the floor in front of me. It looked to be an old man; he had a gun to his head. I opened my mouth to speak; the only word that would come out was “Jesus”. The most evil cackle came from the figure sitting in my floor. He pointed the gun in my direction, looked at me with fire in its eyes and said “do you think he can save you, now?” The old man laughed again, put the gun to his temple and pulled the trigger. There was a flash like a gunshot. The old man disappeared and the bedroom door starting swinging open and slamming violently. I was paralyzed with fear. Then the door slowly opened and I saw a dark cloaked figure gliding down the hall. It disappeared into the abyss that was the unlit living room.

-William