SHORT STORY: It Could Just Be The Wind

 

IT COULD JUST BE THE WIND

 

Finishing my prayer, “Lord, please forgive me of all my sins known and unknown. I repent of any wrong I have done to others, known and unknown. Cleanse me of all my sins and allow me to see your divine angels, In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen,” I feel a chilling puff of air on my right forearm. Goosebumps stand erect acknowledging what my eyes didn’t see. If all the other occurrences could be summed up as, “It could just be the wind playing tricks on you,” I would take it with no more questions asked. But this can’t be explained away so cavalierly.

I wonder for a moment, if the prayer to see angels I just performed really works. I was a little hesitant to say the prayer because the book warned if there is any darkness or unforgiveness in you, you may see demons instead. Immediately after saying the prayer, I, with wide eyes, search for what will appear from my prayer. Nothing. It has always been my dream to see the angels and nothing.

Hearing the sounds of children playing basketball in my yard, I decide to take in some sun on the bench and watch them play. As the kids laugh and try daring basketball moves, I become overcome with the feeling there is a snake at my feet. Unable to ignore the increasing sense that a snake is near, I fold my feet under me Indian style on the bench, which did not ease the feeling. Finally, I cautiously bolt to the security of the indoors. Once inside, I laugh at my foolishness.

Kids fed and tucked into bed without much complaint, I settle to watch my favorite show, ER, with lights off. Just me and George Clooney for an hour. Suddenly in the darkened room illuminated by the flickers of the television, my peripheral vision sees a black shadow dart from the side of the kitchen refrigerator and disappear at the end of my side vision. Snapping my head in the direction of what I am sure I saw, I simultaneously think, “Did I just see that,” and “Who’s there?”

Just as quickly as the feeling of panic came, it disappeared as I laugh at myself, being startled by tricks of the eye. Focusing back on the t.v., I settle in to enjoy my remaining time with George. I jump, startled once again, but this time by the extremely loud booming hum of the refrigerator. It has never been this loud before. Frowning from the audio assault, I must pee and pee badly. I gather myself to scurry past the cold loud kitchen to the powder blue bathroom. Relieving myself and exhaling my uncalled-for fear.

Why have I been on edge all day? I’m never jittery like this. Of course, I’ve seen shadow figures before, but never several times like tonight. I need to calm down, breath, and relax. With that, I wipe and flush the toilet. The sound of the flushing sounds like bombs of war going off. The sound blows me back, cause me to stumble. I run to the living room, hopping onto the couch, cowering under a blanket as the toilet roars from the bathroom. Praying for the toilet to fill and quiet, I wait, all the while I feel as if someone or something is watching me.

Trembling, I look out from the red wool blanket, searching the kitchen for the black shadow. After a few minutes, which seemed like an hour, the black shadow, darted from the side of the refrigerator down the hall towards the bathroom, my baby’s room. Heart pounding, I question once again whether I have seen what I had saw. No! No, I didn’t. I don’t believe in ghos….

Suddenly it dawns on me my prayer. My breathing quickens to pants reliving today’s earlier request to see angels. What if I unleashed demons instead of angels? No! My heart is clean! The prayer didn’t work. Its not possible to request to see angels. Good angels. The book warned me! Why didn’t I listen. No! No! No! I don’t believe such stuff.

The night dragged as I waited for daylight. I removed the batteries from the clock hours ago, each tick of the second hand sounded like a grenade going off. Now I sit in a fetal position in the corner of the green couch. I’m freezing but too scared to move from the couch to put on warmer clothes. My brain is ping-ponging from one explanation to the other for the shadows and noise. Nothing is comforting or reassuring. As each moment passes, I feel my grip on reality is slipping away. If only this was a dream, then I could make sense of it all. Even though I have vivid dreams, dreams I can manipulate while sleeping to start, stop, or change at my command, I can tell the difference between dreams and reality.

This is something different. I am between insanity and reality, not knowing which is which. If I am seeing demons from my prayer, is it real? If I’m seeing demons, is it from the prayer or am I just going crazy? I don’t know what is real right now, which makes me question my sanity even more. Did a mental breakdown happen to coincide with a prayer to see angels? Whatever is happening to me is terrorizing. Rocking myself, eyes cast down, I pray for daylight.

As the dark night sky yields itself to shades of gray tinged with the oranges of a rising sun, I’m proud I’ve held on. I called hubby an hour ago who is out of town working. I didn’t know what to say except I need you to come home and take me to the doctor. Now I question what exactly I will tell my husband and doctors about what happened to me all night. Looking into the kitchen, I see no shadows and immediately question if I ever had.

Hearing the engine cut off from the truck hubby drives, I quickly decide last night didn’t happen. I just had a bad day. I was just over sensitive to noise and now its over. No black shadows or bombs going off. It could be the presence of daylight, hubby’s calming presence, or my imagination, but none of the feelings from the night linger in the coming daylight.

I explain to hubby I was having a bad day and just felt off. I will go to the doctor if the feeling returns but all is okay. We spend the day together having family fun. We put the children to sleep an hour after their usual bedtime. They got to stay up an extra hour because dad had come home early. Me and boo shut down the house for the day and snuggle, talk, and laugh in the middle bedroom. We hear at the same time the sound of little feet almost running from the kid’s bedroom heading our way. Laughing we know it is our nightly bed-jumper, our youngest. We listen as the tiny feet approach, waiting to hear the excuse of a four-year-old trying to worm her way into our bed. No child appeared.

With a questioning look, without words, hubby looks at me for a long minute. Climbing over me, he goes to the door and looks down the hall where the footsteps were heard. Confused, and with mouth open he stares at me for some kind of answer. All I can offer him is an ‘I know. I heard it too’. I pat for him to sit on the bed. I explain the prior night’s event, leaving out the part where I prayed to see angels. That never happened right?

I tell hubby I need to go to the doctors and tell them what I told him. We both agreed the doctors will think I’m crazy. Hubby offers to tell the doctors he experienced some weird shit too in the house and we both heard the unexplained footsteps. I can’t imagine what doctors will think if two parents came to them with such a story. We would probably lose our children. No. Only I will confess to the craziness.

It does enter my mind to pray for the visions to disappear. But that will only work if the prayer to see angels worked in the first place. With hubby experiencing hearing the human-less footsteps, something occurred after the prayer. On the other hand, I have a long family history of mental illness, schizophrenia to be exact. I’m sure I saw what I saw and heard what I heard. But so was my mother when she thought she was the Unabomber police were looking for because she once worked at the post office. The things she must have heard and saw with that delusion.

“I want you to place one of these pills under your tongue each time you have a panic attack,” the nice doctor said handing me a prescription for Xanax. My hubby watched as my shaky hand took the prescription from the doctor nodding my head. Smiling, I felt as if I had the answer, anxiety attack. Sounded right to me even though hubby wants to hang a horseshoe over the door to ward off evil and says he will never stay in the house alone again.

I’m mentally ill. How relieving. It’s not schizophrenia. Sure, hubby is a little shaken. Okay, scared, but we have been okay for days even though I have to pop several pills at night when the noises and shadows come. I sleep with a fan running to drown out the footsteps at night. My days are normal. No boogieman nor signs of schizophrenia. Just peace in the mind. Nights are another story.

Nights have become battles of thought. Are those who can see and talk to angels mentally ill or are those with mental illness able to communicate with beings on another level. Should I embrace being able to see what I see, good or bad, or continue to monitor my mental health for further decline. I brace each night at the mercy of a thing I can not determine. Should I surrender to this unknown? What is my reality? Do I see what I think I see? What is a certain reality is the fact I have gone from one pill to six and this reality persists, and the torture is not knowing what my reality is. “Hello shadow, how are you tonight?”