Hi, everybody
This is my entry to the #freewrite 5-minute exercise No 1009, hosted by @mariannewest. See details here.

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Close Encounters of the Paranormal Kind

One of my children got me this notebook and pen so that I could kill time before time or the virus kills me. He may be the only one who believes and cares about my stories. The others may be thinking I am senile already. I hear them murmur on the phone. They think I make up diseases as much as ghost stories.

I like the idea of leaving my memories for my grandchildren to at least read them. I have not seen them in a while. Now it looks like I will not see them ever again.

I’ll try to answer all the questions he left written on this notebook and maybe, if I last long enough, I’ll answer some others he did not dare to ask. Like, how close do I think we are to the dead.

I have lived long enough to know that the dead never leave completely. Some of them never leave us at all. Some of them stay to terrify us, like my late husband; others to protect us, like my grandmother; and others to play practical jokes on us, like my granddaughter. Whether they do it because they have pending business on earth, because they need to be forgiven, or because they were too young to go (and like all youngsters challenge even god’s authority) is not for me to decide. I just know that they communicate with me; I can feel them, and sometimes I can even see them.

[end of five minutes]

My grandmother died in 1973, I had just had my 7th child. Even though she had taught me everything about work, childrearing, and natural medicines, I was not ready to let her go. She has always been here for me, in dreams and sometimes quite in person. One day, she had been dead for a couple of years already, I was being tortured by one of those neuralgia pains I used to have. I could not even open my eyes. I called my children for help. My husband was not at home that night. But, you know how it works with children, you have their company during the day; you can’t count on them at night. I was writhing in pain in my bed when I felt a pressure on my eyes (I had put a pillow case around them), like a pair of hands playing peek-a-boo. Then I felt like those same hands rubbed some sort of menthol ointment on my forehead. The pain started to die out, then I felt someone covering me with a blanket and hugged me tight. I fell asleep.

Next morning I asked my children if any of them had come to my room last night. They said no. I told them I was dying in pain. They asked me why I did not call them. The nerves. I knew right there it had been my grandmother. We were so close. I knew death was not going to get in our way.

After my husband died I had a hard time sleeping well. He made sure to make his presence felt in very scary ways. He was able to even make light bulbs explode. Some nights I would wake up screaming feeling his hands on my shoulders and his body on top of mine. I prayed hard and loud; I scolded him, begged him to leave me alone. I was not going to go with him. Eventually he stopped scaring me that much, but occasionally I feel a presence creeping on my bed, lying close to my body. I am fully awake. I just stay quiet now and let him rest next to me.

My granddaughter is a different story. She was a prankster. My poor child, snatched from us in the bloom of life. She plays with my nerves once in a while. The other day I felt a body jumping on my bed, sitting on my buttocks, like she used to do when she stayed with me. It freaks me out, but then I remember her. I pray for her rest and peace. I bless her and go back to sleep.

We are close, closer than anyone can imagine.

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