Reader Submission - A Visit From Mom Pt. 1

The following story is from Julie:

I was living with a man that was suddenly acting strangely, just barely hanging on to the edge of sanity. It was to the point I could no longer trust him…I was not sure what he may do next. I was desperate for answers, afraid, and alone. Then something strange happened, so strange that even now I cannot even believe it myself, but it was real. I have an extreme need to share this incredible story to all of you out there that feels no hope, miracles happen trust me! So many people do not understand how you can find yourself in a position where you know there is no escape. Unless people have experienced it, they will never understand. So many of us that have been through such suppression know the real truth on how it happens. If you stay you could die, if you go you know in your heart you WILL die. My heart goes out to you all, my dear sisters and brothers; know that I have a hug for each of you, because I truly know where you’re at!

I woke with such a start that my body had automatically bolted itself into an upright position. For some reason, unknown to me, I had an overwhelming feeling that I was being observed. Even though my eyes were still blurry from sleep and not quite cooperating, I frantically searched the immediate area surrounding my bed. I felt a sudden stab in my gut as I realized someone truly was there, standing at the very foot of my bed. I flung my hand out sideways in the darkness towards my bedside table. I was desperately searching for my eyeglasses that I had left lying there just a few hours earlier. Without them or my contact lenses, what I thought I was visualizing as a person could easily have been my bathrobe dangling innocently from the six foot tall post at the end of my bed.

As I searched blindly in the dark, I felt them for just an instant, barely brushing them with my fingertips. The force was just enough to send them whirling off of the night stand and spinning across the wooden floor. So much for that, my only choice now was to squint like a mole and try to make out whom, if anyone was truly there.

Concentrating to focus, I was able to make out the figure; it appeared to be a woman. She was wearing a brightly flowered dress with a brown tattered work coat over it. It reminded me of the ones we used to wear on our family farm during my childhood years. The woman was staring at me in an odd sort of a way. Her head was slightly quirked to one side. My heart was pounding so hard in my chest that I could hear the echo of each beat inside of my head. But then, even in my half blind state, I began to notice the warm soft smile on the woman’s face. I squinted a little harder. She seemed vaguely familiar to me. My brain shifted into overdrive racing through all my past and present trying to sort out a name that I could place with this face. Suddenly, I realized who was standing there! Oh my God, it was my mother!

I had not recognized her in those first waking moments, only because she no longer looked pale and ravished as she had the last time I saw her. She appeared quite youthful, vibrant and full of love; exactly as she had been before the cancer had attacked her young body at twenty eight years of age. Mom died twenty two years ago slowly and painfully, one pound at a time. She was thirty years young, the exact age that I am now.

I very quietly lowered my weight onto my feet. I squatted down and once again and ran my hands across the surface of the floor trying to locate what was left of my eyeglasses.

Even with this sudden revelation, panic still swept through me. This could only mean one thing, and I wasn’t very keen on what that was. With adrenaline racing through my veins, I leaned over towards the floor, frantically running my hands adjacent to the edge of my bed as I desperately tried to locate my eyeglasses one more time. I really needed them right now, what I perceived I was seeing was not at all acceptable to me.

Stretching just a bit too far, I managed to roll off the edge of my bed and hit the floor with a loud thud. My butt landed square on my glasses. I hastily jerked them out from beneath my bottom expecting the worse. Without taking the time to check their present condition I quickly threw them onto my face, realizing as I did that they were now bent and distorted and had but one remaining lens. Closing my eye on the side of the missing lens, I found that I could actually see through the one that was still intact. I slowly raised my head up past the edge of my bed until I could just barely see over the top of the crumpled comforter. I moved my head upward slowly until I was able to view the foot of my bed once again.

I carefully focused with my one eye to the exact spot where I thought she had stood but a few moments ago, only to find that there was now no one there. In one clumsy motion I stood up and leapt back onto my bed, the sudden movement caused my now useless eyeglasses to once again tumble off of my face and fall somewhere out of sight. I heard a small click, click sound as they landed on the wooden floor and once again slid out of my reach.

I threw my left arm outward this time, towards his side of the bed to check for his presence, but felt only the coolness of the sheet. Thankfully, he was not there, and obviously had not been for some time. Once again I jerked my body upright; my eyes darting around the darkened room. I carefully searched every corner, every shadow for his outline, fearing that he may be lurking somewhere in the dark, hiding as some predator animal might, just waiting patiently for the moment he could pounce on me and do something loveless or unreasonable.

To be continued...

Comments

Anonymous said…
who is "he" in the last paragraph? i thought the poster saw their mother?!

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