| abstract
| - I know this sounds like any other story but it is really starting to scare me now, so here I go. I am your average British seventeen-year-old living in, what I think, is the least haunted place in England, but I keep having these dreams, well more nightmares really. They have been going on for eight years and a few months now and I have always been interested in the paranormal but I have never believed it to be a reality, but now... I am just not sure anymore. Anyway, these dreams all feature the same woman, long black/brown hair, pin straight, falling just below her shoulders. She is always wearing this fitted plain black dress; it is calf-length with mid-length sleeves that end at the elbow. I have never seen below her knees so I cannot comment on shoes or anything, but from the back she looks like any normal woman going for a night out at a semi-formal party or something. But from the front is a different story, her skin is so pale but with a slightly greyish tinge. Her eyes are the most haunting though, they are wide and surrounded by coal black mascara and eyeliner, but they radiate hate and malice and they seem cold and dead. The pupils blend into the irises perfectly so they look like inky black pools surrounded by a sea of white. Yes she has been close enough to me for me to see her in this detail, trust me; it was the most terrifying thing in the world. When she gets close I see that her cheeks are hollow, they actually go into her face, and I have drawn that face but ripped it up and burned them because they scared me. My first dream with her in it, started when I was eleven, but she didn’t really bother me much because she was a "background" character in my dreams. But since then she has been coming more and more apparent in my life. The first full-on dream/vision I have had of her went like this. I was just sitting on my bed reading and I think that I heard my doorbell going. So I went downstairs but it wasn't my downstairs anymore. Sure it looked similar but it looked older and darker, the oak banisters looked more like some sort of dark wood and there was this huge cupboard by the stairs. There were no carpets or anything and I felt like I had just stepped into a totally different world, but another thing I noticed is how still everything was. I heard this shrill scream from outside, so I crawled under this cupboard because I feel terrified. I could actually feel my heart racing away in my chest, threatening to explode. My front door swung open and the woman—who looks quite alive at this point—ran through the door and slammed it behind her. She then ran up the stairs next to me whilst leaving a trail of water behind her from the rain outside. I could hear her breath coming out in ragged gasps; I was staring after her as well as I could from under this cupboard. My adrenaline is pumping around my body like crazy at this point, and I started to crawl out from under the cupboard, but something stopped me and I somehow know that I should get back under the cupboard, so I do so. I heard the doorknob rattle, like someone was trying to get in from the outside, something heavy whacked against the door and it burst open. There is a figure in a deep reddish-black trench coat, but is carrying and old fashioned gun. It looked like the butt and trigger of a musket but its barrel was shaped more like the end of a trumpet, I can’t remember the name properly, I think it is called a blunderbuss or something. I couldn't see too much because it is no lighter outside than it is in the dark house. He had a broad-brimmed hat that covered his face in a black shadow, but his presence sent every hair on my body on edge. He gently shut the door behind him then started towards the stairs. I was biting my lips to stop myself from screaming and giving myself away, because I had a feeling that this was not just a dream. I could hear his feet padding softly up the stairs and his breath coming out calmly and slowly, in contrast to the breathing I heard that sounded like someone had just run the marathon. I assumed that was the woman at the top of the stairs or somewhere else close by, I heard her pleading cries then I heard a single shot. Something was falling down the stairs, and then I saw the woman at the bottom of the stairs facing me. It was obvious she was dead, her eyes had this glazed look and blood was coming out her mouth, I could see a dark patch flowering over her dress as blood soaked the jet-black material. Footsteps stomped down the steps and I saw the man stand over the body and laugh. It was a chilling laugh, there was no soul in it and it had no remorse. He then proceeded to open the door and leave; I looked back to the woman’s body, and my heart was racing. I felt like her eyes were burning into me, blaming me for not helping her. What could I have done? I looked away from those haunting eyes, into the blackness behind me. Next thing I know, my sister is shouting that dinner is ready and my heart is still in my mouth and threatening to run away. A few weeks later, this dream/vision or whatever is still very fresh in my mind (even to this day it gives me chills) but I just pass it off as no more than a dream. Anyway, during this week I get the "sequel" to the dream. It was the same house, dark and old-fashioned with the same enormous cupboard in the hallway. I heard the rain outside the door, I saw a flash of light and heard an ear-splitting boom of thunder, so I guessed that there was a storm outside. There was a part of me that wanted to go outside because I got the feeling that it was safer in the wild storm than it was in the dead, dark house. But I couldn't move. It was when I heard footsteps coming closer to the door that I seemed to mobilise myself and squeezed under the trusty cupboard once again. I knew that this was not going to be a good experience. Sure enough the handle goes down and the door swung open easily which revealed the same figure with a trench coat and gun. I saw the hat turning from side to side as the figure inspected the surroundings he had entered while walking forwards. He turned and closed the door, but in the corner of my eye I saw something move on the stairs by the banisters. It is gone before he turned back around and headed for the stairs. I wanted to stop him from going, but again, I was immobilised and I couldn't cry out. I heard the beginning of a scream which was cut short and I heard a thump of something falling to the floor. I then saw something sliding down the stairs; a black shadow made its way to the bottom of the stairs before it grew taller and became the dead woman. She seemed formed from only the knees upwards, so she looked like a swooping shadowy dress from my angle under the cupboard. She swooped past until I can see her swish around the corner to elsewhere; I took my chances and slid out from under the cupboard and headed for the door. However I stopped in my tracks and turned towards the stairs. For some reason I was suddenly upstairs next to the trench coat man's body. I still couldn't see his face so I went to remove his hat until I heard slithering near the bottom of the stairs. I ran into the closest bedroom which looked like my older brother’s old room (my room now) and scrambled under the bed, I could see outside the door and the feet and legs of the man in the trench coat. The shadow slid next to the body’s feet, then seemed to pause, then I got the feeling that it was staring at me. The woman materialized from the body, she was lying on her front staring at me with those cold, dead eyes. I closed my own eyes and I felt coldness enveloping me from head to foot. I woke up shivering that night, despite my blankets. Since then, I think that I catch small glimpses of her, it doesn’t seem to matter whether I am awake, asleep or in-between. I feel like she is always watching me. The last glimpse I had of her was when I was trying to get some sleep, which wasn’t really working. My room was really dark with only a little light from the streetlamp outside, then I saw a tall dark shadow with a pale face in front of my wardrobe; she was looking at me with what I can only describe as murderous rage. I saw her slowly gliding towards me so I did what most people would do, and scrunched my eyes tightly closed and tensed every muscle in my body preparing for... I don’t know... something bad to happen, I guess. I felt the same ice-cold feeling grip my body and I felt like something was stopping me from breathing. Or someone. My eyes opened fully and I saw her face in every detail about an inch from mine. The black irises and pupils that made her eyes seem like black, dead holes; sunken cheeks and sallow, pale skin. She didn’t seem to breathe but her long ebony hair felt like the breath of death as it touched my face; her pale lips seemed almost blue in the darkness and they were tightly drawn into a grimace of hatred. If she had stayed longer I would have screamed, but she shot backwards through my closed door with that look still on her face. I try to get as much sleep as I can nowadays, but I am always aware of this malevolent presence in my dreams and when I am awake. She hasn’t been that close to me since, and for that I am glad, but even now I can be walking from my room to the bathroom and see her white, evil face glaring at me from the stairs. She seems to be attached to me somehow; I literally can’t escape from her. She can be anywhere at any time and it scares me. Sometimes I think of getting help but who would believe this?! I would sound like a total nutcase. By writing this down, I feel a little better for some reason. It is like why some people write lists to help get some order into their lives, I write what I have seen and it makes me feel a little more in control. That probably sounds silly, but then again read what happened above, I saw these images/visions/dreams or whatever you want to call them, and I feel like... I don’t know... almost like I am losing it. I don’t know what to think anymore.
|
![[RDF Data]](/fct/images/sw-rdf-blue.png)