The Haunting of Self [Part II]

About ten minutes pass, and I remember being in a state of dreamy haze when out of the corner of my eye, I could make out a figure that resembled Ava, my Turkish Angora who usually sleeps with me, perked up. She was staring intently at me, fiercely meowing, tail firmly straight and up as if she was gearing to attack. I wanted to tell her to stop, but what escaped my mouth sounded more like deep painful wailing. I then made out what sounded like a hazy knocking. About 20-30 minutes must have passed without me having any recollection of my actions, when I found myself sweaty in my bed again.

Another dream? I tossed and turned without daring to open my eyes before finally falling asleep again.

The next morning I woke up. The first thing I did was check the mailbox for the key. But to my shock, it wasn’t there. Frustrated, I gave my friend a call, which went straight to voicemail. No luck here.

Aside from the difficulties of getting the key, I pondered the bad dream I had before that morning, and the thumping I had heard soon after I'd woken up. I thought that it was odd that, regardless of whether anyone stopped by to drop the key off, they would knock so early on the door without having a good reason. The more I considered the thumping, the more I started to consider if it really happened at all. Was it a thump on the door? A tapping on glass? We have a glass sliding entryway in the kitchen, which led into a fenced off patio. Maybe Ava was playing around it?

I started to think about why sleepy Ava would even be in my backyard around 5 in the morning, or why she was nowhere to be seen right now. All of it didn’t make very much sense.

I shrugged it off and decided to go about my day, starting off with watering my plants in the kitchen garden. But suddenly something felt like it hit me. I started palpitating, my heart seemed to grow heavy. I looked at my palms, they were sweaty.

The dream-like haze engulfed me and I began to feel nauseous. I reached out to the window frame for support; the window was curtained on the other side. I began to lose balance and I remember drunkenly standing in front of the window pane when I gazed into it. WHAT I SAW STARING BACK SCARED THE LIVING LIFE OUT OF ME.

I’m currently outside in a cafe, having no recollection of what happened after. After regaining consciousness, I hurried out of the house as soon as I could, grabbing my coat and my phone. I couldn’t find Ava anywhere but I did find a ball of white fur that I am sure is Ava’s. I was about to call my other friend when he actually reached out to me, asking about Cain(the friend who was supposed to bring me the keys), who hadn’t made it to work yet.

I wanted to tell him about my experience but something deep inside me kept my mouth shut. I ended up telling him Cain never actually dropped the keys off at my house, maybe something came up suddenly that he had to tend to. He took my word for it and I strangely felt a part within me relieved.

So here I am, currently down to my 5th cup of coffee. Attached along with this email is a rough sketch I managed to draw. I sincerely hope you find it useful. Please help me, I want to make sense out of all this, Nathaniel, and it feels like something inside is stopping me from trying to find out the answers.

Sincerely,

Matt