The Premonition

Nightmare

The mirror showed a reflection that wasn't my own. A transparent cloud that resembled me was there instead. It was cloaked to hide its legs and appeared to be floating in mid-air. Although it was daytime, the mirror reflected night. Moonlit shadows of pouring rain flickered across the floor beneath the cloud figure. The room was darkened in the mirror, momentarily flashing bright with lightning. Its eyes were different than mine as well. They were hollow and white with dark shadows around them. The figure slowly began to smile, and as its smile grew wider, a chill climbed up my spine, reaching my neck as the smile became full.

Barely able to move, I forced myself to back away. Behind me, my hands frantically searched for the door knob. Once I had ahold of it, I left the room quickly and closed the door.

As soon as the door closed, my eyes flew open and I sat up quickly. My face was damp with sweat and I struggled to catch my breath. It was dark and quiet outside but then it started raining like in the nightmare, casting the same shadows across the floor. Without looking into it, I walked over to my mirror and turned it around, feeling a bit silly as I did it.

Therapy

The following week I made an appointment with my therapist. I couldn’t get the dream out of my head.

***

"Hello, Harper. It's nice to see you again. How are you?"

She tried to hide it quickly, but I caught her eyes widening as I first entered her office.

"Hi, ma'am. I'm not doing very well. I had a horrible nightmare last week that is still bothering me."

"Okay. Let's discuss it. What happened in the nightmare?"

I recounted to her what had happened.

"Why do you think it is bothering you so much?" she asked.

"Well, in the past year I have been getting the sort of panic attacks where I get an intense feeling of impending doom. I get scared of dying while I am experiencing the fear I am going to die. For me, it is very scary to think about how I am just going to cease to exist at some point. I have always felt it isn't supposed to be that way. Then my mind also thinks about what it will feel like. Will it hurt? Will I die in a painful way, such as an accident? I guess that comes from being in an accident about twelve years ago. The car flipped and I could have been badly hurt or killed. My mind was stuck on what could have happened. It didn't help that I had a vision of it happening a few minutes before it did. Now I get scared all the visions that pop in my head will come true. It's probably why the impending sense of doom feels very real as it is happening. My anxiety also comes from the loss of control I felt when I was sexually abused as a young teenager. The guy abusing me pinned my arms under his and I could not get out.  Not knowing what was about to happen was awful. The same goes for what was flashing through my mind as the car was flipping in the accident. I also had to go through that feeling again for more than an hour about a year ago as a tornado warning siren went off and a couple of tornadoes touched down only a few miles from my apartment. Stormy weather, men, and dying put me on edge."

"All of that makes sense. Seeing yourself as a ghost could make you fear you are going to die. You may be feeling it could actually happen because of the struggle with impending doom feelings and the vision you had of the accident before it happened."

The Man in the Park

A couple of days later as I was heading to work, I saw a man dressed in black watching me from a distance. He was sitting on a bench on the other side of the park. As I walked through the park, he didn't look away. It was sunny out but he made me forget that. The weather seemed opposite around him as he sat in the shade of a tree. I sped up to get away from his drilling gaze.

The Attack

After work it was raining hard. Storms were coming through.

I decided to get a taxi. Lightning flashes ripped through the dark cab every few moments. The moon was full outside my window with clouds passing over it quickly. My reflection in the window made me appear pale and sick. Strange. I felt fine other than my anxiety from the nightmare.

I paid the driver and got out. Due to the rain, nobody was outside. The wind whipped with the rain, stirring and twisting my nerves into knots.

Before I got to the door, a dark shadow rushed toward me. Lightning flashed, glinting in the blade of a knife rushing toward me. The face of the man from the park was illuminated in great detail for a split second as the knife pierced my chest. I saw him run away as I drifted into a state that felt like going to sleep.

Dying

When I woke up, I felt light like a feather. I was in my bedroom. I couldn't remember going inside. My mirror had been turned back around. That sent the chill up my spine again. Who had done that? The storm was still raging outside. I got up and slowly walked over to my mirror. Adrenaline was pulsing through me. I told myself to stop worrying so much over nothing. It was just another nightmare.

I reached the mirror and nearly fainted when I looked into it. I had the familiar feeling that my body was about to just stop functioning completely. That was how I felt when I had the impending doom sensations.

The shock came from the mirror being empty of my reflection. It was as if nobody was standing in front of it. I tried to examine myself by looking down at my arms, hands, and feet. I was invisible. But how? I felt whole and real. I didn't know what was going on.

I went outside. People were walking about but nobody looked in my direction. Odd. Then suddenly a guy on a bicycle shot out of my chest. He had ridden through me as if I was not there on the street.

My mind scrambled to understand what was happening. The only thing that made sense was I must be dead. The mirror must have been right.

Healing

The next morning when I woke up I felt refreshed even though I was in the hospital. I went over to my mirror and my jaw dropped. I could see myself again. However, this time I looked different once again.

I was glowing, almost as if light surrounded me and emanated from my essence. I looked free like animals in wilderness.

I looked inward and realized my anxiety had vanished. I felt like I could conquer anything.