One Day in My Life by Carol McKinlay

This is a short story about one day in my life. That's a day I'll never forget. The day I ended up in ICPU.

It was in Turkey I saw the ghost. A normal, everyday, run-of-the-mill, sunshine holiday and I saw the ghost, the wee boy at our room window, a window too high to reach from the ground.

No, I hadn't been drinking, nor had I had too much sun. I just woke up and there he was staring in at me. Just staring and staring for what seemed like an eternity then his head fell to his shoulder and his face took on a look of intense sadness. Then he just dropped out of sight.

I mentioned the boy to my husband next morning but he just shrugged it off indifferently. Needless to say the boy was not far from my mind for the rest of our stay in Turkey but then once on the plane the memory receded. I'd put it behind me, my first experience of the paranormal, or so I thought.

Where was I? Oh yes, that one day in my life. Folk said I became different after the holiday. More reserved, less inclined to go out. But then they couldn't see what I could see, couldn't see her wandering around our house, going through the cupboards, checking the drawers, sitting beside me on the settee, on the bed. Oh and she was real, not just for me but for the whole family, had been real for us all as the spiritualist girlfriend now ex-girlfriend of my father. I'd only met her once but here she was now in my thoughts day and night.

I tried staying indoors but she was there. Tried staying in my room but doors were no barrier. By the time she's completely taken over, most of my friends and family were avoiding me.

What I couldn't understand was why she chose me. Did she know about the wee boy in Turkey, was I susceptible because of him. She was a spiritualist. In fact, she owned a shop dealing in spiritualism. She's set herself up as an expert on the occult.

But that didn't help me that day. The day I was dragged away, bible in hand, to the IPCU.

The ambulance came for me at night when the neighbours were watching soaps or making tea or whatever folk do at night in the dark of winter. I was being dragged, kicking and screaming down the stairs.

That was the day in my life I remember, the day I was dragged to the IPCU, the day my medication started and my psychiatric care.

What worries me now in the cold light of day is that nobody bothered to ask her. She was real, I hadn't made her up. She was my Dad's ex for God sake, a spiritualist looking for revenge. She possessed a knowledge way beyond our ken, professed to have supernatural abilities we've hardly touched upon.

But nobody thought to ask her!

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