What My Mother Wants

Every since I was five years old I've been able to see and hear things that others can't. Sometimes it's just a feeling but most times I can catch something passing out of the corner of my eye, like a haze or a mist. There are others that I can plainly see.

In the days before my mother had the last stroke that would eventually rob her of her life, I think that she knew something was going to happen. She had started talking about how her mother had passed and at times we would hear her talking to someone. I stood in her bedroom door one day and watched and she definitely had company that I couldn't see. Whoever it was she was having a very good conversation with them. When I asked her who she was talking to she said, 'Nobody' but as soon as I walked out of the room she started talking again.

When the stroke happened she spent a week in the hospital. She had made me promise that when the time came for her to go she wanted to be at home. It was hard enough to make the decision to let her go but we brought her home so that she could pass in peace.

I took off from work so that I could be home to take care of her and all during that time I would see things at night. There was a mirror on the wall between my bedroom and hers. During the night before she passed. I would see images of someone or something in white passing by.

I felt no fear from whatever it was and I sensed that it was her family coming to take her home. She passed early that morning and I was holding her hand when she took her last breath and I literally felt her heat stop. Ever since then she has definitely made her presence known to me and my sisters.

She had always said that the house was hers until she died and it seems that even in the afterlife she doesn't want to let go. Both of my sisters have heard her. One of my sisters has often said that she wakes up in the middle of the night to see her standing in the door watching her and she feels protected.

For a while it was quiet in the house and then something started waking me up early in the morning by tapping on the bed. It wasn't a light tap either and was definitely coming from someone trying to wake me up. At first I thought it was my sister and I sat up, ready to tell her off when I realized that no one was there.

I thought that maybe I had been dreaming so I laid back down. I tried to go back to sleep but it happened again and continued to happen for the next few days. I just tried to blow it off due to stress at work but the tapping got harder and more insistent.

Finally, I had the idea that it was my mother and she was upset because we hadn't gotten her head stone yet due to financial problems. When we did get the head stone and had it placed the tapping stopped and I thought that she was satisfied. I should have known better.

A few weeks ago the tapping started again. Every time I started to fall asleep there was a hard tap on the bed that would wake me up. After about the fifth time I sat up and said, "Mama, I have to get up early. If you don't want me to fall asleep driving to work then stop it."

The tapping stopped. I haven't felt it for a few days now but I have the feeling that she'll be making a visit soon.

I'll just have to figure out what she wants.