Painful Delusion (Part 1)

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I looked into the eyes of my grandfather sitting next to me. He seemed… despondent. An improvement I guess. He had died three weeks ago.

The elderly woman with the crystal ball kept humming on the other side of the small table with a glowing crystal ball. You could actually see the LED light fixed to the bottom. The woman didn’t seem to be trying very hard to look authentic; I’m not even sure she believed in her own powers.

And yet, sitting beside me clear as day, was my dead grandfather whom she was attempting to call out to.

“Uh, hey gramps.” I mumbled.

“Hello grandson. It has been too long.” The medium responded. “I wish we could have talked more before I moved on, but it’s nice to hear from you now.”

I don’t know what gave this woman the impression I hadn’t been speaking to him. Was it something I’m wearing, or just a safe assumption based on the type of person that comes in asking to speak to a dead relative?

My grandfather and I were close. I was there by his deathbed when he passed and we would frequently get together for coffee. Prior to his admission to the hospital we actually spent quite a bit of time together; on a whim I had picked up a virtual reality headset and he had become obsessed with it. He wasn’t able to keep up with many of the games, but he loved being dropped into the animated worlds that he could just look around and admire.

Looking at the quiet, emotionless visage of my grandfather it was obvious he wasn’t actually speaking through the woman across the table.

I played along a bit; threw out some easy to answer questions and let her do her thing, payed the excessive amount for the show and went on my way. I kind of expected my grandfather to follow after me, but he continued to just stare blankly into nothing. I honestly would have written it off as a desperate hallucination, but I’d like to think my imagination could have done better than a dead man sitting silently beside me.

Up to that point in my life I’d been very skeptical of anything supernatural. I guess I still am, but it’s incredibly difficult to disregard your own first hand experiences. The reunion with my dead grandfather was just the first oddity of many.

I don’t think I can properly describe how unsettling it is to have a stranger on the street walk through you. As it turns out, light scatters within the semi-corporeal beings that I assume are ghosts. When your eye traverses through someone’s forehead you see all the gooey bits inside. It’s something I’ve never been able to stomach, so now I make sure to avoid anyone around me and walk fast enough to make sure no one overtakes me from behind. The sight seems to only go one way.

As I slowly started accepting my new reality I remembered a book my mother had mentioned several years ago. “The Secret” by Rhonda Byrne. The long and short of it is you need to visualize what you want out of the universe and it will manifest itself for you. Some real new age mystical mumbo jumbo that I had easily dismissed before; however, given my new experience with mystical mambo jumbo I figured it was worth a second glance.

My life was going well enough. Stable job, some money put aside, adequate social life. Not much luck in romance, but that rarely bothered me. Still, what if it could be better?

Thus I started a new routine of putting aside an hour of each day for meditation and visualization. I imagined myself in a big house on a plot of land just outside the city. Close enough for convenience and far enough for some peace and quiet. Sitting on the porch, enjoying the fresh air with a cup of tea in my hand and my wonderful wife beside me. Security. Comfort. Happiness.

It was only a month after I started this routine that I met Jen. She was an accountant that worked independently with several local businesses. She was sitting at the table beside me at my favorite coffee shop when I awkwardly commented on how good the coffee was.

“I mean, it’s coffee.” She replied, looking slightly annoyed that I had disrupted her from her work.

“Yes, but it’s good coffee isn’t it?” I pushed. “The subtle notes of coffee in its aroma. The appealing shade of dark brown. It’s ability to turn me from an insufferable prick into a just slightly rude one.”

She laughed. I didn’t even think the joke was that funny, so I saw this as a positive sign.

We exchanged numbers. Went our separate ways and by the next month we had seen enough of each other to know that there was something real between us. We shared the same warped humor, cared about the same issues and found each other extremely attractive. I may be projecting that last one a little bit; she was at least very attractive. I felt like I had finally met the love of my life.

And then I met Tiffany. Then Megan. Then Penny. Then Jen. A different Jen; this one was working retail at an electronics store. I seem to have a thing for Jens. I’ve dated four of them so far. My current girlfriend in fact could be called Jen, though she goes by Jennifer.

Lest I besmirch my honor I feel I should point out all of these relationships started after the previous one had ended.

All this to say, living my life by The Secret certainly made my love life more interesting but only because I was now taking more of an active interest in it. I focused my mind on that image of my perfect life and that encouraged me to put myself out more. Likewise, my job was more fulfilling. I have yet to see the promotion I was hoping for, but working towards it certainly makes the job more bearable.

I can’t say I take The Secret entirely seriously anymore, but I continued the practice of meditation and visualization.

It was on a Saturday evening when things first got weird. At this point, with all the ghosts and such, I figure weird for me is pretty significant. Jennifer was taking a shower while I was meditating on a yoga mat in the living room.

Big white house. Wonderful wife beside me. Birds barking in the background. Security. Comfort. happiness.

“Birds don’t bark.” I said to the empty living room.

Yet the barking persisted. Just outside my apartment window in fact. A somewhat large blue jay staring at me barking as if wanting attention.

After several minutes Jen walked in wearing her pajamas. “Do you see that?” I asked, pointing to the bird.

“No.” Jennifer replied skeptically. “Have your friends learned to fly?”

“In a sense.” I answered honestly. Jennifer knew about my peculiar visions. I always mentioned them early on in a relationship; a sort of litmus test to see if it could actually work. Most of my relationships ended with this honesty. “There’s a blue jay barking at me.”

“On your meds again?” Jennifer joked.

“God no. Never again.” When I first told Jennifer she had convinced me to see a psychiatrist. I appreciated the legitimate concern and the fact that she didn’t just ghost me. I also had considered the very real possibility that I had a mental illness but needed that push to actually do something about it.

The doctor prescribed me some sort of antipsychotic. Side effects may include restlessness, dizziness, constipation, fatigue etc. As far as the doctor warned me, side effects did not include your hallucinations gaining awareness of you.

About a week after starting the medication the ‘people’ on the street started to give me confused looks. By a month I found several stopping to stare at me, usually squinting as if they had trouble making me out. It was just before the two month mark that they started shouting at me. Most if not all of the specters in my life now started reacting by yelling angry gibberish at me or just staring wide-eyed and screaming bloody murder.

It took a week for the medication to leave my system. The withdrawals were terrible, but Jennifer was there to keep me whole. She apologized profusely for pushing me to start the treatment, but I knew there was no way either of us could have predicted that result. I also knew that it was better to at least try to address the issue in case it got worse.

This was about a year before the blue jay incident. Until then things had been more or less normal. I’d still brush through people that weren’t actually there and a lot of the people on the street looked even more dead inside than those I presumed were real. As time goes on it’s getting harder and harder to tell them apart.