About a week after he died I was lying in bed trying to read a book when the watch, which was sitting on my nightstand, clicked open. I was startled but just figured I hadn’t closed it properly before and the tension had popped it open. I closed it back up, turned off the light, and went to sleep.
The first thing I did when I woke up every morning was to check out what time it was by looking at the watch he gave me. I always set it in a certain position; it gave me comfort and purpose. I was very exact about it. This morning when I reached for it, it had been moved and was turned over. I just sat looking at it, wondering if I’d done something in the middle of the night I didn’t remember. After three nights of the same thing, I figured it wasn’t me anymore and it was starting to make me wonder how it was being moved. Each night I went to sleep wondering what would happen. I even took to setting it on certain things, putting books or pencils around it, and even covering it with a washrag one time. It always ended up in the same spot every morning.
Still, I didn’t put two and two together. I thought I was being pranked but had no idea who’d do it or why. I tried pretending I was asleep and stayed awake to see who was doing it, but every time I closed my eyes for a moment almost dozing off, when I looked, it was moved. It became so commonplace that after a time I didn’t pay much attention to it, which in of itself was rather weird. I should have paid more attention. I also didn’t notice specifically when this stopped happening but felt much better about it when it wasn’t moving around.
My grandpa always chewed a very fragrant gum, Black Jack if I remember right, and I always loved the smell on him. I think I loved it so much I started smelling it in my room occasionally. I didn’t think much of it because it reminded me of better times and I smiled whenever I thought I smelled it. I came home one day after school and found one of my geography books open to a page that my grandfather and I had looked at shortly before he died. It was of the area where he had his cabin and where we used to take our walks. He was teaching me how to read that type of map. I thought this was kind of weird too, but again, I didn’t think too much of it—it was just some strange coincidence.
Another time I came home from playing baseball, something my grandpa had loved, when a book on my bed that he’d given to me about pitching opened to the page where he had had me read about throwing a drop. I stood there wondering what was going on; I actually looked around the room for some dumb reason. I knew I wouldn’t see anything and think I did it just to buy some time to take this in. I’d been noticing little things that had something to do with my grandfather but in reality, each time it happened it just made me sadder that he was gone.
I even asked my parents if they were playing jokes on me after I told them what had been happening and they just laughed and smiled at me. I went back to my room and my mom followed me, startling me because I didn’t know she had.
“Don’t tell your dad, but Grandpa always loved you a lot. Maybe he’s trying to talk to you.”
I looked at my mom like she was crazy and said, “What? Are you kidding? How would he talk to me, he’s …”
She just smiled when I couldn’t finish the sentence. After she left I sat down on my bed and thought about it. I couldn’t make heads or tails of it and had never believed there was life after death. I don’t really know why I didn’t—just didn’t seem to be something that I’d ever really thought about much. While sitting there thinking, I figured there’d be no harm in at least entertaining the thought that maybe there was life after death and that the ghosts of people could be around, but I was skeptical until I heard a familiar voice in my ear. So real it was like he was sitting right next to me.
I heard, “That’s right, son.”
I jumped at the voice and waited to hear more. I even asked out loud for him to say something else. After a time I thought maybe I’d heard his voice because I’d been thinking of him and my mind just wanted to hear it again. I didn’t know what to think, but I liked the idea of believing there were spirits of past loved ones. For a couple of months nothing else happened and being young, my mind moved on to other things.
The only thing I’d noticed during this time was that whenever I was trying to figure something out, it seemed like his voice in my mind would tell me what to do. I know we all had inner voices and you basically talked to yourself and your intuition would lead you one way or another, but now the voice I heard wasn’t mine anymore; it was my grandpa’s. I thought it was just me making that happen so I had fun with it and it was actually a comfort.
I had a big test
