Secrets. They are filled in high school halls, in families and friendships and within the memory of our minds. Guilt can flood the very barriers of our mind and spill onto the tips of our tongues, the ones we swore we would never speak of, the pinky promises we gave to our very best childhood friends. But sometimes, secrets can be pushed to the back of our mind, to be forgotten forever, like a time capsule buried deep inside the earth. Whenever the demon of your past tries to claw itself into your constant thoughts, you push it back, hoping to forgotten forever. The past can be a great thing, or not. But everyone knows that the secrets of our past always seem to catch up with us in the present.

Wind whipped my fine hair sideways across my face as I struggled to run to make it in time. I can almost touch my prize, my most desired possession. I stand a foot away from him, hesitating. In all my dreams, I have never made it this close to him. Every time I get closer and closer, but each time he fades away. This time seems quite different. I slowly close the idle space between us, the snowflakes dancing all around us, a beautiful winter wonderland. I lift my small right hand, aching to touch his cheek, just to know I am dreaming and he is really standing before me. I gently caress his cheek. He looks deeply into my eyes, as if he is reading every thought I have ever had. His skin is even softer than I imagined, much, much softer. I am so gentle, treating his alabaster skin like fragile glass. I was so terrified that he might just shatter and disappear like all my other dreams. I wish I knew his name. So I could at least put his beautiful face to a name. Even though he was constantly in my dreams, I knew his was real, somewhere in this world, waiting for me to find him, my heart has told me so. I bring my hand down my side and I don’t even have to look into his chocolate brown eyes, I’ve already memorized them. I look up between my lashes to bring my gaze to his, but to my utter disappointment, he seemed to vanish into the cold winter air. I wanted to know who he is, what his voice sounds like, I want him to hold my in his strong arms and never let me go. I would feel safe, protected. Something that wasn’t provided for me in the unstable home I lived in. My dreams were my only escape; I could be or do anything I wanted.

I awoke around 5 in the morning, 2 hours before my alarm was set. Knowing there was no point in attempting to go back to sleep, I hazily decided to pull myself out of bed and attempt to get ready for school, my most current dream reoccurring in the back of my mind. This dream was just so different than the others, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that the man in my dreams was real. There was a knot in my stomach, and whenever I got this feeling, I knew something bad was about to happen. I had it when my grandma died in the evening of Christmas Day and my great-uncle was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer. My grandfather Terry, as long as I could remember, always told me I had a gift. He always shared stories of his gift, that he could see spirits of the dead and even communicate with them. I was always fascinated by the things he told me