When I was ten years old, I was alone in my room during twilight. I had been reading a book but was taking time out to think about what was happening in the story (Big Red, about a dog i think). As I lay there , I felt a strange buzzing in my left ear. The noise/feeling moved slowly through my body and head, eventually passing out the other side, leaving almost reluctantly. Needless to say, I was absolutely terrified. Certain that if I moved or spoke something truly disastrous would happen to me I stayed perfectly still. Then the humming came back, again at my left ear. It moved through just as it had before. This happened again and again, sometimes starting from the left and sometimes from the right. Finally I could take no more. My stomach was tied in knots and I thought I was going to be sick. I sat up and was prepairing to make a running break for it when there was another vibration. Because I was sitting up it sounded quite different. As it turned out, I spent a whole hour (an eternity at that age) frightened to death by nothing more than the stupid Traffic noise from a road near my house.

I told that story to give some perspective for this one. (After that day, I was extremely sceptical about the paranormal)

When I was fifteen, I heard a strange scratching noise coming from behind our washing machine in our basement. We had had mice for some time and one had managed to excape, so I figured thats what it was. I went to investigate. Approching the side of the machine, I was crawling on my knees (if you've ever tried catching a rodent you know why). I heard a thump on top of the machine, much louder than a mouse would make. I looked up and saw my cat (black tom named sequi). I was just about to reach for him when I realized that it couldn't be him because he had died over a year before. At that moment, he leaped for me, as he used to do. I fell back in terror and he passed through my face (the most frightening thing I have ever experienced). As he went through me I felt my face flush with warmth. (This might just have been from the adrenelin rush, I don't know I can't quite remember the feeling).

When I regained my senses (I have no idea how long that took) I looked around for him but he was gone. I don't remember hearing him run away.

The sceptic part of me would love to dismiss this (and in the bright light of day that isn't so hard). I could rationalize it as being some sort of delusion brought on from bending over (the blood rushing to my head) I can even think of why I saw Sequi, I was looking for a mouse and was sort of pretending to be him (I used to fantasize that we were the same person and we could share each others form) Obviously he was on my mind so why wouldn't I think I saw him.

Now part of me would love to believe this rational, but the experience was just too real seeming for me not to believe it really was the spirit of my cat.

Make of this story what you will, I mostly told it now (I've never told it before) for the tellings sake. I've carried it around long enough (I am now 22) Thanks for reading. Kelly

PS we had the mice as pets and no I never found the one that was lost.