Pink Ballerina

The month before I moved to attend grad school, my lease had expired on my apartment and I was effectively homeless. My older sister had invited me to stay at her house in Texas for that month and had even paid for my plane ticket to fly back and forth as payment, since I would be watching my nine year old niece for a week while she and my brother-in-law went on a trip.

The house had three bedrooms: my sister’s room, my niece’s room, and a guest bedroom that also doubled as a play room. My sister and niece’s rooms both came with their own toilets, though my niece hated to use hers and would choose the ‘public’ toilet in the hallway or go into her parents room and use theirs. The guest bedroom shared a wall with the toilet in my niece’s room.

I hadn’t visited my sister in two years. Living far away from Texas and being a poor college student had made it nearly impossible. In the first week I stayed there, I noticed that the door to the hall closet would open up all by itself. Not while anyone was watching, of course, but it would be closed before everyone went out or to bed, then be open when we got up or returned. My sister and her husband would tell me that their cat would open the door, but I couldn’t see how this would be possible. The door didn’t have a knob, being spring latched into place when closed, but it was a very tight fit. I weight 250 lbs and stand 6’1” and it was a struggle to open the door. Fortunately, the closet in question was a utility closet, holding the water heater, so it did not need to be opened frequently. =)

Midway through the first week, my brother-in-law got word that his grandfather had passed. He and his family packed and flew back to Pennsylvania for the services, leaving me to watch the house. Two nights into being there by myself, I laid down for the evening. I was always very comfortable at my sister’s house but on this night, I was very nervous. I was filled with anxiousness and nervous energy and couldn’t sleep. I tossed and turned in bed, unable to relax and fall asleep. As I lay there in the bed, I entered into something like an out of body experience. I was awake, fully cognizant of the feel of the bed clothes and the smell of the cat’s nearby litter box, but my body did not respond to movement and felt almost as if I were looking at myself from just above my head.

While in this state, almost instantaneously to entering it really, the figure of a young girl pirouetted out of the far wall, the one shared with my niece’s toilet. The little girl seemed benign and unthreatening, dressed all in pink and outlined in pink just floating and twirling. I was, however, terrified at this sight; a translucent pink ballerina dancing and floating while I was experiencing this bizarre OBE. I started to panic a little, my breathing got tight, and fell back into my body. The ballerina was no longer visible, but I couldn’t know whether or not she was still there. I did not tell my sister or her family, since they all get spooked a little easily. My niece still won’t use the toilet in her room and the utility closet door still opens by itself.