Dreams and portents

[i_kender]

Yesterday my lodger (I suppose that’s the best word for her) asked me if anyone had died in the house. Naturally this got my attention, and we sat and talked for a while. It turns out she’d had a very strong and vivid dream. In the dream there was a large painting in her room. It was executed all in vivid reds and was of a young woman in her 20s. The painting was not hanging on the wall; rather it was propped up on the floor, nearby her bed. My lodger stared at the painting, wondering who the person portrayed was, and why this painting was in her bedroom. Just then a man and a woman walked into the room. They were young, also in their twenties. My lodger could tell that they were very close friends and knew each other well, but were not a couple. She told me that the man had ever-so-slightly feminine features. They entered the room, ignoring her, and walked right up to the painting. Standing in front of it, they stopped and gazed at it reverently. She could tell that they were both very sad. She asked them about the painting… who was it? And what did it signify? They didn’t answer, but suddenly she realised that the woman in the painting was dead. She woke with a start, with waves of emotion coursing through her. I asked her if she was afraid. After all, she’d as near as damn it asked me if the house had ghosts. No, she replied, merely sad. But it made such a strong impression on her that she was much shaken, and deeply moved, and couldn’t get back to sleep for a long time after.

Comments

[cabarethaze.livejournal.com]

Very interesting.

When I was in high school, the stairs to the third floor of our house had a bend in the middle, I guess it's called a landing? Anyway, that spot forever caught my eye at random moments, it looked like someone in white or pale color outfit crouching in the corner. I went crazy trying to figure out if anything was reflecting into that corner or something, nothing was. I know I had dreams about it, but I can't remember the details.

When we brought my dog into the house, he would either speed through that corner or avoid it altogether. Sometimes he'd just stare at it from the 2nd floor, like he was watching someone. A few times he even went up to the landing and barked at the empty corner.

[i_kender]

It occurs to me that I didn't mention: no, no one has died in the house. Not in the entire time my parents have owned it (at least 25 years).

I do believe in... these things, but I'm hesitant about putting a name or definition to them. I simply believe there is more to the world that what we take for granted.

[cabarethaze.livejournal.com]

Ah, okay.

I believe there are things that we might not understand, know what they are, etc. I like that.

Oh man, the weirdest thing ever was when I was in Paris when I was 15 or so, my friend's ATM card had stopped working because of a bank error, so she had no cash. We tried to help out with paying for her meals and stuff, but it was a bit problematic. She offhandly mentions that her grandmother used to slip $50 in her wallet when she knew it was a money crunch, and she really misses her now that she passed on as she was always so sweet. We're walking outside of Versailles and something floats past on the wind...yep, it's cash, like $100 in Francs, I think it was. Dropped right at her friggin feet. Be that fate, spirits, random luck, whatever, I like that there's unpredictable things like that which happen.

[i_kender]

What a lovely anecdote, thanks for that :)

[murraynz.livejournal.com]

I imagine that "Yes, someone died, and it was in your room" wouldn't have gone down very well.

[i_kender]

...particularly if there was a stain.

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

How curious. And how typical of them not to answer even when she was sufficiently lucid in her dream to think to ask the important questions.

How old is your house?

[i_kender]

1930s... all the houses nearby used to be part of the Duke of Northumberland's estate.

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

Duke of Northumberland... why do I know something about a Duke of Northumberland?

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

Lady Jane Grey. That's why. Her father was a duke of Northumberland.

Isn't the place that lady jane grey haunts said to be one of the most haunted places in the country?

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

You should show your flatmate some of the paintings of Lady Jane Grey, see if any of them look at all familiar to her. Because that would be superbly weird.

[i_kender]

Hey! My house is not haunted by the ghost of Lady Jane Grey! *indignant*

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

Would you prefer zombies?

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

I'd recommend the one of her execution by Paul Delaroche... which... let me check... is on the lady jane grey wiki page.

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

Wow. Comment spam.

[blankbadge.livejournal.com]

I wonder what makes some dreams so vivid like that, so that they seem to be so much realer.
Did her description of the woman in the painting seem familiar at all?

[i_kender]

No, not really.

I did think of Selena at the time... but why would she be hanging around my house? And, more to the point, appearing to my Korean Foreign-Language-Student lodger rather than me? Hmm... unless ghost-Selena is as much of a perv as living-Selena! ;)

[blankbadge.livejournal.com]

It doesn't exactly seem likely that Selena would be appearing to her...