A few years back, my cousin Alex, his closest buddy, Kevin, and their girlfriends embarked on a cross-country road trip, journeying from sunny California to the heart of Wisconsin. Packed snugly into a compact Honda Hatchback, my cousin and his girlfriend, Lisa, took the back seat, ready for the adventure that lay ahead.
But the memories of that fateful trip would forever haunt my cousin. The vivid scenes in his mind were like fragments of a dream – disjointed, surreal, and utterly terrifying. One moment, they were cruising down the open highway, the next, he awoke in the sterile confines of a hospital room, disoriented and wracked with pain.
Lying there, weak and bewildered, he cast his gaze upon two familiar faces – Kevin and his girlfriend, Emily – standing beside his bed. With a trembling voice, he inquired why he was the sole one bearing injuries, dread gnawing at his heart. Kevin, with a sinister smile curling upon his lips, responded cryptically, proclaiming my cousin as “the lucky one.” Emily, his girlfriend, whispered promises of waiting for his recovery, her words laden with a strange undercurrent.
Suddenly, a knock rapped at the hospital room door, and without warning, Kevin and Emily darted for the window. Panic seized my cousin as he witnessed their desperate escape, defying the laws of nature by soaring through the unyielding glass.
Soon after, the door swung open, revealing the worried faces of his parents, closely followed by my own parents and me. Tears of relief streamed down our cheeks as we embraced the survivor of the horrific car accident. His injuries had been grave, and we had feared the worst.
His eyes locked onto mine, the unspoken question hanging heavy in the air. He wanted to know if I had seen the others – Kevin and Emily. His mother’s eyes filled with tears, and I struggled to find the right words. Haltingly, I murmured, “They’re in a better place now.” His expression twisted into confusion as he recounted how his friends had visited him in the hospital, how they had exited through the window. Terror clawed at my insides as I struggled to explain the truth.
The doctors could never definitively explain what my cousin had experienced. Whether it was the product of his head injury or an eerie glimpse into a supernatural realm, the mystery of his vanishing companions would forever linger, haunting our thoughts and dreams.