Bump in the Night.

My husband (Justin) sees ghosts in the night.

It is a wonder when I am able to fall asleep, and it is a miracle when I stay asleep. In our first months of marriage Justin tried desperately to ensure that I wouldn't insist on separate rooms. He read to me, sometimes for hours. He switched lamps so turning off the lamp wouldn't make as much noise. He would turn off the lamp and then sit still to make sure I was still asleep, then slither into sleeping position. He would lay there listening to my breathing. It was clear that in his awake hours he did everything in his power to help me sleep, but as soon as he fell asleep he would toss and talk for most of the night. We were making it work, but there were mornings that I would try to convince him that it would be romantic to have separate beds, because I didn't have much hope of talking him into separate bedrooms.

We had just celebrated three months of marriage when I found out that not only did Justin toss and talk, but he saw ghosts in the night. We had done our Justin-sacrifices-all-to-get-Brecken-to-sleep, and I was asleep, and stayed asleep. But, I woke up to my husband springing out of bed and slamming the door shut. Fully awake I asked him what was wrong, and he told me urgently in a stage whisper that "there were people in the apartment." As he was grabbing a sweatshirt to wrap around his waist, I was making a list of all the things I would miss when they were stolen and cursing the fact that we didn't have renter's insurance, and hadn't complained enough about the wimpy front door.

He creaked our bedroom door back open, and reached to close the pocket door that divided the great room from the short hallway to the bedroom and bathroom. He inched his way closer to the opening of the pocket door as the opening got smaller and smaller, then peeked his head through the now three inch opening. He then shut the pocket door all the way, and crept back into the bed room, promptly shutting that door. He put the sweatshirt back in the pile he got it from, and crawled back into bed.

I was a little worried that that was the extent of the protection he was going to provide, so I asked him what was happening. He told me very clearly that it was fine, adding, "they won't bother us." He got comfortable and promptly started snoring. I laid awake, scared of what I would find in the morning, terrified that they would change their mind and bother us.

When Justin woke up a 6 hours later I asked him how he could sleep after such a scary thing. He looked and me, with inquisitive eyes and said, "What scary thing?"

Now we are approaching 5 years of marriage, and I can't even count how many ghosts have woken me up in the middle of the night through my husband's awareness of them. There have been women, men, blurs, shimmers. There have been polite ghosts that Justin tells what they can and can't have. There have been evil ghosts that he desperately tries to expel.

Sometimes Justin remembers them in the morning, those are the ones that stick around for more than one night.

October's Write-Away contest's subject is "Ghosts." You have until October 22 to enter if you'd like to join the fun.

Addendum: There has been question of the truthfulness of this story. It is true, all the way true, I'm a creative genius, but not when it comes to making things up.