The Witch

This happened more than 14 years ago.

One night without warning, between 1.00 and 2.00 am, the source of my darkest fears  – the demon itself which had haunted and pursued me throughout my entire childhood and adolescence – returned with a vengeance and ripped me out of my body within seconds of me lying down in bed.

I was completely sober and fully conscious. The only way it can be described at this point is as a hurricane-like silent wind that was at one with the darkness.

I was aware of the time because the bed had no headboard and during the struggle I was able to force my head back over the edge, putting my upside-down vision into line with the clock on the video recorder.

Every time I managed to fight my way back into my body (an enormous struggle of to-ing and fro-ing which lasted about 15 or 20 minutes) I would check on the time in a desperate attempt to keep a grip on the waking world; on ‘reality’.

At a certain point the force proved too strong and I found myself blown against a corner of the ceiling, looking down at my own body and that of my (then) boyfriend. The ‘witch’.