• The world around us is constantly changing; the smart ones notice, and change with it, the foolish ones act as if nothing is happening, and do nothing, the naive ones deny is, and refuse to change at all, the truly conscience ones see what is happening, and try to at least steer it a bit. I was one only smart, and changed with it, but something happened, and now I am conscience. Who knew that just one couch could tell such a story, one of so much sadness, and hatred. I would’ve never guessed had I not started seeing those dreams again. When I was a child I used to have dreams that seemed so real, of people from so long ago, these dreams would wake me in a fright, I didn’t like seeing those kinds of things. They weren’t always scary, but to such a young child they did not make me feel right. I used to ask others if they ever had dreams like that, but they didn’t, so I stopped talking about it, hoping it would go away. When I reached my fourteenth birthday they slowly went away, but by then I had grown used to them, so I felt lost without them. It was around that time that I began to have trouble sleeping, I couldn’t seem to do anything without those dreams flowing through me. My father once said that I wasn’t dreaming, I was hearing, people were telling me their stories from long ago, and I could hear them, so my mind painted a picture of what I was hearing. He said that when I was awake I had to listen to so many other things that I could not hear them, but when I was asleep my mind was empty, so they whispered to me, and I heard clearly.

    I missed those voices so much after I lost them, I guess the saying is true, you truly never know what you have until it’s gone. I spent the rest of my life with a sleeping problem, doctors gave me medication but it never worked. I didn’t know what to do with myself outside of keep so busy that I had to go home exhausted every night so that I could sleep well. I decided to go to college and find a major that I loved, but I found nothing. I had only one option left by the time I used up all of my scholarships, I could take a police class and go into the line of duty. I passed with high honors as always, top of my class. Soon after I went to work I got an offer to be a detective, and of course, I took it. Though most would think that led to my investigating the case that brought back my gift, it didn’t. The case I investigated brought me no money or reward, I did it just to stop the dreams, they were the most horrific things I’d ever scene. It started after I met Calvin Fink, the man who owned half of show business in this city. He was rich, young, handsome, and everything else a woman wanted in a man. Calvin happened to be in the process of buying a museum dedicated to the good old days of the stage, and I happened to love this museum. I knew if he bought it it’d be turned into some cheap bar or studio, but this was the last place in the city that even remembered the past. We all seemed to keep trying to move forward and forget the past, which was why we seemed to make the same mistakes as they did.

    I went for what was supposed to be the museums last day, of course, because I’d gone there for so long I got in free. The owner loved me, and wished I would’ve bought it and kept it going, but I didn’t have the money to keep a dead horse running. I remember my favorite room in that place, the room dedicated to the last group to ever play there, two of them died in this place, the other one, well, she went crazy looking for something left by the other two, and eventually died because of it. In the room there were the two girl’s dresses - they were twin sisters, the only way to tell them apart was their eyes – and the man’s suit, there was the things they used to perform, there was a couch that they lounged on, and the infamous chest were they kept all the things they stole from the crowd. There were no actual pictures of them out in the museum, so I imagined them as I liked. I remember the owner telling me stories of them, the two sisters were very gifted dancers, both beautiful as could be, and the man, he was a con man, handsome and smart, and in every way a gentleman, until he saw something he wanted. They performed many kinds of acts, sometimes just dancing, sometimes magic shows, and other times they did plays. They were big, until one of the sisters decided she didn’t like working with them and got ride of them. It was said that right before the man died he told the sister that he his a great treasure from her, one that only he and the other sister knew of, and she would never find it for as long as she lived, he told her it would drive her crazy, and it did.

    It was stories like that that made me love this place; it was so full of history. I walked over to the couch and touched it; it was covered in dust from so many years of being unused and unmanaged. As I walked across the room a man fell from above, you could hear the crack of his bones. I ran over to check on him, but he was already dead, I looked up and all I saw were three men with terrified looks on there faces. I looked back down at the body and screamed up “Hold it right there you three!” Not a single one of them moved, I got up to them and they were still looking down terrified. I could see they didn’t know what happened. I took them all down stairs after calling an ambulance to come and pick up the body. Questioning people was the easy part, putting together the pieces wasn’t, I asked all three men what happened, and all said the same thing ‘I don’t really know.’ When it came to Mr. Fink, well, he seemed the most startled by what had happened. According to his story, all four of them went up there to check out the rest of the building, when the got on one of the cat walks the felt something weird, suddenly the man just fell over the side. No one knew what had happened, one second they were all safely up there, the next a man was dead on the first floor. Calvin Fink explained that the man had been standing right next to him when he had fallen off, but he didn’t see anything unusual. All he remembered seeing was a light flicker above, then he heard a scream and a loud thud, he looked down and his associate was dead.

    The other men explained that there was no real way he could have fallen over the side, because the side paneling – unlike in a normal theater – was covers with metal sheets and went up to about the stomach area, so unless he threw himself off, someone or something had to have pushed him. I looked over the body again, if you looked at the face close enough, you could almost see a face of surprise, as if he didn’t realize he had fallen until he was near the floor. As a detective I was used to seeing all kinds of things, especially since I was in the homicide department, but this, this was something that gave me an eerie feeling. I spoke to the owner, who had apparently been close behind them, trying to lead them through the catwalks safely. He said that he watched the whole time, his eyes never left the four men, he saw what had happened. He refused to tell me until we were far away from the building. I agreed, we set a date to meet, and I warned him not to go back in or let anyone else in because it would ruin the crime scene. He swore that he wouldn’t let anyone near it, let alone in it. That night I fell asleep faster than I was used to. I suppose it was mostly do to the dreaming again, because that was the first night it happened. All I saw was a huge crowd of people, all dressed odd for modern times, but yet, not so far off, after all, this was probably only maybe thirty years before now. From the music in the background I was guessing that it was going to be a ballet, I looked over to see a man, handsome in every way, he turned and smiled at me.

    In a distant voice he said to me, “Don’t worry, I know you’re nervous because it’s your first night, but I’ve done this for years, I’ll make sure it goes well. Just concentrate on distracting the crowd and I’ll do the hard work, okay?”

    I didn’t know where the voice came from, but it was me apparently, “I know Daniel, but still, what if I don’t so well, I’ve never danced in front of such a crowd, it’s usually just a small group of children, nothing more. And my sister, she won’t be with me, she’ll be helping you, what will I do without her there to help me?” I sounded like I was about to cry by the end of that sentence.

    “You can’t keep depending on her Destiny, she won’t always be there, if it makes you uncomfortable, imagine that she’s there rooting for you. Until then, Fate is coming with me.” He was trying to be stern, but his voice held compassion for the scared young girl.

    I began to cry, well, at least I was pretty sure it was me, “But I don’t like dancing alone, it’s not fun. I’ve always had Fate next to me, even when daddy said she wasn’t allowed to dance with me because she made me look bad. Please, just for today, let her dance with me.”

    He wiped the tears off my face and kissed my forehead gently, “I’m sorry Destiny, but if I let you know I won’t be able to teach you to dance without her. Next time I’ll be up there with you, so for today, just do your best. Soon we’ll all be dancing together.”

    I awoke the next morning to find that I had slept without waking even once. The feeling of it reminded me of me childhood, I could tell it was no normal dream. I got ready for the day while playing it over and over in my head, I couldn’t understand what it meant, usually they told me something, but this one, it wasn’t enough to give me anything. It had been so long that I forgot how to pick up the subtle hints in the dreams that told me what I was looking for. I spent the whole day thinking about it, until finally I had to meet the owner of the museum after work. He wanted to meet me all the way across town at this little café that I’d never heard of, for some reason he was acting paranoid. I sat down, waiting for him to arrive; he came not long after, holding something under his left arm.

    “Hello Katie, it’s nice to see you, as always.” He smiled warmly.

    “It’s nice to see you too Mr. Jordan, but I need to talk to you about what happened yesterday.” The waiter came and set down a cup of coffee, then turned to Mr. Jordan and asked if he’d like some too.

    “I understand, but you see, I had to take this precaution first, so now I can tell you what I saw, and show you something else.” He stilled seemed skittish, even though he claimed he made us meet here as a precaution.

    “Well then, what did you see up in the catwalks when the man died? That is all I am worried about right now.”

    “Okay, I understand, right now this is business. Well, you see, do you remember those stories I told you about the last group to perform at that theater?” He asked before taking a sip of his own coffee that the waiter had left.

    “Yes, but that’s not the point right now, I need to talk about the man that fell off the catwalk. Please, tell me what you saw.” I was getting annoyed; he was avoiding talking about it.

    “But this has something to do with that. Okay, so when I told you those stories you were very young, so I left out many details about what truly happened. You see, up until now I didn’t think anything about those stories, but when Mr. Fink walked in I could sense something change in the building. I suddenly remembered one key thing, Fink was the last name of the man who worked with those women. No one knew if it was true, but it was said that he had a child with one, and because he feared for its life he gave it to a dear friend, and the friend kept the child’s full name in honor of his father. Daniel Fink, the man that worked with the women, was killed in that very building, by one of the sisters. I don’t know if Calvin Fink is his heir, but I do know that something happened up there. What I saw was this, I saw four men, one being Calvin Fink, standing on a catwalk, then something changed in the air, it seemed tense, you know that feeling right?” He looked at me for an answer, I nodded and let him continue. “Well I felt that, the other men just let it go, then one of the lights flickered, and something tried to life up Calvin and the other men with him, but he was protected by something else, as were the other men, all but one. So the man was lifted in the air and moved off the catwalk, then he fell. I was so terrified I could not speak. I was so afraid to stay in that building, I had to meet you as far a way from there, just to ensure both of us would be safe.” He looked at me to see if I was okay.

    “Are you saying that some type of ghost tried to kill Calvin Fink - who owns half the show business in this city - and all because his last name happens to match another man from what, thirty years ago, maybe more than that, Mr. Jordan , if someone’s keeping you from telling me what really happened, than please, give me a sign.” How could I believe something like that?

    I believed in many things in this world, but not that. I sat there staring at him, he seemed to be speechless, as if he expected me to be the only one that would believe him. What was I supposed to do, it was just beyond what I was used to. But something about it seemed to touch me, and then Mr. Jordan pulled out something from the back under his arm. “Look at this.” Was all he said to me.

    I looked at the picture, there were two women draped over each side of a man, I knew who he was, the man in my dreams, Daniel. I figured that the two one each side of him were Destiny and Fate. There was only one way to tell these two women apart, one hard hazel eyes that were mostly green, the other had bright green eyes that stood out. I looked at the picture, taking in every aspect of it. Something about it spoke to me, it told me that the one with bright green eyes was Destiny, the one I had dreamt of, and the other was Fate. So my dream did have a connection, if Mr. Jordan was telling the truth, then my dream was the biggest clue.