The Friend of the Family

Prologue

“Dear child, be not afraid.” So it begins with a voice that is melodious and comforting—a dream in shades of blue and eerie light.

Visitors of fantastic forms and faces descend a staircase invisible, with the moon above and stars diamonding the darkness all around.

In the waking world, some of these people would be thought beautiful, others horrific, though to me, the sleeper, they are equal to one another and no more or less than enchanting.

They descend into my room and gather around my bed.

Although I have not once awakened, I have been aware of them arriving.

No fear troubles me when, one at a time, they enter my mind as if passing through a door.

Each succinctly tells me of his or her life with powerful images and emotions that require no words to convey deep understanding.

Although they come to me in a dream, they are not figments of my imagination.

They are people as real as I am. They are not just the Ghosts of Christmas Past but of all the ages of mankind, outcasts like me, having come out of time immemorial to comfort me, to say in essence, “Yes, I know.”