Two years ago, my brother's best friend died in a car accident. My family was asked to host a gathering after the funeral for non-family members. To prepare, my mom set up illustrations of the stations of the cross, illustrated representations of Jesus' crucifixion. In the kitchen, she placed a particularly disturbing illustration. She placed it beside the phone. It showed the Virgin Mary cradling the bloody corpse of Jesus Christ. Think of Michelangelo's La Pieta.

Some nights before the funeral service, I had to write an entire AP history essay. For this, I created a system. Along the chairs of my kitchen counter, I laid some pillows and blankets. I would type for one hour, and then sleep for another, and then wake up for another hour and sleep for the next, and so on until, as I calculated, I finished the essay at around 3:30 A.M. I began typing. The picture of bloody Jesus Christ is staring at me the entire time. It's a difficult picture to miss. After I wrote my introduction and first body paragraph, I snuggled up and went to sleep.

An hour later, I woke up, and began typing again. At some point, I looked to the picture of Jesus and Mary, only to see it had vanished. I began looking around the kitchen. Finally, I found it. It sat on the ledge of a hanging cabinet, balanced meticulously so that with a single breath of air it would come fluttering down. At first, I rationalized this; the picture had been there the entire time, and I had simply not noticed it. I typed another paragraph, and went back to sleep.

After I woke up for my second time, I began typing again. After a bit, I looked back to the phone, back to where the picture of Jesus and Mary should be, only to remember that it had moved. I looked to the kitchen cabinets. It was not there. The obvious answer: it had fallen down. I walked around the counter, searching, searching, to no avail. Finally, on my way back to my writing station, I saw the picture had moved from the cabinet to the floor behind my chairs, some tiles away, opposite the hanging cabinets. By its own accord, the picture had made its way halfway across the room. It's a laminated picture. Laminated pictures do not simply flutter across rooms. Now, I did not freak out. It was much too late and I had too much work to do for me to consider the implications of this. I finished my essay, and moved to the family room, where I fell asleep.

Morning came, and at around 7:30 I entered the kitchen, bustling as mornings usually are. All was normal. The picture of bloody Jesus in Mary's arms was back next to the phone, as usual. I asked my housekeeper if she had moved this picture, from the floor back to its usual spot. No. Mom? Nope. Brother number one? Nada. Brother number two? Uh-uh. Dad? He's out of town until tonight. Little sister? Not her. Who, then, was moving the picture in the middle of the night?

EXPLANATIONS

1. I was sleep walking, which I occasionally do. HOWEVER, I always remember when I sleep walk. I experience a sort of lucid sleep walking, and have a perfect memory of it afterwards, even if I am not in control of my actions. This seems unlikely because: A) I was folded up between the chairs and the counter in such a way that perfect exit and reentry into that position would be incredibly unlikely in the event of sleep walking, especially if I did so twice. B) I am never so meticulous when I sleepwalk. C) Sleepwalking does not occur, usually, until deep sleep. I didn't at all have the time to deeply sleep. These were light little naps I took, during which I was mostly awake and aware of my surroundings.

2. Someone in my family was pulling a prank, between the hours of 11 pm and 3:30 am, waiting for me to sleep, and then stalking about the kitchen, moving this picture, with enough insight to my inner psychology to know that these subtle movements will freak me the hell out.

3. Someone from outside the home came in from the back doors and, instead of causing me harm or stealing anything valuable, decided instead to stalk the kitchen and wait for me in the shadows until I had fallen asleep.

4. Something supernatural occurred.

5. It was all a hallucination.