During the time I lived in Seattle, I once attended a book signing at a local bookstore for an author who wrote about the paranormal. I remember she responded to a question from the audience that pertained to the subject of spirits in her presentation. In her response, she offered a few spiritual, countermeasures for eliminating unwanted entities. One that remained in my memory was her instruction to speak to the spirits directly. In addition, she also mentioned that lighting a candle blessed the area and intensified the communication process. She described in detail a bit more of the process, but the only portion I could recall was those two simple rules. Talk to the spirits and light a candle. So, the next time I heard the crying, I lit a candle and began to speak to the spirit of the baby that resided in my aunt’s house.
I was sitting in the living room watching television when suddenly, once more the crying started up. I turned off the television, and got up off my chair and lit the candle that I had placed on my coffee table. I was anticipating the opportunity to do this, so I was ready. I was eager to communicate with the spirit. Surprisingly, I was not the least bit scared. After all, it was only a baby. After lighting the candle, I said, “Please, whoever you are, I want you to leave this house and be at peace. I don’t want you to stay around and cry like you have been doing. So, please go and find the peace you need. I do not like hearing your crying, please leave my house, and find your mother.” I also said a few more things that I can’t remember, but those were the majority of my words. The crying seemed to end right after I spoke. I let the candle burn for the remainder of the evening and then I settled into bed for the night.
From my bedroom, I could see the small shadows dance about the wall in my hallway that were created by the somber, flickering flame. I had not heard any further crying since I had stated my concerns to the spirit earlier in the day. I personally felt a peace come over myself and within the house. I slept soundly throughout that night except for the time very early that morning when I had a dream that was so vivid and realistic, I found it difficult to imagine it as being only just a dream.
In this dream, I found myself walking into a large room that was painted white, and was so brightly bathed in a bright light that I had to squint. As I entered the room I spotted a woman who was seated in a chair with her back to me. As I approached her, I immediately saw that it was my Aunt Billie! Her head was bowed down, looking at the newborn baby in her arms. My aunt’s hair was long and draped around her shoulders. It was not at all as I remembered her customarily wearing it, in a tight bun. She seemed relaxed and had a loving smile on her face. She also looked to be so very, very young. I would guess her to be in her mid-20s. There were no words exchanged between us. I tried to speak, but I was unable to form a sentence, not even a single word. We simply looked into each other’s eyes, and that seemed to be enough.
Within just a minute, my aunt stood up off her chair and turned to her side, displaying the newborn to me proudly. This act indicated to me how much love there was between her and the baby. I instinctively reached out to hold the baby in my arms, but immediately, somehow I knew that I could not, so I returned my arms to my side. As soon as I did this, I awoke from my dream. It was all that sudden.
After I awoke that morning, the crying baby sounds never returned. I knew that my attempt to communicate with the spirit, and lighting the candle triggered some sort of cleansing that cleared my house of that poor innocent baby’s anguished soul. My dream sealed these thoughts for me, and I was so happy to know that my aunt’s spirit was also helping me get through this. I was very happy to have dreamed such a beautiful dream about my aunt and the baby in her arms.
A few months later, as the weather warmed up a bit, I decided to bring from the garage, into the house, one of Aunt Billie’s cardboard boxes. I wanted to finally search through my aunt’s personal papers, and whatever else she might have stored. There were about 10 boxes and two big, old trunks. I decided to leave the trunks for last.
Aunt Billie with “Freddie” during the winter of 1941.
I discovered a few surprises such as photos of relatives, and an old photo of my aunt, my uncle and my mother, which was taken in the year 1910. I also found a hand-beaded necklace, and two pewter spoons that belonged to my great-grandmother. There were linens, Christmas cards and a collection of small hats, and other non- valuables, but that was about it. It was not until I decided to open the remaining locked trunks that things got very interesting indeed.
Because they were so heavy, and I was not able to carry them into the house, I took a folding chair into the garage and seated myself before the first trunk. I looked all over for the keys, but was unable to find them. I asked an older gentleman friend of my aunt’s who lived nearby to help me open both the trunks. He used a large screwdriver and hammer, and after spending a few minutes, he eventually opened them both.
While attempting to open the second trunk, the poor man missed hitting the screwdriver and accidentally struck his hand, breaking his skin, which caused a nasty cut. Because he was taking a prescribed blood thinner, he bled quite a bit on the cement floor.
It wasn’t a serious wound, but it did need attention. So, he left me and returned to his home to clean the wound. After cleaning up the spots of blood on the cement floor, I sat myself by the first trunk and began my discovery of what other items my aunt had stored.
The first trunk contained papers, mostly cancelled checks and additionally included a beautiful quilt. The quilt was unusable because it was damaged from mouse droppings and moldy spots. The trunk also contained a large tin box that was filled with Christmas ornaments. That was the extent of its contents. Now the other trunk was next in line.
As soon as I opened its lid, I knew that this trunk’s purpose was for much more important items. The small boxes it contained were stacked neatly and my aunt had taken great care by stuffing wadded newspaper between them, in order to secure them from movement. Slowly, I opened the first box and discovered letters that were typewritten from a hospital in Kansas City, detailing its cost for services rendered. The invoices were made out to my aunt, and were marked ‘paid in full’.
One box contained a baby rattle and blanket. Another box contained the most surprising items of all. As I opened its lid, I found placed on top of it a small stack of invoices, a four-by-five-inch picture of an infant who appeared to be asleep on a large white pillow. I picked the picture up and turned it over, on the back my aunt had written in pencil the words, ‘My precious, Elizabeth Lavender Owen. Age 11 days. Mother’s dove and life.’ My jaw dropped wide open!
The papers that the picture rested upon, I discovered, were paid invoices describing funeral and cemetery services rendered from a funeral home and cemetery in Kansas City. My heart was broken. I must have cried and cried for a full hour. I was emotionally on the verge of collapsing. Everything was now making such sad sense to me. My dear aunt had gotten pregnant out of wedlock, then moved out of state, to Kansas City, to give birth to a child she would eventually lose to a very early death. I was devastated. Although I was so sad, I could only imagine how terrible of a time it must have been for my Aunt Billie, to have to deal with this difficult situation on her own, so many years ago and in secret. It must have been an awful period for her.
Then, as I was trying to process it all, the realization of hearing the crying sounds, and the dream I dreamt, hit me like a ton of bricks. I now knew the meaning of my experiences at my aunt’s house. There was a reason for it all. I believe it was a divine reason. I believed that when, and only when, I would discover the truth behind my aunt’s hidden life, would be the moment she, her daughter, the cousin I never knew, would achieve a final peace.