The Astral Pact

Four years back, I settled into a modest bungalow in the sleepy town of Millbrook, its streets lined with aging oaks and the kind of neighbors who waved but never pried. My closest friend became the elderly widow, Agnes, who lived two doors down. She was a sprightly woman with a penchant for herbal tea and tales of the supernatural. We bonded quickly, and she confided in me her ability to project her astral form at will—floating above her sleeping body, drifting through walls, and traversing the town as a silent observer. I admitted I had experienced odd out-of-body sensations but never managed to control them. With a grin, she proposed a pact: if either of us ever found ourselves free of our physical shell, we would seek out the other and explore the unseen world together. I laughed and agreed, dismissing it as harmless whimsy.

One Saturday in early autumn, I awoke from a strange dream. I was hurtling through a grey, swirling mist toward my bedroom window, drawn by a voice—Agnes’s voice, calling out, ‘Puppy! Is that you? Trisch! Puppy!’ She had nicknamed me that after my puppy-like enthusiasm. The dream felt hyper-real, and as I neared the glass, I could see the shape of a woman hovering just outside, her form translucent and glowing faintly. I reached out to touch the window, and in that instant, I snapped awake.

Sitting up in bed, my heart hammering, I felt an odd lightness. The room was bathed in pale morning light, but something was off—the perspective was askew. I looked down and saw my own body lying on the mattress, eyes closed, breathing slowly. I was floating near the ceiling, tethered by a silver thread that shimmered with an otherworldly sheen. Panic surged, but then I heard the voice again, clearer now, from beyond the wall: ‘Puppy, come on out! It’s a glorious day to fly!’

I willed myself toward the window, and to my astonishment, I passed through the glass as if it were water. The air outside was crisp, and light snow was falling, though it was unusually warm for the season. Agnes was there, her astral form aglow with a bluish luminescence. Her eyes sparkled with mischief as she took my spectral hand. ‘We did it, dear! Now let’s see the sights.’ She pulled me upward, and together we soared over the rooftops, the town shrinking below us. I felt a giddy freedom, laughing as we swept past church spires and over the frozen river that snaked through Millbrook.

We visited places Agnes said were ‘thin spots’—where the veil between worlds was weak. The old mill by the river was one, its wheel rotting and silent. As we hovered inside, Agnes pointed to a corner where a weeping figure was half-visible, its moans a low lament. ‘Don’t worry, they’re quite harmless,’ she assured me. Then we flew to the cemetery, where among the tombstones, a small child’s ghost played alone, chasing a spectral ball that vanished as she approached. Agnes smiled sadly and said, ‘His name is Tommy. He’s been here for fifty years, waiting for his mother.’ I felt a pang of melancholy, but Agnes’s warm presence was a comfort.

But as the morning wore on, I sensed a change in Agnes. Her glow flickered, and her face grew tense. ‘We must return now,’ she said abruptly. ‘I feel a pull—something is wrong.’ The silver thread that anchored me started to tug insistently. We raced back toward our houses, the world blurring around us. As we descended, I saw a commotion outside her house—an ambulance, red lights flashing. Agnes’s spectral form began to fade, her expression urgent. ‘Go back, Puppy! Go back to your body! And whatever you do, don’t answer the phone when it rings.’ Then she vanished, and I was plunged into darkness.

I woke in my bed, gasping, my physical heart pounding. Sunlight streamed through the window, and the clock read 9:15 AM. I stumbled to the window and saw paramedics wheeling a stretcher into the ambulance. A neighbor spotted me and called out, ‘Oh, honey! It’s Agnes. She had a heart attack in her sleep. They’re taking her to the hospital.’ A cold dread filled me. I grabbed my phone, ringing in my hand, and I saw the caller ID: ‘Agnes.’ I let it ring, remembering her warning. But the ringing persisted, and my curiosity clawed at me. On the third ring, I answered, unable to resist.

A voice hissed through the line, not Agnes’s voice, but a distorted, guttural whisper: ‘Puppy… why didn’t you come when I called? Now I’m stuck here… in this place… and you left me…’ The voice dissolved into static, and then the line went dead. I later learned that Agnes had died on the operating table for seven minutes before being revived. When she returned, she was different—her eyes vacant, her speech slurred, and she never spoke of astral travel again. But I knew, with a certainty that chilled me to the bone, that whatever answered the phone was not my friend. And sometimes, when I lie awake at night, I hear a faint tapping on my window, and a whisper, ‘Puppy, let me in.’