The Unreflecting Orbs

I’ve always prided myself on my skepticism. Ghost stories, spectral apparitions, the eerie tales my friends swore were true—I dismissed them all as products of overactive imaginations. But there exists a truth beyond the veil of our senses, and I know it because of what happened when I was eleven.

It was a sweltering summer night in the small town of Marrow, where the old houses leaned against each other like weary travelers. I shared a room with my two sisters in a creaky Victorian that had seen better centuries. That particular evening, my parents were hosting a small gathering, and the house buzzed with muted laughter and clinking glasses. My younger brother was at our grandmother’s, and my eldest sister had gone to a sleepover, leaving just my middle sister, Clara, and me in our room, with its peeling wallpaper and a window that always stuck when you tried to open it.

We went to bed early, the oppressive heat making sleep a welcome escape. I remember drifting off to the sound of crickets and the distant murmur of adult voices. The next thing I knew, I was in that twilight state between sleep and wakefulness—aware but not quite grounded. My eyes might have been closed, or open; I couldn’t tell. The room was dark, but not pitch black; a faint glow from the streetlight filtered through the thin curtains.

And then I saw them.

Three bubbles of white light, each about the size of a basketball, floated into the room from the direction of the closed door. They moved with a languid, unhurried grace, weaving through the air as if they were following an invisible current. The strangest part was their light—it was brilliant, almost blinding, yet it cast no shadows, no reflections on the walls or furniture. The glow just ended at their edges, as if they were portals to a world of pure luminance. I felt no heat, no cold, just a deep, ancient presence.

My heart pounded, but I couldn’t move. I tried to call out to Clara, but my voice was trapped in my throat. The orbs drifted closer, hovering near the foot of my bed, then circled around, passing through the wall as if it were air. They moved to the corner where Clara slept, and for a moment, they paused. I thought they might be watching her, observing us with a curiosity that felt both alien and familiar.

Then, just as suddenly as they had appeared, they glided toward the window and vanished through the glass, leaving the room in ordinary darkness. I lay there, trembling, until dawn broke. When I finally managed to stir, I saw Clara sitting up in her bed, her eyes wide and fixed on the empty wall where the lights had been. She whispered, ‘Did you see them too?’

We tried to tell our parents, but they laughed it off, saying we must have dreamed it, probably from eating too much cheese before bed. But Clara and I knew what we saw. We tried to find explanations: headlights from a car, a trick of the moonlight, even some kind of swamp gas. But none of them fit. The lights had no reflection, no source, and they moved with a will of their own.

Over the years, I never told anyone else about the incident. I buried it deep, rationalizing that perhaps my young mind had fabricated a vivid dream. But then, last summer, I was cleaning out the attic of my childhood home, which was being sold after my parents’ passing. In a forgotten box, I found an old journal belonging to my grandmother. She had passed away years before, but I’d never read her writings. Curious, I opened it and found a section titled ‘The Visitors.’

With a chill that had nothing to do with the attic’s cold, I read her account. She wrote of three pale globes that appeared in her bedroom when she was a child, in a house across town. They circled her bed, and she felt a profound sense of peace, as if they were guardians from another realm. She noted their light didn’t touch the walls, and they vanished through the window, leaving a faint hum in her ears that lasted for days.

I knew then that what I saw was not a fluke. These orbs were real, and they’ve been visiting my family for generations, perhaps drawn to something in our lineage. I’ve since looked into old town records and found similar accounts from other families, all describing the same unreflecting lights. Some call them angels, others ghosts, but I prefer to think of them as travelers between worlds, giving us a glimpse of the infinite.

Now, when I hear ghost stories, I don’t dismiss them entirely. I listen, because I know that our world is a thin skin over something far more mysterious. And sometimes, if you’re lucky—or unlucky—you catch a glimpse of what lies beneath. I’ve started to keep a journal, just like my grandmother, hoping that one day, I’ll understand what those orbs were and why they chose us.

But sometimes, late at night, when I’m alone in my room, I swear I can still see them, faintly, at the edge of my vision—three points of light that never reflect, only exist, waiting to pull me into their silent, luminous embrace.