I have a ghost haunting me

Yukta Parikh
June 06, 2025

I began writing this piece in April. I put it aside because school and life got in the way, but I came back to it at the end of May. Another piece I wrote, The Wound That Never Heals, inspired parts of this one. I also may have listened to Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve by Taylor Swift while writing this. However, it is heavily inspired by my recent feelings about trauma. It follows you around until you can finally look it in the face, and even then, it doesn’t necessarily leave you alone.

Finally starting to break free of my writer’s block!! Hope you like this one!

I have a ghost haunting me. I see her shadows following me down the street, she watches me at night when I can’t fall asleep, sometimes I catch her staring back at me in the mirror. She’s not evil, I don’t think, but she’s angry. She’s waiting for me to do something. Waiting for me to acknowledge that she exists, but I can’t meet her eyes. I turn the other way, pull the covers over my head, and turn the lights off. Anything to pretend that nothing caught my eye, pretend I don’t see her throwing the books off my shelf or slamming the door shut.

How do you ignore a ghost? Google says I should ask her to leave and leave me alone. I don’t want to face her, I don’t want to talk to her. Maybe a part of me wants her to stick around.

“I have a ghost haunting me, that’s why I’m crazy,” I tell people.

Without her, I’ll have to face the possibility that maybe there is something seriously wrong in my head. With no one to blame, I’m the one the dart is hitting. I am the only one left to blame for the things I didn’t fix.

It’s easier to have a shadow following me down the street, watching me when I can’t fall asleep, and staring back at me in the mirror than to face myself. Maybe I can ignore her for the rest of my life, it can’t be that bad to be haunted. Just move from place to place and accept that this is my reality. I will inconvenience myself so completely and deeply just to avoid that, at the root of the problem is me. I can’t fix myself, so how could I fix this?

I’d rather be haunted by a ghost for the rest of my life. I’ll run and I’ll run, hide from her the best I can. For all I know, she’ll find me wherever I end up. I’ll learn to live with her, I’ll find the type of peace that could be taken from me at any time.

I can’t imagine a reality where she doesn’t exist. I find comfort in her presence because at least she went through it all with me. It’s easier to see it that way than to accept that it was I alone who went through the things that no one should have to go through.

Sometimes in a quiet moment, I think maybe I don’t want to be haunted, but it’s the price I have to pay. I’ll lock her in the closet and bury the memories deep, but they’ll just keep coming back. They say you can get rid of ghosts, but what if I’m haunted for the rest of my life? What if I can never close that tomb? What if I can never move on, and that girl haunting me is who I’ll be forever?

I have a ghost haunting me. Her shadows are growing longer, she’s looking at me from the shadows in my room, and there’s a pit in my stomach now. I catch her staring back at me in the mirror, and I don’t look away this time.