Case #2 The Voice

  -Are you familiar with the vanishing hitch-hiker? Or Phantom passengers? What would YOU do if you heard a voice within your car from a passenger that wasn't there?
   "When I was a kid my parents brought me to church every weekend, even though I have never really been a believer. By the time I was a teen and had bought my first car, I was allowed to stop attending with my family. Coincidentally, the road I had to take to visit my high school boyfriend went right past my family's small church, where it sat on a corner with a stoplight. My dad, hesitant to let me go completely to the dark side, bought me a dangly little air freshener for my mirror that said, "Never drive faster than your guardian angel can fly." One day when I was 17 while I was driving along this road I'd ridden and driven along hundreds of times, I reached that corner, and was looking at the little Church when the light turned yellow right at that perfect distance where you could gun it and make the light, or slam on your brakes and stop. My brain deliberated for a moment, taking into account that the roads so far had been completely empty and there was no one else around. Right as I'd decided to just go for it, I heard a voice in my backseat as clear as if a person were sitting there say forcefully, "NO. STOP." It scared me so bad I instinctively slammed on my brakes. Just as the little angel air freshener swung forward and smacked against my windshield, a huge Ford 2-ton truck ran his red light and crossed right in front of me. I was in a tiny Hyundai hatchback. If I had gone for that yellow light, it would have t-boned me right in the driver's side door. I sat there in my empty car, waiting for the light to change, staring at my little childhood church. This one incident kept me agnostic for another decade." -Mikayla W.