CBC - Origins

Kim Barrett  (by: pioneerwoman ©07/2005)

I went to work as a consultant for a firm that specialized in advising businesses on how to be more efficient. It suited me and I enjoyed it a great deal. Upon reflection, I suppose I enjoyed it a bit too much. I was very adept at my job and our firm became very successful. Years passed and I lived for my job.

Then one night, I stayed late at the office and I must have fallen asleep at my desk. I had a dream in which this fellow...or ghost, if you will…walked into my office and took me by the hand. He led me through a door that hadn’t been there earlier and I was suddenly back in my days at the moccasin factory. He showed me things I had done to get ahead that were a bit unscrupulous. He asked me if I remembered being that young man, and of course I told him that I did.

He led me out of the old plant and back into the firm I worked for. But instead of taking me to my office, he took me to the break room and I realized that no one there could see or hear me. I listened to what they were saying. They were speaking of a stingy old man who thought only of himself and treated his employees like slaves. I found myself feeling empathy for these people and wondering who this wicked man was they were speaking of. Then my host told me they were speaking of me.

My host took me through another door and we were outside standing on a lonely hill. I realized that we were in a cemetery and that there was a service being conducted. There was only one person standing there listening. When it was over and that man walked away I looked at the stone and it had my name on it. I looked up at my host and asked, "Am I dead? Does it have to be this way?"

He said, "You are not dead, but you and you alone have the power to prevent this ending. You are in control of your destiny. Choose wisely." Then he vanished and I was at my desk waking up with a terrible headache.

I packed up and went home thinking that I must have eaten something that caused me to have such a strange dream. The next day I was in my office when I heard my secretary speaking with a man and telling him that he was not welcome without an appointment. I heard him say, "Tell him his brother is here. He can choose to see me." A chill went down my spine and I went to the door to invite him in. It was Terry Thorne. He came in and told me this bizarre story about being my brother and how there was a place called Central and he wanted me to go live there with my brothers. I wouldn’t have even listened to him if it hadn’t been for that dream.

When I arrived here and looked in the mirror, I saw myself as a young man. Then, when I saw Sir Richard for the first time, I realized that he was the ‘ghost’ from my dream.