Young gentleman

It should have been just another trip, you know. A trip in which we were going for those long walks in town or in the forest. A trip in which we were going to visit certain places, monuments and stuff like that. It's not like this kind of trip is boring or anything, but it's made on a certain schedule, so that you know what and when you are going to do. Yes, you can be surprised by the beauty of what you are going to see or by how much fun you're going to have, but we should never rule out the unexpected. Those things that you will always remember how and when they happened, because they impressed you so much, that they became some sort of permanent tattoo on your memory. And this kind of unexpected event is exactly the one that I want to recall right now.

Déjà vus are not things that I'm not used to. I've had many of them during the years and imagined how it would be like if I had already seen those things at a certain time in the future and then came back to the past and whispered in my ear what would happen. Yet I know this would never happen. Or at least not during my lifetime. But this surprising experience happened when I was a high school student. I had just finished my first year and went in a trip to celebrate the freedom of the summer holiday. You know kids and teens love that.

The place where my friends and I went was not one that we didn't know. We had been there before and decided to come again because we liked it a lot. It's an old town in the middle of the country. History says it was one of the most important town in the Middle Ages, where the rulers lived. So it was the capital back then. Nowadays the town is not necessarily spectacular. Most of the buildings look the same, the townsfolk is busy with the daily routine and most of the historical spirit has been destroyed by stupid or evil people who thought that politics is an excuse for erasing people's memories and turning them into soulless robots. Those bastards didn't destroy everything though. There are some places, things, monuments, that are so valuable and hold such a high energy, that they don't allow themselves to be destroyed.

My friends and I went in town to have fun. You know, drink a beer, eat a pizza and things like that. But suddenly one of my friends stopped next to the walls that were surrounding something. We had passed by that place many times, but never stopped to find out what was there. I went to him and said:
„Hey, what's up? Something interesting?”
He turned to me and said:
„There were no signs indicating this place.”
„Man, what place? It's just a... very old church surrounded by stone walls.”
OK, my reaction sounds a bit stupid and all, but I had just had a déjà vu. It was like I had had that conversation with my friend, Alex, before and had the revelation of that beautiful church. I called my other friends and told them that we should enter that monument.
„But there were no signs about it,” said Jen.
„There were no signs about the other monuments either,” Eric said to her. „And you know how famous are the other monuments.”
And so we, a bunch of curious kids who wanted to have fun, decided to visit this church.

Entering its garden we saw that the grass hadn't been cut in ages and it looked as though nobody was taking care of the place. We saw a couple of dead trees that nobody cut down and many wild flowers that were randomly growing. But the church looked so old and fascinating. How can such a place be left in such a state? We reached for the entrance and saw there was somebody there. Another tourist? No, it was an old lady who was obviously having serious health problems. But her face lightened up when she saw us. She was very excited that somebody came to visit the church and started talking about its history, although she could hardly speak.

It seems that the church, which is dated from the 14th Century, was built over the foundation of an even older church that existed two or three centuries before it and had been destroyed by foreign invaders. The church we were in had been the place where the kings from the Middle Ages were being crowned by metropolitans. It was really fascinating to find out all the things that old lady was telling us and it was also frustrating that such an important monument, which is full of history, isn't well known to the public.

But I didn't get to that surprising part. It was kinda supernatural, if you ask me. First of all, that place and those informations were very familiar to me, although the experience was new to me. As I said before, I had never been in that church and met that old woman. Yet most of the time she was looking at me as though she knew me. I'm not all that good-looking, you know, so it couldn't have been because she admired me or anything. More than that, she called me many times „young gentleman”, which is, of course, very polite, but it was as though I was the only one she was speaking to and recalling all those events. At one point the way she looked at me became very strange. It was like she was telling me „Please, young gentleman, remember all these informations! Remember me!” When I saw her eyes I felt chills down my spine. „Yes, young gentleman, you were here before,” her eyes were telling me. „We've met each other during those times. Please remember, young gentleman!”

To be honest, I really tried to, if there was everything to remember. Years have passed and I couldn't forget her words and the way she looked at me. The tone of her voice. Although I'm an imaginative person, I don't usually believe in the supernatural. But what if there really is something supernatural about this bond between me and that old lady? What if we had met there before, hundreds of years ago? I feel this is the case, no matter if some people will tell me I'm crazy. I know what I felt there. Every ow and then these words come through my mind - „Please remember, young gentleman!”