Thursday 20th of June 2002

Dear Diary,

A strange thing happened to me this week. No wait, not a thing. A strange someone. A man.

If I told anyone about it, they wouldn't believe me. Well, they would believe me, but they wouldn't think too much of it.

Not my mum. Not my boyfriend. But I do.

But I have to tell someone. I have to get this out somehow. So I decided to write it down in this diary.

It isn't really significant or anything. It's just a strange feeling I got.

Something was telling me I knew that man, but I know for sure I've never seen him before.

So I was walking down this street. About two days ago.

I was walking home, and I was walking down this street and there was this market-place.

At least, I think it was. It's really hard to remember.

Yes, it was a market-place.

And there were loads of people selling stuff and buying stuff, and stuff like that.

I wasn't really paying attention to where I was going, because I was eating some chips, and I was walking through the market-place, and that's where I saw him. The man I spoke of.

He was standing at the opposite side of the street, talking to some strange girl I did not recognise.

He was eating a banana like it was the best thing he had ever eaten.

I remember finding it weird that he was completely dressed in blue, but what I found even weirder, was the feeling that I knew him from somewhere before.

He felt familiar somehow, I can't explain it.

The girl left, but I just kept staring at that man. He stood there looking around the market-place.

I couldn't help it. I just knew there was something strange about that man, and I had to find out what.

So I didn't go home. I knew I was probably make my mum worry sick about me, but I just couldn't stop watching him.

So weird.

But I remember, just as I was thinking about my mum, there she was!

Walking down the market-place with more bags then she could handle.

I smiled, but the strangest thing was, that man was smiling too!

Did he know my mum? Did they know each other?

He seemed much younger than my mum, but it would explain why he feels so familiar.

But my mum didn't seem to recognise him. She walked right past him!

And he kept on smiling and smiling.

Until he looked straight at me. He looked straight into my eyes.

That was probably the scariest thing I've ever seen.

He stopped smiling and all colour faded away from his face.

He looked at me as if he saw a ghost...

I didn't know what to do. What to say. He just kept staring at me. And I just kept staring at him.

We both seemed to turn into statues or something.

And it seemed to last forever. Like...like time stopped at that moment.

It seemed hours had gone by before we finally did stop looking at each other.

That girl suddenly returned, carrying groceries and grabbing his hand, taking him away.

That was really weird.

I watched them both leave the market-place together, walking side by side into an empty alley-way.

A part of me wanted to follow them, and I eventually did try, but my mum suddenly caught up with me and made me help her carry her bags.

Who was that man?

Why did he seem so familiar?

I asked mum if she'd recognised that man, but she said she doesn't know who I'm talking about.

I wish I knew. I wish I could've followed them into that alley-way. A part of me still hates mum for making me unable to do that.

But I could've sworn I saw that man looking over his shoulder at me, before he dissapeared into that allley-way.

I wonder:

Did he know who I was? Did he know me?

And what was that weird sound I heard faintly in the background as I was talking to my mum in the marketplace?

This was so weird...

I'll probably never get to find out who that man was.

Will I?