We’re in a flea market in Clayton, GA.
I’m walking down “Aisle D,” the shelves of which are stuffed with exactly the same kind of junk I saw on Aisles A, B, and C: VHS tapes of bad movies, boxy $25.00 televisions, tubes of salve, dusty plaques, broken Barbie dolls.
A broken tennis racquet, its strings a tangled mess, catches my eye — not because I want it, but because I’m certain I’ve seen it before. Not one like it, mind you … but this racquet, lying at this angle.
Suddenly, everything looks familiar: that perfume bottle, that broken frame, that tobacco tin, that silk flower. I’ve encountered these objects in this order before … but where?
I feel a gear in my head click into place, and, suddenly, I’m not just familiar with the objects along the aisle — I know what’s coming next. “The candle holder,” I say to myself … and there it is, under the flap of a cardboard box. “The magnifying glasses” … and there they are, twelve of them, sealed in shrink wrap. “The remote control” And there it is.
And then, out of nowhere, accompanied by a sense of profound dread, these words pop into my head: “The man with the bad skin.”
I look up, knowing exactly what I’ll see — and there he is, rounding the corner, coming my way. He is forty-five, maybe fifty. He has reddish-orange hair, going gray around the temples. He shuffles toward me, his head down, staring at the junk on the shelves.
Every inch of his exposed skin — his face, his bare arms, his legs from the thighs down — is covered with pea-sized bulges, blisters, and whiteheads. The flesh between each eruption is an angry red, making the blemishes stand out all the more.
He passes me by, and I catch myself standing there, waiting, convinced that this eerie sequence means something — that, at any moment, a shelf will collapse, or the roof will give way, or shots will ring out.
Nothing. Nothing happens.
I am standing in a flea market in Clayton, Georgia, my heart hammering in my ears.
UH I have had 4 episodes of deja vu with a profound sense of dread just today. It is awful and now I am afraid I these episodes will continue to happen. I called my neurologist (I have Parkinson’s disease) and he said I am having panic attacks and anxiety attacks about the “panic” attacks. All I know is that I hate this feeling and the experience scares me.
Sounds like a wonderful premise for a novel – or at least a short story!
Unbelievable! I too have Parkinson’s disease (young onset) and I have been having these terrible deja vu experiences with an awful sense of dread. During these “events” I speak to whomever I am with. After the experience, which forces me to sit down (in a chair, on the floor) and to crouch in a car or lie down on a bed until it passes…I ask the person I’m with what just happened and what was I saying. My husband freaks. During the first one, he could not get me to be coherent and rushed me to the ER where they said I had a TIA. He immediately called my neurologist at OSU (OH) and the neuro said it doesn’t sound like a TIA. So he took me to the university where additional tests were performed and I was OK. I have had some where all I do is repeat the words “deja vu” over and over again. I had one recently where I crouched on the floor of the kitchen, experiencing deja vu and dread. I asked my oldest sister if I “sucked on butter and ate grease when I was a kid”. Very strange. I called my neuro again and he said I am having panic attacks and anxiety attacks. This made no sense to me so I’ve been searching the Web and have found that these are exactly (as far as I can tell) what I am experiencing. He couldn’t give me any recommendations other than “rest”.