A Child’s Dream of Death 

Pert Manhattan secretary- Janet Falk never will forget the frightening dream she had on New Year’s Eve 1959. She was 10 years old and living with her parents Helen and William Falk in Jackson Heights, N.Y. Even today when she recounts the dream she feels the anguish she experienced that night.

On the last day of 1959 several inches of snow had fallen. Janet spent the whole day eagerly anticipating an evening visit from her favorite cousin, Joey Falk, whom she hadn’t seen for a long time. Joey was 12 years older than she but there always had been a warm bond of affection between them. His visits were something she looked forward to.

Joey finally arrived with his friend, Larry Moss, and during the happy family dinner he told them of his and Larry’s plans to go into business early in 1960. Because it was New Year’s Eve Janet was allowed to stay up later than usual; not until 10:30 P.M., after Joey had left, did she retire for the night. Exhausted by the excitement and the long day she fell asleep quickly and immediately began to dream.

She seemed to be a passenger in the back seat of a large car, engulfed in darkness. Then slowly everything started to clear and, as if she were a spectator at a stage performance, she saw two men in front of her, one behind the steering wheel. Both men were peering intently ahead, trying to pierce the darkness. Gradually she became

aware of lights flickering through the windows and the swish of passing automobiles — although she felt no movement. Then she could hear the two men talking.

“It’s so slippery I feel as if the car is trying to get away from me,” said the man behind the wheel. His voice had a familiar ring but Janet couldn’t place it. The man spoke softly and she could see only the back of his head silhouetted in the dark.

“Fog’s getting thicker,” his companion remarked.

“Is that an intersection up ahead? Can you make it out?” asked the first voice.

The man on the right leaned forward to peer through the windshield but his answer never came. The car had started to slow down but then suddenly skidded, smashing hard into the back of a car ahead. As the driver struggled with the steering wheel the car veered wildly,  tires screeching, and with a great rending noise crashed against a pole.

The left front door flew open and almost simultaneously the seat behind the wheel was vacant. Then frightening sounds filled the air. The second man, his head flung back, screamed with pain.

“My legs, my legs. I can’t move my legs. I’m stuck. Oh, God! Help me,” he cried loudly, thrashing from side to side in a vain effort to free himself.

Janet now found herself standing outside the car, still a spectator. Slowly she moved forward until she stood over the inert figure of the driver. He lay on the snow-covered ground a little distance from the car, his arms outstretched and one leg twisted incongruously behind his body.

Inexplicably in the pitch-dark night the scene seemed illuminated as if by a spotlight. Janet could see everything clearly — the look of horror in the man’s unseeing eyes, his mouth agape as if in the middle of a cry.

Then Janet screamed — again and again, as only a child can. It was cousin Joey she was staring at and she knew he was dead!

When Janet’s mother rushed into the room she found the child sitting up in bed, eyes tightly shut, still screaming. Janet leaned against her mother, sobbing uncontrollably.

“Mommy, Mommy, Joey’s hurt. I think he’s dead.”

“No, no, darling. You were having a nightmare,” her mother soothed. “Joey was perfectly all right when he left here a little while ago. You were dreaming.”

“No, I wasn’t,” Janet insisted. “I saw it. I was there in the car

with him. There was another man there too and he was screaming about his legs and Joey was on the ground and he wasn’t moving.”

With her mother watching over her Janet finally went back to sleep, to toss nervously until morning. She had been up about an hour that New Year’s Day when the telephone rang. Joey’s sister Peggy, in a state of hysteria, was calling. It was hard to make out what she was saying but finally Janet’s mother put the pieces together.

Joey had been killed about midnight in an automobile accident on his way home to Yonkers. Peggy’s description of the accident matched Janet’s dream in every detail. The fatal accident had occurred near an intersection. On the slippery road Joey’s car had skidded into the car in front, veered off the road and crashed into a pole. Joey had been thrown from the car and in the fall his neck had been broken. Larry Moss, the man with him, had been found in the car, his legs pinned in the wreckage.

The accident had happened in real life exactly as Janet Falk had seen it in her dream. Was it actually a dream? Or in some mysterious way was Janet at the scene of the accident as it was happening?