I have only just found this sub but this story fits perfectly.
Almost two decades ago I embarked on my adult life, leaving home, moving to another country and taking a job that I had no idea if I could even do. Granted, that makes it sound like I travelled the length of a continent. I went from North West England to West Coast Ireland. A flight of an hour.
17 year old me, lands in Ireland to realise the airport busses are on strike, fortunately, Linda, the lovely lady who happened to be sat next to me on the plane, and also happened to share a few of her homemade shortbread, saw me waiting at essentially an abandoned bus stop and gave me a lift.
I flew from Manchester to Knock, and had to travel to Westport, Co Mayo.
Linda, bless her, had her husband drive about half an hour out of their way to drop me in Castlebar so I could make my bus from there to westport. They even dropped me at the bus stop I needed for my onward journey.
Given that they had driven me, and I didn't take the bus like I had originally planned, I had some time to kill, so I walked up the street and found a newsagents so I could buy some tobacco. A pub was my next port of call.
I made my way in to the newsagents, put my rucksack down in the corner by the door and went to the till to buy my tobacco. The news agent noticed my foreign accent and made conversation. We chatted for maybe three or four minutes in the shop until he asked "how long have you been in the country and have you had a pint yet?" To which I replied "less than an hour, and that's my next stop".
The shopkeeper told me to hand him my bag, leave the shop, take a left, take another left into the alley and three quarters of the way down I'd find a green door that is about half the size of a normal door. It looks like a cellar loading door, he told me.
I questioned this, and he reassured me everything was fine. Anyhow, eventually, I decided to go for it, gave him my rucksack, went out into the alley and did in fact find the green door.
Once I made my way in, it was like the newsagents, but the exact reverse, except this was a pub. Hidden away in the back of a paper shop.
By the time I had gotten inside, the shop keeper was now a bar keeper and was on this side of his weird bar /shop mirror thing.
He poured us each a pint of Guinness, and left them on the bar to settle then immediately started pouring two more. "For future us", he said.
We had a couple pints, smoked a few cigarettes, had a great chat and a bit of a laugh, and I eventually made my way back round to the shop, got my bag then made my way to the bus and continued my journey.
I'll be honest, I thought this whole thing was surreal and really rather amusing. After that, I kind of forgot about it. I was with 30 new colleagues, zero of whom I'd met before, and started a brand new job.
It was only months later, after travelling home briefly, I returned to Ireland, into the same airport to make the same onward journey and decided to go and buy some tobacco and maybe sneak in a quick pint on my way back.
This is where it gets weird. This is where I realise the glitch.
The newsagents didn't exist any more. The building it was in didn't exist. There was no alley way. Even the road with the bus stops on it seemed different, but I couldn't figure it out.
I asked a local what happened to the newsagents that was here. He looked bemused and said "I'm sorry, son, but this has always been a bank".
Now i was bemused. I walked around that town, honestly, for about an hour.
I have returned since. Nothing.
I have spoken to people that lived there. Nothing.
I have told this story to colleagues and friends, many of whom have even been to or stayed in Castlebar. Nothing.
No one seems to have any idea what I'm talking about. None of it seems familiar to anyone, but I remember it clear as day.
I remember smoking my last cigarette at the bus stop looking up towards the T junction where the newsagents was.
I remember speaking to the shop/barman, I remember finding the green door. I remember being amazed this dude had built a tiny bar in the back of his newsagents. I remember how he let me smoke in there I remember all of it.
But apparently, that shop has never existed. There has never been a green door in an alley. There has never even been the alley to begin with.
But, I'm certain. It happened.