FRIGHTENED
--==A Ghostories Library==--

Adopt-A-Spirit
by Alec Logan Prentice

Late last summer(1996), my girlfriend, myself, her twin sister and her twin's boyfriend were playing around in a local cemetery. We decided it would be interesting to see what would happen if we used a Ouija board. We had all used the Ouija board before and had moderate success with it. But the board really seemed to come alive when my girlfriend's twin sister was using it.

This time in the graveyard was no different. It took a little while for the board to warm up to us, but when it did we were flooded with inquires. The first contact was a little rude. The spirits did not seem all that happy about being disturbed by four annoying, living people. But after the initial resentment was over, we were approached by a person (entity) going by the name of Terry. We started out by asking how old Terry was, and found out that she was seven years old and had died in the mid-1940's. We later asked Terry why she was still around and she answered that she was still in search of her mother, whom she missed very deeply.

At this point the psychic twin began feeling paranoid and a bit uncomfortable, so we decided to break the connection. We later found out that we did not break the connection as well as we had believed. For to this day, it seems as though Terry decided to adopt her and the rest of us as sort of a replacement family. Every time we use the Ouija board, she always comes to visit us.

Just as a side note, my girlfriend and I went back to the cemetery to see if we could find Terry's "final" resting place. It took us about thirty minutes, the cemetery was quite large, but we finally found Terry's small grave.

 

Cut Across Shorty:
Some Spirited Tales
by "Shorty"

Our family has encountered many supernatural occurrences. The oldest dates back to when my grandfather moved his family to Woodbridge,Virginia. The house he bought was haunted.

It started the day he moved in. My grandfather came first to get everything situated. That was when everything began to happen. It started with the door knocker. Whenever the door was opened, the knocker would hit the door and make noises. Well, the first night alone he heard the door open and close. Then, he heard footsteps walking into the kitchen and opening the refrigerator door. He heard the door close and the footsteps continued to walk around the kitchen and into the dining room. Through the dining room, they persisted into the living and on to the basement.

My grandfather searched the house top to bottom. He found no one. As he walked upstairs, he heard the footsteps again. This time, they were walking back through the house and out the front door. These footsteps were heard often.

My aunts and uncles heard noises also. There was a pool table in the basement for my five uncles. They were playing one day when they heard the mysterious footsteps upstairs. Each uncle grabbed a weapon. They were armed with pool sticks, knives and bottles. They searched the house top to bottom finding nothing. As they walked back downstairs, they heard the footsteps go out the front door.

My brother is the only one to have actually seen this intruder. He was five and forbidden from going downstairs because of the pool table. My mother couldn't find him anywhere so she went downstairs. She found him and asked why was he in the basement. He told her that he was talking to "the lady with the big teeth".

My mother freaked thinking there was someone in the house that wasn't supposed to be there. So, one of my uncles went downstairs to see who was there. He found traces of anyone, but it did scare my mother badly.

Part 2:
My sister and I were very interested in the Ouija board. So, We borrowed a friend's board. At first we were skeptical about it actually working. We said our prayers, and with two friends and only candle light, we contacted the spirit world. We contacted a spirit with the initials "E.D.F." He played with us for a while and joked around with us. His favorite answer to the question "why?" would always be "because."

After a while, he became serious. His predictions were very strange at first, but now some have come true. He predicted my sister having a baby girl. He told us things only one of us would know.

Being the curious people we are, we asked for proof that he was indeed in our presence. He told us he would make things happen but to go to our furnace. The same time he was telling us to do this, my sister for no reason went to our furnace. We heard a scream and she came running back to us. We asked if she saw anything, but she said she hadn't. She didn't know why she screamed.

E.D.F then told us to go into the attic. He said he was in our attic. None of us were brave enough to go. We told him to stomp three times on the floor above our head. We waited only seconds before we heard three distinct thumps. We told him to do it again. We heard three thumps again. We blew out the candles and ran to our beds.

That wasn't the last of our friend E.D.F. He enjoyed to make noises and visit us in the night. I slept with my bedroom window open. And one night, I started to hear things outside. I would look out and find nothing. The noises persisted for three weeks and were scaring me. So, I had some male friends sleep near my window for two nights and see if someone was window-watching at night.

The noises and presence still occurred, but no one was seen near my window. I started to think it was my imagination, but my sister heard the same noises.

We had a friend with a gun. He brought it over one day. We put it in my room and I locked my bedroom door. Before he left, he was going to show me how to use it. But when we opened my door with the only key, we found the gun was gone.

We turned the house upside down, but no gun was found. After that the noises started in the attic. We would hear footsteps and banging. I had the only access in my room. I went up the ladder and searched our small attic and found nothing.

Things also kept turning up missing. My pager disappeared one night. When I tried to page it, we heard the beeping upstairs in the attic. My sister went there to look for the beeping. She couldn't find it, but she heard footsteps behind her. She turned to see if it was me, but no one was behind her. She got scared and started to cry. She felt a cold hand on her shoulder. That scared her even more so she climbed down the ladder very quickly.

We went into the front bedroom and closed the door. We were both frightened by now. We could see lights going on and off. We checked the light switches and they weren't moving. Then we heard the water running in the bathroom. We ran into the bathroom to see who was in our house, but no one was there. We decided to go outside for a while.

Making sure the lights were off, we locked the doors behind us. About an hour later we went back inside since our nerves were calmed down. We opened the door and found all of the lights in the house turned on. We decided to pull out the Ouija board to talk to our spirit.

He told us that he was doing it and was just trying to have fun with us. But, he doesn't always try to scare us. Some nights when I'm scared and unsure about things he visits to make me feel better with his cold touch. Some nights I have awakened to feel him sitting on my bed. Like it or not, he is here to stay. So, I make the best out of his games. Now, he doesn't scare me. In fact, as I read these stories and tell you mine, I feel his coldness over my shoulder.

 

 

Cries Well Up in the Night
by by Richard Chavez
mando1@sat.net

Back in my old hometown, Seguin, Texas. I was told by somebody that years ago, a boy fell down a well and died. That well was right across the street in front of my house. It stood next to an old broken-down windmill in a small group of trees. At night, knockings could be heard. The boys body was never found so the well was filled up with soil. Those knockings were the sounds of the boy desperately trying to escape!

One night as I lay half awake, I heard a voice call out of the night saying,"HELP ME, HELP ME!" I got up startled. I quickly ran to my brother asking if he had heard it. He was asleep. Then my sister came to me from the other room saying she heard it too. The voice called out again, but my sister looked out the window at the direction where the voice came from and there was nothing there. That was the only time we heard it.

The voice had the voice of a cat and spoke in a shaky voice.

I get the creeps every time I hear stories about people falling down wells, but to be buried alive! Gives me the shivers! Thanks for the creepy story! And of all things, I'm editing this story after midnight!! Yikes, I think I just heard something! Where's that other wall switch!!

 

Dances With Wolves
by Robert Coody
Hailing From: Flagstaff, Arizona
rac@nauvax.ucc.nau.edu
Where the Spooky Event Occurred: Near Navajo Reservation

I have shared enough ghost stories about Corona and now it is time to tell some recent ones. When I left Corona for my new home in Flagstaff, Arizona, I began to explore the countryside for new adventures. I have been doing this for about 23 years here, and have become relatively familiar with the Black Sand country and the Painted Desert located around Flagstaff. Many of the areas have become ruined or overdeveloped these last few years -- and so I have sought other areas that are more remote, to explore. The more remote, then the spookier the area becomes.

In many of these remote areas the land is barren, devoid of visible life -- almost a feeling that you shouldn't be there at all. Other areas which are forested appear never to have seen a human being for over a hundred years or more. These are dark, lonely areas where the life of the developed areas has retreated to safety, and where human beings are perhaps now considered part of the food chain.

It was during one of my lonely treks, which I so often do on my time off, that I ventured too close to a sacred area. It was approaching evening, and as was my custom, I settled down in a fine volcanic sand to start a fire. I soon had a meal cooking and was enjoying a warm cup of coffee.

It was now dark and I was laying back looking at the stars, enjoying the silence of the land, and feeling relaxed after a good day of hiking. I was feeling satisfied to be out of the rat race. After maybe an hour of this rest, I heard footsteps, they were human steps coming in my direction. So much for my peace, but as was my custom, I called out and offered a cup of coffee.

The footsteps stopped and were replaced by a howling dog, a sound which resembled a coyote wail and a dog in pain. It was the scariest sound I had ever heard and was only forty feet away in the dark. I was chilled to the bone with fright or adrenaline. I quickly covered my fire after packing up my equipment and hiked in the dark towards my car which was about a mile away.

The sound followed me. It went to my left, then around to the front and then to my right. It circled me and followed me again. I expected to be attacked by some mutated creature of the dark at any moment. I finally reached the car and hightailed it for home.

The next day I went out to check for prints. I found my camp and there were the prints. Human and then changing to dog, or coyote. The tracks seemed to multiply as I followed them following me the night before.

I shared this information with an old trader friend of mine who then talked to his wife and asked me where I was. I told them and also mentioned the remains of an old sweat lodge nearby. They claimed that there is a society of Navajo known as Skinwalker. They change into the skins of wolves and stalk the living. They said, "never to go back to that spot," because I may have been close to one of their meeting places.

I have yet to return to that spot, but maybe someday I will get brave again and do so. Mind you, I shall be well prepared when I do, as I have been advised by my friends.

Robert Coody

A superb tale indeed, Robert! You never let us down and I thank you for coming back again to share your stories with us (Robert is a return writer here at Ghost Tales). I felt like I was out there in the sand and the stars with you! If you ever plan on going back, let us know ... maybe we can arrange a Ghostories meet!!

 

 

Have Ghost, Will Travel
by Joanne
Hailing From: Fort Smith, Arizona
joeycat@ipa.net
Where the Spooky Event Occurred: Fort Smith, Arizona

We have a ghost.

From her voice I would say she is a young girl. Could any more experienced "GhosTees" tell us how to find out her name? She seems to want to keep company with my 16 year old granddaughter, but all members of the family have had encounters with her. Including my very skeptical son-in law.

She also went to great lengths to help the cats in our house. So much for the theory "cats and ghosts don't mix."

Please E-mail us if you can suggest a method to find her name. Also, we are moving soon and would like her to come with us. Any suggestions?

OK, Ghost Tale-Busters! Here is your chance. Send a suggestion to joeycat and cc our webmaster mailbox here -- and I will post some of the better suggestions for others to read. Who knows what might happen? Porta-Ghost, here we come!

 

 

In the Heart of Richmond
by Patrick Sullivan
Hailing From: Arlington, VA
kepie@erols.com
Where the Spooky Event Occurred: Richmond, VA

IF you believe in ghosts, then it's not too much of a stretch to believe that there are people with a knack or talent for perceiving and communicating with them. I am one such person.

In 1992, I moved to Richmond, VA. I moved into an old Civil-War Era row house in the heart of the city. I knew from the beginning that there was something unusual about the house, but it took more than a year to uncover what it was. My roommates and I would often feel a "presence" in the house. Like there was always something watching us.

One night I was sitting in the kitchen/den and talking with my roommate Josh. For some reason my attention was continually drawn to a corner of the room by the back door. Josh happened to be sitting on a couch next to the back door. When he turned to see what I kept looking at he did a double-take (Josh can be as sensitive to things as I am). Afterwards, he said that he had definitely seen something there. He couldn't describe a definite shape or even color... but he had seen something!

From that point on I started seeing the apparition as well. It was like a mist, or sometimes just a difference in the air itself. I could feel the energy of something living (or once living as the case may be) in the places it would appear. The more often I concentrated on it the more defined the figure became. It was like it depended on us and our attention before it could turn into something substantial.

Eventually, it resolved itself into the form of a young girl about 16 years of age. She wore clothing typical of the civil war period. I spoke to her, with my voice, my mind and my heart. And finally, contact was made! She was relieved as I was. She explained that it had been some 15 or 20 years since someone had acknowledged her presence, much less spoken to her. Her name was Angela and she had died in that house. She would never tell me how she died. She knew what she was (a ghost) but couldn't explain why she didn't journey on to the other side.

We became very good friends after that. She would sit and watch movies with us and read over our shoulders. It was the only way she could read, which she loved to do. I asked her what types of things she liked to read and then would go out and get books of that type. She would sit next to me (or sometimes through me) and we would read together.

Then things got bad in Richmond. Finances were terrible. It got to the point where we had to move out. Angela and I were both very saddened by this. I offered to try and find a way to take her with me. But she said no, that she had to stay there. My finances got even worse after that and I ended up having to leave Richmond entirely.

Sometimes, in quiet moments, I let my mind and awareness travel South. I concentrate on the old row house where I used to live. And I can feel her still there. And she feels me. We smile at each other across the hundred or so miles that separate us. I hope that she gets to do whatever it is that she feels she has to do here before she goes. And I hope that when it's my time to take the journey to the other side, that she'll be there waiting for me.

Wow! I've heard of "long-distance" relationships, but this one takes the cake! And, you know it has been said more than once, when the finances go south, the woman always ends up with the house! (oooooh) Seriously, it was a great (and gentle) story and I hope that you two meet again, someday when your worlds align once more. (Now, where did I put that prenuptial agreement!!) -- BUT WAIT, HOLD THE PHONE, THERE'S MORE!

Wow! Here's an Amazing update to my "In the Heart of Richmond" story...

. . . thanks for the catchy title by the way. I've been thinking about Angela a lot since I found this page and others like it. Last night, I reached out (as I have done before on many occasions) to try to contact her. And then all the sudden... BOOM! There she was! IN MY ROOM! She explained that her obligations in Richmond were complete and that she was given the choice of moving on or staying here as someone's guide. She choose to stay as my guide! Waaaaahooooo!

Well ain't that a hoot! If these two decide to get tie the knot, what do we call 'em? Mr. and Missed? (ooops, sorry again!)

 

Spirit Rising to the Heart
by Denise Bashir
Hailing From: Windsor, Ontario, Canada
dbashir@mnsi.net
Where the Spooky Event Occurred: My Grandmother's House

It all started in about July of '91 when my grandmother became very ill. She had cancer and became progressively worse. At that time I lived in Sarnia, Ontario and was on my way to visit her in the hospital as she was dying. At the time I was 3 months pregnant.

As I entered the hospital my mom and aunt were in the hallway. They told me, "She doesn't remember anything." I peeked my head into the room as she lay facing the wall and all of a sudden she said, "Denise come in I have been waiting for you."

So I went in. She did not know I was pregnant. Then she looked up at me, put her hand on my stomach and said, "Everything will be okay." We were all very surprised at that. Then the doctor came in and gave us permission to take her home to die. She wanted to die in her bed and to see her dog. So at her request, that is what we did.

As the ambulance took her into the house she was breathing heavily and in pain from the cancer that was within her eating her away quickly. As we got her in her own bed the ambulance drivers said that it could be any time for her.

We all gathered around her and her dog licked her hand and cried. As we were watching, she took a big sigh and said, "What is my dad doing sitting there and why is Ray my brother in law beside him sitting with him?" (One of these people mentioned are dead -- the other was alive but was not there.) My grandmother said to her Dad, "Do not take him he must stay here and be with his family." This puzzled all of us. She then looked around and a tear fell from her eye as she breathed her last breath.

It was then that the most surprising thing happened, we saw her spirit rising from her body and it was hovering over my mother. My aunt yelled to my mother to leave the room because she was afraid about anything happening with the spirit. Then all of a sudden she left with a mist-like presence. Afterward, they did the necessary things to her and took her back to the hospital.

Now here is the weirder part. My grandmother has since been seen quite often walking through her house. Lights are always going on unexpectedly and many other things unexplained to all of us -- but we all know that she is there and always will be. This explains the earlier part about me being pregnant. My son was born 6 months later with severe heart problems and will need another operation, which explains why she told me that everything would be okay.

My son died five times and came back every time throughout all of the operations he has had -- and this is a real miracle. To this day I believe she is there being a guardian angel to my son who needs her ever so much.

For my Grandmother, Edith Martinak. May God Bless Her Soul and for Blessing Others -- Denise Bashir.

A spirit rises in departure, a soul awaits the impending moment of birth. Like two ships passing in the night, one holds a beacon for the other as they traverse a silent harbor. And old sailors nod in unison, T'was meant to be, T'was meant to be . . . .

 

 

Trailer for Sale or Rend
by Cindi
Hailing From: Birmingham, Alabama
friskybitch@hotmail.com
Where the Spooky Event Occurred: Panama City, Florida

It started when my husband, sister, daughter and I moved into a trailer in Panama City. My daughter was visiting her father in Atlanta at the time the occurrences began. My sister was rarely at home, so she didn't believe our stories until they began happening to her too.

The weird things started mildly. We would hear footsteps coming down the hall, but nobody would be home except for us. Dark shadows appearing in our bedroom door while we were the only ones in the trailer.

Then "Henry" (what we named our ghost) would turn the air conditioner down to 50 degrees in the middle of the night. We would wake up freezing and blaming each other for doing it. One night I stayed up late just to see if it was my husband, but he never got up and I never took my eyes off of the thermostat. It was at 50 degrees again. I decided to try reasoning with Henry. I asked him to stop doing it because our bill was extremely high. IT NEVER HAPPENED AGAIN!

He decided to get attention in other ways. He would turn on the water in the kitchen when we were in the living room. It happened to me first, and no one believed me until he did it to my husband. I again asked him to stop and he did. He began to open all the windows in the house when we were not at home. We would come home and find every window open and both doors open. Obviously, that wasn't good, so I again asked him to stop, and he did.

My daughter came home and he would play games with her too. He would turn lights on and off in front of her. Which scared her to death, and he would stomp up and down the hall between our rooms all night long. It was getting scary to me also.

Then my sister woke up with her bed shaking one night. On another night she had come home and was alone in the trailer. As she shut the front door she heard the back door slam open. Yet nobody was there. On another occasion we were driving down the street to the trailer, and my husband saw a man standing at the back door with it wide open. He jumped out of our truck with it still moving, and chased the man around the back of the trailer. He was no more than five feet from the man, but this man had vanished.

We moved out a few weeks later.

Seems as though this pesky critter played with all the elements: air, water, sound, sensation and visual. Good thing he wasn't partial to fire! Add them all up and I think I believe I would move too! By the way, did you know that the dictionary definition of "Henry" is: "A unit of electrical inductance that gives an electromotive force ... ? Hmmmm, I wonder if there's some kind of weird connection ... ?

 

Pace of the Rock
by Bob Hansen
Hailing From: Chicago, IL
Where the Spooky Event Occurred: Chicago, IL

I have been haunted by a ghost that throws rocks at me whenever I enter my house. The strange thing is that the rocks hurt on impact, but I do not hear or see them after they hit me -- that is, they simply disappear and do not hit the floor.

People in the neighborhood who know about the house say that some trouble making kid was killed in the house by unknown causes. They remember him because he liked to toss rocks at houses, not to break windows, but to make people think that they had squirrels on their roofs or in their walls (most of the houses here are of frame construction).

This sounds like a real problem. Can't imagine what you must tell people when they call you on the phone and ask how things have been!

"Hiya, Bob. How's things been going?"

"A little rocky lately, I guess!"

Possibly this ghost kid had a thing for Bob Dylan? (If ANYBODY gets THIS pun, you are definitely over -40!) ..-=[:-)

 

 

Trapped, But Not Forgotten
by Christopher J. Davis
Hailing From: Ceresco, NE
Siskokid1@aol.com
Where the Spooky Event Occurred: A Storm Sewer

I swear that this actually happened.

This event took place one the day after I graduated from 8th grade here in Lincoln, NE. Around my school we have a system of sewer drains that crisscross under the school and into the surrounding neighborhood. My friends and I decided to go down and find "HoboTown," a frequent meeting place for kids in the area. We didn't find HoboTown but we did find something, or I should say someone else.

The entrance was about five feet tall and about eight feet wide. So of course we had to duck to walk around in there. The space was cool and damp compared to the surrounding area, considering that it was about ninety degrees outside we were happy to be any place cooler. The tunnel (I call it that because there is no other way to describe it) was almost four miles long and reasonably free of debris. We had a big torch lantern that was borrowed from someone in the group that lit about fifty yards of the tunnel. The little flashlights we had were almost no match for the darkness that occurs when you are ten feet underground encased in a vault of concrete.

We would walk and talk just to keep the place from seeming scary. Boy did that place seem scary. The lantern cast shadows all over the place and the fact that we were walking all hunched over didn't help matters. We walked into the tunnel for about a mile and then we noticed that the walls were different. Not the clean concrete walls that we had seen up until then, they had become broken and cracked and in some places had caved in left huge craters in the bottom of the floor. At this point the tunnel opened up larger and we were finally able to walk upright, but that didn't stop us from being edgy. We knew that if something happened we would have to run hunched over for about a mile to get out of there.

Abruptly the air grew cold, by that I mean cold. We were just walking along and then in the course of a step the temperature seemed to drop almost twenty degrees. We were almost ready to head back because truth be told by this point we were scared silly. The walls had turned to brick and I knew we were in a OLD sewer drain. We found a maintenance plaque that was encrusted with rust that said 1929, who knows how many years had passed before someone had seen that sign.

All of a sudden I got the feeling that I was being watched, or rather not watched, it is hard to explain. I knew something was terribly wrong. I saw something from the corner of my eye, the hair on my back stood immediately on end and I panned the lantern around to see someone sitting in the tunnel ahead of us. I looked at him and he didn't seem aware of us being there. We called out something like "Hey Mister got the time?" or something equally stupid. The only response we got was that he lifted his head and looked straight at us. No it was like straight through us than at us, like he was looking down the tunnel at someone else.

These next three words will haunt me for the rest of my life. For the first time I noticed his eyes were glowing red. That was the sort of thing that a person notices at first but for some reason I didn't. He looked straight at me and screeched, "Run before it's too late. I waited too long and look what happened to me." I heard a scuffle behind me and I turned around to see what was happening only to see my friends take off running away -- back the way we came. I turned back to look at the man and he was standing up, his arms outstretched coming toward me. I took of running and barely noticed when the mile was over and I was running through the opening.

The police were called and they went into the tunnel and found the remains of a man in the tunnel. It appeared that he was injured in the building of the storm drain and was trapped there. No satisfactory explanation was found for what we saw.

Whew! That was an excellent story! Thank you very much for taking the time and sending it along. I've always wondered when you hear stories about apparitions coming toward you, arms outstretched, what they would do IF they finally got you, touched you, eeeks!? Any ideas here? Do these creatures always want to do the worst? Or could it be possible they want the living to lead the way home? - Naaaaawwwww, probably they just wanna give you a big wet kiss!! Ghosts! You gotta love 'em!!

 

 

Let Me In
by L. Mather & Cousin Tim
E-mail: lauramather@hotmail.com
Hailing From: Chicago, IL
Where it Happened: Willow Springs

Okay everybody, prepare to be scared. This is a GREAT story. It might sound lame at first, but stick with it, I won't let you down. By the way, it's actually is true. My cousin Tim told me about this one. Here goes -- we call it "Thrill Seekers."

Tim saw one of his old high school friends for the first time since 12th grade. They talked about what was going on in their lives. It turns out Tim's friend had been investigating "haunted houses" in nearby towns. He would assemble a group of guys and visit old houses that had spooky histories.

Tim would ask around if anything ever happened, and a friend told about a few houses with particularly gruesome histories. One house was owned by a mad man who lived with his twin daughters. The legend says he murdered them one night in some kind of bizarre ceremony. This particular house was out in the woods, isolated and creepy to say the least.

Tim's friend decided to go there and check it out. The place was creepy, but nothing the guys hadn't seen before. The guys broke a basement window and climbed into the old house. It was filthy, ugly and eerie, just what the guys got off on!

They soon found a small room and set up their stuff. The room was empty except for a huge mirror on the wall and an old arm chair. As was their usual practice, they started playing around with the Ouija board and were startled when they actually got a response. Assuming some one of the guys was just trying to freak everybody out, Tim's friend started taunting the "spirit" of the board.

"What's your name?"

"666."

"Are you really the devil?"

"Yes."

"Do you have unlimited power?"

"Yes."

"Are you going to hurt us?"

"Yes."

Tim's friend loved it, this was fabulous -- exactly the kind of thing he hoped to conjure up, that is, if it was real.

"OK, if you're so powerful, and you're the devil, do something!"

The answer came through very slowly, "Open the back door and you'll see what I've done."

This was better than fabulous! Tim's friend laughed as he walked through the house to the back door. Even though he knew better, he almost believed that there would be something there, waiting for him in the dark. Maybe a ghost, or a gruesome monster.

The door was small but heavy and hard to open. It probably hadn't been opened in decades. Tim's friend jerked the door open and stared out into the night. He didn't see anything. He closed the door and walked back to the small room -- as he was sitting down he realized how fast his heart was beating. He glanced over at the Ouija board and then at his friends.

"Very funny guys, great one." He said, a tad disappointed.

But his face turned pale when he noticed the pointer on the board moving on it's own. No one was near the board but were frozen in horror as the spirit spelled out it's final message:

"Thank You! You just let me in."

Good googelly-boogelly! This here's what we call a traditional "Scare-fest hide-unda-the-covers grab the cat forget Motel 6 no Bruce Willis hide the hatchet" Halloween Story, and perfect for standing 'round the fire roasting smores and marshmallows!

I have to tell ya, I normally reserve these for the "Tales" Library, but in this case since it is in the spirit of the season, I "let it in" (ooops, what did I really let in!!! Did you hear that?? Look behind you! Are the lights out? Did you see something move? I heard footsteps -- they're coming closer!!).

But I'll tell ya what, if you can send me a follow up to this story about what happened to the group after that last message (did they run into foul play or just pack it in and go home?), then I'll revise most of this commentary and keep it in the Library for many years to come.

Most of all, Thanks for the tale!

 

 

Friends Forever
by Dan Farish
E-mail: dsdb1594@aol.com
Hailing From: Weymouth, Maine
Where it Happened: Smyrna, Georgia

Our home was broken into in May of this year (1998), but the story begins (and in no way ends)on the night before the break-in. Several unusual events took place that evening which I believe were a warning that my home was about to be burglarized.

We have a security light on the back porch of our home which is located on an interior wall of the porch facing the porch door and the stairs leading out to our back yard.The light operates by body heat, which is how it detects motion. It only comes on if a person or small animal climbs the stairs at night, and has only been set off by neighborhood cats in the past. We also have a dog, who lives for such moments.

On this particular evening the light came on four times as I sat on a couch with a clear view to the stairs. I expected to see a cat, but each time I looked nothing was there. I sent my son to look out into the yard, but again there was nothing.

Later that night my wife went to bed and I decided to stay up and watch television. She shut off the lights in the kitchen and living room before going upstairs to bed. Approximately 10 minutes later I heard the click of a switch as the kitchen light came on. I got up, turned it off and returned to the couch thinking it strange, but I thought little more of it.

The next day our home was broken into through a sliding glass door which adjoins the porch. Now while this story is a little odd, but isn`t really all that much in and of itself. The reason I mention it is because of the events which would take place a couple of months later.

Several times after this incident I thought I felt a friendly and calming presence throughout my home, but nothing out of the ordinary had occurred to confirm these feelings. Then, one Wednesday night after my children were in bed I sat at the kitchen table talking with my wife. We had a couple of beers and were relaxed, but not drunk. We were discussing my work situation and I explained to her my need to find a new career, as I no longer enjoyed my current line of work and had been experiencing a minor crisis in my life because of it. The dilemma was not only how to go about identifying the type of work to seek, but also how to accomplish the same on a limited budget -- and because of it I was feeling a little depressed and frustrated. In trying to explain what seemed to be the hopelessness of the situation, I told her that sometimes the whole thing just made me want to give up and quit trying. Not in a suicidal way, in the sense that I just wanted to crawl under a rock and go to sleep sort of way. She misinterpreted the joist of the message and thought I was referring to our marriage, at which point she silently stormed out of the room and went upstairs to bed. You can imagine how much better THAT made me feel.

As I sat there staring at the kitchen table in disbelief I felt a sudden urge to look to my left -- and to my utter amazement, there stood the ghost of my best friend who had been critically injured in an automobile accident in 1986.

I want you to know this was a brand new experience for me! I had never seen an apparition before and have not had it happen again since that night. When he appeared to me he was the last thing on my mind (meaning I hadn't been thinking about him at all before his appearance).

My friend sat down in the chair to my left and gave me the warmest smile I`ve ever seen. Although his body and head were translucent in appearance, his facial features were very clear -- as if he were there in person. I felt nothing but love emanating from him and even though he never spoke, that smile was communicating his love to me.

I was stunned by his appearance but felt no fear whatsoever. I can only describe it as a feeling of warmth and the familiar feeling of joy you get when you`re with a close friend. I looked at him for a moment and just said, "Hi Ricky, how`re you doing?"

His face continued to shine brightly and although he never spoke, there was no need to. I looked away for no more than a second and when I looked back he had moved to a seat at the far end of the table. I watched as he slowly began to fade away and after a few seconds I could no longer see him. I sat there for about 10 more minutes, smoked a cigarette and pondered this most amazing thing that had just happened to me. I wondered why he had moved to the end of the table like that, and it wasn`t until the next day that I remembered the last chair was beneath a portrait of two baby angels known as "The First Kiss."

I believe it was my friend Ricky who turned the lights on in my home and had tried to warn me of the burglary that was about to take place. Although I failed to understand his warning at the time, you can rest assured if it ever happens again I`ll be paying close attention! I`d also like to add that I swear to God every word I`ve written here is true and I no longer have any fears or doubts about life after death.

Oh, and I would also like to say in closing, "Ricky, I just want to say thank you and I love you too, my Friend."

And I want to thank you for the opportunity to tell my story.

Dan, thanks for sharing your personal experience. (Dan mentioned in separate email the dilemma of calling these submittals, "Ghost Stories." While it is the only way we have to refer to them in a catagorical sense, it is true that by calling them stories it seems to suggest that they are not factual. But I would like to say that while this is the only term we have (ok, we could use "encounters" or "paranormal" -- but I think those terms would make us look like a sideshow and not what we are about), our goal is to present a truer and more personal type of site -- one that has nothing at all to do with hype or gore or shock value, but a place in this universe where people can completely open up and share their personal experiences -- and by doing so lend deeper meanings to what makes Ghostories "tick." That is the essense of what sets us apart from the other "spook" sites . . . well, that and my pitiful attempts at comic relief so that you can all go to bed with a chuckle after being scared out of your wits and not have to keep the lights on for the next week or two!).

Now, let me see, where were we? We were talking about Friends. Dan, do you know how many times in my life I have had people call me their lifelong friend -- some have even called me "brother" -- only to have them fall away after a while and never hear from them? I used to think friendship was a rare jewel -- but as I get older, I think it is a lost art. Our world moves so fast and is so impersonal these days, that even close friends lose touch and if something happens they don't have the time to understand, they just simply drift away or write others off as if it were an item on the menu they no longer wish to order. Many I have found have been hypnotized by the lure of false gold, and someday I am sure we'll have the chance to cover those kind of stories.

So we can say that real and true friends are not only hard to find, when you do find them, they are a blessing -- and for you to have such a friend I believe goes much deeper than your immediate story. If my antenna are up just right, Ricky was the one you went to for advise, wasn't he?

I believe that as the months roll on you will find even deeper meanings in why your friend came to visit. His selection of "another chair" may have a lot to do with the painting of the angels, but I believe he was trying to also help you in finding "another chair" in your life's work. Speaking as someone who has made the transition from one career to another (and I still consult in my old career), you must look deep inside yourself and ask the thousand questions about what it is you would LOVE to do (work that seems more like play than work) and then assess your individual strengths -- one at a time, like baby steps (remember, everything is easier when we break it down into "bite sizes") -- and then match new career possiblities with your abilities. You will be utterly amazed at what you'll find. There are organizations who offer to help you do this, but I believe you can do it on your own if you put your mind to it (I'll warn all my readers to steer clear of the so-called "career seminars" -- there are a lot of bogus ones out there preying on just these kind of situations -- to see what I mean, just look at your "junk email").

Ricky may (and probably will) come back again someday, and when he does, let us know. Think deep about what he might have suggested that you do, and then consider the possibilities on your own. I believe you are about to enter a new chapter in your life.

Regarding the burglary? From my humble vantage point I think it possible he was there to warn you, but I also believe that he is there in your life for another more powerful reason. Let us know what that is when it comes to pass, ok? And thanks again -- these very personal encounters underscore what Ghostories is all about.

 

A Balloon Chased My Dog
by Liz Carr
E-mail: LisCarr@aol.com
Hailing From: Peoria, IL
Where it Happened: In My Home

Recently my boyfriend and I purchased my grandparent's old house. We have been renovating, and because of this I took some pictures showing our progress. Many showed absolutely nothing, but several were downright creepy.

The most dramatic picture shows a white form below our lights that seems to be moving towards the door. The second picture is of the pull out ironing board. There seems to be an old fashioned handle below the existing knob handle -- and right below that is a form that appears to be a chain or decoration of some sort. (These are the only cabinets left in the house that I have not sanded down to wood, so I have yet to see if there are any holes in the wood below the knobs. I will let you know about this.)

Both pictures were on a roll with several other pictures from around the house. Many of the other pictures show large and small dots of light scattered throughout each picture. The spots are not consistent from picture to picture, so dust is probably not to blame. I have since checked the lens and it is totally clean. I have not used the camera nor cleaned it since these pictures were taken.

Now here is a little background about the house: We believe the house was built around the turn of the century and it sits in a rather old part of town. We know that of the people who owned the house before my grandparents that one is alive and one is passed on (which possibly occurred in this house).

Overall, there is no overwhelmingly odd feeling about the house. There were times, especially after we first moved in that I felt I was being watched, but dismissed this feeling as paranoia. As a child the basement always terrified me and the rest of my sisters, but we were young and excitable. I also avoided the back bedrooms as they had the same feeling. We do not know the previous owners nor have we learned what year that the house was built (despite research from the title company that processed the title for the home).

There are only two incidents that happened inside the house to speak of -- not including the regular turning off and on of our touch lamp. There are three levels of light, and it always goes through each level and turns off. We at first thought it was just the vibrations of trucks passing by or a bad outlet, but it happens wherever we move it and there usually isn't anyone around it. It is as if something is trying to tell us it is here but doesn't want to bother us.

The first convincing event happened when our toilet overflowed (clean water) onto a rug in the bathroom. I hung it up on the shower curtain rod to drip off for a while. For the rest of the evening, every time I entered the bathroom I found the rug in the bathtub. The first time I assumed it had just fallen off as I may have hung it crooked. I replaced it making sure that it was even and would not fall again. Later when I returned it was in the bath tub. Each time, the rug was in a different spot in the bathtub. Once it was two feet to the left of where I had hung it on the rod. This happened two or three more times until I went downstairs to yell at my boyfriend for throwing it in the bathtub. He said he had not even used the bathroom for the last few hours. We both found the incident a little disturbing, but not frightening.

The next incident was a little spookier. I was home alone late at night. My boyfriend works third shift, so he was gone. My dog was following me from task to task barking and constantly wanting to play while I was doing my chores in the kitchen. The helium balloon my boyfriend had floated lazily in up in a corner -- and there was not much air movement in the room. Our ceilings are taller than usual, so the balloon was pretty high up. My dog had never paid much attention to it besides when we were trying to get him to play with it -- but mostly he had shown no interest over the course of the last week or so.

Finished with my chores, I finally sat down at the kitchen table to relax and have a smoke when the dog started barking madly at the balloon. I was trying to calm him but he wouldn't have it. Then, slowly the balloon started to move away from the ceiling down and towards the dog. This made me laugh a little as I expected a small draft (although all of the windows were closed). My laughter changed quickly when the balloon followed my dog, who by this time was barking madly and slowly backing up and away from it, through the length of the kitchen. It moved down a few feet through the doorway, then glided back up towards the ceiling, through the dining room, around the ceiling light, back down a few feet through the doorway into the living room and back up -- all the while moving stealthily towards the dog.

By the time it had gotten to the living room I was pretty spooked. I quickly grabbed the balloon, threw it in the spare bedroom and yelled, "Don't ever do that again!!" -- and slammed the door.

A couple of days later, a friend and I decided to pull out the old Ouija (I know, it was pretty stupid. I only did it once as I learned my lesson about them a long time ago. Maybe I'll tell you all that story sometime, but right now it's still a little too scary to think about). As we played with the board, there was a spirit -- it said it was female. It said that it did not like the dog. Here's the really spooky part. It kept saying "the rug." It took me a few tries till I figured out what it was talking about. I then asked it if it had thrown it in the bathtub. It said yes, and "it was dirty." After I learned what I wanted to know I threw it to the side and haven't attempted it again since then.

A week ago we went to South Carolina for a vacation and had a friend watch the house. I had told him a couple of things had happened, but not to worry. It wasn't a mean spirit. Anyway, he and three of his friends were watching a movie. The CD player and receiver (set to CD) were on but turned all the way down. All of a sudden, the television got fuzzy, the touch lamp kept switching off and on and the stereo started making weird noises of people talking. Expecting a weird electrical disturbance or a some kind of surge, my friend got up to flip off the stereo and unplug the light. In that instant it all stopped. As he sat back down it started again! He cursed and stood up and sure enough it stopped and didn't happen again for the rest of the day. This happened 2 more times during his stay and each time there were several witnesses who verified his story. The guys went for a beer run after the first time and the girls refused to stay around claiming that they had a bad feeling about the house. Pansies.

I have a few questions about this: 1.) How did the stereo pick up signals if the receiver was on "CD" and turned all the way down? -- 2.) Why would it stop precisely when he got up and persist when he sat? Weird.

Well, those are my experiences. I haven't used the Ouija since then and we have seen any activity except the occasional closing of a door, that is until these pictures came back. I think they may be remnants of our ghostly roommate. What do you think? Please, let me know! We have two tenants upstairs who have not reported anything strange to us so far. The have lived in the house for eight years. Maybe someday I will ask them.

Lisa, thanks for the stories about your house. Sounds like an old one indeed. I especially liked the part about the balloon chasing your dog! Great visuals there!

I did think it interesting -- from the viewpoint of your house-sitter -- what he must have thought when you asked him to watch the place and then added something like, "Oh, by the way, nothing to worry about, but the place is haunted!" Kinda like saying, "Here's the keys. He's not Freddy Kruger. Hope yer here when we return!" LOL!

Yikes!

 

 

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I was only really, really frightened once . . .
that was enough!

Can you pass the salt?

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