Ghosts of Christmas Present: 5 Chilling Tales to Keep You Up This Christmas. Pt 1

Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house chilling stories I've gathered for you to be rattled but if you rather be startled and scattered with fright, stay tuned and read the next 5 stories Clause are surely ready to give you a frightened delight.

1. The Lost Soul

Around Christmas time 2001 I had a few experiences involving the spirit of a lady that probably still lives in our house. I usually feel her presence more and a bit stronger around Christmas time than I usually do, one night I decided to draw whatever my hand felt like drawing, I drew a bottle with ribbons exploding out of it and a yacht, then it felt like someone was moving my hand for me, my hand drew a circular shape, then my hand lifted mid-air and dropped and made some sort of mark inside the circle, my hand did this again and made a curve and it did it once more this time drawing a dot, I finally regained control of my hand and it looked like I had drawn some sort of weird smiley face.

I told my mother about it and she told me to try again, so the following day I did, my mom had mentioned that she thought the woman's name was "Faye" so that name really stuck in my head. As I was painting some sort of landscape, I asked what is your name? and I allowed my hand to be controlled once more but no response, I asked again but this time about her last name, and she spelled something that looked like "Edith" it was a little bit confusing, I asked why she was there and her reply was "I'm lost". Later on, my mom confirmed that the ladies name was, in fact, Edith this freaked me out big time but until this day I still feel her presence before and a few days after Christmas, I feel bad because I know she's a lost soul. Alle G

2.- Stranger at the Corner

It was Christmas time 95/96 at my aunt's house on a reservation in N. Dakota, some of my family was in the living room watching some t.v. some of the kids were either playing or sleeping and my aunt and uncle were sitting at the table trying to put a puzzle together, my cousin (who worked at a casino) was getting home around midnight or so but this particular night as she pulled up and made her way towards the house, she said she looked up at the window before coming in and saw me sitting at the table with my aunt and uncle along with a figure next to me and another one by the corner who she couldn't distinguish, she simply assumed it was a visitor and made her way inside, without thinking anything of it.

After talking for a few minutes she looked at me and asked me who was standing next to me and near the corner? No one, I said to her. Yes, there was someone there, standing next to you as well as the corner, it looked like your mom and she was playing with your hair, she was running her hand up and down like caressing a child. It kind of freaked me out (being that at that time I was around 12/13) my cousin swore up and down someone was rubbing my head while I was putting the puzzle together but there was also another figure. We got to thinking that it must have been the spirit of her mom (she passed away on her birthday a week before Christmas back in 92).

In my family, we believe our aunts and uncles are like a second set of parents, after some deep thinking, it really didn't' scare me much, however, we can't seem to figure out who the other mysterious figure was, but I know that always around Christmas time something weird happens, we think is our aunt making her yearly visit, but how about the person in the corner?

3.- I Knew You Were Awake

I was never able to sleep in hotels, well I can't really sleep that well period but hotels were the worse just the thought that the previous occupant of this bed is a complete stranger was repulsive in my mind but that's beside the point what I'm getting at is how this lack of sleep in hotel rooms changed my life forever. Christmas, we were spending Christmas in this terrible hotel and not with the rest of my family, great. Don't get me wrong, it's not like I didn't enjoy the all you can eat buffet of soggy hash browns and crappy grits for Christmas eve dinner, of course, they had to cancel our flight out to Virginia. I was trying to sleep in this bleached saturated room, my mind wondering what could have happened for such an excessive amount of bleach.

The room was nothing out of the ordinary, 2 beds one for my dad and I and another for my mom and my sister, a bathroom and a stained microwave that looked in dire need of a good dusting. Somehow, I escaped the room and the stench of the bleach into a dreamless sleep. As I woke up, I could tell it was early in the morning, but that's when it hit me, It's Christmas and I was about to let this bad fortune ruin my favorite holiday. Looking across the bed at the corner to check the time on the clock, that's when I noticed the silhouette of a man about 6'3 across the room, staring at my mom sleeping, still half asleep and caught in the moment, couldn't help thinking of Santa Clause, I realized how stupid the thought was and horror soon filled my head. I know I couldn't let him see me being awake, I quietly put down pretending to be asleep my mind was raising, someone was in my room and I couldn't do anything, I was a scrawny 16-year-old a and this man was built like an ox.

I wondered if I could wake up my dad in time but I knew it wouldn't work he slept like a rock. I was practically in tears I never felt so helpless, for the second time I choke back a scream but he was standing right next to me. I could hear and feel his repulsive breath on my face, it smelled like rotten meat, he didn't know I was awake but surely he did now feeling my face contorted with fear, the heavy breathing stopped and I couldn't help this sigh of relief when I suddenly heard the door opening and closing, I launched out of bed and nothing in the room was out of place and my family was still asleep. Feeling awake as ever, a horrible idea popped into my head and before I could push it away, I was pulling the door open, my heart skipped a beat as I did so, there he was right at the corner at the end of the hall, why am I doing this? I thought to myself, I followed him all the way to the parking lot and then, nothing.

He was gone, he had disappeared that quick, realizing now how cold it was in my paper thin pajamas and when the adrenaline was wearing off, I realized how stupid my actions had been he could have killed me. I went back to my room but I knew something was wrong when I got to my floor, the door to my room was wide open, I know I didn't leave it like that when I left. I walked inside and after a quick search of the room, I saw that it was safe and that my family was still asleep, I locked the door and got back into bed, though I didn't sleep at all. A few hours later my mom and dad got us up and we made our way to the car and back to the airport. While digging thru my backpack to get my iPod, it led to the finding of something that wasn't there before, a note that simply held 5 words " I knew you were awake" I still think about it till this day, it has now been 2 months after the incident and I'm still scared for my life and it gets worse every day, that note I found wasn't the only one, I still receive them.

4.- The Duplex

So one year we were having our Christmas day dinner turkey, stuffing the works, we don't have a big family it was my grandparents and uncles my father and myself, at that time we lived in a duplex with a guy and his girlfriend on the other side, we really never saw much of them, strangely we had a door that connected both of our sides, that's not something that most duplexes have however it had a unique lock, though, it had to be unlocked from both sides in order to be opened and it could open in either direction, I only saw it opened once, before the couple moved in ever since then, the door has been locked (at least on our side). While we were sitting at the table and eating, the doorknob from the infamous door, twisted and turned but the lock from our side prevented from being opened, it was not accidental since that happened for about 10 seconds my dad got up and walked over to the door, placed one hand on the lock and the other on the knob Do you need something? My dad asked but there was no reply, he decided to unlock the door and swing it open.

The other side of the duplex was completely pitch black it seemed like no one was home, it was about 6:00 pm and we were certain we saw them leave earlier that day, my dad and I went to check thru the window and their car wasn't there, being good neighbors we assumed the worse, that perhaps there might have been an intruder so my dad, my uncle and myself went towards their side to investigate. We flipped up all the lights and checked every corner and every room on the first floor, then, we heard a thud coming from upstairs there was even pressure on the floorboards above us, I got to admit I was freaked out, so I stayed behind while my dad and uncle went upstairs. I felt my heart skip a beat when I heard a loud commotion coming from upstairs before I knew it my uncle's scream echoed all over the place, even the rest of my family on the other side heard it, they got up from the table to find out what was going on. Minutes later my dad came rushing downstairs with my uncle right beside him with his hand covering his lower shoulder/chest area he had been stabbed, immediately we all ran back towards our side of the apartment, locked the door and dialed 911, while at the same time, a rapid movement was coming from the other side, then heavy banging and running into the door to the point where there were small chips and cracks forming, we could hear the screaming and grunting of the man while ramming the door. My other uncle and my dad each grabbed kitchen knives, I armed myself as well.

They told us to stand back just in case he came thru, thankfully the man gave up before the door gave in and we heard him exit out the front door, we watched through the window and we all saw his face as he ran through the snow and turned back to see us as well, he took off in his black car but it doesn't end there. The following year the same neighbors lived there and they seemed to be having some sort of get together with a few people, by chance I was looking through my bedroom window (me being a snoop) when suddenly, I recognized one of their guests to be the same man who had broken into their side of the apartment and the same person who had stabbed my uncle when I told my dad, he also agreed it was the same face and we decided to approach the neighbors about it of course, he denied any knowledge of the incident and what were saying, even our neighbors got offended by the accusation defending him and telling us he was from out of state but there was nothing we could do without any proof but we knew one thing, those neighbors (for whatever reason) set that up. We moved out about a month later after our new grown fear of those neighbors became too much and never saw them again.

5.- The Smiling Kid

Every Christmas morning my little brother would come into my room before dusk so we could open the presents and our stockings together, every year without a doubt we would wake up like around 3/4am, I was really afraid of the dark as a child, so my mother would like my door a little cracked and the light from the hallway on. So Christmas morning came by and something wakes me up, I looked at my clock and it was exactly 3:00 am, those bright red numbers have embedded in my memory forever. I looked towards the door and I saw a kid peeking thru it, I rubbed my eyes thinking it was my brother and I told him to go back to sleep, I saw him directly and I saw the biggest smile I had ever seen in my whole life right across his face, he looked so excited when he heard it was Christmas morning. As I woke up a little more I noticed that he had brown hair and the whitest teeth, I walked towards the door to take my "brother" back to his room but no one was there.

I ran towards the stairs to my brother's room and he was there, sound asleep in his bed, there was no way he got to his room without me seeing him since the floor we used to have was highly noisy. Well, several years passed and somehow my stepsister, my mom and myself started to talk about weird things that happened in our old home, I never mentioned that particular morning to anyone but we were talking about how we felt like being watched a lot of the times, when suddenly my mom tells us that before she bought the house the people that used to live there wanted to move out quickly because their teenage boy had hung himself in the basement, my mom wasn't the type of person to make something up just to scare you, she said she came friends with the couple but never really went into detail about what happened to their son, so I think their kid was the one I saw and he was really happy to know that it was Christmas morning that day.

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