Saved By the Screams of Ghosts

Saved By the Screams of Ghosts

By

Jamey O’Donnell

Some people call them ghosts, apparitions, or spirits.

I call them friends.

I call them friends because they once saved me from being murdered.

Jimmy, Rodney, and Chet were with me on that cold, snowy winter day, out on the Lentz farm, ice fishing away on their frozen pond on the backside of their harvested corn field.

We were only 10 years old back then, but the memory of that day haunts me still, and has stayed with me all throughout my life.

When the day started, the sun was out and we were fully prepared for the way the day was, but not for the way the day turned out. We had caught a bunch of catfish and crappie, but then the storm hit us from the east and we were out there unprotected from the elements, miles from home.

The only shelter to be had was the old 2 story farmhouse that had been unoccupied for almost half a century, smack dab in the middle of Old Man Lentz’s farm.

No one knew why the old farmhouse had been empty for so long, but there it was, waiting for us boys to seek shelter from the storm, so we did.

Trudging through the winter wasteland of snow and ice with our sleds being pulled behind us, we barely made it to the front porch veranda once the wind really started to whip, but we were glad that the door was unlocked, allowing us to all pile into the living room, leaving our sleds on the veranda.

There was no heat or electricity for lights, but there was a fireplace and some cut up wood by it, so we lit a fire and huddled around the hearth, catching the warmth emitting from it.

By the sound of the storm whistling through the old creaky windows, we had resigned ourselves that we would probably be spending the night, and causing heart attacks of our parents, wondering where we were.

Luckily for us, we had a bunch of fish to eat, and upon looking in the old kitchen, we found a big old cast iron frying pan, and fried the fish in it over the fire we had made after we had gutted and cleaned them.

Things could have been a lot worse for us, so we thought, and they did as the night wore on.

After we had eaten our fill of fish, Jimmy thought he’d take a look around upstairs before it got too dark outside to see anything, and found 4 bedrooms, each with a bed and old dusty comforters and blankets on them, and he was the first one brave enough to actually get in one of the beds to sleep in it.

After being up there for an hour, leaving us in the living room downstairs, we all creeped up the stairway to have a look at him, and there he was in one of the beds, fast asleep and looking snug as a bug in a rug.

One by one, we eventually filled up the rest of the beds up there, and laid in the silent darkness of the night, each of us being creeped out by the wind whistling and the creaking of the old wooden farmhouse.

We spoke to each other over the next hour, to keep us from being scared out of our minds, until we all fell asleep up there, warm and cozy underneath the covers, which beat being huddled up on the floor in front of the fireplace downstairs.

It was Rodney that had to point out that the house was probably haunted, even though he had no reason to think that, but just the mention of the possibility sent shivers down all of our spines, and made it that much harder for us to succumb to the throes of sleep, but we did anyway.

I don’t remember exactly what time it was, but it was Chet that screamed out first, breaking the silence of our slumber, crying out like a scared baby girl at the sight of a garter snake in the grass.

“Is that you Chet?’ I screamed out into the night.

“I just saw a man in the hallway walk by!” he screamed back. “I think it was a ghost!”

“You are just seeing things. There’s no ghosts in here Chet. Now go back to sleep!” said Jimmy, now awake.

Wahhhhhh moaned Chet, and then he drifted off back to sleep.

It was a ghost that Chet had seen, but it was nothing to be afraid of. In fact, it was that ghost that would save my life that night.

We couldn’t know what was about to happen to us that night, but two convicted child murderers had escaped from the DuPage County Sheriffs Department earlier that day by killing the two deputies transporting them down south to Joliet Prison, shortly after leaving the county jail.

After overcoming the deputies and killing them, they stuffed them in the trunk, then slid off the road on North Avenue and started running into the snowstorm, and then came upon the abandoned farmhouse on Old Man Lentz’s property where we were holed up.

About an hour after we had all gone to sleep after Chet had woken us all up, we all heard a hell of a ruckus downstairs, as the door had opened and closed behind it, and two voices started talking loudly, leaving the 4 of us upstairs quietly shitting our pants.

Rodney had crawled out of the bedroom he was in and crawled into mine, scared out of his mind.

“Jamey, who are those people talking downstairs? What do we do?” said Rodney.

“I don’t know. Just be quiet and maybe they’ll go away” I answered him.

Well, because Rodney was the clumsy oaf that he was, he caught his foot on the bedpost as he was crawling back to his room, and made a hell of a sound, perking the ears of the men downstairs.

“Did you hear that Mack?” said one of the men.

“Yeah. I heard it. I don’t think it’s just us in this house!” said the other man.

Both of the men grabbed the service revolvers out of their coats they had taken from the deputies, then started slowly creeping up the stairs in the darkness toward the bedrooms we were in, causing Chet to start whimpering.

One of the men had a flashlight and you could see the light coming up the stairs, shining bright, beginning to illuminate the dark and dingy rooms we were in.

“I hear a boy up here. Been a little bit since I’ve had a boy to play with Mack. How ‘bout you?” said one of the men.

These men had evil intent, and would take it out on us once they had the chance, that much we were certain of.

The problem for us was that we were all separated in different bedrooms, so we couldn’t talk to each other to make a plan, but instead just hide underneath our covers and wait for them to attack us.

That was when I saw him, my friend, the ghost.

At first I had to wipe my eyes to believe what I was seeing, but it was in the shape of a man, looking to be an old farmer wearing overalls, hiding behind my bedroom door, looking at me and holding a finger to his mouth, as to signal to me to be quiet, so I was. Quiet as a church mouse.

Rodney was still in my room, and he could see the ghost as well, and just curled up in a ball on the floor, not making a sound.

All of the rest of us got real quiet as well, and all we could hear were the footsteps coming up to get us.

Then suddenly all 4 of the bedroom doors slammed shut at the exact same time, causing Chet to scream and the rest of us to yell out in surprise.

We were just as startled as the men on the stairs were at the slamming of the doors.

I had a feeling I knew why my door slammed, but how about the rest of them?

The men stopped midway in the stairwell and didn’t move a muscle for a time that seemed like forever, then one of them half whispered.

“How many people do you think are up here Stafford?” asked Mack.

As they shined the light on the 4 bedroom doors, Mack answered.

“At least 4? Maybe more.”

“COME OUT HERE WHOEVER IS IN THOSE BEDROOMS” yelled Stafford.

Then you could hear Chet’s shaky voice say “Go away”

The men started laughing, not the kind of laughing that made you feel good or smile, but the kind of laughing that made you want to cry.

“Hey boy. You got room in that bed you’re in for someone else to join you?” asked Mack, followed by the most sinister laugh you could imagine.

You could hear Chet behind the bedroom door start to cry out for his mom, and it was horrible, causing the rest of us to start crying as well, which brought more laughter from the men in the stairwell.

“I’m coming in there boy. Might as well pull down your pants and get ready” said Mack.

That caused Chet to start screaming at the top of his lungs.

The ghost behind my door than disappeared through the wall to the next bedroom over, and suddenly a different ghost appeared in my room from that same bedroom, and looked at me, trying to assure me that everything would be alright.

The men were now all the way upstairs and the boys could hear them outside their doors.

Mack was standing right outside of the door leading to the bedroom Rodney and I were in, with Stafford right behind him, with both men having guns drawn.

Suddenly, all the bedroom doors opened as quickly as they were slammed shut, and 4 ghosts, one out of each bedroom, rushed the men, screaming the most horrifying screams I’ve ever heard, with my ghost pushing Mack into Stafford, and Stafford falling over the balcony railing, snapping his neck as he hit the floor below, and on his way over, fired his weapon into the back of Mack’s head, killing him instantly.

Both intruders were now dead, and all of us were safe from harm. All of us could now see all 4 ghosts, two more farmers, and an old grandma type, all probably belonging to the same family.

Chet and Jimmy ran into the room Rodney and me were in, astonished at what we had just witnessed, and having our whole thought processes changed about ghosts in a split second.

These ghosts saved our lives from these men, and we would all be forever grateful.

The next morning, we all took our sleds back home and told our parents about what had happened. Naturally no one believed us, at least until the police had gone to the farmhouse and seen the bodies for themselves.

Yes, ghosts are my friends, and I can’t wait to meet them again.