The Ghostly House

The summer I was to turn 10 years old, we moved to a house that was in walking distance of about 100 steps where my family previously lived. Things began happening that I had not experienced in the old house. I recall the younger sister of a friend saying that we were moving to the "ghostly house", but I blew her off and thought no more about it.

One morning I woke up and was unable to move or speak, but I could hear my grandparents talking in the kitchen. I heard the radio playing and the sound of the coffee perking on the stove. I closed my eyes and suddenly opened them again because I felt someone sit down on the bed. I literally could feel the bed sink down as if weight were placed upon it.

In the darkness, I made out the silhouette of a man who looked like Alfred Hitchcock. I was frightened of what he would do if he knew that I saw him, so I closed my eyes and prayed. When I woke up later everything was normal and I told myself that it was all a dream. After this, on random occasions, I would have these experiences where I could not move for speak and it felt as if someone or something was in the bed with me.

I never told anyone because I was afraid of how they would react and in later years I have been told it was a night terror and sleep paralysis. One night as a teen, I sat up in bed in the middle of the night and saw what looked like a ball of fire go past the bedroom door. I quickly lay back down and pulled the cover over my head.I was wide awake and not dreaming and very afraid. I began having night terrors and sleep paralysis on a regular basis so I started putting Bibles and crosses under my pillow at night.

Upstairs in the hallway ceiling, was the door to the attic crawlspace. My grandma said she had no idea what was in it because she had never used it. I tried a few times to push the door open but always put it back. I had this extreme dread that there were evil spirits trapped there and I did not want to let them out like Pandora in the mythological story. It's hard to explain but it were as if something was telling me to leave well enough alone.

There was a tree next to the back porch at the far end of the house. No one ever climbed it as they did the other trees. Each time I stood near it there was this eerie feeling as if I should not touch it so I did not. I felt as though some unseen presence was lurking but never saw anything. I enjoyed playing in the yard and sitting on the front porch and the wall under the house. I never had any problems except in my bedroom when I was asleep.

Before they tore it down, I used to go back to the old house we had lived in. I walked around inside and always felt happy. Never did I feel anything was wrong in that house but the new home was a problem. I remember in August of 1975 my great-grandmother who slept in the downstairs bedroom with me was in the hospital. My mother purchased new linoleum for the bedroom floor and put it down before great-grandma was to come home.

I remember feeling a cold chill as the furniture was being moved out and the linoleum was being laid but again I never saw anything. It was as if something were there lurking but did not have permission to show itself. I had no issues in the living room. kitchen, hallway,or other bedrooms but only the bedroom downstairs and near that tree.

When I was 21 we moved to the city and I thought I might finally look in that crawlspace but could not get my nerve up to do it. I pushed it just a little then let the door back down. There may have been nothing there at all but I did not have the courage to find out. It was as if something was preventing me from finding out.

The house was torn down and I never set foot on the property again until 2007. I went back to my childhood church which was about 100 steps from where my old house had stood. I decided to visit the property where I had grown up. I recalled how the front yard used to have rich green grass and lots of 4 leaf clover.

When I stepped onto the property that day the grass was brown and there were no 4 leaf clover in sight. It was as if without humans walking, sitting, and breathing the air on the property that the grass had simply dried up. There was nothing left to let anyone know that a house had ever stood in that spot except a slab of concrete in the ground. As I walked over to stand on it I got that same feeling of dread I used to have near the tree, which had been cut down.

I did not see or hear anything but the hair stood up on my neck and I had this feeling as if something did not want me to be there. I was not happy to be in this spot and felt as though I were intruding. I was so uncomfortable that I immediately left. How sad because I enjoyed my young life on that property. The day I met my husband he visited me in that home and there were many happy memories. Why now did the property seem so uninviting?

I had an older cousin who died in her 90s who lived in the house just in back of mine but was up the hill. Most everyone said they felt uncomfortable in that home as if they were being watched. A woman who took care of my cousin until she died told my grandma one day that she had seen the spirit of a man sitting in a rocking chair in one of the bedrooms. She said he wore glasses and smoked a pipe. She had described my cousin's brother who was deceased and this woman had never seen him. After my cousin died several people said doors opened and closed in the house and renters would not stay there.

I can recall running screaming from that house as a little girl when the clock on the mantle chimed because it sounded like something from a horror movie. Anyone who could tell me anything from the past about the property is now deceased. There must be an explanation for what has been experienced in my former home and the house of my relative but no one can tell me.

I'm thankful that I never actually saw anything because it was bad enough always sensing that something was not right. I wish I had asked my friend's sister that day long ago why she referred to my home as the ghostly house. I continued having night terrors for some years in every home I lived in until now so that was my personal issue. I have never again, however, lived in a house where I felt uncomfortable or as if I was unwelcome or being watched.