I'm not sure how I feel about it, although I suppose we all should have expected it. The paranormal is normal in my family.
My father died two weeks ago, and according to my mother, it didn't take him long at all to come back for a visit. Twice so far, she has gone into the bathroom in the morning and found a sopping wet washcloth draped over the lip of the sink -- just as my dad would leave them after using one to wet his face before shaving in the morning. Once, while my mother was undergoing one of her dialysis treatments, she felt someone pat her knee three times. Then, while making her bed one morning, she felt a hand brush through her hair and then down her arm.
And lastly, while I was over at my mother's house yesterday, the television turned itself on.
As I said, I'm not sure how I feel about it. If he's just there to watch over her or comfort her, great. My worry though, is that he's stuck in that miserable house just like everything else that haunts it. This is a dark, gloomy house where three people have died and where nobody has ever been happy. My mother finds the house peaceful and says it feels cozy and homey, but personally, I'm afraid of the place. I don't even like being there after dark. I lived there for ten years, but only realized how ungodly creepy the place was after I moved out on my own. I guess it's true: you really can get used to anything but now, if at all possible, I avoid going out there.
Why? Because frequently you can hear what sounds like a woman in high heels pacing on the stone floor of the kitchen late at night. Because books fly off shelves -- including one that I saw travel about six or seven horizontal feet across the spare bedroom before dropping to the floor. Because there are weird shadows to be seen in there sometimes, including some that move in a very unnerving, jittery fashion.
Because the grain of the wood paneling, especially in what was my old bedroom, seems to form screaming faces. One of these faces appears to have been cleaved in half, as if by an axe. Another of these faces looks like a skull with something dark dripping upward out of the eye sockets.
Because, so far, three people have seen a woman in a white blouse and a long, old-fashioned dark skirt standing in the front yard at the end of the walk. A friend of mine saw her in the evening, the paper girl saw her at five in the morning, and one of my mother's friends saw her early one morning as he rode past the house on his way to his apple orchards up the mountain.
Because antique mirrors weighing about fifty pounds apiece have flown off the wall, crossed the room, and turned en route so that the glass was facing the wall they were hanging on. Granted, this event caused my father and I to come running to discover my mother in the throes of a hypoglycemia, but it's still unsettling.
Because on at least one occasion, the family who lived there before us came home one night to find a man sitting at the kitchen table. They looked at the man, the man looked at them wide-eyed, and then he disappeared.
Because the bedroom doors open at night as though something is peeking in, and then close themselves. Also because the front door has a nasty habit of locking itself behind you -- to the point that everybody knows to carry a key if they have to go outside for any reason. We learned that lesson the hard way after the house locked my mother outside one wet, cold winter day and she ended up very ill after sitting outside for several hours while waiting for my father to come home.
Because once while I was home alone one summer day, I heard someone coughing violently in my mother's bedroom -- the same bedroom where one of the three people who died in that house passed away from cancer.
Perhaps most of all because on most any given night you can step outside and hear from the woods that press in around the house on all sides eerie laughter, muttering, gibbering, and distant conversation you can't quite make out.
There's probably some I'm forgetting, but I've made my point. I do not like the thought of my father stuck in that awful tomb of a house. If he's there of his own accord, fine, but I can't stand the thought that he might be trapped there like God knows what all else.
My father died two weeks ago, and according to my mother, it didn't take him long at all to come back for a visit. Twice so far, she has gone into the bathroom in the morning and found a sopping wet washcloth draped over the lip of the sink -- just as my dad would leave them after using one to wet his face before shaving in the morning. Once, while my mother was undergoing one of her dialysis treatments, she felt someone pat her knee three times. Then, while making her bed one morning, she felt a hand brush through her hair and then down her arm.
And lastly, while I was over at my mother's house yesterday, the television turned itself on.
As I said, I'm not sure how I feel about it. If he's just there to watch over her or comfort her, great. My worry though, is that he's stuck in that miserable house just like everything else that haunts it. This is a dark, gloomy house where three people have died and where nobody has ever been happy. My mother finds the house peaceful and says it feels cozy and homey, but personally, I'm afraid of the place. I don't even like being there after dark. I lived there for ten years, but only realized how ungodly creepy the place was after I moved out on my own. I guess it's true: you really can get used to anything but now, if at all possible, I avoid going out there.
Why? Because frequently you can hear what sounds like a woman in high heels pacing on the stone floor of the kitchen late at night. Because books fly off shelves -- including one that I saw travel about six or seven horizontal feet across the spare bedroom before dropping to the floor. Because there are weird shadows to be seen in there sometimes, including some that move in a very unnerving, jittery fashion.
Because the grain of the wood paneling, especially in what was my old bedroom, seems to form screaming faces. One of these faces appears to have been cleaved in half, as if by an axe. Another of these faces looks like a skull with something dark dripping upward out of the eye sockets.
Because, so far, three people have seen a woman in a white blouse and a long, old-fashioned dark skirt standing in the front yard at the end of the walk. A friend of mine saw her in the evening, the paper girl saw her at five in the morning, and one of my mother's friends saw her early one morning as he rode past the house on his way to his apple orchards up the mountain.
Because antique mirrors weighing about fifty pounds apiece have flown off the wall, crossed the room, and turned en route so that the glass was facing the wall they were hanging on. Granted, this event caused my father and I to come running to discover my mother in the throes of a hypoglycemia, but it's still unsettling.
Because on at least one occasion, the family who lived there before us came home one night to find a man sitting at the kitchen table. They looked at the man, the man looked at them wide-eyed, and then he disappeared.
Because the bedroom doors open at night as though something is peeking in, and then close themselves. Also because the front door has a nasty habit of locking itself behind you -- to the point that everybody knows to carry a key if they have to go outside for any reason. We learned that lesson the hard way after the house locked my mother outside one wet, cold winter day and she ended up very ill after sitting outside for several hours while waiting for my father to come home.
Because once while I was home alone one summer day, I heard someone coughing violently in my mother's bedroom -- the same bedroom where one of the three people who died in that house passed away from cancer.
Perhaps most of all because on most any given night you can step outside and hear from the woods that press in around the house on all sides eerie laughter, muttering, gibbering, and distant conversation you can't quite make out.
There's probably some I'm forgetting, but I've made my point. I do not like the thought of my father stuck in that awful tomb of a house. If he's there of his own accord, fine, but I can't stand the thought that he might be trapped there like God knows what all else.
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