Haunted Objects: Stories of Ghosts on Your Shelf

by Christopher Balzano

  In my head, I heard a voice say my name. It then said, “You will use it or I’ll kill your whole family.” At that moment, the closet door slowly opened and the board fell off the top shelf. When I looked back at my roommate’s bed, the dark figure was gone.

  I got the board, ran out the door, and threw it into the dumpster behind the building. I ignored the pounding on the metal as I walked back to the front door. I had no desire to see it ever again.

  The decapitated body of a foreign woman was found in the same dumpster a few weeks later. Some police friends not involved in the investigation told me they were recommending I be put on the short list of suspects because it was the second time in as many years a body had been dumped on a property where I was a resident. I laughed it off because it was so absurd.

  Although I have used many other Ouija boards over the years, I have never felt the same intimidation or heaviness as I did while using that first board. Logic tells me the Ouija board had no connection to the murder, but there is a tiny voice that always questions the possibility and makes me pause.

  Sarah Finds a Board

  It is rare to find anyone who has actually purchased an Ouija or spirit board. Boards usually just seem to “be there,” perhaps owned by a longtime family member or picked up at a long-ago yard sale. Ask people where they got their boards and they will usually shrug their shoulders. They have no memory of the acquisition.

  Boards seem to be one of the last true artifacts handed down from generation to generation. You can visit the board game aisle of the local toy store to find a new glow-in-the-dark version or you can buy one at your local occult dealer, but the casual user won’t do either. Instead, spirit boards are discovered in the attic or basement of parents’ or grandparents’ houses, under a tattered quilt, on top of old books, or next to the old game of Operation with the funny bone long lost.

  People take boards out of storage and breathe new life into them, sometimes asking the former owner if any paranormal activity occurred when they used it, but more often not knowing its history. Many people associated with the paranormal condemn any use of the spirit board because of this kind of “blind” communication, which is like walking along a dark street in the worst part of town, tempting fate. For others, not knowing a board’s history is part of the thrill.

  Sarah knows the history of her board and the colorful path it took to her is as interesting as the events she witnessed with it. She now admits the unusual things she experienced with it may be linked to the road it traveled to get to her, although part of her wonders if the board itself caused some of the sad things it saw.

  Sarah’s board was made in the 1930s and belonged to her great aunt, who lived on a farm with her brother and sister. While she is unsure of any communication they might have gotten from it, there was tragedy linked to it in those early days.

  A fire broke out in the barn where her great aunt kept the board. Several of the animals were burned alive, and the damage to the barn was so severe, the family had to tear it down and build a new one. Almost all of the family’s possessions stored in the barn were lost, but the spirit board was untouched. It was found on a burnt railing, with not a mark on it.

  When Sarah’s aunt left the farm, she took the board with her. Years later, it ended up with Sarah’s grandmother, who didn’t use it. Sarah found it while cleaning her grandmother’s house. She may have been young at the time, but she recognized what it was and how it was used. Her story is typical: Most people cannot remember the first time they used a board, and the understanding of how it is used seems instinctive.

  When Sarah got a little older, she would take the board out when she was with her friends or during sleepovers. She had many experiences while using it, often harmless or amusing incidents when viewed by themselves. Once, they talked to a spirit claiming to be Marie Antoinette, who spelled out, “I want your head.” As the young girls laughed, a book fell on her friend’s neck.

  Sarah brought the board to the home of another friend, who thought she lived in a haunted house. For a while, they talked to “nice” spirits before something else communicated with them. It spelled out, “DIE, DIE, DIE,” and the temperature in the room dropped. They tried to move the planchette to “Goodbye,” but it wouldn’t move. The lights turned on and off and furniture began to move. Sarah’s friend felt cold hands on her neck and began to scream. Sarah threw the board against the wall and everything stopped.

  Things got more intense when Sarah moved out of the house. In her second year of college, she returned home to get some furniture and personal belongings because she was moving off-campus into an apartment with some friends. The board was on the washing machine in the basement, although later her mother said she had not seen it in years.

  Sarah took the board with her and began to notice odd things almost immediately.

  “I could not keep things alive near that thing,” she said. “We kept it in the living room because we would use it when friends came over. All the plants died. I thought it was weird, but my roommates didn’t notice. I took it into my room and put it under my bed. The fish I kept on my bureau died the next day.”

  There was something compelling her to keep the board, which is another trait commonly found in people who spend time using it. A friend who practiced Wicca blessed the board and the scary sessions stopped, but ironically, this led to some disappointment.

  “It didn’t seem to work as well. We would talk to people, but there was nothing that raised the hairs on the back of our necks. We missed being scared of it,” Sarah said.

  That changed the night she woke up and saw an old man in her room using the board. He was bald and wrinkled and sitting cross-legged on the floor in the moonlight coming through her window. She could almost see through him, and she knew he was a ghost. He motioned for her to come over and it was then she noticed that in front of him was the board, which she had put away in the closet a few days earlier.

  “I screamed and when my roommates came in and turned on the light, he disappeared. Maybe it was the end of a dream, but the board was still there on the floor,” she said. “I threw it in the dumpster. There was something evil about that old man, so let him go haunt the dump. That board is where it belongs.”

  Sarah, now entering her forties, has not used a board since. When people take one out at parties or get-togethers, she finds a reason to leave the room. Sometimes history is meant to stay in the past.

  Bed of Dread

  When a person is terrified by something in the night, the best remedy is usually to crawl under the covers and hide there until it either goes away or the sun comes up. But what happens when it’s the bed that is so terrifying?

  Caesar related the story about a family he knew that purchased a home that came with a bed frame. The family’s son decided to use it, and from the moment he began sleeping in the bed, strange things occurred. Lights and other electrical devices would turn on and off on their own, and inexplicable shadows would flicker on the walls. Bed sheets and blankets would be pulled off or even float above the bed, and the son would often have nightmares and wake up to bitter cold temperatures and a feeling of being watched.

  At first, only the son endured these hellish, sleepless nights. He finally told his father, but his father didn’t believe him. He thought it was his son’s imagination, which would calm down once he got used to the new house. But after constant pestering from his son, the father finally decided to spend a few nights in the boy’s room, just to prove that nothing was actually happening. It didn’t take long before the strange incidents happened to him as well, and he, too, became a believer.

  The family decided to do a little more research on the history of the home and discovered that someone had committed suicide in the house. While there was no proof that the bed or even the room it was in had belonged to the suicide victim, it still hit a little too close to home for the family. They got rid of the bed frame and soon after, everything returned to normal.

  Altered B
elief

  As a paranormal researcher for many years, John Brightman is used to dealing with family drama when investigating private residences. He’s also used to dealing with haunted objects and even a few allegedly cursed ones, but never before have all three situations combined into one strange case that still leaves him wondering exactly what happened.

  Author’s note: All the family names have been changed.

  Lucy called John’s group, New England Paranormal Research, to help her deal with paranormal activity that was going on in the house where her mother, sister, and brother had all lived. All three had recently died, and various phenomena had been taking place in the house: objects moving around, doors opening and closing on their own, and other such things. But when her young granddaughter reported seeing her dead uncle near the staircase, and when Lucy herself saw a strange mist coming up from the basement doorway, she knew something was haunting the house and she wanted it gone.

  According to Lucy, her older brother, Armand, lived in the house with his mother Mabel. Mabel was in her early 90s and had not been in great health. Then again, neither had Armand; he was in his 60s and he, too, had become ill and was having trouble taking care of Mabel. Also living with them was Armand’s sister, Erica, who wasn’t doing much to help.

  One day, when Armand wasn’t at home, Erica saw her chance to speak to her mother alone. Erica told her that if she agreed to sign the house and everything else over to her, she would take care of her and she wouldn’t end up in a nursing home if things got too bad with Armand. Mabel agreed to do so because she had a great fear of dying in a nursing home or some other assisted-care facility. She wanted to die in her home, with dignity. She signed everything over to Erica, including all the legal power to decide her care.

  When Armand found out, he was furious. He was the one who had remained at home taking care of his elderly mother while Erica went on living her life. According to Brightman, Armand had “gone nuts” from being cooped up with his mother for so long, in combination with his own health issues. He thought he was going to inherit everything when his mother died—his reward for being the dedicated son.

  But as it turned out, Erica lied. After Mabel signed everything over to her, Erica put her in a nursing home anyway. Mabel died not long after, and the cause of death was never really determined. Brightman figured it must have been natural causes, but the research his group did suggested that the medical examiner had never made a solid determination. Both medical and police reports provided no answer.

  About two months after Mabel’s passing, Erica’s spleen ruptured and she died as a result. A few months later, Armand passed away as well. Within about an eight-month span, all three parties involved in the spat had died.

  As the only surviving family member, Lucy took possession of the house and began cleaning it out and preparing to place it on the market.

  That’s when she discovered the altar.

  In Armand’s room was a small desk with three or four candles placed across its surface. In the center of a desk was a strange box, which Lucy couldn’t remember ever seeing before. Before he took ill, her brother was a successful commercial fisherman, and she thought it looked like something he might have come across in his many travels.

  The box measured about eight inches long and four inches wide and resembled a jewelry box. Inside was an old and faded stuffed toy that looked like a fish. Tacked to it were photographs of three people, two of whom she instantly recognized—Erica and Mabel. The third picture was of a man she did not recognize. Little stickpins had been inserted into the toy in various positions, like a voodoo doll.

  Lucy didn’t think her brother was into voodoo. Yes, he was eccentric—if you came to visit without calling first, he’d slam the door in your face, no matter what. He had collected many items related to fishing, like old buoys and netting and other such objects, and arranged them in the backyard in a way that made sense only to him. But voodoo? That went beyond anything she imagined.

  Yet as she continued to examine the contents of the wooden box, she found additional items that made it look more like voodoo was the case. There were extra pins, dried herbs that might have been sage, and mysterious oils and ointments with no labels. It looked as if many of the items were old. Perhaps this was something Armand had been practicing for years.

  It was possible—a fisherman lives something of a nomadic existence and comes in contact with people from many different cultures. Some of those who work in commercial fishing still bring old world beliefs and traditions on the ships with them.

  The box the doll was found in.

  Armand sailed out of the port of New Bedford, Massachusetts, alongside a great many seamen of Portuguese and Brazilian decent. Within those cultures exists a form of black magic known as macumba, and it is possible Armand learned the magic from one of them. Macumba rituals are often used to seek revenge on family members who have done harm, often utilizing a photograph of that person to do so. For that reason, many superstitious Brazilians will not allow a photograph of themselves to be given to anyone they don’t know.

  Upon discovering the box and altar, Lucy’s first instinct wasn’t to call a paranormal investigation team. Instead, she hired a medium to help the restless spirits move from the house and remove bad vibes brought about by any strange rituals her brother was practicing. Another reason she sought help from a psychic was to address rumors of a stash of money hidden somewhere in the house. Armand had been successful in the fishing industry, but there was no trace of his profits anywhere.

  The medium told Lucy that Armand’s strange outdoor collection of seafaring memorabilia was some sort of map detailing where he buried his money in the yard, but the family never found any of it. She also explained that the pins that were stuck into the fish doll were arranged in a way that would inflict pain on the intended target. Without knowing about Erica or how she died, she noted that one of the pins appeared to be placed in what would represent the spleen. A shiver went down Lucy’s back.

  The medium also told Lucy that if they buried the box with the fish doll in the yard, the hauntings would stop. Unfortunately, that didn’t turn out to be true, which was how John Brightman and NEPR got involved.

  “It was just a weird situation,” John said. “(Lucy) called us in and explained the whole situation with her brother, sister, and mother. We investigated one night for over nine hours, and we captured absolutely nothing in terms of evidence.”

  Perhaps the haunting was meant only for the family to experience.

  “It was kind of a let-down,” he said. “I was hoping to get something that would back up what they were saying.”

  John and his team even dug up the box with the fish doll inside, which at that point had been buried for about three months. They returned it to the house and attempted to use it as a “trigger object,” hoping that it would stir up activity again.

  “Again, nothing,” he said.

  John took pictures of the box and the doll and sent them to colleagues who are authorities on voodoo. The voodoo experts said the pins were inserted in the right places to inflict pain on the intended targets, but not knowing if Armand invoked the proper chants and prayers makes them unsure that he “activated” the curse.

  Was Armand really so upset with his sister and mother for the sneaky arrangements they made behind his back that he put a macumba curse on them, leading to their deaths? And did his evil actions result in his own passing as well?

  The doll that may have held a curse.

  One mystery that still remains is the identity of the man in the third photograph stuck to the fish doll. Speculation is that it could have been a fishing partner who wronged Armand in some way. Perhaps a deal gone bad is the reason Armand’s money has never been found, and he turned to macumba to seek his revenge on his partner as well as his family. That might even explain why the doll was in the shape of a fish.

  When the box was removed from the property, all the strange activity came to an abrupt e
nd, and a sense of peace that had been missing for many decades once again filled its rooms.

  The box is now in Brightman’s possession. He plans to eventually give it to John Zaffis, paranormal investigator and collector of haunted objects, to be placed in his museum, John Zaffis Museum of the Paranormal.

  Brightman believes Armand’s spirit perhaps felt guilty about the pain he had inflicted on his loved ones and realized he was wrong to be so upset. Once the box and the doll were removed, his spirit was able to find peace and move on to be reunited with his mother and sister, where all would be forgiven.

  The Haunted Travel Clock

  When Richard was a child, his mother owned a small wind-up travel clock that had been a gift from her grandmother. Richard never felt comfortable around the clock, saying it always gave him the creeps, even though he had no idea why. He said it looked like a small version of the famous “Big Ben” clock in London. It had a gold case and a green face with Roman numerals in a gold color. The hands and wind-up key were brass.

  Although it was an ordinary little clock, it just never sat right with Richard. Just being in the same room with it would give him fits of paranoia, as if it was ticking down the minutes of his life.

  When Richard’s great-grandmother died, the clock stopped working. No matter what was tried, it wouldn’t start up again. Richard began to wonder if maybe the tick-tocks hadn’t been measuring his life, but rather that of his great-grandmother. The thought was enough to send shivers down his spine.

  Richard’s mother never threw the broken clock away because it held sentimental value for her, and every time he looked at it, he would get a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. When his mother was out one day, Richard buried the clock in the backyard. He said there was “merry hell” when his mother found the clock was missing, but she never discovered what he did with it.