“Why don’t you leave already? This is freaking me out and I’m not even there,” wrote Roland H.
Listen, I’ve never run from anything in my life. And this is an experience I’ve fought for too long and hard to just abandon.
“I don’t understand why you’re doing this,” wrote Annie Francis.
Let me explain: I’ve made a study of death over the years, looking at what different cultures believe happens when we die. I know that sounds pretentious. I’m only 23 for God’s sake! But I meant it when I told you this question has burned a fire in me. I’m not ashamed of it.
It started when my pet dog, Arthur, died. I was there when it happened. I saw the life fade from the dog’s eyes — and for a moment, I saw peace. Silly, right? I mean, if there’s an afterlife, that doesn’t mean dogs go there. But there was an indescribable look in his eyes as if he wasn’t looking at me anymore, but beyond me. I keep wondering what comes next. What did Arthur see? And could he have stuck around if he wanted to, in spirit form?
Every culture has a theory on ghosts, and most of them are remarkably similar. A floating spirit, conjured out of mist, destined to wander the places where it suffered in life.
I don’t get caught up in the religious aspect of it all — I’ll leave that to the theologians — but how can we not wonder what happens at the exact moment of death? Is our soul truly separate from our bodies? Many people talk about finding peace in their last few moments: do we understand something then, something that answers our most eternal question?
So, Annie, that’s why I’m here. I know that’s a little bit off topic but I think it gives you an idea of my level of commitment.
Where was I before all this started? Right, Mrs. Madison’s son’s friend.
Angry Spirits
Nov. 14, 2010, 9:13 p.m.
Sean Gordon
In April of 1975, Margaret Madison came home from shopping to find a teenaged stranger screaming in her living room.
When she walked in, he started babbling incoherently at her. The only words she caught were “the soldier” and “the woman.” She should have been alarmed, but the kid appeared so stricken, Mrs. Madison went to him to try and comfort him.
He continued talking nonstop for several minutes, interrupted by the occasional sob. He kept looking up the stairs, as if scared someone or something were going to come down it at any moment. By this time, Mrs. Madison was quite worried. It was not unusual for her kids to invite friends over, but so far none of her children had materialized. She was left only with a distressed boy she didn’t know.
Finally, she was able to work out that the teenager was a classmate of her son, Harold, who had invited him over. But the kid wouldn’t say where Harold was, and when she called upstairs, there was no reply.
Mrs. Madison dashed up the stairs and into her son’s room. She found Harold with blood on his face, lying on the floor of his room. He wasn’t dead, but he had been knocked unconscious. By the time she figured out that he was all right, the screaming started again from downstairs.
“He’s here!” the boy downstairs shouted. “He’s right here!”
She heard him run to the front door and pull frantically on it, screaming that he couldn’t get out. The house, he claimed, wouldn’t let him go.
Mrs. Madison did the only sensible thing she could think of: she called an ambulance and the police.
When they arrived, they found Harold awake with a concussion, but otherwise unharmed. His friend was in far worse straits, staring at the corner of the living room and insisting that “he” was there. Mrs. Madison saw no one, although — and she didn’t admit this to the police — she did see a shadow that shouldn’t have been there.
The only question remained: what had happened? As Harold later told it, he and his friend had wound up in a heated argument. Mrs. Madison couldn’t remember over what. A girl, she thought.
Whatever it was, the fight quickly became violent, with both kids slugging away at each other. Harold’s buddy was losing, and picked up some object on the bedside table — a radio, I think she said — and hit Harold in the head with it. Harold saw the proverbial stars floating before his eyes and blacked out.
What happened next is the subject of speculation. Harold’s entire room was upended, but apparently not from the fight. Mrs. Madison said it was as if some great wind came through, knocking all the pictures off the wall. Harold’s prized baseball — which sat in a glass case up on a high shelf — somehow came across the room, landing near the same point Harold’s friend had been standing. There was shattered glass everywhere.
The kid told the police that a “soldier” had appeared in the room, shouting at him angrily. The only other description he offered was that the soldier was dressed in an old uniform, and had black marks all around his neck. When the kid turned to flee, a woman stood near the steps. He darted past her, intending to push her out of the way when he headed down the stairs. But instead, he ran right through her as if she wasn’t even there. That was when the screaming started — and when Mrs. Madison entered the scene.
Mrs. Madison drew some interesting conclusions from the incident itself, which probably would have caused most of us to move out.
“I’ve been scared here, but never particularly threatened,” she said. “Up until then, I couldn’t have said exactly why. But I suddenly understood. This house cared for me the same way I cared for it. I’ve always felt an affinity for it, even before we moved in. What I hadn’t realized is that it felt similarly. When Harold was threatened, the house felt threatened, and reacted accordingly.”
But it doesn’t end there.
There have been times, Mrs. Madison told me, when the house simply wouldn’t let someone in. The front door would jam and refuse to open. In particular she remembered a police officer who showed up to ask her some questions during the 1994 Lord Halloween murders. Mrs. Madison was alone at the time and was forced to converse with the cop through the shut door. No matter which door she tried, none of them would open, an impediment that embarrassed Mrs. Madison at the time. Later, however, she began to wonder. Was the man — whose face she never saw — really a police officer? Was it possible he was the killer himself? Could the house have protected her?
Another time a friend of her daughter Kristine was locked in, instead of out. Try as they might, no one could open the door — until the friend, apparently feeling guilty, broke down and confessed that she had “accidentally” borrowed some of Kristine’s earrings. After that, the door opened just fine.
“It’s my protector,” Mrs. Madison told me last year. “And not just mine, either. The house seems to take a shine to certain people — and reacts to help them.”
When I heard that story, I was damn glad I had never treated Mrs. Madison badly. If I had, I’m not sure I’d be leaving here tonight alive.
The Girl Scout and the ghost
Nov. 14, 2010, 9:32 p.m.
Sean Gordon
It was Mrs. Madison herself who originally invited me to stay the night. When I interviewed her last year, she was clearly excited by my keen interest in her stories. Unlike a lot of others, I never mocked her. In fact, I came to believe that she held the key to understanding something that eluded me for years.
She told me as the interview ended that she would call me soon so I could experience a taste of what was in this house.
But the call never came. More strangely, my attempts to reconnect with Mrs. Madison were rebuffed — and I never knew why. At first I thought she didn’t like the article I wrote about her home. But, if I do say so myself, it was extremely well-written, and it made her look good. Besides, her refusal to return my calls or even answer the door when I was here started before the article was published.
Unfortunately, I had to wait until now — after a fight with the town itself — to be let in. I just wish I understood what had changed her mind.
I still feel her presence here. Oh, not in a spiritual way. It’s just that all the furniture is e
xactly as it was last year. The place is stocked with antiques. I’m sitting on a sofa in the dining room and there are two wooden chairs sitting across from me, both with acorns carved into the tops of the back of the chair. That means they came from Waterford — the acorn is a calling card for furniture designers in that area — and hail from the 19th century. They must be incredibly valuable. (Thanks to Tim, I had to cover the Waterford fair last year, which lets you tour several historic homes. That’s the only reason I know what the acorn on the furniture means.)
Every other room has similar surprises in it. Even the hallways have antiques in them. There are several Civil War-era maps of Leesburg and one that is a hundred years older. And while the kitchen has modern appliances, many of them are hidden away behind custom-made cabinetry. You stand in the kitchen and feel like you’ve gone back in time.
The house is in such good condition — it’s even dusted by some cleaning service — that I half expect Margaret Madison to walk in from the dining room, just as she did last year. But alas, that’s not to be. She died in February of this year.
Surprisingly, she didn’t leave the home to her children. Instead, she sought for it to be declared a historical landmark and turned into a museum by the Town of Leesburg. The town, of course, is still busy trying to raise funds for this purpose, but the home remains under its wise and benevolent (sarcasm alert) control in the meantime.
Before Mrs. Madison’s change of heart, however, I did get the chance to talk to her three children, all of whom also eventually came to accept that the house was haunted.
Mrs. Madison’s daughter Kristine told me she finally believed in ghosts when she was sitting in the living room reading next to a roaring fire. Suddenly she felt cold, as if someone were standing between her and the fireplace. When she looked on the floor, she could see the shadow of a person standing there — but there was nobody else in the room. She sat watching as the shadow moved and then the seat cushion across from her depressed, as if someone were sitting down. She screamed and fled.
Harold, meanwhile, said he hadn’t believed until about ten years ago. Like his father, he thought Mrs. Madison and his sister exaggerated what happened to them in the house and that there “must be some logical explanation.” But he came by to visit his mom (his father had long since passed away) one day and instead found a 13-year-old Girl Scout standing in the living room. His mother was out running errands and wasn’t home yet. The girl, it turned out, was perfectly real, but claimed to have been let inside by a woman in an unusual dress. The two had talked for some time, with the strange woman giving the girl a history lesson on the house.
According to the girl, the woman said the house was built in 1851 by her father, Gerard Morgan, and had been used as an infirmary during “the War between the States.” She added that “he” had tried to take her home after her “daddy died,” but that she hadn’t let him. She also said, “I will never leave this place.”
The stunned girl found the woman odd — at 13 years old, she knew the math didn’t add up concerning the history of the house — but asked only whether the woman wanted to buy some cookies.
The woman laughed and said Harold, she called him by name, would be coming by to purchase a dozen boxes. She promptly excused herself, walked into the kitchen, and disappeared.
Harold walked in a few moments later.
Two things made Harold believe in the ghost. For one, the girl appeared to have no idea she had been talking with a spirit, and also no embarrassment about being caught inside the house. Clearly, as far as she was concerned, she had been let in by the home’s owner. Her sole goal there was to sell Girl Scout cookies. (Harold insisted she went on to sell a record number.)
More interestingly, however, was that the girl’s story seemed to match his mother’s painstaking research into the history of the house.
The home had indeed been built in 1851 and been used as a makeshift hospital in the Civil War. Mrs. Madison had also unearthed a document that made mention of a legal battle over the property.
Was it possible that a Girl Scout had broken into his mother’s house just to give a short — and accurate — history lesson? Theoretically, yes. But Harold found it unlikely. Far more likely was the…
Shit!
Okay, there was just a pounding of footsteps from upstairs. It sounded like someone running down the hallway.
And I just heard a door slam.
It’s finally happening!
Lights, Part II
Nov. 14, 2010, 9:48 p.m.
Sean Gordon
The light in the basement is on.
I’ve just made a careful tour of the entire ground floor —and the light in the basement is on.
It wasn’t on earlier; I checked. And now it is.
The footsteps upstairs have stopped, but it’s pretty clear that whoever is in here with me wants me to know they’re here.
This isn’t proof yet. It could be some pranksters. One of the photographers at my paper is into practical jokes. Maybe this is him.
I’m just saying it’s possible. There could be a rational explanation.
Maybe it’s the wind. This house really is damn cold — there might be some air circulation problem. “’Tis the wind and nothing more!” Isn’t that how that poem goes?
Sorry to quote Edgar Allan Poe at you. William and Mary didn’t have a journalism program, so the closest I could do was major in English.
I haven’t worked up the nerve to either go upstairs or into the basement yet. Apologies for that. For right now, it’s safer to leave the lights on and have my flashlight at the ready just in case.
When I imagined being here, I always thought I’d be fearless. But although I’m excited, I’m pretty scared. My heart’s beating so fast I’m worried I might have a heart attack.
There have been no more sounds from the upstairs, but there’s no mistaking the light in the basement. I wanted this, didn’t I? I thought I could face a few ghosts, but look at me. My hands are shaking.
My mother always said you get what you deserve and boy, would she be laughing now. I fought to get in here and now I’m fighting the urge to run.
But I won’t. I’m staying put. I’m on the front lines here, people, bound to give you the truth about ghosts. It was my dad who set me straight. He believes there are only two kinds of people in this world — cowards and survivors. Cowards whine and complain. Survivors “do what must be done.”
And I’m a fucking survivor.
“What are you trying to prove? What are you hoping to find?” asked someone calling themselves “Room1408.”
I just want to find out the truth. I’ve wanted to know what happens when we die for a long time. You may think everyone wonders about it, but I’ve been serious in my devotion to the subject. I’m not just content to read books on philosophy and religion — I’ve explored every avenue open to me.
Okay, enough talk. I’m going into the basement. I’ll just pop down and come right back.
Petrified beyond the ability for rational thought
Nov. 14, 2010, 9:58 p.m.
Sean Gordon
Damn, damn, damn. Totally freaked out now. Damn. Still alive, but give me a second to catch my breath and write what happened. It’s the real deal, people.
You won’t believe what I’m about to tell you.
In the dark
Nov. 14, 2010, 10:08 p.m.
Sean Gordon
Here’s how it went down: I walked down the steps slowly. They were so steep, I kept worrying I’d fall and break my neck and I’d never be able to update you guys on what happened. But I made it to the bottom in one piece and took a look around.
The basement is scary as shit. It’s pretty much every horror movie basement you’ve ever seen. The darkness is so thick that it’s oppressive. Other than the laundry room, there’s not much down there. It smells damp so I don’t think it was that useful for storage. There’s a washer, dryer and a utility sink along the far wall, but otherwise it�
��s almost empty. There are some big poles down there; they look like they’re holding up the damn house. Maybe they are.
Anyway, I turned off the light very carefully, pulling once on the chain. I pulled out my flashlight and turned it on, and then proceeded to back up the steps slowly, keeping one hand on the railing.
I wanted to see if the light stayed off. I made it all the way back out to the kitchen and it stayed off. But then I heard a noise upstairs and looked away. When I turned back, the light was back on again. I turned away for less than a second, mind you. There’s simply no way someone could have run up and turned on the light and run away again. I would have seen them.
I was pretty spooked, but I was also determined. I swallowed hard and — I’m either very brave or very stupid — walked back down to the basement. I didn’t want to, but my father didn’t raise a coward. I carefully moved down the steps again and turned the light off.
And that’s when the door to the kitchen slammed shut.
I was left in that basement in the pitch black. First, I tried to turn the light back on but I couldn’t find the chain. When I finally did, the light wouldn’t come on. I just pulled on the chain again and again and nothing happened. Then I tried to use my flashlight (which I’d forgotten I even had in my hand) but it didn’t work either. It had been shining brightly twenty seconds earlier, but it was completely dead.
As I fumbled in the darkness, I thought I could hear something else. It was the sound of multiple voices whispering in the dark. They were saying somebody’s name. Stephanie, I think. I don’t think anybody named Stephanie lived here. That’s a pretty modern name, isn’t it? But that’s what I heard.
The Last Blog: A Short Story (The Soren Chase Series) Page 2