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Local Legend Podcast: The Witch of Pilot’s Knob

Something sinister roams Pilot’s Knob cemetery in Marion, Kentucky. Is it the ghost of a child witch or something much darker? Or both? It could be both.

Dusty lets his hair down and rambles for a bit about this relatively unknown legend.


If you have any legends you’d like Dusty to look at, hit him up on email or Twitter! And make sure you’re following Horror-Writers on Twitter as well.

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Here’s What Really Happened to Claire

I’ve been sitting on this story for a while now. Jill called me in late July to unloaded it and I’d decided to bury it out of fear and spite, but in the process of clearing out my own demons, I came to realize that secrets are really dangerous.

We had to do some soul cleansing in preparation for the exorcism of our home. Demons thrive on shame and worry – the nasty byproducts of secrets, among other things – and our priest advised us to come clean.

I have your pretty run-of-the-mill secrets. Occasionally, I don’t return the grocery cart to the holding pen, I just leave it in the parking lot. I pick my nose in the car. Sometimes I fantasize about running away to begin a new life, alone, waitressing in Colorado. I wet my pants quite frequently while walking the dogs or getting the kids out of the car, and it’s not the uh oh! I was laughing too hard and a little pee came out kind of wetting my pants. No, I’ve ruined two pairs of Uggs. The flat tire on Chris’s car didn’t just happen out of nowhere, I hit that curb pretty damn hard. I’ve had Botox three times and I’ll keep getting it until the relentless aging process calls for bigger guns. Sometimes I nap while the kids are at school instead of doing housework. I’m a gossip. I’m an angry mom. You can all attest to the fact that I use the Lord’s name in vain and I swear relentlessly. Oh, and I’ve never seen Top Gun, though I lie and tell people that I have if the subject comes up. It’s just too annoying to listen to people’s incredulousness and insistence that I simply must see it.

There is my list of relatively harmless little deceptions and white lies, but, as the preacher says, “lies aren’t color coded in the bible.”

Our exorcist insisted that bringing hidden things, no matter how insignificant they may seem, into the light would snatch them back from demons and drain their negative power. The technical term for all you Catholics out there is confession, and it was supes fun to tell the priest all my little offenses. But I had this one nagging secret that I’d kept for a while.

I didn’t think it was my sin to confess. It was a secret that I’d been holding for someone else and as I aired my own dirty laundry, I realized that that someone had put me in the role as confessor. A role that I had absolutely no right to and one that had put my soul in grave danger.


 

When Jill called me in late July and asked me to meet her for coffee about thirty minutes away in Newton, I tried as politely as I could to make excuses. After I’d listened to her and her besties tell me their ghost story I’d never wanted to see any of them again, let alone catch up over coffee. Of course, I’d seen the three women around town a few times, from afar in Whole Foods or driving by in their souped-up SUVs on Washington Street. That was as close I ever wanted to get to those witches again.

And I use that word respectfully. Those women conjured their dead friend and used her spirit like she was a genie. I didn’t believe that was the only dabbling they’d done in the dark arts. I simply couldn’t believe they could be that successful with such a powerful spell out of the gate and then just give up magic for good.

Hillary, Jill and Vanessa frightened me, and after I’d had some time to process their tale, I began to fear they would regret telling me their ghost story. To begin with, the story itself didn’t add up. What if they noted my obvious suspicion and realized what a mistake it had been to share it with me?

Hillary, Jill and Vanessa’s story of the drowning of their friend Claire on Morses Pond is Ghosts in the Burbs story number eight, If You Go Out In The Woods Today  on the blog and podcast. Go back and listen if you haven’t heard it yet and ask yourself if their story sounds genuine.

I did just that before I met with Jill. I wanted to refresh my memory. It made the truth, or at least what Jill claims to be the truth, all the more chilling.

When she reached out to me this summer it was right around the time that I’d hit rock bottom with my back. It was the days of only sleeping until about one o’clock in the morning before I had to get up and pace downstairs until morning. I was highly medicated and beginning to notice strange tapping noises in our home. I was in no shape to take on Jill’s stress.

She left me three messages and texted several times before I got back to her. I tried to beg off, but she was insistent. She said it was a matter of “life and death.”

I didn’t have one ounce of patience for melodrama, but she sounded so desperate that I agreed to meet her.

Jill thanked me over and over in a text and insisted that we meet in Newton. She didn’t want to risk being seen together.

“Whatever,” I texted back, to exhausted to argue.


 

“You look great,” Jill said as we sat down at the sticky, crumb-covered high top table. “Are you doing Paleo?”

I laughed, “No, it’s just nerves.”

“Well, they look good on you,” she replied pushing Tory Burch sunglasses to the top of her head. “I’m a nervous eater, I just stuff my face with carbs. It’s why I’m up seven pounds.”

“Oh, shush,” I said, rolling my eyes.

“Well, I mean, I really can’t gain weight unless I try super hard. It was one of the things we asked for in the conjure. But, that’s sort of why I asked to meet you here.”

“Jill,” I grumbled, “I told you on the phone that I can’t deal with anyone’s ghost story right now. I’ve got my own stuff, I -”

“You’re the only one who I can tell,” Jill pleaded. “Please, just listen.”

“Fine,” I said taking a sip of weak, lukewarm Dunkin Donuts coffee. “What’s the problem?”

Jill leaned forward, her flawless skin glowing under the harsh fluorescent lights, “The story we told you wasn’t one hundred percent true.”

“No shit,” I replied.

“So you did know,” she declared, slapping a hand lightly on the table top.

“Yes,” I said simply, shifting in my seat. My back alternated between a dull throbbing and sharp pains that travelled down my left leg. In no mood to drag the story out of her, I’d listen as she’d asked me to, but I wasn’t up for an interview.

“Vanessa said you didn’t buy it, but Hillary insisted we were fine. When we told you about Claire and, like, what we’d done, we thought maybe it would make things settle down.”

“Did it?” I asked.

“No,” she replied shaking her head. “But we hoped it might help.”

“Why did you think telling me your ghost story would help things?”

“Confession is supposed to help,” she explained.

“Only if you confess everything,” I said quietly.

“Right, and that’s why it didn’t work,” Jill said nodding her head.

Her doe-eyed, innocent look grated on me. Whereas Hillary was the quintessential Queen Bee and Vanessa an unapologetic bitch on wheels, Jill’s innocent front offended me the most. She was the girl in the power group in high school who would be kind to you in gym class but giggle and whisper along with the other mean girls as you passed their lunch table. Her sticky sweet act made her the most dangerous; you’d never see the knife coming.

“Ok, so we didn’t exactly tell you everything that happened the night Claire died,” she acknowledged.

“What were you all smoking pot in the woods that night or something?” I said getting increasingly uncomfortable.

“It wasn’t drugs,” Jill said quietly.

“Ok, well, I don’t understand why I’m the one that has to hear this,” I complained.

“She’s getting worse. Besides the three of us you know the most, our husbands don’t even know what we did after she died. I have to try and see if this will work.”

“Jill, I don’t want to know, if you need to confess go to a priest,” I said about to get up.

“Liz, please, she won’t let me,” Jill pleaded. “Besides, you already know too much. It will be safer for you if you know everything.”

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me, Jill. What did you guys do to her?”

“It really was an accident, really! We didn’t kill her on purpose – “

“Stop,” I demanded, panicking. “Please, don’t tell me any more.”

“I have to, you already know too much and I think she might come to you for help or, maybe use you to get to us.”

“Fuck,” I said, both resigned to my fate and grossly curious as to what had actually happened that night in the woods.

Jill took a sip of coffee (two Splendas and skim milk) and began her story.

“At the beginning of that summer we’d set up a little bonfire spot in the woods. It was hidden away in this valley, near a stream. We had a couple of cases of beer with us that night and were drinking around the fire the way we had done a million times that summer.

“Vanessa started to head back into the woods with Philip to make out, but Claire stood up and said that we needed to get going or we were going to miss curfew. We were supposed to be home by eight-thirty.

“Vanessa was drunk, and she told Claire to relax and stop being such a goody two shoes. Claire snapped back at Vanessa and told her to stop being such a bitch,” Jill paused and took a deep breath before continuing. “So Vanessa stomped over to Claire saying something like ‘What did you call me you little priss’ and then she shoved her.

“It was like it happened in slow-motion. We all watched as Claire lost her balance and fell backwards, she landed hard and hit the back of her head on a rock. And then she had, like, a seizure or something. Her whole body was writhing around on the ground and her arms and legs were flopping around. It was awful.

“Chris jumped up and pulled Claire onto his lap, she flopped around for a bit more and then went still. He got hysterical. He screamed her name over and over and then he started screaming at Vanessa. ‘What did you do? You stupid bitch! Look what you did to her!’

“Hillary had knelt down beside him to feel Claire’s wrist and Frank stood over her watching. All the while Philip began screaming back at Chris and Vanessa was yelling right along with them. John, my husband, walked over to Philip and put his hand on his chest to stop him from attacking Chris.

“Finally Hillary screamed louder than everyone else. She told us all to shut up so she could concentrate. She bent down to check Claire’s pulse again and she told us she couldn’t feel anything. Claire was dead.”

“Jesus, Mary and Joseph,” I lamented.

Jill nodded her head and pressed on with the nightmare, “We all just stood there silent, watching Chris as he rocked back and forth holding Claire on his lap. They’d been together since we were in, like, sixth grade, you know? He was really her best friend.

“Anyway, I don’t know who spoke first, but I think John said he’d walk through the trails to a neighborhood and call the police. That started a whole new round of yelling. Philip had stolen the beer from his parents house and they would have kill him if they found out. Vanessa started freaking out because she had pushed Claire and even though she hadn’t meant to, she had killed her.

“Finally, Hillary broke through all the yelling, ‘Shut the fuck up so I can think!’ She screamed at us. We all shut up, hoping that she would take control. She did. She told us exactly what to do, and we did it. Chris didn’t want to, but Hillary finally convinced him that it was the only way.

“We each chugged another beer because part of our alibi was being too drunk to notice that Claire wasn’t with us. Hillary insisted the beer was an extra precaution in case we were breathalyzed. She poured a beer on the rock where Claire’d hit her head, to wash away the blood. Then she had us wait about fifteen or so minutes until it was dark out then Philip, John and Frank carried Claire’s body to the boat and as we were pulling away they tossed her out of the back to make it look like she’d hit her head on the dock.”

“Oh my God, Hillary is a sociopath,” I said.

“You have no idea,” Jill replied.

“What about Chris, how did he go along with this?” I demanded in disbelief.

“Frank and Philip talked him through it. Along with Hillary they convinced him that it wasn’t worth the trouble we would all get into if we told the truth. Claire was dead, why should anyone else’s life be ruined?”

“Said every teenager in a made for T.V. movie,” I remarked sarcastically then stood up. Jill looked up nervously and asked if I was going to leave.

“No,” I said, leaning my elbows on the table. “It’s my back, I can’t stay in one position for too long. It’s nothing.”

“You should do yoga,” Jill said knowingly, “It’ll really loosen you up.”

“I’ll have to look into that,” I said. “Anyway, how the hell did you get the police and everyone to believe you? I mean, I could tell you were all hiding something when you all told me the story.”

“They believed what they wanted too,” Jill said sadly. “It was strange. It was almost like it was supposed to happen the way it did. Like we didn’t have any choice but to follow Hillary’s lead. And it worked. She saved all of us from a mountain of trouble.”

“It does seem too perfect, how could seven teenagers keep a secret like that?” I asked, “Especially if they were drunk.”

Jill just looked at me and shook her head. Something bubbled up in the back of my mind. A little detail that the women had told me that night back in the fall.

“Hillary said she got that book, the one with the spell in it, after Claire died, right? But if you’re telling me the truth, as you know it anyway, then there is no way anyone could have believed you. Maybe Hillary wasn’t surprised by the accident, maybe she expected it.”

“How could she have known Vanessa would push Claire?” Jill demanded. “No, there’s no way, I mean… No. There’s absolutely no way,” she trailed off.

I stared at her for a moment and said, “Hillary’s book had a spell in it strong enough to conjure a dead girl, what if she needed a sacrifice to make that spell work?”

“It’s not possible,” Jill said, though I could tell she wasn’t so sure.

“There are lies within your lies,” I replied. “You guys even lied to me about what you ‘wished’ for or whatever when you conjured her spirit.”

Jill looked down at her coffee cup smiling sadly, “We were so young,” she began, “We thought we knew what we would always want. We asked to marry our boyfriends, we asked to be rich and thin and pretty forever. We wished for the number of children we would have in the future. We wished for good grades and good colleges and nice cars and health. We knew that it was everything that Claire would have wanted too.”

“You told me that you all asked to live near each other too,” I said.

“No, we didn’t ask for that, it was part of the conjure. We have to stay close to each other whether we want to or not. We realized that when we went to college. Things get…bad when we are apart for too long. Vanessa and I ended up transferring so that we could be near Hillary at B.C.”

“And forgiveness?” I asked.

“What do you mean?” Asked Jill, confused.

“You guys told me you conjured Claire so you could ask for her forgiveness,” I said.

“Oh that,” Jill looked down at the table, “No, we didn’t ask for forgiveness. That was a fib, we, well we thought that making Claire’s death count for something would sort of, like, atone for everything.”

“Atone?” I repeated.

“Yeah, like, make up for the fact that we’d covered up the way she really died.”

“Jill – “ I began.

“I know,” she said, cutting me off. “Listen, we were young and completely self involved. I know that now. But believe me, we’ve suffered for what we did, more than you can even imagine.”

“Am I supposed to feel badly for you and your ghoul friends?” I demanded.

“No, no not at all. I, just, I was hoping you could help. That you might know what to do,” she stumbled.

“Ok sure, I know exactly what to do. Go tell the police what you all did so Claire’s poor family knows the truth. There’s my advice. Either you can do it or I will,” I threatened.

“It’s not that simple,” Jill replied. “Claire doesn’t want that now. I think there was a window in time where if we had fessed up we could have been released from all of this and Claire could have moved on, but that window has passed. Believe me, I’ve tried to go to the police. I tried to confess, really.”

“What the hell do you mean, ‘tried to confess?’ That’s bullshit.”

“You don’t understand. She won’t let me tell the truth now, none of us can. I got into a car accident on the way to the police station and when I finally got there I got so dizzy I couldn’t even stand,” Jill explained.

“Please,” I said, rolling my eyes, “You were just scared to death of being found out.”

“No, it wasn’t that. I wanted to tell the truth, I tried and because of that I wasn’t allowed to sleep for a week. If it were all that simple I would have done it years ago. And don’t get any ideas, you can’t go to the police either. Trust me, she’ll retaliate. Her power has grown like crazy. We didn’t know that would happen, but somehow she is drawing power from us, or maybe she’s just gotten used to being dead.”

“Or maybe her power comes from blind rage at you for putting her in this position,” I countered.

“Maybe,” Jill replied.

I sat back down in the tall chair, my leg both numb and throbbing. The nerves in my back caused the pain to travel, making me antsy and exhausted.

“Jill, what is it then? What exactly is she doing, just tell me so I can go home and forget about you and your friends.”

“She’s always there now, everywhere I go. I can’t look in mirrors anymore, if she isn’t directly behind me in the bathroom then she’s peeking around a doorway in the background. That’s her favorite trick. Staying just out of sight so you have a moment of relief, thinking that she might not be there before you spot her.

“The worst though was last week I was out walking our dogs around the pond -”

“Morses Pond?? I asked in disbelief.

“Yeah,” she said, then seemed to realize, “Well it’s a good place to walk the dogs.”

“Ghoulish,” I spat.

“I suppose,” she acquiesced. “But that’s not the point. I was walking the dogs and ended up running into my daughter’s first grade teacher. As we were chatting Claire stepped out of the woods behind the woman and just stood there, right over her shoulder staring at me. She doesn’t usually come so close. Do you have any idea how hard it was to carry on a normal conversation with that woman? I couldn’t let her think I was a crazy person.”

“God help us,” I sighed. “Jill, I am sorry but you all made your bed -”

“Yeah, fine, but it’s not just Claire,” Jill leaned forward, whispering, “I think I am beginning to see other things. Things that aren’t from our, like, realm. I think she’s letting things in. It wasn’t part of the conjure, I mean, it’s not something that we counted on.”

“So it was all alright when you were getting everything you needed from her and she was just lurking around outside, but now that she’s pushing back a bit you can’t take it?” I said sarcastically.

“No!” Jill said, annoyance briefly showing through her botox. “She’s taken things too far. It was under control at first, we could manage her. Yes, we saw her once in awhile, at the edge of the field while I played field hockey, or a glimpse in the stands at Vanessa’s volleyball game. But then she, came closer. And she was so angry. I mean, it was all an accident. Even if we didn’t completely tell the truth to our parents and everyone, Vanessa didn’t mean to kill her, it just happened. What was the use in ruining everyone else’s life over an accident?”

I stared at the woman for a moment and asked quietly, “And how’s your life turned out now, Jill? You and your friends trapped her ghost so you could use her energy for a stupid wish list and when things got a little too real you gathered your little coven and bound her tighter.”

“We are not a coven,” Jill hissed shaking her perfectly highlighted hair.

“You are the definition of a coven,” I said sitting back in my seat, attempting to find a more comfortable position.

“Why are you so mad at me?” She demanded.

“Oh for fuck’s sake, Jill. I’m not mad at you, I am afraid of you and your friends. I just want you to cut through the bullshit and tell me why you dragged me here.”

“There’s no reason for you to be afraid of us, we’d never hurt you,” she said reaching her hand out to touch mine.

I yanked my hand and my coffee back and said, “Oh really? Is that why we’re meeting in a Dunkin Donuts in Newton? Because you’re so sure of our safety? What would Hillary and Vanessa do if they knew you told me all of this?”

“I’m doing this for all of us, but they think we need to go back into the woods to bind her again. I don’t. I think we need to confess. We can’t live on the same street forever, we’ll drive each other crazy, we’re already beginning to.”

“So you really have to stay together? How bad was it when you all went away to college?” I asked.

Jill considered for a moment then said, “When we separate, she is able to, like, draw us down easier.”

“Coven,” I spat before taking a sip of my coffee.

Jill ignored my comment, “She can latch onto us if we are alone.”

“Well, you’re alone now, is she here?” I asked.

Jill gave a small nod and her eyes darted to the windows behind me.

A chill consumed my body and I turned quickly to see a large Dunkaccino display.

“There’s no one there,” I said pretending to be annoyed so she wouldn’t see how terrified I actually was.

“I told you, no one else can see her.”

“Oh, Jill,” I said, sighing.

“Just wait, I know you’re skeptical, I get that but just look at this, please.”

She looked down at her phone. Punched the security code, swiped around a bit then handed the phone to me.

I hesitated but she forcefully shoved it towards me so I took it. I looked down at the photo on the screen then looked back up at her.

“It’s not photoshopped,” she said quietly.

I looked back down to a photo of three smiling little girls; their blond, brunette and auburn hair tousled by the wind. They looked to be about seven years old and wore big smiles and soccer uniforms.

Arms around one another they stood on a grassy field, a colorful fall forest behind them. At the end of the line, to the blond girl’s right hand side, stood an older girl, a young teenager. Her black hair remained untouched by the wind and cascaded down over a navy blue short-sleeved polo shirt. She wore khaki shorts and worn-in boat shoes, but no smile.

“No,” I said, moving my fingers to enlarge the image. As the image enlarged I realized that I could actually see the autumn leaves behind, or I should say through, the teen. I dropped the phone on the table as though it were one of the Angus Steak and Egg sandwiches marketed on a poster behind Jill.

“It’s her,” Jill said, sitting back in her chair and reaching for the phone. “That’s concerning enough, but look in the background, by the treeline.”

She moved her fingers over the screen to select and enlarge a portion of the photo and handed the phone back to me. Again I hesitated to take it and again she shoved it towards me.

I sighed huffily as I accepted it. I looked at the enlarged area and saw a teenage boy at the treeline. Though the image was a bit blurry, it was still clear that it was a young man with dark brown hair. He too wore shorts and a short sleeved polo.

“Lurky,” I said, looking up. “Who the hell is that?”

Jill paused, “It’s Chris.”

“Oh, come on,” I said, attempting to hand the phone back.

“Look at his feet,” Jill said.

“What about his feet?” I demanded looking back at the photo.

Then I saw it, “They’re not there,” I said quietly.

“They’re not there,” Jill repeated. “I don’t think she has enough power yet to bring him back completely, but once she does, I just don’t know what they’ll do to us.”


 

I sat in my car and watched Jill pull out of the parking lot in her Land Rover. She was talking, either to herself or to someone or something that only she could see. I didn’t trust her or her story but I fully believed that she and her friends had done something wonderful and terrible and had completely lost control of it.

Did I go to tell the police? No. What proof did I have? It was my word against theirs. I publish ghost stories on a blog and podcast; I’m not exactly the most credible source. I mean, really, who is to say that I haven’t made all of this up? Maybe I just have an overactive imagination. Who knows what they could tell the police about me.

At any rate, that’s the “true” story as it was told to me and this was my confession of Jill’s confession. I’m telling you this because our priest said that I have an obligation to share the truth because I shared the lies. So, do with the so-called “truth” what you will.

There was a time when I would have thought, what difference does it make. We all make up stories to support our version of events. We excuse ourselves from the worst offenses and justify wrongs.

We don’t have to invite everyone, we all just have to promise not to post any pictures to Facebook afterwards so they don’t find out. It’ll be fine.

Maybe my daughter threw a candy bar into my bag in the grocery and I didn’t realize until I got home. What am I supposed to do, drive back and pay for a one dollar chocolate bar? It’s fine.

I know I said I’d help out at the kids’ holiday fundraiser but I have so much wrapping to do. There’ll be plenty of volunteers there, they won’t miss me, they’ll be fine.

Sure he’s a bigot and a racist, but he’ll be good for the economy, right? It’ll be fine.

Slippery fucking slope, huh?

It all matters – every word, every deed, every opportunity to do the right thing – now more than ever. Look beyond the veil with me, be honest with yourself and tell me, who’s winning? Can’t you see the demons high fiving, the devil looking on and nodding his head with a knowing smile?

Even though my little spiritual warfare seems to be behind me for now, I can’t say the same for everyone else. So I can listen. I can be here.

I won’t turn away. I’m a little shaky and knocked down a peg or two for sure, but I’ll be here just the same. A tiny library flier took me this far, I can’t imagine where we’ll go from here.

Categories
Archives Ghosts in the Burbs

Tapping Out

So a couple weeks ago I had every intention of sharing a classic haunted house story with you. Way back at the beginning of the summer I met with a young woman named Lydia who’d nannied for a family on Nantucket and experienced a crazy haunting. It seemed like a great story for October. Nothing like a good safe scare to kick off the high holy season.

But I’ve been distracted. You know, I honestly considered ghosting out on the blog and podcast. Just walking away from it without explanation and hoping that somehow everyone would understand. But it didn’t feel right and at the same time I didn’t know how to move forward with this project.

Please indulge me for a moment and let me have a middle class white girl break down. My day-to-day stresses me out enough. I have my hands full without having to manage creepy shit in my home on top of everything else. For example, am I messing up my children? Am I causing irreparable damage when I lose my mind because they took Sharpies and methodically blacked out page after page in my day planner? Defying all parenting advice, I allow them to watch more than two hours of television every day – without exception. And God help them, they are like me. They like Scooby Doo and the scary parts of Disney movies. They’re drawn to it and, in all honesty, I can’t wait to watch Ghostbusters with them in a couple years, then Gremlins and Jaws
But, what if they end up where I am now, too damn close to darkness and unable to look away?

And what about my marriage? I love my husband more than life. I quite literally could not exist without him. Despite that, most of the time now I am a complaining whiny bitch and he is so strong and kind that he can take it and still love me. But how long can someone put up with that before they just simply can’t?

What about the damn house and the cars and the dogs and the groceries and the twenty-percent-off coupon for Pottery Barn (do I really need any more throw pillows? Yes). How about the extra fifteen pounds that I have to lose and what in the motherfuck am I supposed to bring to an “upscale potluck?” I mean give me a small break. Then there’s my back and our families and the fact that one of my sisters isn’t even talking to me right now because she thinks that I am channeling a fucking demon who is influencing me to interview people and record their ghost stories.

No really.

She hasn’t spoken to me since last Spring. She said that the last time we were together the demon latched on to her for a bit then made her dog depressed.

No really.

So I have regular, mundane, relentlessly boring, Groundhog Day level issues that I’m already trying to navigate. I despise the term but they are “First World” problems and most days I feel like I am barely treading water trying to stay ahead of them.

Do I deserve this absolutely charmed life that I live? No. I did nothing to earn it, I just lucked out and got it. So why did I peer into the darkness? Was I daring it to come and get my lucky self? Maybe. Was I really thinking that it was all simply a fairy tale, nothing that some creaky floorboards and an overactive imagination couldn’t explain? I admit it, yes, I thought it was all way too good to be true. Like those “You’ve been pre-selected for a free cruise” postcards. Complete bullshit, but fun to imagine.

The problem was that when I peered so dismissively at the darkness it looked back and laughed.

And now, there is tapping in my home. It is steady and persistent and intelligent.

Look, I admit it, for the last podcast I layered EVPs into the recording of Eric’s story. It was schtick-y, I know, but kind of creepy, right? And around that time I began to entertain the idea of somehow writing these stories; I mean just making them up instead of actually interviewing people. Truth be told it takes a ton of time to meet up with people and hear their stories. Transcribing the interviews and then adding in all the side commentary takes an even bigger chunk of time that I simply don’t have. I thought that it would be just so much easier to make everything up, and frankly, I was beginning to really get spooked.

Something had to give for time’s sake and for my sanity’s sake. I toyed with the idea of continuing with the podcast, but dropping the blog. I simply am not at a time in my life right now where I can be relied upon to consistently use proper punctuation and tense. I’m not proud of it, but it is what it is. As for creating these stories rather than collecting them, I imagined that it might offer a certain level of protection. I still love a good scare, but not a real scare. God bless the Internet; I can’t tell you how thrilling it has been to discover that there are other people out there who like this stuff too. In real life I don’t have anyone to talk to about ghosts or the last episode of The Dead Files. But sharing these stories connected me with people who are actually as enthusiastic about Ghosts Adventures Aftershocks as me.

Anyhow, the idea of making ghost stories up or somehow distancing myself a bit from them is moot. Apparently I was too late. The tapping in Emily and Chad’s interview? That was real.

I didn’t even know about it until a listener tweeted, “Tapping! I heard tapping!”

I went back and listened to Emily and Chad’s story and there it was. Persistent, intentional tapping. It was undeniable and it was what I had been hearing in my home for several weeks. Easily explained away, until it wasn’t.

Of course, we’ve all heard of this paranormal tapping. The taps in sets of three that always seem to be on the list of things plaguing a haunted home. I’d heard about these taps on countless reality television shows but, trust me, it is different when you hear them in your own home.

So, after I listened to my recording of Chad and Emily’s story I Googled “paranormal tapping” and came across a Wikipedia page for the Fox sisters. I’d forgotten about those ladies. Leah and Maggie Fox claimed that the raps and knockings in their family home weren’t random and they weren’t some sort of elaborate trick. No. They were the workings of Mr. Splitfoot and through him Leah and Maggie claimed they could communicate with the dead. The women travelled the country and then the world to prove that the dead remained near the living and they had something to say.

It was the late 1800s and people devoured their message. The women had a major role in the development of Spiritualism – the religion that began with table raps, expanded to automatic writing and graduated to the Parker Brothers Ouija Board we know today. They made it OK for people to contact the deceased. Their revelation hit just before thousands of people lost loved ones to war and it was through their method that countless people attempted communication with those who’d crossed to the other side.

The Fox sisters gave people hope. No longer did one have to rely on blind faith to be reunited with loved ones after death. The Fox sister’s otherworldly communication techniques allowed the living to reach out for answers to what is (ironically) the most important question in life – what happens after we die?

These women made people believe in the unbelievable, and then… they confessed that it all had been an elaborate prank. They admitted that the mysterious rappings began with an apple, some string and a gullible mother. But then, strangely, the siblings recanted their recant. As they reached old age they admitted that they had actually lied about lying. I don’t know what to believe, but like most things in life I assume it was complicated.

Perhaps the women had begun their communications with Mr. Splitfoot as a childhood prank, but Mr. Splitfoot didn’t take kindly to be called a fraud. He kept speaking to people and he kept rapping and that kept people seeking answers. What had begun as an apple on a string bounced against the floorboards became modern Spiritualism.

The Fox sisters aside, other people heard knocking in response to their questions. So who or what were all those people really communicating with? I suppose we could find one clue in the fact that Mr. Splitfoot was a nickname for the Devil.


 

Like the Fox sisters, my ghost story began with tapping. Not so much on the walls but inside them. It was unsettling, sure, though denial made it possible to ignore for a while. But after I saw a shadow figure in our basement, Chris had an ADT security system installed.

It was like bringing a knife to a gunfight.

Almost as soon as the installation team left the alarm began to randomly go off without any apparent cause. The system sent us a text every time the alarm triggered and without fail, the texts indicated that the sensor attached to the basement window, the one under our porch (which is only about a foot high), had been tripped.

No one could possibly fit underneath our porch to trip the alarm.

ADT replaced the sensor twice, but it kept happening. I finally told them to just remove it since no one could break into the house that way anyhow. The problem was, the alarm kept going off and we kept getting those damn texts;” ADT Pulse Alert: 3:30 AM Burglary Alarm. Basement Window 3. Proceed With Caution.” The company returned to the house four times trying to “diagnose the problem.”

Chris insisted it was a fixable issue. I knew it wasn’t. I knew exactly what the problem was. I saw a shadow figure near “Basement Window Three” while I was doing laundry. I couldn’t very well tell the kind people from ADT that so every time they came I pretended to be just as perplexed as they were and thanked them for trying.

Something followed me home and it’s wasn’t a friendly ghost. I’m almost certain that the dark entity at Emily and Chad’s house latched onto me and hitched a ride to our house. I never told Chris that I wasn’t wearing my blessed medallion that night. I haven’t admitted that all of this is my fault, but I know that it is.

At first the tapping was only occasional. Three little taps, just loud enough to catch your attention. Then they began happening throughout the day. At random times, sort of, but at times when the thing doing the tapping was almost trying to distract or add to the chaos. Like, when I was trying to get the girls ready for school in the morning and rushing around and the dogs were asking to be let out and the microwave was beeping and we were already fifteen minutes late. Right in the middle of all that craziness, right when I simply couldn’t handle one more thing. That’s when I’d hear the tapping.

We’d only lived there for about four or five months and we’d had a lot of work done to the house. Our old radiators had been ripped out and we put in a new heating system and central air, so I figured it was all that new stuff settling. Like pipes or something. But then this one rare morning when I had the house to myself it became obvious that it wasn’t pipes.

I was in our upstairs bathroom tweezing my eyebrows and leaning right up to the mirror when I heard three knocks right behind the mirror. Like, right behind the mirror. It startled the hell out of me. I jumped back and stood there staring for a moment trying to explain it away when I heard another three taps, this time above my head. On the ceiling. With just one tweezed eyebrow I ran out of the house and sat in Starbucks until it was time to pick up the kids from daycare and school. I took them to Perrin Park until Chris got home. I didn’t mention any of it to him.

Later that week I was in the basement doing laundry. There’s a carpeted play area separated by a door from the unfinished part of the basement. There we store unopened moving boxes and other unnecessary junk, and that’s where we have the laundry hooked up.

I’d left Kat in her bouncy seat in the playroom while I switched the load over. Next to the washer and dryer sits the boiler, behind which is a cramped little storage space that is too spidery and damp to actually store anything. I compulsively listen to podcasts during the day as I complete all the menial tasks that are parenthood. I only keep one headphone in, though, so I can hear Kat if she fusses. Anyhow, I was listening to Last Podcast on the Left with one ear, keeping the other ear out in case Kat needed me while I transferred towels from the washer to the dryer. Just as I slammed the dryer door shut I heard a little, like, hum. It sounded like, hmmmmmmmm.

I stood very still for a moment then took out the earbud. I wasn’t sure if the noise had come from the podcast, or Kat, or the dryer, but it was strange. I didn’t hear anything more so I went to clean the lint trap and as I pulled it out of the machine I saw something move behind the boiler out of the corner of my eye.

Look, I acknowledge that I was three-kids-and-two-dogs-and-a-move sleep deprived. I also admit that I was taking nerve pills and valium for two herniated discs in my back. Regardless, I saw something and it wasn’t one of the dogs.

It was a shadow in the shape of a small person. A small man. He was sort of hunched over, and he was looking back at me.

Honestly, I just stared. I didn’t move. I didn’t understand what I was seeing and my mind was trying to create an alternate reality. Because there couldn’t really be a shadow shaped like small man crouched behind my boiler. That would be fucking ludicrous. So I stared and I stood very still and refused to believe my eyes, until he lifted up one of his small arms and his tiny hand pointed to the door. And then, I mean even if I was somehow imagining the shadow man and hallucinating, I didn’t hallucinate the fact that the fucking door started to slowly close. By itself.

A chill like I have never felt went through my body. Actually, it wasn’t a chill, it was more like the feeling that you get when you’ve stayed in one position too long and your arm falls asleep and it’s all pins and needles until it wakes up. I had that feeling from head to toe. I was frozen in place for way too long and when I finally did bolt for the door I was certain the shadow thing was going to stop me.

But it didn’t do anything. It let me leave.

No one believed me and really, I didn’t blame them. I even let Chris half convince me that I must have hallucinated. Which, really wasn’t out of the realm of possibilities what with my back problem and all the medication I’d been on.

I was able to put most of my fear away and pop it on the denial shelf in my brain but there was this one nagging detail. The door. Mistaking a shadow for a tiny man, sure, maybe that is possible. But that fucking door started to close by itself after the thing pointed to it.

I didn’t see anything else for a while. So I convinced myself that I hadn’t seen what I knew that I saw because no one else really believed it, and if I really did see it then there wasn’t enough nerve pills or Valium in the world to numb my panic. Denial became safety in the make-believe.

Chris didn’t believe me until he saw something for himself. He didn’t see the little shadow man though; he saw an actual man, or the apparition of a man I suppose.

We’d been arguing over nothing all morning. Which had pretty much become the norm. I hated not getting along with him, but it was like every single little thing that he did drove me insane. Anyway, that morning he was bringing up a bunch of stuff from the basement. I’d refused to go back downstairs and I wouldn’t let the girls go either.

He was stomping up and down the stairs carrying up toys and laundry up and I was trying to give him some space, but I was worried. I was scared really; I didn’t want him down there either. I was in the kitchen, near the door to the basement. Chris was headed back down the stairs when I heard him yell, “Hey!”

Immediately, I had that pins and needles feeling all over. I went to the top of the stairs and was about to call down to him when he appeared at the bottom of the steps and yelled, “Press the panic button. Now!”

I stared down at him as he sprinted up the stairs two at a time. He pushed past me and hit the panic button on the alarm system.

The girls were all in the living room watching television. He ran in and grabbed Max and Joey, and I scooped up Kat, who was screaming and red faced from the loud alarm.

“What is happening?” I called over the din.

“Someone broke into the basement!” He yelled back. “Get the girls outside!”

We brought the girls out through the front door and across the street. Chris went back inside the house even though I begged him to stay with us. I stood there with the three girls, helpless watching him run back into the house.

Two police cars pulled in front of the house just as Chris walked back out our front door.

“He must’ve climbed back out through a basement window,” he said.

“Was it broken?” I asked.

No, it hadn’t been broken.

Chris told the police that he had been coming around the corner to collect laundry when he saw a guy, a really tall guy, walk into the bathroom. Chris said the guy hadn’t stopped when he yelled at him so he made the decision to get us out of the house before going back in to find out what the hell the guy was doing down there. But by the time he’d gotten us outside and returned to the basement the man was gone.

We have those tiny little quarter-sized ground-level windows in our basement. Someone could not climb into one of those windows without breaking it. It would be impossible, especially for a big guy. And if they’d opened a window – let alone broken one – the alarm would have gone off.

But Chris was insistent that he’d seen a man – a very tall man – walk into the basement bathroom. He said he watched his hand come out and reach back to pull the door closed behind him.

The police didn’t find anything. As chance would have it our backyard neighbor was out planting mums. She didn’t see anyone come past the fence. The man simply disappeared.

After that, I set up sleeping bags for the girls to sleep in our room. When we talked about it that night after the girls were asleep Chris mentioned that the guy’s arms had been long. Too long for his body. He also told me the man had been so tall that he had to duck into the bathroom to avoid hitting his head on the frame. He hadn’t mentioned either of these details to the cops.

So a tiny shadow person and a big long-armed apparition lived in my home.

I became a sort of prisoner to the house. I couldn’t leave the girls there alone and I couldn’t take them out many places. There was only one of me and three of them. It was too much, especially with my back. I didn’t want to go to friend’s houses because I didn’t want to contaminate them. I’d become almost pathologically afraid of being alone, yet I was becoming increasingly isolated.

The tapping became constant. It was to the point that I almost didn’t even notice it anymore.

There were other things. Strange things. There was this one drawer that refused to stay shut on a side table in our family room. I’d come down every single morning and the bottom drawer of this two drawer cabinet would be open so far that it was about to fall out. The girls couldn’t open it by themselves, it sticks and you have to – well, whatever, they couldn’t open it. I’d never opened it in the middle of the night and neither had Chris. It simply was open every morning.

The batteries in the television remote went missing. No matter how many times I replaced them, they disappeared. The first few times that it happened I tore the house apart and couldn’t find them anywhere. At first I blamed the girls, but then I started hiding the remote from them. It didn’t make a difference. When I’d dig it out in the morning the batteries would still be gone.

All of these little things add up to family life, right? Just weird annoying things that happen when you have small children. Sleep deprivation could make me lose batteries a million times over. One of us could be opening a random drawer in our sleep. The shadow figure could have been a figment of my imagination or of my lack of sleep. Chris could have seen a burglar that had a super villain level ability to escape through tiny windows. The taps? Just taps. And none of it is particularly scary. Just strange.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t just family life and sleep deprivation.

The tiny shadow man waits just around corners sometimes so that when I’m not paying attention I almost run into him. He’s there then he’s gone faster than I can process it. It is truly terrifying.

Twice Chris saw the outline of a man in our bedroom window as he pulled into the driveway in the evening. We didn’t call the police the second time; we knew they wouldn’t find anyone.

The upside to all of this was that terror – true chilled-to-your-core, catch-your-breath, try-not-to-wet-your-pants terror – beats the Atkins diet any day of the week. Bye bye baby weight. Another good thing about hearing unexplained tapping noises in your home and/or seeing a tiny shadow man traipse around your house tends to put things in perspective. Traffic couldn’t stress me out anymore and I thoroughly enjoyed a long wait in line at Roche Bros. or Starbucks. I liked being surrounded by normal people and I tried to distract myself from my own worries by imagine theirs.

The woman in the LuLu Lemon workout gear was counting the calories she’d had for breakfast and trying to decide if she could treat herself to a skim milk latte or if she should save all her calories for wine. The middle aged man in the sport coat who was still wearing his sunglasses couldn’t remember if he’d cleared the search history on his laptop. His daughter had brought it back to college with her and he couldn’t let her find out that he’d recently searched for a divorce attorney. The teenage girl was hoping that she didn’t run into any of her mom’s friends because they would ask her how the college search was going and she didn’t know how much longer she could keep lying to everyone. Her mother thought she had a chance at Brown, but she’d secretly signed papers for the Army. I wished for these normal worries.

I should have called Biddy when I first saw that thing in my basement. I should have asked for her help immediately, but I didn’t. It wasn’t until Jenn dropped by unexpectedly to welcome us to the neighborhood and check out our new digs that I accepted my desperate need for help. The second she stepped into our entryway she turned to me and said, “You let something in didn’t you?”

I didn’t even try to pretend. I told her everything and then I called Biddy. I don’t have the mind space to wonder how Jenn knew that we had a malevolent spirit in our home the second she walked in and right now I don’t want to know.

So, do I believe in ghosts now? It’s complicated. I don’t know about ghosts, but I know for sure that there is darkness. I know what I’ve seen in my home. I know what my husband saw. I know what I’ve heard and I know what the people that I’ve interviewed have experienced. But ghosts? They’re a red herring.


 

“When did you begin to notice a problem in your home?”

“Well, we, I mean my husband and I, we heard the tapping noises first.”

“And when did you hear them?”

“First it was only at night and only once in a while, but then it began happening when I was home alone during the day.”

“What did the tapping sound like?”

“It was faint, always three taps in a row, evenly spaced. Sometimes we’d hear it once, sometimes we’d hear the tapping for an hour or so. It’s sort of inside the walls, but no matter where you are in the house is sounds like it is close by.”

“And you had the house checked out for plumbing issues, yes?” He asked, turning towards Biddy for confirmation. She nodded her head in affirmation.

“Good, that’s good,” he said and smiled reassuringly. “What was the next occurrence that caused you concern?”

I hesitated before answering him, “I saw a shadow. In the basement. I was doing laundry and just out of the corner of my eye I saw movement. When I looked I saw a tiny man, I mean, not an actual man, it was a shadow shaped like a man and it was looking back at me,” Chris reached over and took my hand. “It made the basement door close by itself.”

“And you are certain this wasn’t a person, an intruder, perhaps?” The man asked.

“Yes,” I said, unwilling to elaborate.

“I’m sorry that happened, dear,” he said kindly. “Did the shadow man try to engage you? Did he move toward you, or, perhaps did you hear any noise or words come from him?”

“No,” I replied.

“And Chris? Have you seen this ‘shadow man?’”

“No, not the shadow guy, but I’ve seen something else. It’s a tall man with long arms. It had to duck to walk into the basement bathroom and I’ve seen it in the windows.”

“Tell him about the scratches too,” I prompted. Chris looked at me and gave a small head shake.

“It’s alright,” Biddy prompted, “he’s heard just about everything before.”

Chris sighed and said, “I’ve been scratched on my back several times. A couple of times in my sleep so we might explain that away, but it’s happened during the day too.”

“I think it was the shadow man that was doing it, but I can’t be sure, of course,” I added.

“Were you ever scratched?” Asked the man.

“No, never scratched,” I said.

He nodded his head and exchanged a look with Biddy.

“What?” I demanded, looking between them. “Is that significant?”

“It would be more significant if you had been scratched, yes. So the fact that you have not been touched is a good thing. Other than you being scratched, Christopher, the paranormal activity has been just visual and auditory, yes?”

“Yes,” Chris answered firmly.

“Good, good,” the man replied while making a note in his bi-fold.

“Don’t you think that the entity is amping up to aggressive contact, Father?” Biddy asked.

The priest removed his glasses and sighed. He said, “Unfortunately, yes. I feel strongly that your home needs an exorcism. I believe there is a demonic entity in this home and that your family is under oppression. Without swift action your family could be in serious physical and spiritual danger.”

I reached for Chris’s hand and looked at him, “I am so sorry, it’s all my fault,” I began, but Chris shook his head and put his arm around me.

“What do we need to do?” He asked.

The exorcist closed his bi-fold and said, “Have faith. Things are going to get much worse before they get better.”

Categories
Archives Book Reviews

America’s Most Haunted Hotels: Book Review

America’s Most Haunted Hotels: Checking in with Uninvited Guests
By Jaime Davis Whitmer with Robert Whitmer

Ghost stories are a staple of the horror genre, and they always have a little sharper edge when the magic words, “based on a true story” appear under the title. Ghost hunting has taken on its own genre, as either pure entertainment or amateur scientific research, sometimes a combination of both. I readily admit my deep affection for a good haint tale, and this book delivers spooky real-life accounts as well as practical information about haunted tourism. If you’re a writer, having a solid nonfiction reference like this is handy.

Jamie Whitmer is an author, ghost hunter and traveler. Her book Haunted Asylums, Prisons and Sanatoriums was published in 2013, and this could be considered a sequel of sorts. She opens the book with practical information on what it takes to do a full paranormal investigation at sites like old prisons and hospitals. These are expensive and time-consuming since the entire building must be rented to do an investigation.

However, haunted hotels can be investigated for the price of a room, and many offer ghost tours for those who just want to visit. If you’re an avid spirit-seeker without a big budget, this is much more affordable. The Whitmers were able to use the tools of the trade in their room, or within hotel common rooms with permission from the manager. (It never hurts to ask.)

In the introduction, the author shares her experiences with spirits of the dead and her ideas of how and why these hauntings occur. Her husband, Robert, also shares his views. He’s a practical man and says he is “open to the possibility that things exist that I cannot see…I go into this endeavor with an open but cautious mind.”

The author researched the hotels featured in the book. She opens each chapter with the history of the original owner(s), photographs of the hotel, notable events in town, the natural landscape and features, and tales of famous deaths, hauntings and other sightings that gave these hotels their notoriety. Some of those stories are apocryphal and don’t stand up to the author’s historic scrutiny. She and Bob both write separate first-person accounts of what they did—or didn’t—experience during their stay at each place.

Occasionally, the couple is delighted with their stay in the hotel but disappointed that they experienced nothing more than a great night’s sleep. Of course, ghosts aren’t on the payroll and don’t always show up when people want them to! On other stays, Ms. Whitmer writes of doors mysteriously opening, corner-of-the-eye glimpses of people who weren’t there when she turned her head, and an emotional experience that left her shaken.

It’s hard to resist the charm of these old hotels. If you enjoy “ghost tourism” and are looking for a firsthand guide to the top 10 haunted hotels, you should read this first before planning your trip. The people who led their tours were engaging and knowledgeable and clearly enjoyed their jobs. While room and tour prices will change, the authors do their best to help you plan your trip accordingly.

I’m scheduled for a stay on the Queen Mary in a few months, and eager to tour and see the places that the authors described so beautifully. While I doubt I’ll see a ghost, I will know a bit more about the history of this great ship-turned-hotel, and the Whitmer’s account of their stay will have me keeping watch out of the corner of my eye.

Categories
Archives Ghosts in the Burbs

Kids are the f*cking worst

“How are the renovations coming?” Biddy asked grabbing her latte off the table.

“You know, they’re coming,” I answered vaguely.

“You look like you haven’t slept in weeks,” she commented.

“Don’t pull any punches,” I replied, laughing, “The house is great, it’s just a bigger project than we’d expected so it’s been a touch overwhelming.”

That was an understatement. I wasn’t sleeping well, Chris and I were either walking on eggshells around one another or bickering like PTO co-presidents trying to choose an autumn fundraiser theme. On top of that, I’d begun biting my nails again. A habit I hadn’t entertained since middle school.

I’d reached out to Biddy for Emily (who suspected she needed her home cleansed of an evil entity) and then Biddy had reached back out to me. She wanted to catch up and discuss what had happened in Emily’s house. I hoped Biddy might fill me in on the banishment ritual that her old paranormal contacts had performed on the Hayes’ house so I brought along my digital recorder.

I began to ask her a question about Emily’s home when Biddy interrupted, “How are the girls?”

“Good,” I said, nodding my head. “They’re really good.”

“Even with all the construction?” She prodded.

“Yeah, really it’s just Chris and I that are stressed about it. We just,” I hesitated, choosing my words carefully, “we’re just getting used to the house, I think.”

Biddy tilted her head up a bit, jutting out her chin, “What is it?”

“It’s the electricity,” I sighed. “We’ve had a guy out and he couldn’t find anything wrong. The lights, I mean, not just the lights, the power to the whole house will go off out of nowhere then not even a minute later it turns back on. Anything electrical freaks me out especially since the house so old.”

“Anything else?” She asked, her eyes attempting to maintain a contact that mine could not return.

“You mean besides fearing an electrical fire?” I said with a smirk. “No, I just haven’t had insomnia like this since after Joey was born. I’m having these super realistic dreams of mundane nonsense. Like, I’m in college and forgot that I had a final, or I’m at the grocery store, checking out three full carts of Pirate’s Booty when I realize I forgot my wallet. Just stupid dreams, but they get my mind going and then I wake up and worry my way through the rest of the night. I’m sure it’s just the stress from moving and construction and the kids. Life stuff, I -”

“Let me send my electrician over,” Biddy interrupted. “He’s used to me calling and having him double-check old houses. I’ll get him over next week.”

“We’re away next week,” I said.

“Where to?”

“Nantucket,” I replied.

“Even better. I’ll send him over while you’re away and he can fix whatever needs fixing. When you come home you can light that place up like a Christmas tree if you want.”

I accepted the offer gratefully.

“So that’s it, huh? Electricity on the fritz and some stress dreams?” She asked.

“Yup,” I said, picking at a cuticle, “That’s the gist of it.”

“Uh huh,” Biddy took another sip of her drink and seemed to consider for a moment before saying, “Eric, the tech guy from my old ghost hunting team, wants to talk to you about something that happened to him, but I don’t know if it’s such a good idea. You seem like you’re burning it at both ends.”

“No, not at all! I’m looking for a story for the blog,” I said quickly.

We chatted awhile about Emily’s successful house clearing, of which there wasn’t much to report. Biddy explained that Emily sensed a decrease in activity before the priest came to bless the house. Jane, Biddy’s psychic friend told her that though she could feel there had been something dark in the home at one point, it was no longer there. She reasoned that perhaps it had been too attached to their previous property to truly travel with Emily’s family. Whatever the case, Emily’s home was clear of negative energies.


“Now, who are these handsome gentlemen?” Eric demanded, handing me a rectangular white box before bending down to greet my dogs.

“That’s Walter and Artie,” I answered, holding the door for Eric to come in.

“Which is which?” he asked.

“Walter’s the pudgy one,” I explained.

“Well, they’re a perfect pair,” Eric enthused. “My grandmother had Westies, one of them used to actually dig moles right up out of the ground.”

“Yeah, they’re supposed to be critter catchers but these guys haven’t had much luck,” I said. “Thanks for coming over during the Kat’s nap, I was afraid I’d miss the chance to talk with you. What’s this?” I asked, indicating the box he’d given me.

“Russell Stovers,” he said, looking up at me with a big smile.

“Cut it out!” I exclaimed, ripping off the paper. “It’s the Nut, Chewy, Crisp assortment! These are the freaking best. Thank you!” I gushed, genuinely thrilled.

“You really know your stuff,” he observed with a laugh. “I love ‘em too and I didn’t want to come empty-handed,” he stood and looked around, “So you’re doing some work, huh?”

“It’s a work in progress,” I replied, motioning to the plastic sheeting taped over several doorways. “We can sit in the yard, it’ll be much more comfortable than this construction zone. What can I get you to drink? I have coffee, sparkling water, tea -”

“Sparkling water would be perfect,” he replied.

I poured him the water, grabbed my own coffee, the box of candy and the baby monitor and lead Eric outside. We arranged ourselves on two Adirondack chairs and the dogs happily sat near our feet. It was early August and rather warm but a big old maple tree shaded us from the sun and a light breeze kept us cool.

This was my first time meeting Eric. You know those guys who have an intensely loyal labrador retriever named Chief who follows them around without question? Eric was that kind of guy; a self-assured, quietly confident alpha.

He wore a striped polo shirt tucked into khaki shorts held up by an embroidered nautical flag belt. The worn in Sperry’s were a given. I could picture him on a dock, loading a Yeti cooler onto his Boston Whaler, or grilling ribs in the backyard, or patiently standing in a long line at Starbucks with a smile on his face.

All of this was a total shock to me. I’d pictured a totally different Eric. The only thing I knew about him beforehand was that he was the “tech guy” on Biddy’s old paranormal team. I had imagined a tall, dark-haired thin man with densely drawn arm tattoos. The Eric of my imagination wore black t-shirts, torn skinny jeans and Vans. As usual, reality was so much more interesting than my imagination.

After chatting a bit about my choice of audio recorder (a little SONY digital voice recorder that I could tell he found lacking) I asked him what he did for work. I wondered what sort of “tech guy” he actually was.

“I’m an information security analyst for a financial company in Boston,” he told me.

“So do you, like, make sure spies don’t hack people’s 401K’s or something?” I kidded.

“Something like that,” he said, reaching for a chocolate.

I followed suit and grabbed a caramel before admitting, “I use the same password for everything.”

“Me too,” Eric replied, “I use my dog’s name.”

“Really?” I asked.

“No, not really,” he laughed. “Change your passwords, you’re going to get hacked you dingbat.”

I rolled my eyes and laughed despite feeling like an idiot, “Anyway, tell me about hunting ghosts.”

“I don’t hunt ghosts anymore,” he said seriously.

“Oh, I thought you were in charge of all of the technology for Biddy’s old group,” I said, a bit confused.

“I was. I began working with Biddy years ago helping her to set up video and voice recorders so she could document her ghost hunts. I got into the whole technology side of it, we were one of the first groups to use the Ghost Box. I met Frank Sumption at a paranormal conference back in 2002 and he gave me one of his first ‘Frank’s boxes.’ It completely blew my mind and made me a believer.”

“Is that the thing that scans through radio stations and lets ghosts carry on conversations?” I asked. I’d seen these devices used on Ghost Adventures and while they made for exciting television, I highly doubted they were paranormal walkie talkies.

“Technically speaking, an AM FM portable radio is modified to scan through the AM frequencies,” he explained. “An investigator may ask any spirits present to answer questions and since it is believed that spirit responses travel in the same frequencies of AM stations we’re able to actually receive answers to our questions. In other words, we can hold real conversations with ghosts.”

“Mmm,” I said, impartially.

“I get it, it sounds like junk science until you witness it for yourself. I know Biddy’s told you about Poe, right?”

“Oh, yes, of course,” I replied, jarred at hearing the name of the shadow figure that had trailed Biddy for most of her life.

“I caught Poe’s voice multiple times on the Ghost Box, in multiple locations, on multiple dates. His voice is very, refined. It’s unique, unmistakable, really” Eric insisted.

“I know,” I said, quietly.

“Oh, did Biddy play some of my recordings for you?”

“No I, well I caught his voice, I mean his laughter on the recording of our interview,” I admitted.

“No fucking way,” Eric said, obviously impressed.

“Yeah, his voice was definitely distinct. I can imagine hearing it on the Ghost Box must have been terrifying,” I said.

“Oh, it was, I can play some of the recordings for you if you like,” he offered.

“No thank you,” I said firmly. “But, is that what you wanted to talk about? Digital voice recordings?” I asked.

“No. Sorry I got sidetracked. I didn’t always believe in the paranormal. I loved science fiction as a kid and I’ve always been into technology, so hooking up with Biddy’s team just began as a hobby. Once I realized there was more to it than creaking old houses and faulty electricity, I started to take it seriously.”

“From what Biddy told me you guys had a lot of success hunting ghosts,” I remarked.

“Looking back on it, I think they had success hunting us,” he said. “But it’s not the ghosts I wanted to tell you about,” he took a sip of water before continuing, “You know, I haven’t told many people about this. Biddy’s a good friend, and she told me about your blog so I asked her to put us in touch. I think people need to know about the kids.”

“Kids?” I asked, praying he wasn’t about to go off about the so-called Indigo Children that were all the rage a few years ago.

“Yeah, the first time I saw them I was on a run around the Rockridge Pond Trail right off Cliff Road, do you know it?”

Wellesley was crisscrossed with walking and hiking trails and I’d jogged or walked the dogs on many of them, but I hadn’t heard of Rockridge Pond and I told him so.

“Good,” he said firmly, “Keep it that way. I saw them there first. I’ve thought so many times about that morning. It was a Saturday and I have a usual weekend running route, but for some reason I changed it up that day, it was a last-minute decision to turn off the road. I’ve wondered if they did something to make me turn onto that path. Really, they must have, it felt like a set up.”

“Hold on, who are you talking about?” I asked.

“Right, I don’t want to jump too far ahead, but it was the kids. The Black Eyed Kids, that’s where I saw them for the first time, on that path. Have you heard of them?”

“Mm hmm,” I managed to mumble. I did know about the Black Eyed Children, though I wished that I’d never heard of them. Part of the lore of these Black Eyed Kids is that they will only appear to you if you know about them. So, let me just give you a warning, dear creeped out reader: if you do not want to know about them and test that part of the lore, stop reading now and come back for the next story. Earlier this summer I interviewed a nanny in Nantucket and she had an awesome haunted house story. If you don’t want to tempt fate, skip the rest of this tale.

But for those of you who plan to ride this out, the phenomena of the Black Eyed Children is well documented and pervasive. The first documented encounter appears to be from Brian Bethel in 1998. The journalist’s story spread across the internet after an email detailing his encounter went viral as it was forwarded by friends, friends of friends, and so forth.

As the story goes, Bethel was on his way to pay a bill when he pulled his car over in front of a movie theater to use the light from a street lamp to write a check. Two kids approached his car and knocked on his window. He was immediately filled with intense fear. Not the kind of fleeting fear that occurs when someone startles you, no, he said it was a dread like he’d never felt before.

One kid asked if Bethel would give them a ride to their mother’s house. The boy insisted that “it wouldn’t take long,” they just needed money to see a movie at the theater. “We’re just kids,” the kid insisted before raising his face and showing Bethel his black eyes. No pupils. No irises. Just blackness. Appropriately, Bethel freaked out. The boy continued, “We can’t come in unless you tell us it’s OK.” Like the smartest man in a horror movie, Bethel pealed out of there and looked in the rear view mirror only to see that the two kids had disappeared.

Google “Black Eyed Kids” or “BEK” and you’ll find countless stories of encounters with these beings. I would love to lump these creatures in with tales of the Slenderman or Dogmen. Sure, totally credible sources who have absolutely no reason whatsoever to tell these horrifying stories have reported seeing all of these creatures, but I prefer to believe that it is all fiction because if it isn’t, if there really are Black Eyed Children and packs of Dogmen in the woods, then we simply are not safe. Ever.

And here was Eric. Physically fit, technologically minded, preppy and apparently of sound mind telling me that he’d had an encounter with Black Eyed Kids. Safety is a facade.

“You really have heard of these things?” Eric asked, a bit shocked.

“I’ve read a few stories about them,” I replied. “I know enough about them to know that I never ever want to be anywhere near one.”

Eric looked at the old tree above us for a moment, then said, “Biddy told me you were interested in the paranormal, but, forgive me, you don’t really seem the type.”

“Right back ‘atcha,” I countered with a smile. “You look like you should be golfing.”

“And you look like you should be driving that Suburban parked out front to the local chapter of Oprah’s book club. I’d even bet that you’re the only one who actually read the book,” he shot back with a smirk.

“You got me,” I said laughing, then I grabbed another chocolate and asked, “So what happened?”

“It was last fall and I was out for my run this one Saturday morning. I usually run out to Natick Center then come back and finish with a loop around Lake Waban.”

“That’s far,” I commented. “Are you training for something?”

“Always,” he answered. “Do you run?”

“Not recently,” I replied. Between our recent move and a family trip to Nantucket I’d thrown my back out to an extent that I had never done before. I was literally sleeping on my kitchen floor. It was the hardest, smoothest surface in the house and it allowed me to sleep until about three a.m. each night. I was on serious nerve pills and muscle relaxers. Though I’d been a faithful (slow and awkward) jogger for the past fifteen years or so, I had two marathons under my belt. I used to think of myself as physically able to conquer discomfort. But I had been proven wrong, I hadn’t been able to jog in a couple of months. The pain had been too great.

“A break is good every once in a while,” he replied kindly, sensing there was more to the story.

“Sometimes,” I half-heartedly agreed.

“Well, that morning I decided to change up my route. I planned to run out and back on Cliff Road and then maybe stop at Starbucks before heading home.”

“Where do you live?” I asked.

“In a neighborhood off Central Street, over near E.A. Davis,” he replied with a wave of his hand. “It was one of those perfect running mornings, you know? A crisp, overcast fall morning with a slight breeze and my legs felt great. It was effortless.”

I just nodded my head, surprised to find myself holding back tears. I really missed running.

Eric continued, “So I’m running out on Cliff Road and I see this trail sign for Rock Ridge Pond. Have you been there?”

I shook my head no, I hadn’t ever even heard of it and told him so.

“Yeah, me neither,” he replied. “I figured I’d take a quick detour and check it out. The leaves had all begun to turn so it was a good day for a trail run.

“The path is rather wide at first, tree-lined and totally covered overhead and then it opens to a small clearing with this random granite table and benches. I remember wishing I had my phone with me. With the fall foliage and the pond in the background it would have made for a spooky photo.

“I stopped for a moment, getting my bearings. There were a few paths I could take. Two looked like they led back into neighborhoods, but a third appeared to skirt the pond so I chose that one. It was narrow, and I was watching my feet as I ran since the ground was covered with rocks and tree roots. The trail has a couple of little wooden walkways to keep you from stepping into muck. I’d just crossed the second walkway and was headed up a short incline when I looked up and saw this little boy sitting on the ground, hunched over next to a cluster of trees. One of his legs was pulled to his chest and the other was straight out.

“It gave me a real start. I actually stopped short and just stared for a minute, trying to catch my breath. I figured that he’d fallen and maybe hurt his leg or something, but there was something off about him. He must have heard me coming, but he didn’t move a muscle. It even crossed my mind for a moment that he might be deaf.

“‘You alright there, buddy?’ I called to him. I was probably about twenty, maybe twenty-five feet away from him. His head tilted to the side a bit and he said something, but he didn’t look up and I couldn’t hear him. Something made me not want to get anywhere near this kid. I’m not embarrassed to admit that I was actually terrified. But, like an idiot, I shook the feeling off and convinced myself that it was just a kid and he might need help.”

“Here we go,” I said, wanting him to stop the story right there and talk to me about Ghost Boxes again.

“Yup, here we go,” he agreed, “I took a few steps forward and called to him again, ‘Hey, buddy, what’s up?’ The kid just shook his head back and forth. At this point that twinge of fear I had turned into annoyance. I’d been having an awesome run, why the hell had I turned down this path, you know? I kept walking towards him and the little fucker just sat there stock still.

“I considered turning around but, you know what? I honestly thought that maybe it was one of those television What Would You Do? set ups. Like a camera was going to pop out of the woods and some reporter would accuse me of being a spineless bastard.”

Eric and I laughed at this for a moment and I agreed, “I live in constant fear of undercover investigations. That’s why I always return my grocery cart to the holding pen.”

“Well, if that had been the case then it would have accounted for the way the whole scene just didn’t feelright,” said Eric. “As I got closer to him I noticed his clothes. They weren’t right either. He reminded me of a kid from the 1950s. He looked like he could have fit in on the set of Stand by Me with his white t-shirt, too-short jeans and Chucks.”

“Stop it,” I said, recognizing the outdated clothing as a signature mark of the Black Eyed Kids.

“I know, it was unsettling and confusing. He mumbled something again and I said, ‘Kid, I can’t hear you.Do you need any help?’ I was still walking towards him, and I got within about ten feet of him when another boy steps out from behind the trees.”

“Oh no,” I said quietly.

“Yeah, it startled the hell out of me. I think I said something like, ‘What the hell is this?’ The other kid, the one that came out from behind the tree, said to the ground, ‘Hello, sir. Can we use your phone to call our mom?’”

“No, no, no,” I said, groaning. “Are you for real with this, or are you pulling my leg?”

“No, I’m dead serious. I’ve been to the ParaCon events, I’ve read the stories on CreepyPasta (http://www.creepypasta.com/). The second that kid spoke, I knew exactly what was happening. And if the creepy kid on the ground was Will Wheaton in Stand By Me, then this out-of-the-woods bastard was Kiefer Sutherland.”

“What did you say to him?” I asked. “Or, I mean, did you just turn around and run away?”

“That’s what terrifies me the most about the entire experience. I didn’t react at first. Somehow, I couldn’t. It was as if I were watching it happen to me. The boy on the ground tilted his head up a bit, but I didn’t look at him. I had my eyes on the older one. He looked like he was maybe fourteen. He hadn’t looked up, he was still staring at the ground and said, ‘My brother’s had an accident, sir. I’d like to call our mother. May I please use your phone?’ He reached out one of his hands and then took a step towards me. That snapped me out of my daze. I didn’t want that kid anywhere near me.

“I backed away a couple of steps and held my hands out in front of me. I said that I hadn’t brought my phone on the run but that I’d be happy to jog back to the road and knock on a door so someone could call for help. I don’t know why I was holding up a facade like this was all normal, but something inside told me to play it cool.

“The older kid started shaking his head back and forth slowly then goes, ‘Sir, we won’t be allowed in. Please, let us use your phone.’ All of a sudden it occurred to me that there might be more of them there in the woods. I wanted to turn and look behind me, but I was terrified to take my eyes off those two freak shows.”

“Oh God, I hadn’t even thought of the possibility of more of them,” I said, horrified.

“I’ve spent so much time thinking about that day, about those few moments. Sure, the kids were weird and dressed oddly, but, I mean, the terror I felt is almost indescribable. The evil emanating off those kids, or whatever the hell they were, it was real. My reaction was primal.”

“How did you get out of there?” I demanded, peeling the wrapper off of a chocolate.

“I was backing up slowly and the older boy kept walking towards me, still staring at the ground. I kept my eye on the little one, but he was sitting still. ‘Look guys, it’ll take me ten minutes tops to get back to that neighborhood. I’ll grab some help and be right back,’ I said. Then I was about to turn and sprint the hell out of there when the little one looked up.”

“The eyes,” I said, shaking my head back and forth.

“Those eyes,” he agreed, leaning down to scratch Artie’s back.

“All black?” I asked.

“Yeah, completely. When you read about it, or see those drawings or Photoshopped pictures of the Black Eyed Kids they really look creepy. But, I still haven’t been able to find one that shows what they actually look like. The kid’s entire eyeball was black. He looked like a totally normal teenager, but his eyeballswere black.

“They weren’t shiny, they didn’t have a glow or anything, they were just completely and totally black, like they’d been replaced by dull marbles. I for sure screamed. The older one started walking forward quickly and he looked up too. Same thing, black marble eyes.

“Then he goes, ‘Sir, my brother has had an accident. May we use your phone?’ I just turned and ran. I don’t even remember getting out of the woods, I was back out on Cliff Road sprinting for my life. I ran over the bridge, crossed over Washington Street and ran straight into Maugus. It was the first place I came to that was filled with people and I just ran in the door then bent over with my hands on my knees sucking wind. I’m sure everyone there thought that I was a lunatic.

“A waitress came over and asked if I was alright. I just nodded and took a seat at the counter. I drank two cups of coffee and sat there for maybe, I don’t know, forty-five minutes before I was able to muster the courage to go back outside and run home. Thank God Noah was still there, he usually plays tennis Saturday mornings with a friend of ours, but the woman had cancelled on him.”

“Who’s Noah?” I asked.

“My husband,” Eric replied.

“And what did he think about all of this, I mean, you told him, right?”

“I think he was pretty skeptical of it all, but he could see how freaked out I was. He suggested that I take a shower and then the two of us head back out on Cliff Road to see what we could find,” Eric said and then picked Artie up to sit on his lap.

“Which you certainly refused to do,” I said, firmly.

“Of course! There was no way I was going back out there!” He insisted.

“Have you gone back since?” I asked.

“Hell no,” he said, scratching under Artie’s chin.

“Just to play devil’s advocate, here. Do you think there is any chance that you maybe – “ I began.

“Got punked?” He finished for me.

“Well, yes. I mean, considering your experience in the paranormal and the fact that you knew about these Black Eyed Children, maybe your mind was ready for it and these kids, were like, just playing a sick joke.”

“Yup, by that evening I’d convinced myself of exactly that. I know that was what Noah thought too, and by the next morning we were actually joking about it. He leaves for work early and that morning he left me a little post-it note with a smiley face drawn on it with huge black eyes.”

“Funny,” I commented, smiling.

“He’s a wise-ass,” Eric chuckled. “Over the next week I just convinced myself that it had all been some post-Halloween prank by a couple of asshole kids. I went from feeling embarrassed, to amused, to impressed by how they had managed to pull off the whole creepy scene.”

“So is that what you think it all was? A couple of terrifyingly brilliant pranksters?” I asked.

“No. That’s not what it was, at all. It was two Black Eyed Kids and they locked in on me for some reason and this past year has been a fucking nightmare.”

“Oh no, please don’t tell me these things are real,” I begged.

“Liz, they’re real. It’s all real. I mean, I don’t know about bigfoot or the whole cryptozoology thing, but all the paranormal stuff  you’ve heard of? It’s real and I have seen very few examples of it being positive.”

“Did you see them again” I asked, referring to the kids and ignoring his statement about all things paranormal. I was freaked out enough as it was.

“I saw them two more times,” he replied. “Almost exactly a week after my run, on that following Saturday, Noah and I were headed back from dinner. We pulled onto our street and the headlights flashed on the two kids, just standing in the neighbor’s yard across the street from our house.”

“What in the fuck?” I demanded.

“They were just standing there, staring at the ground. ‘Look at these two kids, what are they doing out so late?’ Noah said, sounding worried. I fucking flipped out. ‘Noah, it’s them!’ I literally screamed, ‘Drive, just drive!’ He didn’t, he pulled into our driveway and cut the engine. I was about to have a fucking panic attack and I told him so. I begged him not to open his door, and he looked at me like I was having some sort of mental breakdown. I suppose I was, but it was for good reason.

“He told me to calm down and just stay in the car. He was going to ‘go have a ‘chat with the youngsters and tell them to scram,’ and yes, he really talks like that. He’s a ninety-year-old trapped in a forty-seven-year-old’s body. At any rate, he opened the door and I clamped down on his arm and pleaded with him to close it and drive away. He wrenched his arm out of my hand and told me to pull myself together.

“He got out of the car and turned to walk across the street to the neighbor’s yard, but he stopped short. I yelled to him, ‘What? What the fuck is it? Are they there? Where are they?’ He just stood there looking up and down the street for a minute then turned to me and said, ‘They’re gone.’”

“Oh, God,” I said. “That is almost worse than if they had just, like, bum-rushed him.”

Eric nodded his head in agreement and said, “It took him a while to convince me that they were actually gone. He kept saying that they must have run back through the neighbor’s yard, but I knew that wasn’t the case. I felt like a paranoid fool, but I knew I hadn’t seen the last of them. The next morning I woke up with my first headache.”

“Oh no, so that part of the lore is true?” I demanded.

“Well, in my case it was, anyways. Not everyone gets sick after they’ve encountered these kids, believe me, I’ve done the research. But I was one of the unlucky ones. The headaches came first. The one that happened after we saw them in our neighbor’s yard lasted for three days. It wasn’t bad enough to stop me from going about my day, but it was ever-present and nothing touched it. I couldn’t get rid of it.

“Noah finally convinced me to go to the doctor that Tuesday afternoon, and she suggested that the migraine was stress induced and gave me a prescription for 800mg Advil. I didn’t bother filling it. I knew it wouldn’t help. And, at any rate, that first headache was gone by the next afternoon.

“Then Noah had a business trip. He had to go to Austin for two nights. He’s an engineer and they have an office down there and – well, nevermind that has nothing to do with anything. Anyhow, he went away for two nights, the Wednesday and Thursday night after we had seen the kids in the neighbor’s yard. He was worried about leaving me alone. He did believe that I’d seen something that frightened me, but I suspect he also believed that I was having some sort of mid-life crisis. He suggested that I reach out to Biddy and tell her what I’d seen, but honestly I was too embarrassed at that point to tell anyone else.

“You know what I thought, really? I wondered if maybe I was losing it a little. I’d been ghost hunting for years and nothing had ever really scared me. Sure, EVPs always gave me the creeps and there were a couple experiences in those abandoned lunatic asylums we’d traveled to for investigations that scared me. But other than that, I was a total bystander. I was the documenter. The recorder of everything. It kept me at arm’s length, know what I mean?”

I knew exactly what he meant, I just nodded my head and sipped my cooling coffee.

“Yeah, well, I bet you do,” he said with small laugh. “Your interviews let you just dip a toe in, huh? I guess I thought that maybe it had all caught up to me and that, after having witnessed so much and filled my head with that darkness, I was sort of, I don’t know, I guess I thought it was some sort of late onset paranoia.”

“Who could blame you for that?” I asked. “The very little that I know about the things that Biddy was able to document terrifies me and you were right there alongside her. I would think something might be wrong with you if you didn’t eventually become a little paranoid.”

“That’s true, I suppose. I wish that had been what was happening to me, that I’d just stuffed all the scares down for years only to have them burst out in a mess of paranoia. But no. The kids were real. The first night Noah was away I was an absolute basket case, I had two extra couple of beers and slept in our guest room because it had only one window and is located at the back of the house. It somehow gave me a sense of safety.

“When I woke up the next morning and nothing had happened, I again thought that I’d indeed had a stress response and some sort of paranoid delusion. That day was normal and so was the evening. Then, I was walking up to bed that night and I was about halfway up the stairs  when behind me I heard someone knocking at the front door.

“I froze. I just stood there, completely still, hoping that I hadn’t heard what I’d heard and if I did that whoever had knocked would just go away. It was about ten o’clock at night. Who the hell would be knocking at our front door?”

“Oh my God, my heart is literally racing right now just hearing this,” I blurted, crinkling another candy wrapper.

“I was in an immediate state of panic hearing that knock at the door. It was overblown and irrational. I knew those fucking kids were out there, I just fucking knew it. I just didn’t know what the hell to do about it. I’d read all the stories, I knew you weren’t supposed to let them in, and of course I wasn’t going to let them in. I needed to get them to stop coming around. I needed to get rid of them. I almost wished for a gun.”

“Oh, shit!” I whispered.

“No, obviously, I would never, I was just cornered and fucking overcome with irrational fear. I waited there for a few moments, who knows how long, it felt like forever, and then the knocking, well more like banging on the front door came again. I almost jumped out of my skin, but at least it startled me out being frozen in fear. I stomped back down the steps and looked out through the peephole.

“There they were. The little one was at the door, the older one was standing about ten feet behind him on our walkway. Both were, of course, staring down at the ground.

“‘Get the fuck off my property!’ I screamed at them through the door. ‘I’ve already called the cops!’ I know it sounds ridiculous, but it’s what came out.”

“I would have been rocking in the corner terrified,” I replied.

“Believe me, I wanted to, but once I confirmed that it was actually them out there I didn’t want to take my eyes off of them. What if they tried to break in? What if one of them came around to the back porch? I couldn’t remember if I’d deadbolted the back door.

“Our house is old, we have these two long, thin windows on either side of the front door. After I yelled at the kid I heard him say, ‘Sir, can we come in please? My brother and I must call our mother. She will be very concerned.’

“I know I sound like a complete and total lunatic, but I screamed, ‘Get the fuck out of here, I know what you are.’ At this, he leaned over, looked in one of the side windows and tapped on the glass. I was filled with a terror I have never felt before. I jumped back, but immediately looked out the peephole again. The younger one had stepped back from the window and was still looking at the ground. But the older one, I could just make him out in the front porch light. He was looking up at the door and I could see the light reflected off of his black eyes.

“All of a sudden I was calm, it was like I’d pushed the panic away and knew what I had to do. Loudly, but calmly I said something like, ‘I’m not opening the door for you. I will never let you in. You must leave my property now, you are not welcome here.’ This made the younger one look up at the peephole. He stared at me even though I know he couldn’t see me, but he did, he stared at me for an agonizingly long time and then he turned back to his ‘brother’ or whatever the thing was. The older one nodded his head and the younger one walked towards him, once he’d reached him the older one turned away from the house too and they walked back down the front walkway, took a right at the street and I watched them from our side windows until they were out of sight.”

“But then what?” I demanded. “I mean, it is real then, it’s all real? They found you and came to your house and you saw their eyes again. How did you sleep? What the fuck did you do?”

If I’m being honest here, I was almost outraged at him. I mean, how could he come to my house and tell me that these things were actually real? I’d heard and accepted a lot, trust me. Aliens, ghosts, even those fucking things that Peyton claimed to have in her basement. But Black Eyed Kids? Jesus Christ Almighty. I mean for the love of all that is holy, how could this be?

“I grabbed my car keys and cell phone, sprinted for my car and got the fuck out of there,” he explained, almost defensively. “I called Biddy immediately and told her what was happening and she told me to check into a hotel and she’d come see me first thing in the morning.

“She calmed me down, told me to get some sleep and advised me not to call the police, which I had been considering. They certainly couldn’t help and anyhow, and she pointed out that I wouldn’t want to endanger anyone else by exposing them to those things.”

“Oh no, I hadn’t even thought of that,” I admitted.

“Yeah, me either,” Eric agreed before taking a deep breath. “Biddy showed up the next morning with her psychic friend, Jane, who gave me a reading, which was pretty disheartening. But ultimately it was good to know what I was dealing with and that things were going to get a lot worse before they got better. The three of us put together a plan, which included having a priest to the house to perform an exorcism as well as having a medium come to place protections all over the property. Biddy also reached out to a Voodoo practitioner that she knew from New Orleans. The woman came up straight away and performed a ceremony over me and Noah.”

“Whoa, wait a minute, Voodoo?” I said surprised.

“Yes, well, no one is sure what these kids are really, so Biddy thought it best to pull out all the stops. If they are demons, then the priest would get rid of them. Some sort of entity? Then that’s what the medium was for, and the voodoo? Well that was a ‘cover your ass’ move. Once Biddy mentioned to the Voodoo practitioner what we were up against, the woman’s response let her know that we needed all the help we could get.”

“Thank God for Biddy,” I said.

“Amen,” Eric replied.

“But how did it get worse?” I asked. “If all these people worked to protect you, then what got worse?”

“See this scar?” He asked, leaning down so that I could see the top of his head. He looked back up at me and said, “The headaches didn’t go away. The migraines got so bad that I couldn’t leave my bed for days. My doctor ordered an MRI since I’d never had an issue with headaches before, and it showed two bright spots on my brain. Two good-sized dots, like eyes.”

My own eyes instantly filled with tears and I felt sick to my stomach, “Oh, Eric, no,” I managed to say.

“Oh, don’t worry. It was nothing good old-fashioned brain surgery couldn’t take care of. And it wasn’t cancerous, thank God. But if we hadn’t caught it those two bright spots would have eventually done me in.”

“Thank God,” I said, dumbly because I didn’t know what else to say.

“As far as I’m concerned I got off pretty lightly. You’ve read some of the other accounts from people who’ve been chosen by these so-called ‘children,’ right? If I hadn’t known Biddy, if she hadn’t leveraged her network so quickly, then I could have been in for years of health issues. That seems to be their calling card.”

“So, you think you were chosen, that they sought you out specifically?” I asked.

“Definitely,” he said firmly.

“The people that read your blog, they know this stuff is real, right? You’re clear on that?” He asked, looking hard at me.

“I don’t know, really. I think people read it for entertainment. But yeah, I mean, I get emails all the time from people asking if I’m just making these stories up or if I’m actually interviewing people,” I explained.

He nodded his head and put Artie back down on the ground before saying, “I think you need to make itvery clear that not only is this story true, there are stories like it all over the country. There’s a reason the paranormal has become so popular. It’s not just because of all the ghost hunting shows or the internet. Things have been ramping up since the seventies. The only thing that we know for sure is that we have absolutely no idea what the things we call ‘paranormal’ really are.”

“You sound like Biddy,” I commented.

“That’s because we spent years working together trying to figure out what the hell is going on out there and all we have is evidence that there really is something happening and it can be dangerous. You know what happened with her and Poe. These, so-called, Black Eyed Kids found me. Nick Sayre is fucking obsessed with his Ouija board and that shit is going to get him or his family killed, or worse.

“Over the years, the people who we’ve hunted ghosts with have committed suicide, had horrible accidents, suffered from deep depressions, alienated their loved ones, become obsessed with chasing bumps in the night. And yet, can any of them say they’ve ever really accomplished anything or moved the field forward? No. We have EVPs, blobs of light caught on film, the occasional apparition, scratches in sets of three on our backs, personal stories, and a fuck ton of people scurrying around in the dark, every single one of them certain that they will be the one to piece it all together.”

“I guess that about sums it up,” I said. “So we’re just a bunch of assholes chasing this distraction and we’ll never get anywhere.”

“No. We might be a bunch of assholes, sure, but there is something out there that wants us to keep looking and it gives us tiny little breadcrumbs that lead to nowhere. Whatever it’s plan is, whatever it wants, it’s working. There are more people looking into the darkness than ever before.”


I waved to Eric from the doorway and ushered Walter and Artie back inside. I checked my phone and saw that I’d missed a call. Jenn, my old home invasion poltergeist acquaintance had left a message. She’d heard I’d moved to the neighborhood and wanted to drop off an housewarming present. In her message she invited herself over for a coffee and tour of our new home.

I found myself smiling at the idea. It would be nice to do something so normal and neighborly. With everything that had been going on at the house I’d sort of dropped out of my little social scene. I began to call her back when I heard Kat babbling from upstairs, awake from her nap. I’d have to reach out to Jenn later and invite her over, but not until we got back from Nantucket.

We were headed back to the island for a week’s vacation. I was thrilled to get away from real life and onto island time. The house we rented had a washer and dryer, which was good, because I hadn’t done laundry in, I don’t know, two weeks maybe. I just couldn’t make myself go back into the basement. Not after I’d seen that shadow behind the boiler.