WHENEVER anyone used to mention Poltergeist, I used to think of small blonde children, televisions and scary clowns.
Now it reminds of 1999 when I was 21, skint and fresh out of university, and moved into a house scarier than Amityville.
My best friend and I rented a flat out on the top floor of a huge old Victorian house while I was saving up to do my journalism training.
It all started the first night we moved in. Karen was stuck on the M62 so I was unpacking boxes on my own well into the early hours. The house was freezing so I wandered through to the kitchen to investigate the central heating - when I noticed the wine glasses I hadn’t realised I’d unpacked all lined up neatly on the counter top.
Puzzled, I opened the cupboard door to put them away, when I heard an almighty smash behind me. One of the glasses has shattered by itself on the counter into shardes of glass so tiny it was ike brushing dust away.
During the six months we lived there, friends staying over would wake in the night after hearing their name being called out by an unknown voice, more than once I would feel a heavy weight on the end of my bed as if someone had sat down, shoes would disappear then turn up in random places, and the old lady on ground floor told us the whole building was haunted by Frank Butterfield, a servant who’d lived in the house in it’s glory days.
The only time I ever actually saw the ghost, or at least I think I did, was one night when I heard Karen walking down the hall and go in the bathroom in the middle of the night. Then I heard her shout: “Lisa, while you’re up can you check I locked the door?”.
Realising the footsteps weren’t Karen at aIl, I leapt out of bed and threw open the door. It could have my eyes adjusting, but the hall seemed to be thickly charged with electricity, and in front of me, hovering in the hall I swear I could see something developing in front of me like a polaroid picture, taking the form of a tall man with a haggered pale face.
I screamed for karen and ran back into my room where I spent the night hiding under my duvet.
Needless to say, we moved out soon after!
Posted by Lisa