Back in February a good friend of the family passed away unexpectedly. He spent quite a bit of time in our tavern, sometimes to help my dad repair things or just to pass the hours with a beer or several. In the time since his death, there have been...strange things happening.
Barstools, which were lined in a neat row at closing, are found pulled away from the bar in the morning.
Items like pens, till tapes, note pads, and wrenches which usually are placed in OCD-ish order suddenly go missing.
One of the hired help swears she saw a shaft of light move down a staircase and into a backroom.
There's the occasional, breath halting feeling of being closely watched.
Nothing like this ever happened before this man's death.
Naturally, this needs to be investigated with a good friend, some flashlights, and cameras.
We had honestly planned to be fearless in the pursuit of "finding evidence in defense of the supernatural while maintaining a skeptic's logical point of view," but things genuinely change when you're shut in a pitch black, circa 1890s building filled with enough of its own sounds and shadows that a real ghost is entirely unnecessary.
After our 9 p.m. arrival and a quick tour of the premises, we set about snapping pictures and trying to sense changes in the atmosphere and wishing we had dowsing rods or at least a voice recorder.
Katie was quick to notice that one of the far back rooms, the kitchen to be precise, had a certain tension to it. It wasn't that the ceiling fan didn't circulate as well back there, but more a matter of the air itself feeling charged.
I hadn't told her that this was the room that the night bartenders tend to avoid, also the same room where it feels that, if you were to glance up from the deep-fryers, you'd almost expect to see something standing there. Watching you.
It didn't take long at all to experience something I can only describe as paranormal.
After half an hour of snapping pictures and glancing with anticipation at the quick previews on the lighted screens, of jumping at little groaning sounds, of peeking up a certain set of rather foreboding stairs, we experienced a chain reaction of events.
I took a picture of the unsettling back room while both of us stood in the main bar room. Taking a quick look at the fresh image, my hands started to shake. What was that hovering over the-
A low, thrumming vibration, almost a rumble, rolled from what seemed to be the far end of the bar, away from all appliances. It was a feeling more than a sound, like I could feel it more than hear it. Katie and I looked at each other, wide eyed, when suddenly one of two spare batteries set safely on a table (and guarded from falling by my purse handle) went flying off the table and fell a good two or three feet away. It didn't just roll off the table by force of gravity, no, this thing was like a bullet shooting through the air.
It couldn't have been more than 10 seconds from the time I glanced at the picture and the battery hit the tiled floor, if that.
Sincerely, I don't believe I was ever more desperate to get out of a building than I was at that moment. I can also honestly say that I'm NOT eager to go back, even though it's broad daylight now and the spooks are hopefully resting.
We made new plans: Truckstop. Yes, excellent plan. I concur. Earl Gray and french fries would be ever so lovely right now, wouldn't they? Ah, wonderful, I'm so glad we agree! Get your shit and get out. Now.
A safe distance away, it wasn't any easier looking through the pictures, especially when my eye caught a circular white spot on one photo. We ruled out the possibility of dust, a glare, or any other trick. The picture preceding it, I discovered this morning, also has the same white circle, but lower towards the floor. Guess what the picture was of? That damn back room. You can find pictures at the end of this post.
I verified with my mom this morning as well that, besides the fridge behind the bar and the ice machine, there would be no machine or appliance to make a rumbling, thrumming sort of sound. The streets were dead, and the basement doesn't stretch under the main bar room. And appliances usually don't fill the entire air with their noise and hit you like a wave of energy that flows through your body.
It was...exciting to say the least. Like I said, I'm not keen on returning there, especially in the dark, but at some point my curiosity is going to get the better of me. Next time I think I'll take a Ouija board along for the ride.
No comments:
Post a Comment