Posted on June 27, 2012 at 6:25 PM
Initially, I had intended this as an appendix to a six-year-old ghost story of mine; but looking over my entries, I see, somehow, this rather important ghost story never made it here. I can't figure out why... So, I must start at the beginning. When I first moved to Reading, I lived in a old red brick house in the little old town of Sinking Spring. The house sits by the railroad tracks, (there are a lot of trains in Reading, to this day), and an old school, which has been converted into apartments. It actually sits on the corner of a small crossroads. The first strange thing that I noticed was that at least every other week a car would stall and break down there. Then, I'd hear somebody running up the steps every day at about the time school let-out. Also, we'd go out, return, to see that the attic light was on. I did not have the light on. Ron also started talking in his sleep. This would freak me out, only because he spoke in a little girl's voice. He also tried to rip up my Raggedy Ann one night in his sleep. These turned out to be small things compared to what was yet to come.
One night Ron was away on business, and I was alone in the bathroom which faced the road. I heard screaming and yelling, what I could only call an angry altercation, then a huge accident. It sounded like a train. I got so scared that I just crumpled on the floor in a ball and waited to hear the police and ambulances, only they never came. I sat there on the bathroom floor for what seemed like hours, as I was certain somebody must've died in such a noisy accident as that. I was confused. Finally, I got up and looked out the window. Nothing. The streets were as dark and desolate as before, and nobody was around. I had no idea what had happened.
I do know that when I had to cross the narrow train tracks I would always run across them in what I can only call an unfounded panic. I hated them. Also, I noticed scads of stuffed animals were placed there, and figured there must've been a child killed there. About the same time I started seeing people, men and women, parked there, sitting in their car, at the tracks. I thought they must be family members of the victim. They would always look at me and smile, and I remember feeling very sorry for them.
Then, one night, we were sitting in the living room watching television when a panicky BANG, BANG, BANG, came at the back door. It was so scary that Ron actually ran out with a Marine knife in his hand. Shiner went about ballistic, and he does not get scared very often. Terriers are pretty tough little dogs. There wasn't anybody around, and we would have seen or heard anybody that had run away, as there are windows that line that entire side of the house, and the street runs up and down.
I was so curious about these things that I went to the library to look them up. At first I thought that maybe it was the old man who had lived next door. I heard he had died just prior to us moving into the house. But, it wasn't him. At the library I discovered that there had been an Indian massacre in the town prior to the seven-teen hundreds; but of course, like any small town in America, they'd want to keep that hush-hush. I used to walk past a bird seed mill every day, where a lot of crows liked to hang-out, across from that there was an old mound covered in rocks, vines, and trees. I always thought that there were Indians buried there. I also discovered that the kids had tried to burn that school down at least twice, but not a lot more.
One day I asked a woman from around here about it. I told her about the accident that I had heard, and asked her if there had been any sort of horrific accident around there. She said that there had been a woman and a child in an accident right around there, maybe ten years back, but she did not know much more about it, besides the fact that they had been murdered. I had written this ghost story in myspace blog, and as it was, one of my friends, there, knew all about it, as he had gone to high school with one of the women that was killed there. His information led me to look up the entire story online, only to discover that it was worse than ever. Apparently this woman, in her early twenties, was trying to break it off with her boyfriend, the father of her two-year-old child, but he had been stalking her. She was at the McDonald's with her friend, another woman, (I think it said she was only twenty-one), and her one-and-a-half year old baby. The boyfriend showed up there, and chased the four of them, in their car, to the railroad tracks just as a train was approaching. He was behind them in his car when he shouted, "WHERE YOU GONNA' GO NOW BITCH?", and rammed them into the oncoming train. The two women and both of the children were killed upon impact. If I remember the story correctly, the man got four consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole.
This was about where my first edition of the ghost story had ended, but since then, there had been some other occurrences that I have not spoken nor written about due to personal reasons. I cannot seem to shake the old-fashioned idea that some things should never be spoken of! First, the neighbor behind us committed suicide. I knew about this, before I knew about it. I heard the woman screaming when she had found his body. When you hear that sort of scream, you know it. I was extremely depressed in the house. I would lay in bed and pray to die. One night, in the bedroom, I saw a translucent gold demon with a ram's head come out and rise from beneath the bed. Even his eyes were golden, and he sort of glowed in the dark. This might sound crazy, only Ron had seen it too. Unlike myself, he is a very logical person. I thought the demon must be personal at that time, but not so much anymore. I fell down the steps and smacked my head off the hardwood floor. I could have sworn that I was pushed. One morning I awoke and could not walk for days. I still cannot understand what happened there, but I would scream just to sit up. The old woman across the street died. She had just waved to me from her window just before. After we moved the next tenant had attempted suicide too. He also caught the house on fire. He blamed it on the cats. I wouldn't believe that, only I had heard cat ghosts there before too... clawing at the stairs, crying... Only we did not have a cat. I thought it was my dead cat following me. I always thought she had the demons.
Now, is when I've got back to thinking about the night that I had heard that accident, as true as life. Remember, I thought at the time, that it was a very real accident. As far as I know it, the killer is still alive, in jail. Now, he was Hispanic, and knowing how family oriented and Catholic the Hispanic community is, for the most part, I'm sure what he did, killing his own child and the mother, would be considered especially heinous to them, (and to most), so he might well have been offed in the joint, in which case my thoughts hereafter, are completely irrelevant; but if he is still alive, I see them as important proofs, to myself at least. I heard an angry altercation before the crash. I heard a fight, yelling and screaming. That's why I was so scared. It didn't sound like any ordinary car crash. It sounded deliberate, like murder. Hearing him, if he's still, indeed, alive, and I have no reason to believe otherwise, as this was not that long ago, and he was young, means that his ghost is residual, a prerecorded space in the energy there. The screams and shouts were somehow recorded there, and maybe, having only heard it once, it might have even been on the anniversary of their deaths. Somehow, he's alive, only his voice has been recorded and captured there. I suppose the panic and the evil have left their trace in the very atmosphere. I also think that the banging we heard at the door was them, only I don't attribute the lights left on, the running up the steps, the pushing, or pain to any of them. I think the place might be cursed. The thing that's there might even predate the Indians as far as I can tell. Maybe it is just all of the negative energy balled-up there. The roof fell in on that house right after we left it too.
I feel very fortunate to have scored one of Tatianna's beautiful Russian dolls!
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XOXO