The Ghostening: Part the First
A real-life Monadnock-region ghost story told in four parts
Originally published on facebook dot com.
It was a dark and stormy night.
No, it wasn’t; it was actually a very clear night, and the moon was nearly full, so things were pretty bright out, considering.
Shortly before 2:00 AM, I was woken by a ‘THUNK.’ It sounded like someone had kicked the box spring of our bed, or like someone had jumped from the foot of the bed onto the floor. It was loud, and my eyes snapped open immediately. I lay there for a moment in the dark, trying to figure out what the hell it could have been — there was no one to be seen in our room, the door was closed, and our two jiggly-titted cats were, per usual, banished from our room until the morning. I sat up and established that nothing had fallen from the bed. My husband James appeared to be sound asleep. I considered that maybe I had dreamed it? Nope, I definitely heard it.
Bothered and now wide-awake, I put on my glasses, got out out of bed, and left the room to check on my four-year-old daughter, Sylvie (All the mamas out there know that, when unsettled at night time, the best way to soothe one’s soul is to reassure yourself your babies are sleeping and safe). Sylvie was sprawled out, snoring peacefully. I trudged to the bathroom and had an uneventful pee. On a whim, I decided to go into the little room James uses as his office, the only other room on the second floor I hadn’t visited in the last few minutes.
Both the aforementioned fat cats were curled up, asleep on the futon. So, the thunk definitely was not cat-related. I sat beside them and gave them some pets, because, how can you not take the opportunity to pet both your sleeping fur-babies at the same time? Whilst petting the kittehs, I gazed out the window, which looks out over our backyard. We have a long lawn, which extends to a wooded area near the river bank, the ground of which is covered by dark green vinca minor. That area extends about 15 feet or so, and then slopes down to the Contoocook River.
The moon illuminated the lawn, and then all faded to deep black as soon as it hit the wooded area. There was nothing to be seen in that limited black expanse, except…what was that fuzzy, light-colored, vaguely column-shaped thing, right where the the lawn met the woods? I strained my eyes, trying to distinguish the shape. When I looked directly at it, it was very blurry, nearly impossible to make out. When I looked above it or next to it, at the blackness of the trees, I could see in my peripheral vision that it was clearly vertical, longer than it was wide. Like a person standing upright. When I looked at it straight on again, it fuzzed out. But…was that a glimmer? Was this thing at the edge of my yard scintillating at me or some shit? What was this pale, faintly shimmering, mystery figure doing standing right at the edge of the woods?
Out loud I said: “What in the actual frigging hell is that?”