In the four years I've worked in the office where I do, there have been regular occurrences which I feel can only be called paranormal. At first, they could be passed off as my imagination, or by some logical explanation, but eventually, it went beyond that.

My office is fairly small, it's in the front of a manufacturing plant, but to my knowledge, the events have been limited to just the office area and restrooms directly outside the offices. It's not too old of a building, maybe late 70s or early 80s, and to our knowledge, all that sat on this property previously was farmland.

I remember the first time something odd happened to me was just a few months after I'd started working here, and I'd gotten in early in the morning, and was making a pot of coffee in the cubicle where we have our coffee maker, water cooler and mini-fridge in (and a table). I put the empty pot under the filter and began walking out of the cubicle when I heard a sizzling sound. The pot was on the table next to the coffee maker and coffee was spilling out all over the place. I dashed over the put the pot down and cleaned up the mess, sure that I'd put the pot down before I left, but guessing I'd just thought I did.

Not long after that, I was in early again talking to a co-worker just outside the doorway that led into the offices near the restrooms, when all of a sudden we heard a door slam very hard inside. I had to unlock the door to the office area since it was locked on that side (but there was another door that led out to the factory on the other side) and my co-worker and I went in, turned the lights on and looked around for someone. I figured that they must've gone out the back door, and checked the door, but it too, was still locked. All the office doors (there were six) were also locked.

Gradually about three of us out of the 7 people who worked in the office began seeing (but moreso hearing) unexplainable things more and more often, like lights being turned out in the mens' room when you are alone in there, doing your business, scratching sounds coming from inside walls, doors being left open that were closed the night before when you left (our cleaning people come in the later afternoon and early evening before everyone has left the office) as well as radios that change stations of their own accord in the time it takes from you to get up from your desk, go to the copy machine or get a cup of coffee and return to your office.

All these things were unnerving to say the least, but not truly scary until one evening last fall when I had come in on a Saturday morning, to catch up on a project I was working on and have access to the copier without interruptions from co-workers as well as the use of our large conference room table to lay my sheets of paper out in orderly piles that would need to be hole punched and put in binders.

I was alone, and it was about 9 or 10 in the morning, and I'd been working away for over an hour without anything odd going on, when suddenly I felt like I wasn't alone in the conference room. It really felt like someone was standing behind me watching over my shoulder. I got very scared, my palms began sweating and heart raced. I turned around and of course I was alone, but the feeling was still there. I still had so much to do, but really didn't want to be in there alone, so I did the next best thing, and flicked on the radio in the cubicle across from the office we used as the conference room and turned it really loud.

When I returned to the conference room not a minute later, all my stacks I'd neatly piled up waiting to be hole-punched were messed up, some pages on the floor, a couple of the chairs next to the table rolled aside, as if someone got up from them quickly or shoved them away. That was it. I ran to my own office, grabbed my car keys off the desk, and left the office, just like that.

Strangely enough, when I got in Monday morning, I was told by my manager, who was there early, that he saw how far I'd gotten with the project and remarked all that really needed to be done was punch the holes in the stacks. I was confused. He said he got in and was the first one there, and happened to see the conference room door open and all my piles on the table neatly piled up. I looked myself and it was true, they were all piled up again, and nothing messed up or laying on the floor. Even the chairs were all neatly pushed in. I asked him if the lights were still on or the radio on when he came in and he said no. Since he wasn't one of the people in our office to believe any of the events that had occurred and never mentioned anything odd happening to him, I thought it best not to tell him what happened to me Saturday morning.

Things still happen out of the ordinary here, nothing really evil or harmful or as dramatic as what happened that Saturday morning, but nonetheless, whatever is sharing our office with us continues to make itself known now and again.

Most recently, about a month ago, I put a picture in a frame up on my desk of my girlfriend and I, and when I unlocked my office door the next morning, found it under my chair. I asked my boss if he'd seen anyone go in my office after I left, or if he was joking around and he said no. A few days later, the picture was moved again, in my top drawer. A couple weeks ago, it was moved yet again, this time behind my office door sitting on the floor against the baseboard of the wall. I had enough, and being the only one in thus far, shouted "Stop playing with my picture-it isn't funny anymore!" I felt kind of silly afterwards, but whatever it was must've heard me, because it hasn't been moved since.

Sorry this got so long, but there was a lot more I could say, but didn't, so if you have any questions, please email me at bryanbohru@aol.com. Thanks for reading this.

More of the Invisible Co-Worker

Earlier, I submitted my experiences regarding a presence at the office where I work, and have gotten a good many emails from people asking for more information/follow-up to this story.

I work in an office building which is in the front of a factory. The building is not that old, probably no more than 20-25 years old. All of the experiences I've had have occurred solely in the office area, never in the large factory behind us.

In addition to pranks like moving a coffee pot while the coffee is brewing, turning on and off radios at people's desks, and hiding a photograph I keep on my desk, this entity makes noises, like scratching sounds inside the walls, banging on file cabinets, and slamming doors. Only once has it been over the top, as I described in my previous submission, when it made itself known one Saturday morning when I came in to work on a project in our conference room which involved copying and correlating pages in stacks. I left the conference room for one minute to investigate a radio that had been turned on in a nearby cubicle and when I returned, all my paperwork had been scattered on the table and on the floor. That's when I took off, freaked out. I found out that when my boss came in that Monday morning before me, he found everything was neatly piled up and orderly once more.

Since these incidents, a couple of my female co-workers have noticed balls of light, or more like globs of light as one woman put it, darting around the ladies' room while they are in the stall, or from the corner of their eye, while washing their hands at the sink. That restroom tends to be much chillier than other parts of the office, even when it's warm everywhere else, and when there is no air- conditioning on.

Another one of my female co-workers told me in confidence not too long ago that she came back after driving halfway home to get something she forgot on her desk, and everyone else had left for the evening. She came in, turned on the lights, and went to her desk to get the manila folder with the documents in it she needed to work on at home. It wasn't where she left in not half an hour earlier. No one had been there since she left, since she and the only other person left at the same time. She figured she'd just look for it the next day. Getting back into her car, she glanced over at the front passenger's seat, and there was the folder. That freaked her out so badly, she had to drive to a nearby fast food restaurant before driving all the way home to calm her nerves. She swore she didn't take it with her the first time she left work, that there was nothing on the seat of the car before.

Finally, I myself have recently been somewhat creeped out by our unseen co-worker. (I don't think that whatever it is is malevolent, it seems like it enjoys playing tricks on us, and sometimes thinks it is helping us, too.) A few weeks back, I was in early, and the first one here, and happened to be reading the newspaper in my office, drinking coffee, around 8 in the morning, when I heard a soft rapping on my office door, which was half-open. I called for the person to come in, and nothing happened. I repeated myself. I got up and of course, no one was in the hall or even in the office yet for that matter.

Just last week, while in our stock room, which is just an unused office piled with supplies, I was on a step ladder getting some adding machine tape rolls when suddenly the pile of rolls I was reaching for toppled over on their own volition and rolled off the shelf onto the floor. Another one of my co-workers said that while he was in that room a couple months ago getting something, he heard footsteps going from the door and stop right behind him. He thought it was one of us, and without turning around, asked "Yes?" and when he got no reply, saw that he was alone. Needless to say, he got what he needed, and got out of that room very quickly.

We still have no idea what or who is the spirit in our office is or was, since there was never anything on this property previously but farmland. No one has ever died in the office that we're aware of either. Most of us have become used to its antics, but I personally still find them unnerving regardless of their harmlessness and hope that our unseen co-worker would find a new place to work sooner than later.