SOMETHING BROKE UP OUR DATE What I am about to explain is something my boyfriend and I experienced a little over a year ago. I was enjoying my summer vacation after finishing my freshman year in college, and he was working part-time. In early July of 2001, we had been together for almost a year and, as we are both nature fans, we loved taking long walks and hikes together. I say "loved" in the past tense because one particular adventure changed all that. I had decided it would be romantic if I gave him a tour of my old elementary school, Chatsworth Hills Academy. We all call it "C.H.A." for short. It was built over a Chumash Indian campsite, which was also used as their burial ground. It's a beautiful location up in the desert hills, right next to a sulphur spring (which is why the natives chose the spot). To this day there are still rock paintings on the boulders behind the third grade classrooms, and every so often a child will find an arrowhead, or other artifacts, while digging around in the sandbox on the playground. The campus buildings are trailer rooms because the founders of the school decided against digging into the sacred ground, as it would have been disrespectful to the Chumash tribe. This lovely and historic place was a colorful backdrop to my education as a child. But at the same time, it has always had an odd energy about it. Perhaps I ought to give some past examples of that energy before I relate this most recent tale... I remember that in the first grade my best friend, Kia, told me that she'd discovered something special about the large tree that loomed over the sandbox. Namely, she said that "he" had begun to talk. She, along with a handful of other young classmates who had heard it as well, dubbed the tree "Mr. Yackety" (as in "yackety yak, don't talk back") because it seemed to grumble at them when they got too close for its liking. I myself believed what I was told -- being six years old at the time and afraid of my own shadow, I figured it would be unwise to test the warnings of the other children, so I was never bold enough to approach Mr. Yackety alone. I can also recall one frightening afternoon in 1991 (the third grade), when a large group of other girls decided that they were going to play "Bloody Mary" in the bathroom during our lunchtime. Again, being faint of heart at that time, I was the only girl in the class who did not go along with this. On the off-chance that the game might actually conjure a spirit, I opted to remain outside, in the safety of the sunny playground. But I kept watch for teachers while all the others crept into the bathroom. About 15 minutes later I heard all of them screaming in terror, and saw them race back out the bathroom door. None of them would tell me what had happened until finally, after lunch was over, one of the girls spoke to me about it. Her name was Lindsay, and it just so happened that her desk was next to mine in class. She leaned over during a reading assignment and whispered to me, "We saw Bloody Mary! She showed up and she was mad! She tried to break the mirror and come into the room to get us!" And she would say nothing more than that, no matter how I pressed her. Now, looking back, it may have been that since they were excited and were hoping to see something, they had mistaken one of their own reflections -- or a trick of light coming through the one bathroom window -- for a ghostly apparition. But being a bunch of third graders, we didn't question such things. Bloody Mary or not, all of us kids agreed that our little school was the center of a connection to something beyond what the grown-ups deemed "realistic." Our teachers had told us about the Chumash people who had lived there long ago, and my best friend and I had always wondered what we would see if we were ever at school in the dark of night. Did the ghosts of Indian braves emerge when no one was around to see them? This was the unique environment in which I lived and learned from kindergarten until the end of fifth grade. During that time I never had the chance to stay there late, so the spiritual goings-on of the campus remained a mystery. Kia never made any midnight ventures there either. Fast forward to one fateful night in July 2001. Shame on me for not writing this down immediately after it happened -- for I can recall everything about it except the precise date. I do remember that it was a Wednesday, because Josh, my boyfriend, had to close the store where he worked on Wednesday nights. He gave me a call on this particular evening and told me he was off. He had just closed the store and dropped off the deposit, and wanted to know if I'd eaten yet. I told him I hadn't, so he stopped at a nearby Taco Bell and bought dinner for both of us before coming to my house. It was about 10:00 pm when he arrived. We took our tacos to the park near my house and had a nice picnic there under the stars. After eating we sat there and chatted for over an hour, then decided that we wanted to go walking. But where? I remembered that C.H.A. was a beautiful place, and that he had never seen it before although I had described it to him many times. I also knew that there was no security there whatsoever -- having been a student there as a young girl, and having driven by it at night in later years, I had seen that the campus gate was always wide open, with no sign of guards or alarms anywhere. It would be easy for us to sneak in and out without being questioned. So we got in his car and drove up to the campus gate just before midnight. Sure enough, it was open, and when we drove into the parking lot we found it completely empty. We parked the car and got out to take our stroll. There was no moon that night, so the only light we had came from a single pair of floodlights that had been attached to one of the trees by the soccer field. Because I remembered the lay of the land so well, I had not brought flashlights or anything else for us to carry. This is important to remember. The place was noisy at the time because the sprinkler system was watering the soccer field. Near that field is a frog pond as well, and the frogs -- who are always lively -- were ribbeting and croaking away. This, also, is important to remember. Well, Josh and I walked through the dark, hand in hand, and even with the limited amount of light I could point out what had been my classrooms, the cafeteria, the music building and computer lab, and some of my favorite places to play. After a while of this we got tired of walking about, and did something that, in retrospect, was probably not very intelligent. We decided to head back to the car and have a little fun, if you know what I mean. We didn't get caught by anyone or anything... at least, not right away. It was when we were finished that we noticed something wasn't right. As we were getting dressed and chatting in the back seat, we noticed that the two floodlights outside were no longer on. It was now completely black out there -- we could see nothing outside the windows, even if we leaned right up against the glass. Upon discovering this we also stopped talking for a minute -- long enough to notice that the sprinklers weren't on either, and that the frogs had stopped croaking. The lights and sprinklers, we concluded, might have been on automatic timers and went off on their own. But what was the matter with the frogs? It didn't make any sense. Those frogs only stop croaking when they hear a predator approach. When Josh and I had been out walking, they had temporarily stopped when we went right up to their pond... but they had started again as soon as we began to walk away. They had also been noisy when we were back in the car. What reason would they have to be silent now? We were no longer close to them, and we were the only ones there, after all. Or so we thought............... We were still sitting in the back seat, and had begun discussing how strange this was, when I saw Josh cast a quick glance out the back windshield -- as though he thought he had seen something. I looked out as well, wondering what he had been looking at, when I saw something that made my heart stop. It was a small orb of light, swaying ever so slightly from side to side. And it was coming straight to us. My immediate conclusion was that unbeknownst to me, the school had hired security guards after all, and what we were seeing was a flashlight that belonged to one of them. "There's someone coming!" I screeched to Josh. He jumped into the front seat and turned the key in the ignition, hoping that we could get away without being arrested. The car wouldn't start for about 30 seconds. Then, when it finally did start, it wouldn't move. I was still in the back seat, watching with horror as this light got closer and closer to the back windshield. I became even more frightened when I realized that no matter how close this light got, I never saw the person that was holding it. It became painfully obvious that this was no security guard. Finally after almost a full minute of struggling with the engine, Josh got his car to move -- but it went in reverse, top speed, right towards the light. I watched through the back windshield as this orb came closer and closer to us, until it was literally on top of the trunk and right in front of the glass -- the only thing that separated it from my face. And then, when it was that close... it randomly disappeared. Immediately after that, the car went forward as it was supposed to, nearly crashing into a tree before Josh finally got control of the steering. We floored it. I don't remember Josh ever driving as fast, or in such a panic, as he did on this particular occasion. Both of us were thanking our lucky stars that we had gotten away in one piece, let alone scott free. Josh's old Pontiac had gotten the workout of its life that night. We still talk and debate about exactly what the hell that thing was on that eventful evening. We both know that there was no way it could have been a human being. For one thing, the car had stalled for so long that if indeed it was a guard, he would have had plenty of time to just stroll right up to the driver's side and demand that we get out of the car. I had also been watching that light for the entire duration, and there was no sound coming from it. No, "Hey, you" or, "Stop where you are..." no nothing. Not a word. But the most important detail of all comes from the fact that the car went into reverse. We flew backwards, right towards this thing, at such a speed that if it had been a human -- or any physical living thing -- we would have backed over it, no question. I saw that light come right on top of our trunk... and it would have been accompanied by a sickening crunch or crash, along with loud cries of pain and a serious dent in the car, if it had been a living thing we'd hit. I have since told my best friend, Kia, this story and she doesn't know what to make of it. She supposes that after all these years, we have finally gotten an answer to the question of what exactly comes out to roam the campus after sundown. My experience has awakened her curiosity enough that she has asked me to take her there at some point, to see if we can get E.V.P. readings or "ghost photography" from the area. I must admit that although it was a frightful shock to me at the time, I have had a year to get over it and wonder about it myself. I do have questions that I hope to have answered someday about what exactly greeted us that night. Was it the ghost of a Native American? And if so, was he or she simply trying to get a closer look at us -- or did someone decide that we should be punished for using their final resting place for a rendezvous? Perhaps I am no longer the little girl afraid of my own shadow. I may or may not decide to comply with Kia's request, and conduct a few studies of the school. But Josh -- who was once a skeptic about stories such as this one -- has insisted to me that he will NEVER go back to that place again. IF ONLY THIS STORY WEREN'T TRUE I don't suppose this would count as a typical ghost story, but I find it far more disturbing than anything else I have experienced in my life. Granted, I haven't been around for very long (I'm only 21 years old), and I have witnessed some pretty sad and troubling things, but so far I think I can safely say that this was one of the most horrible events of my life. I had the sense -- and the need, because I was so upset -- to write it down in my journal soon after it happened. This experience is very similar to the one discussed in "What My Father Said." I have something in common with the person who submitted that story, for both of us have had dreams that come true. The story I'm about to tell you was by no means the first time I'd gone through this, but it was certainly the worst. It was Tuesday night, July 25, 2000. I was enjoying my summer vacation after graduating from high school. My family and I had just gotten back from a trip to our lake house in upstate New York, so I was suffering major jet lag and had no trouble getting to sleep. That was when I had my worst nightmare. I dreamed that I was walking down a narrow sidewalk, with grass on either side, on a very bright and sunny day. It was so hot and bright that it was difficult to keep my eyes open (I have vividly detailed dreams). After walking a few feet I noticed that to my right was a humble brick building, which had a small porch shaded by a white metal awning. I saw a huge crowd of people waiting in line to get into this place. Most of them were older -- about 40 or so, I would have guessed -- but there were also many people who were my age at the time (18 and younger). At the front of the crowd, being greeted by people as they walked in, was a classmate I easily recognized. He and I had gone to the same school since the first grade or so. There may be a chance that either he or someone he knows will read this, so to keep from upsetting him I'll call him James. Well, James was sobbing and wouldn't talk to anyone. I got a bad feeling about this and rushed up to him, trying to console him and ask what was wrong. He wouldn't even look at me, and continued to cry as though his heart would break. I decided to get into this building to see what all the fuss was about. In the dimly lit entryway I found his mother wearing a long black dress, looking very tired and forlorn as she was greeting her well-wishers. Her older son, James' only sibling, was standing protectively beside her, but he too looked worn and sad. At this point I thought, "Oh no... where's his father?" I rushed into the next room, which was a sanctuary with dim, off-white walls and limited lighting. At the far end of the sanctuary was a casket made of lighter-colored wood... either pine or cedar... and I knew that the poor man was lying inside, quite dead. I ran back outside to find James, and by that time he was laughing and making polite conversation with the guests. I tried to get his attention and ask him what on earth had happened, but he would hear none of it. He was willing to talk about anything and everything, except his dad. Then the dream flashed ahead to much the same scene, except that instead of the brick building we were standing in a lovely white house. The house had a tiny kitchen with grey stone counter tops, and next to it was a little doorway leading to a dining area, with lots of food crowded on the little table there. Nearby was a staircase that led up to the bedrooms, and all over the front wall I could see beautiful color photographs of James with his brother and his parents. Then I woke up, feeling profoundly disturbed. I pushed it to the back of my head, wanting to believe that it was just a bad dream, but it wouldn't leave me alone. Every night for the next week it popped back into my head, causing me to be progressively worried. I had known since two years prior that James' father had been struggling with cancer of the pancreas, and I was beginning to wonder if perhaps he'd gotten worse. I had always felt odd asking James about him, because although we had always gone to school together we had never really been friends. In fact, our social circles had been so vastly different that we barely knew each other. So it wasn't like I could just call him up to chat, especially about something so personal. But for the next week after I had that dream, I felt like I would go mad. I was particularly miserable that Sunday, August 5 -- I felt an awful sadness eating away at me, and knew that something terrible was going on. I didn't get a wink of sleep that night, and felt just as bad, if not worse, the next day. I finally decided that no matter how weird I would sound, I had to get ahold of James and find out what was going on. I called Information and got his family's phone number, but when I tried it, the phone just rang off the hook. There wasn't even an answering machine to pick up. That drove me crazier still. I knew then that something horrible must be going on with them, otherwise why wouldn't they have had the time to at least record a voice mail message? I must have called at least twenty times over the next two days, and every time it was the same thing: no answer from either human or machine. Finally on Wednesday, August 8, James answered the phone. I tried to sound as casual as possible, and pretend that I had called out of pure curiosity to see how his summer was going. I asked him what was new, and held my breath for the answer. His voice broke as he told me what I'd been praying not to hear -- his dad had died on Monday the 6th. It was all I could do not to break down on the phone. I tried my best to sound strong, and of course I didn't tell him about my dream... for can you imagine how he would have felt? It simply wasn't something I could do in good conscience. Well, as it turned out, the funeral was scheduled for the following afternoon, Thursday the 9th. He invited me to it, and I will never forget it as long as I live. I wanted to scream and run. EVERYTHING at that funeral was exactly the same as it had appeared to me in my dream. The demographics of the guests, the dress his mother was wearing, the color of the walls in the building, the lighting inside, the weather... even the casket. Identical. The way James acted towards everyone was the same too. He cried at first, but assumed an air of total denial for the rest of the day. He made no mention of his father after saying his goodbyes at the grave site, and would not allow anyone to get too emotional or sympathetic with him. What distressed me more than anything else, though, was the location of the reception... James' house. Once again, it looked just like I'd seen it in my dream. The family photos, the staircase, the layout of the house itself with the kitchen and dining area -- it was all the same. The problem here was that I had never been to James' house before in my life, so I'd had no way of knowing what it looked like. As I stated before, we had never been friends, so I had never had a reason to be there. How, then, could it have been presented to me so accurately in my sleep? I hope that no one who reads this has ever had the same sickening feeling that I had on this day, when I saw that my terrible nightmare had so literally (and completely) come true. But if you have -- if you've felt the knots twisting in your stomach, the cold sweat, the complete loss as to what to do or say -- then you can also imagine the tremendous guilt I still carry with me as I remember it. I will always wonder why I had to see that in my mind's eye before it came to pass. I will never understand why such a nice, charismatic family had to bear such an awful loss. (James and his brother had been among the most popular and intelligent students in my high school... they were both student council leaders and valedictorians.) Out of all the possible things that could have happened to cause a death in their family... why did it have to be the slow torture of cancer? That wasn't fair at all. And finally, what possible good did it do for anyone that I saw this in my dream, and couldn't do a thing to prevent it? I still have not told James about my vision. I have never seen him again since his dad's funeral, but even if I had the opportunity, I don't think I would ever say a word about it. It had broken my heart enough to see it twice, first in the dream world and then again right before my eyes. I never had the heart to mention anything of the kind at the funeral or reception. I couldn't say a prayer or throw dirt onto the casket at the burial, like everyone else did. My feet were cemented to the ground. I had seen enough already, and I must have appeared rather cold and rude. But in the end, all I could do was embrace James quickly and walk away, weeping. MIRROR MIRROR For those who are about to read this, I should clarify that I am NOT making this up and I consider myself a relatively sane person. However, I have had several experiences with the paranormal and I have explained a couple of them. Even with my past experiences, though, I consider these recent events to be most unusual, as I have never heard of anything similar happening before. Basically, this is the first instance I've ever seen of a haunting attached not to a building, event or location, but to a single object. This particular object is my antique hand mirror, which I won from ebay a couple of months ago. (I must apologize in advance for the length of details, but I feel that each instance is vital to the overall story.) The auction for this mirror ran from June 6 to June 16 of this year, and I had a couple of reasons for checking it out. First of all, my old hand mirror (a cheap replica which I had bought at a local Salvation Army) had broken, and I was looking for a nice replacement. Secondly, I love all things old-fashioned so whenever I can afford it, I collect antiques -- especially personal items. Finally, the mirror was listed as "haunted" and I had a morbid sense of curiosity. I wanted to read its story, and boy, did it have an interesting one. The seller explained that the mirror was over a century old, having been given to his great-grandmother (from HER mother) as a gift when she was a little girl. What amazed me about it was its stunning beauty despite its age -- it looked practically new. The seller confirmed that the mirror was in beautiful shape, and explained that while it was not easy for him to sell this mirror, he had decided that he wanted nothing more to do with it because he was seeing odd images in the glass. Why was he seeing such things? He wrote that his great-grandmother died while she was getting ready for bed one night over twenty years ago -- holding that very mirror in her hand. He did not elaborate on how she died, but I assumed that it was simply due to age because she was in her eighties. When the seller inherited the mirror after her death, he claimed to have seen the image of someone standing behind him whenever he looked at his reflection. When he turned around to see who it was, however, he found no one there. This continued frequently, happening more often at night than during the day. He explained that he showed the mirror to several friends and family members, and they too would see a misty image behind them almost every time they looked into the glass. He wondered for a while if perhaps it was just a smudge, but the more he cleaned it, the better the misty form could be seen. It never disappeared. He finally decided that perhaps the misty form was an image of his deceased great-grandmother, and he was concerned that she was not "moving on" as he thought she should be. He came to the conclusion that perhaps if he sold her mirror, she would take the hint and get back to the other side where she belonged. Well, I was skeptical about it at first. I believed his story and had no doubt that he was being serious -- he assured all potential bidders that this was "NOT A JOKE," and he had no negative feedback in his ebay history. But I wondered if maybe he was seeing not so much the great-grandmother herself, but just some of her energy left behind. I believe that when someone is emotionally attached to a place or thing, they leave a little bit of themselves with it when they pass away. Naturally, a century-old mirror would have a great deal of energy attached to it, as it has seen its fair share of faces, emotions and changes. So... I decided there was probably nothing to fear, and I bid on the mirror. To my great surprise, I won! The mirror arrived toward the end of June, and was very nicely wrapped in vintage, black floral fabric. The same day I received the package, I emailed the seller to let him know it had gotten to me safely, and I left him positive feedback. He wrote back to thank me for doing business with him, and asked me to please let him know about anything odd that might happen with the mirror. He did not sound confident that anything would happen -- in fact, I think he was rather hoping that nothing would happen at all -- but as the mirror was in his family for so long, I think he wanted assurance that his great-grandmother had finally moved on. Unfortunately, I could not give him that kind of news. Instead of seeing nothing at all, I have seen and experienced things that even the seller has not -- or at least, if he has, he never mentioned it in the auction description. The first day I had the mirror, I could not help but notice that it had an odd "pull" on me. I felt like I kept wanting to stare into the glass for long periods of time. I also noticed that my reflection was very strange-looking. It was still my face, mind you, and I didn't see anything like "someone standing behind me" as the seller had mentioned, but I felt almost like I didn't recognize myself. It's hard to explain, but it was my face and yet not at the same time. I suppose the best way I can put it is this: I was seeing what I might look like through someone else's eyes. I showed the mirror to my mom and stepdad, who had interesting reactions. I never told them anything about the mirror's history, so they have no idea that it is supposedly haunted. Nevertheless, they acted very strangely when they saw it. My stepdad simply admired its craftsmanship, saying that he thought it looked very nice, but he did not look into the glass. Instead he handed it back to me very quickly and did not mention it again. My mom, on the other hand, looked at the mirror for a long time, staring into the glass for a couple of minutes. She seemed to have a much keener interest in it, though she did not say much. I wondered if it had the same "pull" on her as it did on me. My boyfriend reacted to it the same way my stepdad did. He picked up the mirror, complimented its style, but did not look into the glass. He gave it back to me very quickly and has not touched it since. My best friend Kia's boyfriend -- whose name is Chris -- also made a very brief comment on its beauty without looking into the glass. He simply glanced at it from an angle, almost as though he did not want to look into it directly, and made a strange point. "Very interesting," he said after I told him about the mirror's previous owner. "You say this woman died while she was holding it? She must have fallen when that happened... strange that the glass doesn't have so much as a crack in it. The whole thing... looks like it's never been touched." He gave it back to me very quickly after that, and never touched it again. Kia, my best friend, reacted like my mom and I had. She seemed to adore the mirror. She stared into the glass for almost 15 minutes straight, barely blinking or speaking to anyone. I asked her what she was seeing in it that was so captivating -- mind you, I had not yet told her what I had experienced because I wanted her to see it for herself, without the power of suggestion. She confirmed my suspicions; she was seeing exactly what I had seen. "It's weird," she said, "It's still my face, but... it doesn't really look like me. It looks like how I might look to someone else." She kept staring at the mirror for another five minutes or so, until finally I had to take it out of her hand. Otherwise, it looked as though I wouldn't get it back from her. Aside from this, I have felt a presence in my room that was not there before. It is especially strong at night, and seems to be strongest when I turn out the lights to go to sleep. It seems that there is a shadow standing by my dresser, where the mirror is kept. While I do not feel threatened, it does feel bizarre. It was so powerful the first night I had the mirror that when I was in bed, I didn't want to face the direction of my dresser, because I was sure I would see something. (However, I have gotten used to the presence since then, so it does not bother me as much.) That was the full extent of the "haunting" until the first weekend in July, when my two little brothers came up from our dad's house to visit me. Michael, the younger of the two, knew that I had bought a strange mirror and he wanted to see what it looked like, so I brought him upstairs to my room and handed the mirror to him. He looked at it briefly, then jumped and shook as though something had bitten him, and put the mirror back on my dresser in a hurry. I had never seen such a violent reaction from anyone before, so I asked him what was wrong. He hesitated for a moment before answering. "I really hope that was just the soda I drank..." he started. "Why?" I asked him, "What happened?" He looked very frightened as he responded slowly. "Well... for a second there... it was kinda like I couldn't breathe," he said. Then he looked at me very seriously, and told me he didn't like the mirror at all. He said that if he were me, he wouldn't want it in his house, then he hurried back downstairs. Only a few minutes later, I caught him back upstairs again. He was creeping slowly outside my bedroom door, peering in cautiously at my dresser, where I keep the mirror. When I asked him what he was doing, he replied that even though he didn't like the mirror, he felt like he wanted to look at it again anyway. I asked him if he had looked into the glass the time before, when he had jumped. He told me that indeed he had. My other brother, David, looked at the mirror too. David is the kind of kid that doesn't believe in anything he can't see -- not God, not angels, not ghosts, not demons, not anything. He refuses to set store by any legend or experience unless he has it right there in front of him. He's a very scientific-minded person, not easily shaken. But when he picked up my mirror, he acted very strangely. He laughed and made fun of it, sure... as he makes fun of most paranormal stories. But I noticed that even as he was laughing, he was staring deeply into the glass. Gradually, the more he stared, the less he laughed. Then, out of nowhere, he said something that was completely out of character for him. "I want to see the shadow," he said, still staring into the glass and barely blinking. When I asked him to repeat himself, he said, "I want to see the person who's standing by your dresser every night." I was shocked. For a kid who doesn't believe in such things, his behavior was very odd. Even odder than that was the fact that I eventually had to take the mirror away from him, as I had had to do with Kia. As you can imagine, neither brother has touched the mirror since then. My dad, meanwhile, has never seen the mirror and swears that he does not want to as long as he lives. Michael, who is terrified of it, told him about his experience and that was all that Dad needed to hear. "That thing is evil," he told me once. "It's cursed, and now you've given it what it wants. You've taken it in. It's got you... but don't bring it near my house. I don't want death in my house." While I personally think that Dad overreacted when he said that, it shocked me to see that someone who is usually so light-hearted, humorous and open-minded about the paranormal would be so adament against something he has never even seen. Things got even stranger in mid-July, when my mom and stepdad left town for two weeks and took my grandfather with them. My boyfriend and I were left alone to house-sit for them, and for the most part, everything was fine... but every once in awhile, when I was home alone and waiting for Josh to get off work, I would hear what sounded like footsteps and whispering upstairs. The sounds would always come from the landing at the top of the stairs, right outside my bedroom. The night before my parents got back into town, it got stranger still. I was standing at the kitchen sink, pouring water into a pot so I could cook pasta for dinner. Josh, meanwhile, was outside cooking meat on the grill for the main course. The house, and the neighborhood, was completely silent. I was pouring the water, minding my own business, when suddenly Josh rushed into the kitchen and said, "Honey... is everything okay?" I told him I was fine. "You didn't scream just now?" He asked, looking puzzled. I had no idea that there had even been a scream. I didn't know what he was talking about. He swore that the scream he heard was a woman's voice, and that she sounded exactly like I would if I had seen a spider or gotten startled by something. I asked if he was sure that the scream came from the house, and he swore that it did... it sounded exactly like it came from me in the kitchen. Now, there is no way it could have come from the kitchen, because I did not scream at all. BUT... I got a chill when I remembered that my bedroom, where I keep the mirror, is directly above the kitchen. Later that night, Josh and I were both upstairs getting ready for bed. I was in the hall bathroom brushing my teeth, so the water was running. Josh was across the landing in the master bedroom, and he had just turned on my parents' fan (which is one of the loud, stationary fans, not a ceiling fan). This fan was on as high as it could go, and when it is on that setting, it sounds like a jet engine. The noise from the fan combined with the running water prevented us from being able to hear each other speak, which I should have kept in mind. But when I heard murmuring and whispering out on the landing, I assumed that Josh was talking to himself, as he often does when he is in a room alone. Shortly after I heard the murmuring I looked down at my bathroom sink, and was disgusted to see that the water was not draining... the stupid sink had clogged. "Dammit!" I yelled before reaching for the Draino. I thought that Josh had heard me yell, because I saw him looking at me from the master bedroom. I found it odd that he didn't say anything, though, because usually when I yell or start he asks me what's wrong. I did not think anything of it, though, until after I had successfully drained the sink and I came into the bedroom to tease him about talking to himself. Instead of blushing, he looked at me like I was crazy. "I wasn't talking to myself," he insisted, "I didn't say anything at all." I thought he was trying to scare me, so I pressed him about it ten times... and each time he assured me that what I had heard was not him at all. I told him that I thought it must be him, because he had seemed to be occupied by his own thoughts when he stared at me after I had yelled, "Dammit," instead of coming to see me. This seemed to puzzle him even more. "You yelled?" He asked. He hadn't heard a thing. That was when it occurred to me.... the fan was on full blast, and the water in my sink was running, and we were across the landing from each other... all of which contributed to him not being able to hear me yell. If we couldn't have heard each other with yelling, then it would have been impossible for me to hear Josh muttering under his breath with all that distance and noise. At least... it would have been impossible if it was Josh. Then I remembered that the muttering I had heard did not come from the master bedroom... it had sounded much clearer and closer. It had come from the landing, right outside the master bedroom, the bathroom, the other two bedrooms and... my bedroom. When I realized this, I finally believed that Josh had not done the muttering. Since then, the haunting has gotten more pronounced. If I have my bedroom door open at night lately, it will sometimes close by itself, very slowly and carefully. The night before last, it did this while I was trying to leave the room. It closed right in my face. There was no draft to make it do so... my window was closed tightly, and my little fan was not near it; it was also blowing air in the opposite direction anyway. I held out my hand in front of the door to make certain that there was no breeze, and sure enough, there wasn't. I decided that if it was a ghost shutting my door, I might as well acknowledge its existence. So, for the first time ever, I spoke out loud to the presence in my room. "Listen," I said, "I'll close the door again in a minute, but right now I need it open because I have to get out to take a shower." It seemed to work... because when I opened the door after that, it stayed open. I've found, over the past couple of days, that as long as I speak to whoever shuts the door, she will leave it open for me while I'm running in and out of the room. I call the presence "she" because I wonder if it is the woman who owned the mirror before me. Last night, Josh slept over and got quite a scare from this woman. This was the first night we had slept in my room together since I got the mirror back in June. Whenever he had stayed over before now, we had slept in the master bedroom, because we were watching the house for my parents and we had it all to ourselves. However, since my stepdad was home last night Josh and I slept in my room instead. My bed is only big enough for one of us, but it does have a trundle, so that is where Josh slept. The trundle was on the floor, right next to my bed and right in front of my dresser. I went to sleep fairly quickly last night, so I didn't hear a thing... but Josh was wide awake for quite some time, and when we woke up this morning, he told me what had happened while I was asleep. Apparently he was lying there in the dark, waiting to get tired, when suddenly he heard a voice whisper his name into his ear. "JOSHUA..." it said very harshly and clearly. The whisper was loud enough that it made him jump up in bed, and right when he heard it he felt a chill, as though a cold wind had completely swept over him. He turned to look at me but realized that I was sleeping. (He also knows it couldn't have been me because I never call him by his full name. I always call him Joshie or Sweetie... never Joshua or even Josh. I only address him as Josh in my writing!) That has been my full experience with this mirror so far. I only want to conclude with another fact that I find most unusual.... remember that the seller had asked me to keep in touch if anything odd happened? I have written detailed emails to the seller, and told him all about what has happened here, and I have also asked him if these things ever happened when the mirror was still in his possession. He has not responded to a single email, and in fact, he never gave me his real name either... not even during the actual transaction when I bought the mirror. I only knew him by his ebay name, and only I'm guessing that he is a man because that name sounds stereotypically masculine. So... why has he not contacted me? Is it because he's disturbed by what I've told him? Or is it because he knows more about the mirror than he let on in his auction description? Moreover, how did his great-grandmother really die? She was an elderly woman, but how is it that she keeled over while she was holding the mirror, and the mirror did not break or even suffer a crack in the glass? Did she see something that scared her so much that at her frail age, she couldn't handle it? I may never find out. Submitted From: Katharine, CA, USA