1995, I had just turned 17 years old and was
bubbling over with excitement at having moved into my first
apartment. The heat was almost overwhelming trekking up
four flights of stairs, but as soon as I stepped into the
apartment for the first time, goose pimples shuddered up
and down my spine from the freezing plummet in temperature.
Anxious to have everything perfect my first time on my own,
I dismissed it, making a mental note to have the air vents
checked. In retrospect, I should have gone with my instincts
that something was quite fishy about receiving the largest
apartment for half the price. They told me it was because
the one I had viewed was not ready yet and they were giving
it to us as a consolation for my troubles.
Griping and grumping all the way through the day,
my new husband Jimmy contemplated throwing everything else
out and starting over, but we made it through the grueling
process of unpacking, with nice buns to show for it I might
add, and settled in to pass out for the night.
I remember coming out of a hard sleep in slow
motion, hearing a loud clicking noise through a tunnel like
state. Eventually my blurred vision snapped to focus and I
glanced at the alarm clock, three a.m. What in the world
was clicking?
I stumbled out of bed stubbing my pinky toe on the
corner of some unpacked boxes. I let out a small whimper of
anguish and hobbled into the living room careful not to
wake the sleeping bear (my husband). I plopped on the couch
to wait for the throbbing to subside when the
loud “click”, “click” caught my attention again. I realized
it was coming from the kitchen.
The pain in my foot forgotten, I made my way around
the breakfast bar and onto the cold linoleum kitchen floor.
I swear at that moment, in between the refrigerator and the
stove, I could feel my breath coming out in a fog. I became
extremely annoyed at that point because I noticed the red
light of the oven was on. The clicking was the temperature
heating up and going off. What I had failed to notice at
that point was, if the oven had been on all night then why
was it so cold? I turned the oven off and ran back into bed
shivering under the covers.
That was the first night. That morning, getting ready for
school, as I was still in High School and graduation was
not until the next month, my husband yelled at me from the
kitchen something to the tune of, “What in the world are
you going to cook in the oven for breakfast, you don’t have
that much time?”
Irritated first thing in the morning, we irritated
each other a lot, and not having any idea what he was
rambling about I started to go off on him when I realized
the oven was back on again.
At first I thought I must not
have turned it completely off the night before, but later,
after a month of turning off the oven I finally confronted
my husband. We were both baffled because we had each
thought the other was forgetting the oven. I finally made
my way to the front office and complained about the
defective appliance and the ridiculously cold air unit.
They promised me they would fix the problem and
sent maintenance in the next week to install a new oven
appliance and check the air conditioner. Everything was
fine for about a week, then that is when the stove lights
started coming on sometimes two at a time and sometimes all
four, it didn’t happen all of the time but regular enough
to be a nuisance. I guess we just sort of got used to it by
the second month and it became part of our routine to turn
it off or just put it to use when it was on. As for the air
conditioner, we got tired of putting in maintenance
requests so we just decided to deal with it.
It wasn’t until my husband went out to the field
(he was in the Army) for two weeks and I was left alone at
night that the weird things started to happen. I remember
coming home after a late night at work and starting a hot
shower. I left the bathroom long enough to undress and
towel myself before returning to a steamed bathroom and
stepping into the shower. My body lurched at the immediate
feel of ice running down my skin. Immediately I jumped back
out and made a futile attempt to adjust the temperature of
the water. As I leaned over the edge of the tub turning the
clear glass handle back and forth from “C” to “H”, I felt
as though a presence was standing behind me and turned my
head quickly to face the mirror. At that point I had
flashbacks of every horror movie I had ever seen and
decided to stop creeping myself and go downstairs to hang
out with friends. I stood up still facing the mirror and
saw distinct, translucent, fingerprints on the steamed
reflection. I don’t think I ever ran so fast with my voice
in my throat and the dread of someone chasing me.
My friends thought I was a riot when my horror
story was relayed. They said there was just something wrong
with the pipes and my mind was playing tricks on me. What
they could not explain was the red splotches I had on my
chest and down the left side of my arm. They kept asking me
why I thought the water was cold.
I was actually grateful when my husband returned the next
day, but the very night he returned and we climbed in our
bed, the temperature in the bedroom became a brutal ripping
of our skin that it was impossible to get warm.
Jimmy actually pulled our floor heater out of the
storage because we just could not get comfortable. I know
you are thinking, hey the night gets cold right? Well, no,
this is the beginning of the summer, in Texas. Let me tell
you, it is hot. We actually opened up the windows to let
the cold air out that night. We finally dozed off to the
whir of the red heating coils.
Around three in the morning my eyes flew open. I
felt a warm breath against my cheek and turned to make out
a shadow by the head of my bed. Just as soon as I had seen
it, it was gone. I noticed that the heater had gone off,
but I didn’t care, there was no way I was getting out of
bed to fix it. I tried desperately to go back to sleep and
even cuddled up closer to Jimmy for warmth and the feel of
security, but as I lay there in the dark I knew my mind was
starting to wander and soon I would be cowering with
freight. Outside our bedroom window I heard it, just then,
a whisper. Deep, throaty but very distinct, it said my
name. We were up four floors. It was whispered right by my
head. Our headboard was up against the window and a person
could have been standing right there. That was not
possible; there was no balcony and no one above us. I
bolted upright in bed and turned to wake my husband, I
didn’t have to. He had already sat up and was looking
through the blinds of the opened window trying to figure
out where the voice had come from.
He heard the same thing as me, my name; he said it
woke him up. We both sat there for a long time straining to
see out of the window before we heard the clicking noise
from the kitchen again and when we snapped our heads in
unison towards the kitchen that was when the whisper was
behind us again.
Well that was enough for us; we went downstairs
that night and stayed with our friends claiming that it was
too darn cold. We didn’t want to tell the story because we
weren’t sure if it was a prank or something else and I’m
thinking the something else was too much for us to accept
the reality of. The very next day we went to the front
office and had them give us the apartment we originally
asked for. We had movers come and transfer all of our items
to another, smaller apartment on the other side of the
complex.
Jimmy and I are no longer together; we divorced
within the first year of our marriage. I am re-married now
with two children and to this day I cannot sleep with the
windows open and will not take a shower when I am alone in
the house.
Contact me here: acherry77@netscape.net
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