A Job Right Out of A Horror Movie
Tanya, South Australia
February 2006
I have had many past experiences of ghost’s and firmly believe in them. My husband however was not a believer until we worked as cleaners in a school.
We were first employed to work in a group of transportable buildings which housed about 13 class rooms, we worked there for about 3 weeks with nothing happening, then we were asked if we would like to clean the bottom story of the main school building (after we finished with the transportable’s and when all other cleaners and school staff had left for the night), this is when the story begins.
Firstly the lay out of the building, to the left of the main entrance was the staff room, staff toilets and Headmasters office, to the right was a corridor where there were four classrooms on the right, student toilets and the deputy Head Masters office on the left, at the end was an activity room. There were two sets of stairs one in the main entrance and one at the other end next to the Deputy Headmasters office. The corridor was lined with lockers and storage closets.
The first night was 31 October (Halloween) we had to start cleaning the building at 6pm and had a night of no occurrences, the next night things started happening, first it started of slowly, a sound of a mop bucket moving when it hadn’t - I was at one end of the building, my husband who was more than three rooms down the corridor heard a woman calling "yoo-whoo" from the direction of the corridor, remember we are alone.
The next night we noticed that the cleaner who cleaned the top floor had not signed out and being an elderly gentleman we considered we better check, he was not there but after that we keep hearing voices coming from the top floor. The doors of the storage cupboards that were next to the second set of stairs sounded as if they were being banged on, the doors actually rattled and moved, I was in the nearest class room and witnessed this, then a horrible smell arrived in the room and from then on continued every time we entered, this was confirmed to me by the teacher of the classroom the next day.
This behavior continued for a few weeks including the reopening of windows that had been locked and always as we were ready to go home.
We used to have to cross to the other side of the school to clean the gym, bathroom and toilets. I always had a feeling of being watched as we walked away and came back.
A few weeks after this a cone (that is used for sporting events) was rolled out in front of my husband from a classroom.
We always used to argue about who was going to clean the activity room as we were both extremely uncomfortable in this room and would rush to get out, the worst thing was the size of the room and the lack of cord on the vacuum, meaning we had to stop and replug the vacuum in all the time, the windows in this room were notorious for reopening, then we would have to walk the entire length of the corridor and open this room to relock the windows.
By now we were getting spooked so I rang my Mum and talked to hear about it, she said, "Talk to them". Well that was a big mistake, from then on things got worse.
In the ladies staff toilets there was a bed for sick members of staff to rest on, upon entering at night I saw the bed rise as if someone who was sitting on it had stood up. This happened quite a lot and I would say "Hello I saw you so I’m not scared of you", but I was.
Voices and rattling continued worse than ever before and were followed by the sound of little feet running up the corridor.
Then one day while we were cleaning down stairs we heard loud, arguing voices coming from up stairs, we took no notice as we had seen that the headmaster’s car was still there, but after about half an hour in walked the headmaster and school office staff from outside. We were alone.
There was the incident of finding a pile of dirt on the floor after I had just moped it (on Friday night) only to find it gone when we came in on Saturday to do the polishing.
Then the scariest thing that ever happened if my life occurred, coming back from the gym one night I went into the female staff toilets, were my bag was to get a tissue, while blowing my nose I though I heard someone call my name but didn’t hear it clearly then after I was finished I heard it again loud, long and clear Taannyya. Well I froze and screamed for my husband who was only out in the corridor and about 5 meters away (and he couldn’t hear me) then I found my feet and ran to him telling him off for not coming.
Well that night I couldn’t leave fast enough and for the rest of the time we worked there I was never alone. We worked altogether for just over 3 months but they were the scariest 3 months of my life.
We now feel as if someone followed us home, or was disturbed during renovations, as ever since things have started to happen around the house. Noises, like a car arriving and someone getting out, footsteps and other strange sounds. Voices, one time I heard someone say to me "no don’t go stay here" as I was going out the door. Things going missing only to turn up where we had looked (and normally after having bought a replacement).
Then there is our dog, a big German Shepherd who gets scared every now and then and tries to hide under our bed, when he is like this he won’t leave our side while we are in other rooms or settle down. The budgie is affected too; strangely the cats show no signs of being scared.
We are now used to our ghost and call him Peter.