Coronet Bay

Every year in January my family and I go away for 2 weeks to the same small beach town of Coronet Bay on the coast of Melbourne.

Every year we rent a beach house for the duration of our stay, a different house each time. Last year we had chosen a rather large, old-fashioned style house with the kitchen, dining area, lounge area and master bedroom all downstairs, leaving the upstairs as a rather wide open space with walls sitting at peculiar angles to create privacy. Since my younger brother and I were both allowed to bring a friend with us for the holiday, there was a minor argument over who slept where. Eventually we decided that my brother and his friend, Matt, would sleep in the area closest to the bathroom, while myself and my friend, Holly, would sleep next to the balcony, which suited us fine.

That evening, after we had settled in a bit, I went to the master bedroom to say goodnight to my mother, who was already in bed. As I sat talking to her I was faintly aware that I could see a reflection in the mirror on the wall. When I looked up, I thought I saw the reflection of an elderly woman; however she disappeared a second later. I mentioned something about it to my mum, and she said that she thought she had seen something similar in the lounge earlier.

The next few days were fairly peaceful. We would occasionally hear random knocking from the area that Holly and I slept in, and Holly swears she heard a cat purring, however that was all. It was the day that my aunt and uncle came to join us that things started to get a crazy.

As it was a beach holiday, we were all downstairs lathering up the sunscreen and getting ready to go to the beach. Holly and I had iPod speakers upstairs constantly playing music, so Holly raced up the stairs and turned them off. By the time she had reached the bottom of the staircase, the music had started again. Assuming that she had just hit the wrong button, Holly returned upstairs and turned it off again, this time making sure if was defiantly off. However when she began to descend the stairs again, the music resumed playing. Feeling a little panicky and annoyed, Holly pulled the plug out from the wall, determined to make it stop. When she was only a few feet away, the music began playing again! Freaking out completely, she grabbed the speakers and hid them in the cupboard. Thankfully, the music stopped.

Later on that afternoon, after my aunt and uncle had arrived, everyone decided to go for a walk along the beach. Holly and I, however, decided to stay at the house. We began to move some of the furniture around so it was easier to get out the door to the balcony, when something really quite creepy happened. At the this point, I should probably point out that what appeared to be the ceiling from downstairs was also the floor from upstairs; meaning that there was only one layer of floorboards. At the bottom of the staircase were two large wooden columns, which reached to the upstairs ceiling. Around these poles was a small gap in the floor boards, so we could see downstairs clearly. As Holly tried to pull a couch towards her, she managed to fall over. As I stood laughing at her, Holly was staring intently at the gap in the floorboards. After asking her what it was, she replied that someone was downstairs.

Freaking out a bit, we both slowly made our way down the stairs, however nobody was there. Holly pointed out where she had seen the person standing, but she couldn't make out if it was male or female or how old they were; it had moved way too fast. After calming ourselves down a bit, we sat at the table to play cards. A sudden thump from upstairs stopped us, and as I turned to look at the stairs I saw a face floating in midair. It was a round, rather fat face that could have belonged to a man or a woman, with a revolting smile smeared across its greedy face. It was only there for a second, but it is an image I will never forget. However later on, Holly confessed that she had not seen the face.

Later on in the evening, my mum came upstairs to ask Holly and I if we had seen the salt shaker. We both said that we hadn't, and upon asking why, mum explained that it had just vanished. Shrugging it off, we all went downstairs for dinner. After we had finished eating, we all sat around the table talking for quite a while. In the middle of this, Holly got up to get a glass of water. When she sat back down at the table, she asked if we could go upstairs. Seeing the distressed look on her face, we both excused ourselves to go to bed. When we were upstairs, Holly explained that she had gotten herself a drink, placed the glass on the side of the sink and tuned to walk back to the table. However when she turned around, she felt something furry move from under her foot and run away, followed by a faint hissing, as if she had stood on a cat's tail.

Not even 10 minutes later, I was in the small bathroom next to the stairs brushing my teeth. All of a sudden, the room became very cold. The door thudded lightly, as if a gust of wind had moved it; however I knew that all the windows were shut. My heart began to beat faster and I refused to look up at the mirror, as at that moment I could feel someone behind me. This was more than just sensing it; I knew that someone was standing there, breathing down my neck.

I flung open the door the raced over to tell Holly what had happened, and found her standing on the balcony. When I approached her, she quickly told me to be quiet, and to look over at the trees in the corner of the front yard. I did as I was told, and looked just in time to see a flutter of what looked like blue fabric disappeared around a tree. When I told Holly this, she said that seconds before that a young woman had been standing next to the tree, wearing a long blue dress.

Needless to say, we had a difficult time getting to sleep that night. We were incapable of talking about anything else, and both refused to admit to each other (or ourselves) that we were scared. Finally I began to fall asleep, when Holly quickly grabbed my arm and asked if I had heard that. When I asked her what she was talking about she told me to shut up and listen. We both sat in our bed and listened intently. I was about to tell her that I couldn't hear anything when suddenly the faint sound of a cat's purring greeted my ears. The purring became louder and louder, followed by the sound of claws scratching against the side of the couch (which we had pulled out into a bed). We both screamed and raced down the stairs, to find my aunt, uncle and parents still sitting at the table. When we told them what happened, mum followed us back upstairs to try and find the "ghost cat." However by the time we got back there, it was gone.

The next morning Holly and I woke up at the same time, and Holly rolled over just in time to see a Siamese cat jump from the arm of the second couch and disappear before it hit the floor. When we told my mother about this, she said that she had seen the same cat earlier in the back garden.

My aunt and uncle left later on, and from that moment onwards nothing overly strange seemed to happen. The salt shaker, which at this point had been missing for about 3 days, turned up under a cushion in the downstairs couch, which we had searched over and over. Nothing seemed to happen to either Holly or I again, except for the occasional random knocking in the bathroom. My mum later saw the cat another time, and on the day we left saw a man walk across the back garden and then disappear. To this day, my aunt and uncle claim that they saw and felt nothing, and honestly believe that Holly and I were making up stories.