The Ghostly Chronicles: Chapter 11 Oh, Henry!
We would be staying at my brother-in-law's house in Ohio. Mike's mom was just too straight-laced and odd. We could stay up late and talk and play cards or do whatever we wanted to do this way. It was a little cool there during the day, and the nights were cold to me. We went to a big bonfire one night, and it felt great. I had only packed clothes for Mike and me for 3 days, and none of them were cool weather clothes. But Glen had tons of clothes to wear, and Chris had extra baby things available if I needed them.
We had a nice visit, and it was nice to be able to get some peaceful sleep. Something was going on constantly in their house, 4 kids, neighbors dropping by, family dropping by, it was a nice distraction. Monday morning, we stopped by the mom in-law's house to say goodbye to her and Mike's brother Tom and then we would be on our way back to Maryland.
When we got in the car and were ready to leave, dummy Mike thought he would show off to his brother by flooring the Camaro while it was in park. It wasn't like he did it real quick and stopped; he did it and held the accelerator down and then did it over and over again. The result was that he threw a rod in the motor, and now we weren't going anywhere. Secretly, I was relieved; I was in no hurry to get back home. The result of his stupidity was the engine on the car would have to be rebuilt, and it wouldn't be ready until Saturday. Mike called Camp David and had been granted a week's leave to get the car fixed.
That stupid incident would turn out to be one of the best thing's that happened to me. While we were in Ohio waiting on the car to be repaired, my family was going through hell at the house. Of course, I didn't know that at the time. While I was gone, every event was relayed to me verbally by listening to tape recordings and a critical letter and pictures. It was a pretty wild week.
Unbeknownst to me, my mom and her sister had been discussing the action at the house. Shirley had arranged to bring an outsider in to see what his reaction would be. I don't remember where or how she found this person or what his "claim to fame" was, but he obviously surprised everyone by his house actions.
The Friday evening that Mike and I left, my aunt and this man showed up to stay in the house overnight. I would think that being in a home that had 100% of their basement floors covered in flour would have been an oddity to an outsider. Add to that everyone was sleeping in the living room and not in bedrooms, easily identified by piles of covers and blankets, a basement door not just locked but chained with a dog chain; the guy was not phased. Normal life had ceased in the house.
Everyone was assigned a flashlight and candles and matches. Nobody was to be left alone at any time. Nobody was allowed to speak unless the guy asked them questions; he was in charge of "the hunt." The tape recorder was set up with new tapes and was to be monitored to make sure that it was working. They would wait quietly while the guy decided on what time he was going on his search.
After midnight, they all went into the basement, including the dog. As soon as the guy got down there, he started yelling like a revival preacher at the unknown. My aunt joined in; they were daring whatever was down there to show themselves; they were teasing and cajoling them. My mom said that the guy "acted like a first-class nut" the entire time he was in the house. I have to believe her; my uncle said the same thing. They spent 45 minutes to an hour down in the basement with this guy commanding the entities to come out and play. My uncle said, "it was the damnedest thing I've ever seen in my life!" He thought the guy and my aunt, his sister, were both nuts. ( That's funny if you really think about it.)
After prancing around the basement for a good while, the guy decided it was time to take the hunting party back upstairs. Now, the man in black was going from room to room upstairs, doing the same thing. His disciples of fear followed along behind him, obeying his commands; again, they were daring the unknown to show themselves.
He ordered all of the lights off upstairs, candles to be lit, and he lighted incense. Sounds more like a party, but it wasn't. Then he opened up a box and pulled out an Ouija board. I would have been out of there. Ouija boards have connotations throughout hundreds of years as being an instrument of spirits, allowing spirits into a domain to interact with the living. Whether I believed in them or not is not important, I have never heard of any proof that they are not a tool, but the real reason is that I just don't think that some things should be tampered with; it's just best to leave some things alone. There are some things that I just don't want to know.
The board was now sat up on the coffee table, and the eerie mood was established by using candlelight only. The man picked his partner for The Ouiji Board Games. It was my brother. Honestly, if he picked someone else, I might have thought that they were pushing the stylus around for kicks, but not him. He had been genuinely afraid of some of the things that had happened around the place, he didn't find any humor in it, and I believe he actually wanted to disprove that anything out of our realm was going on.
According to my family, as soon as my brother sat down, the board activity started. The man was asking all of the questions, and they were getting answers. The main "character" identified himself as Henry. They asked a multitude of questions; some were answered, some were not. Sometimes words were just spelled out randomly, such as "leave" "go away." One question asked was how many things were hanging around the house; the answer was "many." They asked questions about time periods, historical events, and questions to identify the house's history or land. The only question that was answered relating to those questions was "my farm." All of the verbal communications from the real man were recorded. Henry stopped answering questions; the last thing he said was "go." Ouiji party was now over.
Almost as soon as the board action stopped, activity in the house started. Instead of starting out slow and building up to more intense action, it started out loudly. The first notification was from the basement door. It was much more intense than it had been previously. They said it sounded like the door was being kicked. The dog was going nuts. The guy was yelling "Henry" over and over again, demanding that he appear. After a few minutes, the glittery stuff started forming on the stairway, a big, wide, long cloud of it. The dog was put on his leash. The man kept calling Henry over and over. Henry finally showed up. The cloud disappeared at the top of the stairs, and a black fuzzy, distorted looking form appeared. It looked like he was wearing a black hat like the Amish wear. It looked like a dark suit that he had on, he didn't have any legs, but he had feet, with something that looked like boots. Behind him were what appeared to be a woman in a long, old-fashioned, looking dress. No color, just shape, she was not black, she was grayish, fuzzy-looking, behind her there was a what they thought to be a child, about the height of a 4 or 5-year-old. It was wearing what looked like an old-style full-length dress and a hat, like a bonnet. None of them had legs, but they all had feet that moved constantly and made that shuffling noise. The female and child looking things went back into my room, and the sound of the shower door opening and closing started. Henry stayed in the living room, dining room area, shuffling his feet, and then went into the kitchen and vanished. The other two stayed in my room, and I was told it sounded like they were opening and closing dresser drawers and moving things. Everyone quietly went back to my doorway and watched them for a minute; they didn't seem to notice my family. They were standing at my dresser, shuffling their feet, looked up, and then vanished.
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