Occupied

My boyfriend and I were looking for an apartment because the one we were in was too close to the highway and therefore very loud. We decided to check out an open house in a neighborhood we wanted to live in.

The apartment was everything we wanted. While my boyfriend talked to the landlord, I walked around alone, mentally decorating as I usually do. I went to the bedroom and was pleased that the closet took up one entire wall. I stood in the middle of the room with an open window to my left that let in a lot of light. Curious as to how much closet space there was, I went to open the doors and the instant I put my hands on the door knobs, an image flashed in my head.

Have you ever been so engrossed in a day dream that you are staring off into space, not really looking at what is in front of you? Well that's what it was like in that heartbeat I touched the door. The difference is that I didn't ask for that image. What I saw was either a man from the waist up so drenched in blood that no features were recognizable or it was a man that had been completely skinned and I was seeing muscle.

I gasped and let go of the closet door. My first thought is that I have been watching too many crime shows (anything to rationalize, right?) I didn't know what to do so I went to the next set of closet doors. There was nothing inside, but I said "hello" to the empty room. I then walked back to the living room. My boyfriend was still talking to the elderly landlord, but I didn't listen to a word. I looked back down the hallway to the bedroom and even though I couldn't physically see someone there, my mind's eye saw a man standing in the hallway. He wasn't angry or happy. All I sensed was that he was curious. I felt he was curious about this person that knew he was there. I wasn't curious about him and I no longer felt comfortable there.

My boyfriend, however, was thrilled with the place. He was very excited about it so I didn't tell him right away what happened. I just told him that I was uncomfortable being there. That night, I had a dream that I was standing in the room. Everything was completely silent and black and white. It was sunny just like it had been earlier. In the morning, I told my boyfriend what had happened, but that if he really wanted the apartment, we could take it. Part of me wanted to still believe I was just being silly.

I was with my boyfriend when he called the landlord. The conversation seemed casual, but at one point my boyfriend looked at me sharply. He hung up the phone and told me that the landlord has said that since we were taking the apartment, he was legally obligated to tell us that someone had died in the apartment. It turns out that a man had a heart attack in the apartment.

I tried to be accepting and understanding, but I didn't think that I could handle living there with ghost. Even though my boyfriend doesn't believe in ghosts, he didn't want to live with me living with a ghost. So I asked that he call the landlord back and tell him that we wouldn't be taking that apartment after all.