The Neighbour With The Grudge

I was born and brought up in Birmingham, England before moving to Yorkshire, England when I was 9 years old. Before I moved to Yorkshire, I lived in a semi detached house in a suburb to the west of Birmingham, it was very quiet, no heavy traffic... It was lovely. I lived with my parents and my older brother and sister.

When I was 19, me and my daughter who was 2 1/2 at the time moved back to Birmingham so that I could undergo a counselling degree. Obviously since moving up north, we no longer had our old house so I had to rent a 2 bed house in another suburb close by to my old home. It was a nice little house, big open living room, beautiful views from the upstairs windows, nice big bedrooms... It was perfect for me and my daughter.

So we moved into the house, my daughter was very happy and settled quite quickly. The first night we spent there, everything was absolutely fine. My daughter went to bed so I decided to stay downstairs and watch some DVDs while eating a take away. Time went by and seeing as I was at university the next day I went to bed. The next morning, I did the standard procedures of any mum, I gave my daughter breakfast, got her dressed etc then took her round to my aunties house who still lived in Birmingham and was a registered childminder.

Once I dropped my daughter off at my aunts house, I returned to my house where I turned the heating down to 20 degrees (it was the end of the year, getting cold but not cold enough to have the heating on full) gathered my books and left locking the door behind me. At 5pm, I left university, picked up my daughter and drove back to the house. When I pulled up, I went round the car to get my daughter out of the back seat, once she was out and locked the car and for some reason I looked up at the house and was drawn to my bedroom window where I could see my curtains moving.

It was strange because the house was fairly new with double glazed windows so it couldn't have been a draft and the curtains were heavy but I did have the bathroom window open that morning so I assumed it was just the breeze from that. Once inside the house, it was incredibly cold... 20 degrees on the thermostat is enough to kick the central heating in and keep a stable temperature in the house, again I assumed it was because I had left the bathroom window open. I left my daughter in the living room and went upstairs into the bathroom... The window was closed and locked. I went back downstairs and checked the thermostat, it had turned completely off. The only reason a thermostat would do that is if it was faulty, I had done it myself or the temperature of the house went above that of what I set it to... None of this happened.

After what felt like hours of trying to warm up, we had tea and I got my daughter bathed and into bed. She drifted off fairly quickly which was normal and I returned downstairs to get on with an essay. About an hour later, I heard my daughter screaming. I went upstairs assuming she had maybe fallen out of bed or just had a nightmare but when I got to her room, she was stood up at the end of her bed with her arms out to me, this wasn't because of a nightmare she was literally beside herself. Of course any parent would know that trying to get sense out of a 2 year old isn't easy, so I sat on the bed with her on my lap and asking what was wrong, through the tears she pointed to the corner of her bedroom.

I looked over and all that was there was a chest of drawers and a bin, I looked back at her and she was staring at this corner of the room. I asked her what are you looking at sweetie and she said "man". I was a bit puzzled by it but I just put it down to her having a really horrible nightmare. She was still inconsolable so I brought her downstairs and laid her on the setee with her quilt while I sat in the recliner next to it. I got my head back into a book and carried on with my essay while watching some random comedy on the tv, my daughter was sound asleep within minutes.

I had obviously drifted off because I remember being woken up by this almighty smell of whiskey. It was so pungent that it was like someone had poured bottles of it all over the living room carpet. I do drink alcohol but I never touch whiskey and I had none in the house whatsoever, in fact I had no spirits at all. It got to the point where it was starting to make me feel really sick but then just like that after a few minutes, the smell completely vanished. By this point I was getting a bit concerned because generally I am a sceptic and not easily spooked but something was definitely going on in that house.

I relaxed back into the recliner and went onto the internet, please don't ask me why I did what I did next because I really don't know for sure, I think my fascination got the better of me but I am a big fan of a British tv series called "Most Haunted" where a group of ghost hunters investigate supposedly haunted buildings and one of the methods they use to determine wether there is a ghost, is to draw around an object on a piece of paper and leave it there and you return later on to see if the object had moved outside of the outline. Now I know its crazy and again being a sceptic it still surprises me that I thought about doing this but I went into the kitchen and grabbed my purse. I placed 5 coins on a piece of paper and drew around them and left it all on the dining table. I scooped up my daughter and put her in my bed with me, I fell asleep instantly.

The next morning, my daughter didn't remember anything about the previous night but I remembered the smell of whiskey so I knew I wasn't dreaming the whole thing. But we got up, dressed etc and left the house but I had forgotten about the coins... Not expecting anything to have happened with them obviously. Oh how wrong I was.

We returned that afternoon about 3pm, we'd done a food shop so I was unloading all the food shopping while my daughter was in her buggie in the hallway. With my first load of shopping, I walked through the open living area and to get to the kitchen you have to walk through the dining room, I looked at the table with the piece of paper and the coins and I dropped my shopping when I saw it.

All 5 coins had moved out of the outlines, some more than others. Now I will point out, my daughter didn't know about this, she didn't see it and she didn't know it was there so she couldn't have possibly moved them. By this point my heart leapt into my throat and I felt really faint. I left the shopping and went to get my daughter and when I saw her, she had her eyes fixated on the top of the stairway, even when I called her name she didn't acknowledge me. I looked up the stairs and saw nothing, I turned my head and asked my daughter, "What are you looking at up there?" And she said "man".

Again my heart jumped into my throat, I looked up the stairs again and I heard this almighty crashing as if something had been dropped from the top of the stairs and was bouncing down each step to the bottom. I grabbed my daughter and got us into the car and drove over to my aunts house, I didn't even lock the house.

By the time I got to my aunts house I was a complete wreck, I thought I was loosing my mind or I was just so exhausted from work and studies that I had literally drained myself and started halucinating or something. But my aunt is a believer in the paranormal world and told me that if I suspect something is wrong in the house then I should find out. I couldn't believe what I was hearing but because I was so hyped up I just agreed.

As it happens, one of my mums friends is an exorcist and he lived on the other side of Birmingham, my aunt rang my mum in Yorkshire and asked for his number but didn't say why. After a few hours of calming down and drinking no end of black coffee, I finally came to my senses and realised I was being totally ridiculous and my daughter was just being silly like kids usually are but my aunt was adament that I go with Martin (the exorcist) to the house and find out what the hell was going on there. I agreed out of respect for her but I insisted that my daughter stay with her. With that, she insisted that we stay the night at her house and asked for my house key so she could lock up.

The next day, Martin arrived at my aunts house and he was just like I remembered him. To look at him, you would think he was some high end financial banker the way he was dressed but he was such a down to earth bloke, it was hard to believe that he exorcised houses and demons. Of course I was a non believer in all that but he was a family friend and that was what I saw him as so I had to give him the benefit of the doubt. He took me into the kitchen where he asked me what had been happening to me... I explained to him about my daughter saying "man" when there was no one there, the temperature drop, the smell of whiskey, the coins and the crashing noise on the stairs. He was very, very sympathetic towards me and said that in order to establish what was going on in the house I would have to accompany him to the house. A part of me was apprehensive as hell but then reality sunk in and I realised I had nothing to be scared of... It was a nice house in a nice area and I was probably just over tired from all the work I had been doing.

We got to the house, and before we even set foot in the door, Martin stood dead in his tracks and looked up at my bedroom window. I didn't say anything (remember I saw my curtains moving?). He looked away and we headed inside, closing the door behind us. Again the house was unnaturally cold, there was no reason for it to be unless all the windows had been left open over night which they weren't. I remember so vividly Martin carrying a bible and a small purple cloth, that purple cloth seemed to have no purpose it just looked like a hanky, God it still scares me thinking about it.

Anyway, Martin stood in the hallway looking around when he asked me where all the "phenomena" happened, I first showed him upstairs to my daughters room. He sat on the bed while I perched myself up against the wall near the window. I was staring at him while he just sat there looking around the room, he was so quiet and it got to the point where I said "Martin there's nothing here" and just as I finished that sentence he stood up and looked at the corner of the room where my daughter stared into. I can't forget the look on his face when he did that and I don't want to talk about it because it makes me feel so ill at ease.

He looked at me and clear as day he said "He's a bad soul". He said nothing else and summoned me to follow him downstairs. We entered the living room, I sat in the recliner again while Martin paced around the room touching the walls very gently with his fingertips, I didn't question it I just left him to it, by this point thinking "bloody hell here we go". He stopped dead at the dining table where he saw the coins on the piece of paper, he asked me if I had set this up and of course I replied yes... He retaliated by saying "This has angered him, he thinks youre making him look a fool and he doesn't appreciate it". I got really pissed off by this point and told Martin that I am a sceptic and I'm not in the mood for games I just want to know what the hell is going on. I felt kind of bad for getting edgy with him but I was so fed up of it.

He sat down on the sofa and put his bible and purple cloth on the foot rest infront of him and asked me very bluntly "Katy, I know you're a nonbeliever but what you have been experiencing is not your imagination or exhaustion", I sat there and rolled my eyes like you do. Then what he did next absolutely terrified me to the point where I could have had a heart attack I was that frightened. Martin asked for a pen and paper, I pulled out a notepad and pen that I always carried around with me in my handbag and handed it to him. He picked up the pen and started drawing while talking to me at the same time.

He began to draw a series of circles with what I can only describe as flowers in the middle of them... While drawing he said "this is what this soul is showing me, does it mean anything to you?" I sat down next to Martin and had a look at the picture once he had finished. I picked up the paper and stared at it for a few seconds then suddenly I realised it was a similar pattern that was on a ball I used to have when I was little. I used to go out in the garden and throw it against the garage wall, it was one of the few things I could remember of my childhood.

Anyway I told Martin that I did recognise the pattern but what about it? And he said "The soul in this house did not like this object." Just then as if lightning had struck me, I remember when we lived in Birmingham when I was younger, we had a neighbour called Jack Morris, he was a man in his 60s and lived alone. He wasn't friendly at all and always complained about something to do with one of the neighbours even if they did nothing wrong and another thing I remember about him was he sewed his curtains shut in the front and back windows.

Now this is what scares me and I had completely forgotten this had happened until I saw this picture. I was outside with my brother and sister playing with this ball when I accidentally kicked it over the dividing hedge between our house and Jack's. We went round to retrieve the ball and when we asked him if we could have it back he got right into mine and my brothers face and swore at us, some words that no child my age should have heard and I could smell scotch whiskey on his breath when he shouted as us... I never got my ball back.

By then I was shaking like a leaf and it felt like I was having a panic attack. Martin comforted me and said he would rid the house of his negative energy but to do this he wanted me to go outside. I left the house and stood by the car and had a cigarette in the hope that it would calm me down... I really was a complete wreck.

After Martin had finished, he left the house and tried to talk to me but I just couldn't speak. I think the shock of what had just happened and the flaskbacks rendered me speechless. Martin drove us back to my aunts house where my aunt was waiting with my daughter, I sat in the living room and remember staring at the floor and refusing to talk to anyone, totally unlike me. About an hour later, Martin and my aunt sat with me and I finally spoke and asked "what the hell just happened, am I going mad?" I laugh about it now because it sounds so crazy that I asked an exorcist that question but like I said, he is first and foremost a family friend.

Martin was very patient and explained to me that he had cleansed the house of Jack Morris but this wasn't enough for me. I wanted to know why he was there and what he wanted from me. Again Martin was incredibly patient with me and explained things to me.

Jack was a loner and although we didn't know this when we lived in our old house, he had a deep hatred of me and my brother and sister but particularly with me because his wife had left him a few years previously and they never had children as much as he did want them. He sunk into a deep depression and turned to alcohol... Whiskey to be precise. After we moved to Yorkshire, Jack was blind drunk and fell from the top of his stairs where he died instantly from a broken neck.

Although I was shocked by what I heard it still didn't answer my question of why he was there in that house that was a good 4 miles away from our old house so I asked Martin again why was he there. Martin told me that when I had returned to the old house when I went back to Birmingham (which I did because I just wanted to see it again), Jack was grounded in the house next door and he followed me to the new house where he re grounded himself into the fabric of the building. He basically held a grudge against me because of the ball incident and simply because at the time I was a child, a child that he never had. He hated our family so much for it but his hate was generated towards me because I was such a happy child and he wanted that so much for himself. And my daughter did indeed see him in the corner of her room that night, he was watching over her which makes me shudder at the thought of it even now and when she saw him at the top of my staircase which then followed by the crashing sound, it was him replaying his death to my daughter.

I didn't return to the house even though it had been cleansed, it was too much for me so my aunt and her partner cleared everything out for me and I decided to move back to Yorkshire and continue my studies there. I explained what had happened to my mum and she was just flabbergasted by the whole thing and like me, my mum is an avid sceptic but even this made her question things. I was a small child when I lived in that house, I remember very little of my childhood unless someone reminds me of it, but neither my parents nor my brother or sister told me of Jack Morris that lived next door and I had completely forgotten about him until Martin drew that picture for me.

The whole experience has left me questioning my belief in the paranormal world. Admittedly, what happened to me is enough to make anyone believe but I am still unsure. What happened at that house was real and I do not lie. If Mr. Morris did decide to haunt me and replay his death to my daughter then it proves that he was a bastard in life as well as death. It's something that will stay with me for life, I'm just glad my daughter was too young at the time to remember it.