This is a collection of events that took place between 2003 and 2006 in the house of one of my close friends, who happened to be my sister's boyfriend for a time. His name is Neil.
The house was a typical town style house, with small entrance porch from the front door, through a second wooden door (with a clear coloured window pane) into the front living room, then through big double doors into the dining room, and finally a door into the 'galleon' style kitchen. To look down on the house, it would be a long rectangle shape. There were 3 bedrooms on the first floor with a small bathroom, and then a converted attic on the second floor, with its own wooden stairs leading up. This was Neil's room.
I will say some of these things happened to Neil by himself, Neil and my sister or Neil's family, most of which I was not present for, but I do trust him, and I do trust my sister. I will try to make it clear where I was present. Also, we did no experiments, so there really could be plausible explanations for it all, so please feel free to offer your thoughts. I will try to break it into single events as there are a few.
Neil has a little sister, who used to have a bedroom on the first floor. At the time she was around 9 years old (we were around 18/19). When I first got to know Neil, it was as my sister's boyfriend, but we got on and started to socialise. I would go to his house with them, and I remember walking with Neil, my sister and another friend to Neil's room one time. We got to the top of the first set of stairs, and I could hear Neil's sister playing quite loudly, and having a discussion in her room. I just thought it is what girls do, until I heard my sister ask, "Is she playing with 'her' again?" I asked what she was talking about, and they explained Neil's sister had an imaginary friend who was a little girl. I must have had a look of 'and your point is...' on my face, but then my sister continued that they hear the little girl in the night. I asked them both to elaborate. They told me they would be sleeping and would wake up to hear running on the landing below, back and forth in the dead of night, then they would hear running up and down the wooden stairs to Neil's bedroom. Naturally Neil got up to investigate, but would find everyone sound asleep. He and my sister would say that once Neil had returned to bed after finding nothing, they would hear a little girl's quiet 'giggle' from the other side of Neil's bedroom door. Other members of his family claimed to hear the running, and also find nothing upon looking, although he didn't know if they heard any laughing.
One time I was talking to Neil's older brother about the house, and he told me that things would go missing and show up days later in a random place. He said it was not an odd thing here and there, but whole piles of washing would just vanish, then reappear days later, one time under his pillow. This I thought could just be a prank or miscommunications, but I asked the whole family about it, and although his parents seemed sceptical, they swore they were not the culprits.
They all claimed they would be in the bath or shower at different times and they would hear someone walk to the closed, locked door, and slowly try the handle. They would call out to make their presence known, but never got a reply, or heard anyone walk away. This doesn't sound odd, but once I was using these facilities and it happened. It is difficult to explain. You kind of know if someone just doesn't know you were in there, they would push the door, feel it's locked and usually say, "Oh, sorry" but this was a slow, deliberate handle turn, no force into opening the door. Granted, it could be a prank, but I just don't think so.
In this same bathroom, the toilet would just flush by itself. I saw this numerous times. The obvious is to think a mechanism fault, but the handle would be pushed and held down. We would stand there looking at it, taking the cistern lid off to find a cause. Then all of a sudden it could be released and could be used as normal. I do have my doubts about this one though, I must admit.
At the top of the stairs to Neil's room there was a small door, probably about 4 foot high, which opened to a little cupboard where they stored general stuff, an old coat, pairs of shoes, old toys, etc. One time, in the middle of the night, Neil claims a Buzz Lightyear toy started going off by itself over and over again. He turned the lights on and followed the sound. He pinpointed it to inside this cupboard, opened the door and found the toy under a load of other junk. Obviously something had perhaps fell and pressed it, it happens, and he put it on top of everything facing up. Days later my sister said the toy had gone off again. This time, it was laying on top, face up. It happened again. I heard it this time, just repeating, "To infinity and beyond" and "I'm Buzz Lightyear, I come in peace." We just stared at each other in disbelief. He hadn't thrown it away because, at the time, he thought it was an expensive toy, but he made sure Buzz did some fancy falling that day, right onto the main road.
Around 2005, Neil's parents moved to the coast (we lived in the centre of the country), and left the house for him to live in until he could sort himself a place of his own, and then they would sell it. His sister went with them, and his older brother had gotten married and moved out himself by this time. Neil lived there alone.
After this, my sister and Neil claimed everything got louder. The running up and down the landing, the running up and down Neil's stairs, and a knocking on his door all happened in the day now. My sister told me they both were watching a film in the front room at night one time when they heard one loud knock on the wooden inside porch door. They naturally looked up and both saw the face of a man staring at them through the little clear coloured window pane. Neil jumped up and as he flung open the door, he pushed his hand out as if to push someone back, only to find no one in the porch. The outside door was always locked, which he double checked. Also, when they were both watching the TV in this room, something would sometimes hit the closed double doors from the other side. They said it sounded like a bird does if it flies into a window. This happened quite rarely though.
Things started to be left almost as evidence. For example, dusty handprints started appearing on the wall as you walk up and down the stairs, just faint hand prints, like if you have slightly dirty hands, and then put them directly onto a wall. They were easily wiped away.
The main event which I witnessed myself was one Friday evening we were in Neil's room getting ready to go for a few beers in town. There were 5 of us. I was the last out of the room, and I turned the light off. I distinctly remember this to this day because I forgot to do it and had to run backup. Nothing out of the ordinary. When we got back, admittedly a little merry, we went upstairs to listen to some music (Neil's parent took their hi-fi with them and he listened to the radio to get to sleep, which was set on a timer) and have a few more beers. There were 4 of us this time, me, Neil and 2 friends. As we climbed the stairs, we could see the light was on from the gap under the door and as I entered the room behind Neil, I was greeted with a, "What the f@*k? Did you do this before we left?" As I looked at him with a blank look, and then looked into his room, the there in the middle of the floor were 9 cigarettes stood filter end down, in a perfect circle with a red throw away lighter in the middle. To this day none of us know what or how this happened. It is one of those moments when you just stand and stare, not believing your eyes. I know we were with Neil all night, and he is the only one with the keys to his locked house, other than his parents who were over 200 miles away. He even rang them and his brother to check their location.
A lot went on most of the time in his house, footsteps, things being moved, toilets flushing, handprints, but for some reason this is the thing that shocked him the most. Almost as if there was always a niggling 'well it could have been this' thought in the back of his head. But with this he knew, as well as us, that the house had been empty from the second we left to the second we got back (around 3-4 hours). We did take pictures of this, which unfortunately are long lost, and we also recreated it, which takes some time and some patience, but it is easily done.
Neil moved out of the house not long after this event, it truly did spook him. The house was sold and everyone moved on in time. We have never spoken to the new owners, although I do believe it was sold again not long after Neil left.
I always felt nothing downstairs in his house, not spooked nor watched or anything, but that always changed and got worse the higher in the house I went. I didn't like the first floor, and hated his room, especially if I was left there by myself at all. In my opinion, there was definitely a little girl there, playful and mischievous, but I did always get a negative vibe, although nothing really suggested that, it just felt that way.
I appreciate you taking your time to read this, and I apologise if your eyes are stinging a bit due to its length. Please give your views and thoughts, and I am happy to discuss anything.
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