The Haunting Followed Them

Something was wrong with the house.

Angie Kelly of New Cumberland, Pa., and her family moved into the large Foursquare that sat over a large series of caves in the 1990s.

“There was a hole in the back yard that lead down to the caves,” Kelly said. “We kept a board over the opening so kids and dogs wouldn’t fall in.”

But the Kelly family had more to worry about than cave openings.

“Being in the basement doing laundry, I never felt like I was completely alone,” Kelly said. “It was a strange feeling, like someone was watching me.”

Whatever was watching Kelly may have been watching her toddler, too.

“My son, Ryan, was also exhibiting very strange behavior,” Kelly said.

Ryan began slamming himself against the safety rails on his bed and tried to throw himself through the house’s large front window.

“At one point (he) attempted to throw himself down the stairs,” she said. “This was a frightening thought.”

Then things started happening in Ryan’s room.

“A horrible odor filled my son’s room, and just his room,” Kelly said. “Before too long, his room was overrun with flies. They were all over the windows, ala ‘Amityville Horror.’”

Kelly couldn’t get rid of the smell or the flies.

“They seemed to have no desire to leave his room,” she said. “The odor seemed to emanate from his closet and I had to remove his clothes so they wouldn’t stink.”

Finally, Kelly turned to religion.

“We never did figure out what the smell and the flies were all about, but after hanging a cross in his room, the smell left and the flies disappeared,” Kelly said.

The Kellys finally moved away from whatever lurked in that house.

“The house also got hit by lightning while I was living there,” Kelly said. “It was a very weird year that I lived there, just one strange thing after another. It was kind of a relief to move out. The entire experience in that house was very bizarre.”

But whatever was in the house may have followed them.

“In the mid-1990s, I lived in a rented duplex,” she said. “It was probably built in the 1920s. On various occasions, I would see a dark man that came down my stairway, take a left turn and head for my kitchen.”

That’s all the dark man, a walking shadow, would do; walk down the stairs and take a left turn.

“That didn’t bother me much until one night I awoke to the screaming of my young son,” she said. Ryan was now about four or five years old.

She ran to his bedroom and asked what was wrong.

“He was sitting up in bed, hysterical, and said, ‘Please make them go away,’” she said.

“Who?” Kelly asked.

“All of these people,” Ryan screamed.

Kelly couldn’t see anyone in the room, but she believed her son did.

“All I know is that he was absolutely hysterical and the incident frightened me for a very long time,” she said. “Was his room a portal? Could be.”

They eventually moved from the house and it sat vacant.

“Recently this same house was put on the market for sale,” she said. “It sat for a long, long time, the price dropping and dropping. It finally sold, but after many months on the market. I am convinced the reason the house sat so long for sale is that people know it is haunted.”

Copyright 2009 by Jason Offutt

Got a scary story? Ever played with a Ouija board, heard voices, seen a ghost, UFO or a creature you couldn’t identify? Let Jason know about it: Jason Offutt, P.O. Box 501, Maryville, Mo., 64468, or jasonoffutt@hotmail.com. Your story might make an upcoming installment of “From the Shadows.”

Jason’s books on the paranormal, “Darkness Walks: The Shadow People Among Us,” and “Haunted Missouri: A Ghostly Guide to Missouri’s Most Spirited Spots,” at Jason’s blog, from-the-shadows.blogspot.com.