Ghosts, flies and scratches

The smell roused five-year-old Caitlen Crotts’ mother from sleep. It was the smell of death.

Caitlen’s family had just moved to the house in Galax, Va., a house once occupied by cousins who dabbled in the occult. The Crotts immediately found their cousins had left something behind.

“On that first night, I was asleep on the pull-out couch,” Caitlen said. “My sister, having just been born, was in the bedroom with my mom and dad.”

It was then the stench wrenched her mother awake.

“She smelled something awful,” Caitlen said. “Awful and strong enough to wake her up from a deep sleep, and trust me, my mom sleeps deep. It smelled like decomposing bodies and burning.”

As Caitlen’s mother snapped awake, she moved her eyes toward the open bedroom doorway and saw a man.

“A tall man was standing there,” Caitlen said. “She woke up my father and he jumped from the bed and chased after the black shadow man.”

Caitlen’s father chased the tall, dark man into the kitchen. The intruder ran toward the back door.

“The black shadow man disappeared through the back door,” Caitlen said.

Her father threw open the door and ran outside, but the shadow man was gone.

The Crotts family soon discovered there were more spirits in the house than the shadow.

“A few months later, I remember getting up in the middle of the night and going into the kitchen,” Caitlen said. “I don’t remember why I went in or what woke me, but there was a man in the kitchen cooking. He looked normal to me and I was not afraid.”

The man asked Caitlen if she would like biscuits.

“I told him no,” she said. “I went back to bed in my baby sister’s room that night.”

That wouldn’t be the last night Caitlen slept in her sister’s room; it happened more frequently after she began to see the blonde man.

“It was summertime and I had just gotten my own bedroom in that house,” she said. “My bed was against the wall and I had a big vanity right on front of the bed at the foot. I remember waking up one morning and, still laying in my bed, looking into the mirror. There was a man there, in a purple turtleneck sweater, with long blonde hair.”

The blonde man didn’t move; he just stared at Caitlen through the mirror, his expression blank.

“I quickly pulled the covers over my head and huddled there. I didn’t scream,” she said. “A short time later, I looked in the mirror and the man was gone.”

He would be back – often, and Caitlen wasn’t the only one to see him.

“He frequently appeared in my mirror when I was in bed,” she said. “Once, my cousin stayed the night. She woke me up crying and said someone had just hit her.”

She claimed the attacker was a blonde woman in a purple shirt.

“I know it was the same man,” Caitlen said. “She thought it was a lady because the man had very long blonde hair, but he is a man. I remember that ghost the most because of how often he was in my mirror in the mornings. Even now, 14 years later, I’m afraid of mirrors.”

There was also something wrong with the bathroom. It attracted flies.

“That bathroom was filled with flies at least once a month,” Caitlen said. “It would randomly just fill with big, black flies. My mom would go in with a vacuum and, frustrated, clean out the flies. She did this so many times.”

No matter how her father tried to plug possible entry points in the bathroom, the flies returned. Caitlen thinks the flies may in some way be connected to an event that happened the next day.

“One night, a night that preceded a fly-filled bathroom morning, I woke up to a pain in my foot,” Caitlen said. “I screamed and called for my mom. When she turned on the lights, we saw that my sheets and blanket were covered in blood and my foot and ankle were netted with long scratches.”

She never stayed in her bedroom again.

“After that, I had to share a room with my sister beside my mom and dad’s room,” she said. “My room stayed vacant for the rest of the time we lived there.”

Caitlen’s family is certain the former tenants attracted the spirits.

“It was a fairly old house and before we lived there, my cousins had lived there,” she said. “They frequently partied and had a somewhat crime-filled lifestyle. My mom lays the blame here for the things that happened there; she says they were into black magic.”

Although Caitlen said her cousins weren’t educated in satanism, they dabbled in it, and used a Ouija board “almost nightly.”

“They decorated the house in skulls and things like that,” she said. “And they listened to music that scared me, even now it gives me a disturbing feeling.”

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 newest book on the paranormal, “Paranormal Missouri: Show Me Your Monsters,” is available at Jason’s blog, from-the-shadows.blogspot.com.

There's Something in Our House -- Part Two

Author’s note: This is the second of a two-part story about something wicked that has invaded the Liberty, Mo., home of Kim and Mike Smithmeyer, and their seven-year-old twin boys.

Three years after the Smithmeyers moved into their newly constructed home in Liberty, Mo., strange occurrences slowly appeared in their lives. After four years of unexplained bumps and slamming doors – things started targeting the children.

A child-sized body hit the bed one morning, rousing Kim Smithmeyer from sleep. She expected one of her twin boys, Dan or Randy, trying to sneak into bed with her. She prepared herself, then snapped up to surprise them, but no one was there.

This wasn’t the only childlike event that crept up on Kim. Small voices have called “Mommy” in the night, although when she checked on her children, they were asleep.

Then things began to talk to the twins.

“Randy has mentioned how come sometimes when Dad isn’t home he’ll hear (Dad) say, ‘hey, fellas,’” she said. “Randy has also said ‘I’m really tired of doors shutting and no one comes through them.’”

Kim is sure her experiences in the house haven’t influenced what her children have told her, because they don’t know what has happened to her.

“I have not talked with my kids about any of the stuff I’ve seen. They’re seven,” she said. “He’s hearing doors shutting. They came down one night and said, ‘can we sleep with you? We’re tired of hearing scratching sounds in our room.’”

Although she hasn’t heard the same slamming doors or scratching sounds the children have heard, Kim said the twin’s room feels different than any other room in the house. And they feel it, too.

One day Dan, who’s been diagnosed with ADHD and anxiety disorder and often acts out in anger, misbehaved and Kim sent him to his room.

“If he doesn’t do something right the first time he gets angry with himself,” she said. “I took a glass of water up there and said, ‘what can we do about your anger?’”

That’s when darkness wiped itself across Kim’s life.

“I’m just tired of the voices telling me to do bad things,” Dan said.

Calmly, Kim asked, “What do you mean?”

Dan looked at his hands.

“Well, I don’t want to say because they’re bad words and they might hurt your feelings,” he said.

“You can tell me anything,” Kim told him. “If it’s bad, you don’t need to deal with it anyway.”

Dan looked at his mother.

“The voices tell me to kill you,” he said.

Kim sat looking at her son, trying not to let Dan know how much these words disturbed her.

“They tell you to kill me?”

“Yes,” he said.

“Anything else?”

He looked back down.

“To hurt the cats and to do things to my brother,” Dan said.

Kim stood and said she was going to get Daddy. When Mike came to the room, they sat, Dan on Kim’s lap.

“I don’t want to say it,” Dan said abruptly.

“Did someone just say something?” Kim asked.

“Cut the bitch’s head off,” Dan said in a weak voice.

Kim looks back on that moment in horror.

“He said the voices said they killed Jesus,” Kim said. “We don’t watch scary movies. I can’t imagine him saying he wants to kill me.”

They took this normally polite, friendly boy to a psychiatrist the next day. Kim said they’re open to therapy, medication or a paranormal solution – anything to help their son.

Dan spent the next weekend with his grandmother. “He was perfect,” Kim said.

But when Dan came home, bedtime was not so perfect.

“When we brought him home from Mom’s, he was in a great mood, but when we took him to his room his whole demeanor changed,” Kim said. “He just said, ‘can I just sleep with you?’”

“You don’t want to sleep up here?” Kim asked.

“No, I don’t want to sleep up here.”

Kim could see the fear in the boy’s eyes.

“I said, OK.”

As Kim and Mike watched the boys walk down the stairs toward the master bedroom, muffled knocks thudded in the room.

“I heard three knocks from the closet,” Kim said. “I said to my husband, ‘I know you heard that. That was three knocks, Mike. That was from the closet.’”

Mike, who had held the door the entire time, looked at Kim, his face ashen, and shook his head.

“Kim,” he said. “I felt it in the door.”

At this point they decided to do something about whatever lurked in their home.

“I feel like a fool. I talk to the house,” Kim said. “I say, ‘I know something’s here. Please just don’t scare my family leave my children alone.’”

Although Kim and Mike are interested in the paranormal and watch various ghost hunting TV programs, they don’t talk about it with the boys.

“I am intrigued, but I’ve never done Ouija boards or anything,” Kim said. “I just think everything is possible. I think we’re going to keep the boys in our room for a while.”

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 newest book on the paranormal, “Paranormal Missouri: Show Me Your Monsters,” is available at Jason’s blog, from-the-shadows.blogspot.com.