Ghost Stories

Audrey


    My first paranormal experience was probably the scariest. But then again, I was only four.
    It was a normal spring day outside with my mom. She was pushing me on the tire swing we had on our tree in the backyard. Her hair was the same shade as mine, except longer and curlier. I was wearing my favorite t-shirt, and jeans. Thats what most of my wardrobe consisted of back then, no matter how many time my mom tried to get me in a dress. It was about 6:30pm.
    "I want to go inside. I'm cold." I told her.
    "Really. It's still pretty warm out. Are you sure?" She asked. Apparently, it was about 70 degrees still, but I insisted I was cold. Back then I didn't know why, bt now I know that it was that same creeping chill.
    "Uh-Huh, I want to go inside." I slipped out of the tire swing, and we walked toward our house. It was painted white on the otside, and was three stories high. The entire time walking, I couldn't shake the sense that someone was behind me. But no matter how many times I looked behind me, no one was there. I looked at my mom to see if she noticed anything, but she didn't appear to.
    "Hello Audrey," my dad said when we got in the house. The furniture was just like the outside, simple, yet elegant, and tasteful. The couches were a white leather, with chandeliers, the typical rich kid's house. He looked up from his newspaper, and bent down to kiss my forhead. He normally worked late, but he, for some reason I don't remember, was home early that day.
    "Hey daddy," I replied.
    "Audrey, sweetie, would you go get changed for dinner?" my mom asked me. Even in the house I could still feel like there was someone behind me. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't shake the feeling of someone breathing down my neck. I tried to get away, and ran up to my room, but that did nothing. When I closed the door, the shadow on it got bigger, looking like black ink bleeding slowly through a thin piece of paper as it made its way upward toward the ceiling. I took a few paces back until I could feel the walls through my t-shirt. The black tendrils of the shadow looked like snakes, creeping their way toward me, and down the wall my back was against. I could feel my little chest constricting on me as they inched farther and farther down the wall, and it was becoming harder and harder to breath. I shut my little eyes tight, and tright to tell myself it wasn't real. But then coldness hit me lie a sudden blizzard, and I let out a high-pitched wail.
It wasn't long before my parents came rushing into my room, denting my wall with the doorknob.
    "M-mommy," I stammered.
    "What, sweetie what is it?" my mom asked me, her voice full of panic and worry, kneeling over to comfort me. I looked in her sea green eyes.
I tried to tell her about what had happened, but I kept stammering over words, and all I could do was point at the door.
    "What about the door?" she asked in a soft voice.
    "Shadow," I finally managed to say.
    My mom looke at my dad, and they both chuckled. They spent the next ten minutes explaining to me that it was only a shadow, casted by the sunlight outside, and that it couldn't hurt me.
I've tried to tell them about this many times after that, but they didn't believe me. I don't blane me. I was only four years old, I wouldn't believe me either. I was just a little girl, not to mention an odd little girl, at least I was where I grew up. When every othr little girl wanted the newest barbie, I wanted the newest Hot Wheels track.
    Now that I'm older, I reckon they'd believe me now. But after thinking about it for a while, I voted on not telling them. They were very religious, and did almost everything by the book, and the last thing I wanted was to be strapped to a gurney, staring at a priest holding a cross to my forehead.
So telling them, out of the question.
    And I figured out who the shadow was. That night I woke up to my mom crying in the kitchen. The phone was on the table, and she was curled up in my dad's chest. My grandmother was in a car crash that day. She was driving to surprise me. Oh yeah, that's why dad was home early...
    Anyway upon hearing that, my mind was making the connections. I was only four, but I was amazingly advanced for my age.
I've never had anything as dramatic as that happen to me again. There were things that came close but, never as heavy as that day.
    It was 12 midnight, and I was finally done those stupid review questions for Romeo and Juliet (making sure my answers matched HER opinions). I looked around. I really should clean up in here eventually, I thought as I looked at the mountains on the floor. I couldn't even tell which were clean and which were dirty. Deciding it was too late, and I was too tired for this, I turned off my light, and went under my purple down comforter, and tried to prepare myself for third period english the next day.