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CHAPTER 1
THE FUNERAL OF FLOWERS
Jennifer Donnelly
Security Officer
Denver, Colorado, 1996
My sister and I would often play on a trail behind our parents' apartment complex. My favorite time of the year to visit this area had been in spring, just after the chill of winter left and the ice melted, which gave us a creek we could splash around in. There were blooming trees to climb and lilac bushes by the dozen to stick our noses in and inhale the lovely aroma. It was while our noses were buried deeply into one and our hands filled with lilac sprigs to take home to Mom, that an elderly woman appear behind us. We were startled at first, but she had such a warm smile and wrinkly face, we soon realized we had nothing to fear and smiled back at her.
"Lilacs, just lovely, aren't they?" She asked us, bustling in between us to smell them herself. "They're my favorite flower; they just smell so good." She took in another lungful then pulled back to look at my sister and me, her face suddenly filled with sadness. "I can remember them at Lincoln's funeral. The smell of them, so strong, so sad, but they still remain my favorite."
"President Lincoln?" I asked and she nodded.
"It was a grand funeral. Do you remember it?" I shook my head and glanced at my sister, who returned my look with just as much bemusement. Lincoln had been buried in 1865, as we had learned in school. We were in the year 1996 — 131 years after Lincoln had been buried; of course we couldn't remember it. Not to mention, we were in the heart of Denver, hundreds of miles away from Lincoln's grave. I turned around, wishing to ask the lady more questions, but found she had vanished. There was no sign of her anywhere.
We never spoke about her again, the incident fading from my sister's memory (she had been seven years old at the time, and when I asked her if she remembered that lady a few years ago, she could not recall the meeting), but has since remained strong in my mind. It wasn't until a few weeks ago when I was reminded again of the lady. I saw a lilac bush while listening to an audiobook of Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter, and I wondered if lilacs were even at his funeral. I immediately did a Web search and found that his funeral was known as the "funeral of flowers"; soldiers threw lilacs on the street in front of his carriage, the blooms being crushed, releasing the scent and forever jading those in attendance's memories at the smell. The realization that I had met a lady who claimed to be there had me anxious, in near tears, and even now as I write the words down, has my skin prickling.
CHAPTER 2
THE BUTCHER KNIFE AND THE BATHTUB
Thomas Glenn Kelly
Wholesaler
Minneapolis, Minnesota, 1997
In 1997, my girlfriend and I were renting a huge, beautiful, old duplex in south Minneapolis. My girlfriend worked the night shift, 10:00 p.m. to 7:00 a.m. I would go to bed just after she left for work and she would wake me in the morning when she returned home.
One morning she woke me up and asked me why there was a butcher knife in the bathtub. I told her I had no idea, and we laughed it off. A few weeks later, she woke me up and asked why the bone-cutters were in the bathtub. Again we laughed it off, as the kitchen was adjacent to the bathroom and the butcher-block knife holder was on the counter just outside the bathroom.
A month or so later a similar thing happened; my girlfriend asked why the bone-cutters were in the bathroom sink. This odd occurrence continued throughout the three years we lived in the duplex. A total of probably 10 times, somehow in the night, kitchen cutlery ended up in the bathtub or the bathroom sink — once in the toilet. Toward the end of our time there, twice, the butcher knife was laying at the foot of our bed.
During our last weekend in the duplex, we threw a party and invited the downstairs tenants. They were a couple who had lived in the building for years and during the course of conversation and drinks, the subject of our landlord came up. We both went white when they informed us that in 1968, our landlord's mother had committed suicide in our unit. In the bathtub. With a butcher knife.
CHAPTER 3
I COULD HEAR IT BREATHING
Joseph R. Keever
Driver
Great Bend, Kansas, 1986
I lived upstairs in a three-room apartment, and my mom and dad were visiting from Illinois. They slept in my queen-size bed; I slept on a rollaway bed in my living room/bedroom, with my bed 3 feet away from the foot of theirs. One night, I was lying on my back when I heard someone walking up the stairs. I assumed it was my neighbor coming home, but then I heard my door opening. There was no way this could have happened as I always lock my door. I heard someone walking through the kitchen, but I could not move. I tried to sit up and tell dad or mom that someone was in the apartment, but I could not speak. I felt something touch my ankles. I really wanted to move or scream, but couldn't. I felt something moving up my legs then on to my chest, and I could hear it breathing and feel it breathe on my face. I was still unable to move. It growled in my face. Suddenly it was gone. I sat straight up, horrified at what just happened. To this very day I always sleep on my side, never on my back.
CHAPTER 4
DO BAD DREAMS DO THIS?
Tracy
Entrepreneur
Garden City, Michigan, 1972
One night many years ago, I went to sleep and a few hours later I was awakened by the sound of gnashing of teeth and growling of what I thought was a very angry dog. I could feel its claws scratching into my chest. I immediately started flailing at it to get it off of me, then jumped out of bed and ran to my parents' room. I knocked on their door. My mother opened it, and I told her what just happened. We went into my room, she looked around, including under my bed and proceeded to tell me it was just a bad dream. I pulled up my pajama top and showed my mom my chest. I asked her, "Do bad dreams do this?" My chest was covered with red claw marks!
CHAPTER 5
THE CRASH
Barbara J. McNey
Retired Engineering Administrator
Cupertino, California, 1972
One morning at 4:30 a.m., I dreamed that the guy I was dating was in a terrible plane crash. In the dream, he was killed. My mom and sister came to break the news to me, and I was crying. I awoke from the dream very anxious and depressed as he was actually on a business trip in New York. Later that day I called him, but before I could say anything he said, "I'm glad you called; I was just getting ready to call you." He proceeded to tell me he had flown to Pennsylvania that morning and had been in a plane crash. He had been sitting next to the wing and it had caught on fire. As the plane went down, he was holding onto his rosary beads and thinking about me. The pilot landed safely in a field, and no one was seriously injured. This accident happened at precisely 7:30 a.m. and there is a 3-hour time difference between California and the East Coast; this means I dreamed about my boyfriend and the crash just as he was experiencing it!
CHAPTER 6
THE PHANTOM PHOTOGRAPHER
Chase Wesley Jensen
Student
Moentrose, Colorado, 2011
I bought a Kodak digital camera from Wal-Mart and was unhappy with the clicking sound that I heard coming from it when I first went to use it. I decided to return the camera and chose a new one of the same brand from the same store. When I returned home, I inserted batteries and proceeded to turn it on. I couldn't believe what I saw, as there in front of my eyes was a photograph of myself from the neck down already in the camera! I knew it was me as I was wearing the same shirt as in the photo! There was no way a store employee could have taken this photo as the camera was never removed from the box until I got home. Additionally, I couldn't have taken the photo of myself by accident as the perspective was from a distance, and I couldn't have taken such a photo on my own. I hadn't adjusted any of the settings so there was no way I had inadvertently turned on the self-timer. I was so amazed that I told my mom, and she couldn't believe it either. It was definitely one of the creepiest things I've ever encountered.
CHAPTER 7
HOLLYWOOD HOBO
Corliss Sinclair
CNA in a Healthcare Center
Los Angeles, California, 1984
In 1984, I moved to Hollywood from Connecticut with my boyfriend Glen. We lived in North Hollywood, and being very close to Hollywood, we would often walk into town. One afternoon we were heading toward Vine Street and passed many recessed store fronts as we went. The construction of all these store fronts was similar: a tiled front floor with the door to enter, recessed way in, with display windows on each side. As we passed one business, I noticed a tall, dark-skinned man leaning inside the entryway. He was facing out and looking down the street toward us as we came walking up to Vine Street. I looked directly into his face and noticed his appearance. He was dressed in rumpled clothing, was unshaven with a slight beard, had long hair, and was very tall. Underneath all of that hobo clothing was a nice looking young man around 30 years old. He had a serious gaze as he returned my glance. We walked up a few more recessed doorways and there he was again — the same young hobo man! I found it rather startling, but I said nothing to Glen about it. We walked up and passed many more recessed businesses, and in yet another doorway, in the same position, there he was again! Each time our eyes met. It was the same man with the same serious gaze. By the third time, my own gaze became a stare.
That was it, I didn't see him again. I know he couldn't have run up past us as the sidewalks were very busy with pedestrian traffic and I would have seen him. Why did he show himself to me? Did he want to spook some young woman he didn't know? To this day, I do not understand how this could have happened, and I wonder if I had simply been looking at a ghost with nothing better to do on a Sunday afternoon.
CHAPTER 8
THE SEGMENT IN THE SKY
William B. Francis
Systems Engineer, Optical Recognition
Deerfield, Tennessee, 1998
I was out on the front lawn around twilight. I was looking just above the barely visible tree line and toward southeast. At that time, I saw a brilliant, green, rectangular bar appear in the sky. At first I thought it was a green laser, but the amount of power that would have been required to have it appear as it did was huge. I held my arm out and attempted to gauge size and perspective; the bar was about two-fingers-wide at arm's length, and it appeared very sharp on all sides. I felt a crackling sound in the air. The whole episode lasted approximately 30 seconds. If it wasn't a laser that created the segment in the sky, where could that shaft of green light have come from? It was one of the truly vivid unexplained experiences I've had in my life.
CHAPTER 9
IT WASN'T UFOS THAT SCARED HIM
Nita Anderson Hiltner
Retired Newspaper Reporter
Yucca Valley, California, Late 1970s
My sister and brother-in-law moved to Yucca Valley in the late 1970s. The area was known for UFO sightings and was a place people swore UFOs landed all the time, but it wasn't UFOs that scared my brother-in-law one night while he worked as a meter reader.
It was dark, and my brother-in-law, Chris, was driving down Old Woman Springs Road. Previously, late one night, my sister had seen an old woman walk through their living room into a wall, in a house on the same road. Chris was on his way home in the company truck when he saw a white mist forming ahead. He drove closer to the mist, and it enveloped the truck. Then it faded away except for his side of the truck. He looked to his left and through the window and saw the ghostly face of an old woman. He screamed and stepped on the gas and drove as fast as he could. The thing stayed with the truck no matter how fast he drove, so he stopped and jumped out of the truck. There was nothing around. He got home and told my sister to never tell anyone about his experience, as he was scared and people would think him crazy.
Fast forward a couple months. Chris and my sister had friends over to their house one day and the friends departed after dark. A half hour later, they got a phone call from them saying they had experienced the apparition themselves!
CHAPTER 10
HER LAST GIFT
Mary Hominuk
Crisis Worker
Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, 1999
In 1993, my older sister committed suicide. A few years before her death, she had given me a tiny birthstone ring for my birthday. I greatly cherished this ring and was heartbroken when I lost it during a move. It was one of the last gifts she had given me and I searched everywhere for it. I truly mourned the loss of that ring.
The years passed, and I moved once more into the home I live in now. In 1999, my husband, son, and I were walking to the car, which was parked in front of the house. Something glittery on the lawn caught my eye. I reached down and picked up a dirt caked ring ... the very birthstone ring I had lost years ago.
My sister gave me one more gift.
CHAPTER 11
ROAD RUSH
Gary Chunn
Pest Control
Pontotoc, Mississippi, 1987
Leighton, David, and myself were returning home one night. We were all 17 years old, and had just dropped twin sisters off at home in Pontotoc, Mississippi near the Pontotoc and Lee county line just outside of Tupelo. David and I were dating the twins and Leighton was always the third wheel on these double-plus-one dates. We drank a lot back then, but not this particular night, as we had been with the twins and their dad would have killed us!
We dropped the twins off by their 11:00 p.m. curfew that night, then headed back to my house. We took a back road that we traveled all the time that was just a couple of miles from where I lived. One of the guys asked me to stop on the road so that he could relieve himself, and the other agreed that he needed to do the same. The road was gravel-topped and was lined with trees and fences on both sides.
When I stopped the car, it appeared as if the car was suspended off the road just a tad. It seemed as if the road kept passing underneath us, and I could see the trees, grass, and fence posts passing by equivalently on each side of the car. It appeared as if I was still driving on the road at about 30 miles per hour, which is the normal driving speed on this road. I knew the car was really stopped because I had the brake all the way down to the floor and was no longer guiding the wheel.
When my friends asked me why I wasn't stopping, I knew they were seeing the same thing. I told them that I had stopped the car. To prove it, I turned on the car's interior light and showed them that I was standing on the brake and not holding the steering wheel. David, Leighton, and I were so frightened I lifted my foot from the break, and this time floored the gas. About a quarter mile down the road, we bravely stopped to see if the same thing would happen again. It did not. I turned the car around and went back to the original spot, and the same thing happened exactly as it had before! Frightened again, I took off very fast and went home.
The experience was much like being dizzy, but instead of things twisting around us, they rushed past and underneath us. Inside the car, everything seemed very normal, just as everything had been a normal weekend night for us up to that point.
I often wonder if we had stayed to see what might have happened next, if we might have been carried into another dimension.
Throughout the years, we all have gone back to the same spot several times just to see if this would happen again, and it never has.
CHAPTER 13
NO 25TH BIRTHDAY
Barbara J. McNey
Retired Engineering Administrator
Prescott, Arizona, 1972
In high school, I had a crush on a guy in my neighborhood named Gary. He told me that he "knew" somehow that he would die before his 25th birthday. I told him he was crazy. He went to Vietnam and came back safely. I said, "See! Your prediction didn't come true." He still insisted that he knew he would die before his 25th birthday.
Meanwhile, I moved out of state and we lost touch, but one day several years later, my mom called to tell me Gary had died in a construction accident. It was two weeks before his 25th birthday!
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "It Was A Dark And Creepy Night"
by .
Copyright © 2014 Joshua P. Warren.
Excerpted by permission of Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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