David L. Golemon
The Supernaturals
For, Shaune, Brandon, Karie Anne, Tram, Kiera, Gary, and JoAnne — what can be scarier than real life?
Author’s Note
Over four years ago I ran a story on my blog at EventGroupFiles.com asking my readership to send me examples of a real haunted house that I could possibly use in a story. Needless to say, the response was overwhelming. I received so many letters that I decided not to print any of them, as it would have taken most of my time to do so. I thanked everyone, then placed the project on hold, trying to put my thoughts about ghosts into perspective.
However, there was one particular letter that that caught my attention and became a thorn in my side. It was from a family in upstate New York who wished to remain anonymous. They told me of the beauty of a house nestled quietly in the mountains. Confused as to the subject matter of this note and suspecting that the author of the letter had misread my blog, I read on nonetheless. They explained that this house, although beautiful, had something wrong with it. It was the summer home to a very wealthy and famous family with a sordid history of sorts. The family had not lived in the summer retreat since the fall of 1940. They described the house as a three-story gothic structure that sat alone in a valley of immense beauty, built in the years leading up to World War I, yet again they reiterated that there was something wrong with this gorgeous estate. Curious beyond belief, I pestered the writer until I received via “Snail Mail” the address of this estate in the mountains, on the lone condition that I not use their name or the actual house in my story, if indeed I did write one. I agreed.
A month later I went to see this house and the hundred-acre estate surrounding it. It turned into a very tiring five-hour drive from my home on Long Island. When I arrived, expecting nothing more than a rundown shanty of a house, I was amazed to see a three-storied, yellow and white painted gabled mansion that looked as if it could have been built the week before. After seeing a “for sale” sign on the main gate, I called the real estate broker and asked if I could see the interior. My request was granted and the agent met me later that afternoon.
Upon entering the house from underneath a large welcoming portico worthy of a fine hotel, I was amazed to see the pristine condition of this twenty-four room, one hundred and twelve year old house. Although the agent unlocked the front door for me, she informed me that she would wait for me on the porch. Thinking this odd, I entered the house on my own.
I spent a grand total of two minutes inside the most beautiful foyer I have ever seen, before I turned on my heel and left the summer mansion. I am not a believer in things that go bump in the night — I write about them, talk about them, and in the end I laugh about them. I am a man not afraid of most things, other than maniacs running around and blowing up, or crashing aircraft into buildings, or being afraid for your kids on their first day of school. But in those two minutes, standing in that foyer and looking up at the immense staircase that seemed to travel up to the sky, I realized through my feelings alone that there was indeed something wrong with the house. I got a chill as I looked around, at the way everything in the living room looked freshly dusted, and the way the Persian rug looked as if it had just been carpet swept, and the wood of the wall paneling looked just oiled.
Standing there I felt, and this may sound ridiculous, that the house was aware; aware I was intruding. That was coupled with that indescribable feeling of being watched by menacing eyes. With a final chill, I turned and left that house in the mountains and never returned. Now, I must remind you that I don’t believe in ghosts, or any other agent of the night that you cannot see, cannot study, and cannot feel with your hands. Even with this experience, if that is what you could call it, I am still an agnostic when it comes to ghosts and spirits. But I do believe one thing: that house in the mountains wants to be left alone. I am convinced of that.
So, here we are. I made several enquiries about this house, and yes, it was once and still is owned by a very famous and wealthy family. Although the summer home has not been lived in since the forties, its upkeep is maintained through a private contractor and the estate is kept immaculate. That brings us to this story. I have written this tale with the elements of the supernatural as just a figment of my rather tormented imagination, but there is one thing I must stress. I attempted to bring the feeling alive from my memory of walking into that house four years ago — to pass along the feeling of dread in such a supposedly inanimate object. As I said, most elements that make up this fictional story are from the author’s imagination, but the house almost described to a “T” in the story is real. I have been there, and I will never go back after my two minute stay. The reader, that is you, can travel to this small valley in the mountains if you’re good enough to find it, because I will keep my word to the people who guided me there and never reveal it. Then you can judge for yourself just what makes you want to run from that beautiful home and its property and never look back.
So, just this one warning: the account you are about to read is, as I said, fiction, made up, maybe overblown possibly, but there is one immutable fact that you can take to bed with you. The house depicted as Summer Place in this story—is real.
DLG
October 3, 2010
Epigraph
“Oh, very gloomy is the house of woe, where tears are falling while the bell is knelling, with all the dark solemnities that show that death is in the dwelling!”
Prologue
Jessica and Warren stood like sentinels — or at the very least, like guard dogs — next to the master’s third-floor chambers, only feet from the master bedroom suite and the sewing room. It had been three hours since the professor had ordered lights out and allowed the experiment to truly begin. Warren placed the digital recording device in the center of the Persian rug. It ran the length of the blind-cornered hallway, close to a hundred feet. The 25-year-old grad student slapped Jessica’s hand away again. She kept grabbing for him every time the old house creaked or settled in some far off place. At the rate they were going they would never place all the sensitive equipment in time. The young girl wasn’t exactly ghost hunting material, and he felt sure that Professor Kennedy would end up regretting having chosen Jessica for the team to investigate the old, rambling house.
“Look, you’re going to have to quit pulling on me every time you hear a noise or feel a draft,” Warren said. He straightened after making sure the digital recorder was working, and raised the beam of his small penlight from the recorder to shine it onto Jessica’s face. The girl was terrified. He knew asking a psychology major to join the experiment had been a mistake, but the professor wanted objective opinions; not just from the “extreme nature point of view,” but also from the human mind also — thus Jessica. “Listen.” He tried to speak calmly to the girl. “The house is a hundred years old. Boards have loosened up. Windows don’t meet their frames like they used to. The house will shake, rattle and roll. It’s not ghosts and it’s not supernatural at all…it’s just house noises.”
“We’ve been to a lot of places with Professor Kennedy on this study, but this house is not just a house. This has nothing to do with settings inducing hysteria. If there is one place in the world that’s haunted, it’s this house, these grounds. I can feel it. You can feel it. Everyone who has ever stepped foot into this house has felt it.”