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This is an account of my "biggest" paranormal experience to date. Please read to the very end of the post, as it is a story of two halves, both of which are important.
About 20 years ago I was a student living away from home in a huge, old house. The house was owned by a lovely retired couple who rented out the unused rooms to students. I lived with two other students for three months over the summer period. The house had six bedrooms and was over three floors, with two "half landings", each with stained glass windows. My bedroom was in the roof - a huge, converted attic, opposite a games room.
I honestly had so much fun in that house over the three months I was there. It was such a warm and friendly place, beautifully decorated by the couple who owned it and always filled with gorgeous cooking smells and sounds of raucous laughter. It was one of the most care-free times of my life. Not for a moment did anyone suggest it could be haunted and the thought never crossed my mind.
Out of the blue, one summer's night, I needed the bathroom about half an hour after I'd got into bed. This often happens to me (I know - too much information!) so I got out of bed, went out onto the landing, took a step towards the staircase...and stopped dead in my tracks.
In the corner of the "half landing", lit only by the dim orange glow of an outdoor street light falling through the stained glass of the window, was a black figure. I was terrified and stood rooted to the spot, staring at it.
It was fairly tall, slender and definitely a male and seemed to be dressed in some kind of hooded cloak, almost like a monk, although I could only make out an outline. It had no discernible features - it was just black. The more I stared at it, the more it looked as if it was staring back at me, from tiny, pinpricks of white light where its eyes should have been.
After what must have been maybe ten seconds, I hurried back into my bedroom, switched on the light and hid under the duvet, hardly daring to breathe. Eventually, I must have fallen asleep.
In the morning, it was a beautiful day and the sun came streaming into my room. I almost immediately forgot about the thing I'd seen the night before, dismissing it as a trick of the light, or maybe even the silhouette of a coat stand or some other thing that one of the owners might have placed there without me noticing it.
I never mentioned my encounter to a soul and, three months later, I left the house (I graduated) and moved back home with my parents. I lost touch with the girls I had been living with and the whole incident was, to my mind, forgotten.
Five years went by without any contact with either of them. Eventually, I moved to London.
Coincidentally, one of the girls from the big house had also moved to London and we re-established contact, becoming firm friends again. She had a flat and I started to go there most weekends for dinner or for drinks on her roof terrace. We would stay up into the small hours talking about anything and everything.
One night she started telling me about her Aunt who lived in an extremely old property (dating back to 1000 A.D.). She described how there was a particular room she refused to stay in as she had woken up one night to find a dark entity standing at the foot of her bed.
Now, prior to her saying that, I had no idea she believed in ghosts, so I had never told her about what I'd seen when we lived in the big house together. I mean, I didn't tell anyone, for fear that I would be ridiculed, and besides...it had been a trick of the light or a coat stand, hadn't it?
So, emboldened by the story she had just told me, I started to tell her about that night when we had been students together in the big house. When I got to the point in the story where I'd stepped out onto the landing and was heading for the stairs, I told her I'd stopped in my tracks because I'd seen something in the corner on the half landing -- but she interrupted me before I could tell her what it was. She said:
"Was it the figure of a tall man dressed in black?"
My blood ran cold and I felt instantly sick. She had just described to me something I had seen five years earlier, in the house where we lived together, even though I had never told anyone, even her. She went on to say:
"I used to see it in my bedroom, standing by the sink. Jessica saw it too"
So...my question is this: What was it?
I always thought it was just a ghost, but having tried to find out about ghosts in that area and coming up with nothing, I had stumbled upon internet chat about shadow figures... It seemed to fit with what I'd seen, especially as it was clearly aware of my existence and it had those weird eyes...
It has never appeared to me again and I don't (and have never) suffered from sleep paralysis or anything similar. I do not routinely see entities but I had a cluster of experiences whilst I was a student (no drugs/drink involved ).
I would love any and all ideas and opinions on this one please, as this is my biggest paranormal experience ever and it took five years to fully unfold! I'd really like some help to try to make some kind of sense of it, please.
Thanks everyone and stay safe!
About 20 years ago I was a student living away from home in a huge, old house. The house was owned by a lovely retired couple who rented out the unused rooms to students. I lived with two other students for three months over the summer period. The house had six bedrooms and was over three floors, with two "half landings", each with stained glass windows. My bedroom was in the roof - a huge, converted attic, opposite a games room.
I honestly had so much fun in that house over the three months I was there. It was such a warm and friendly place, beautifully decorated by the couple who owned it and always filled with gorgeous cooking smells and sounds of raucous laughter. It was one of the most care-free times of my life. Not for a moment did anyone suggest it could be haunted and the thought never crossed my mind.
Out of the blue, one summer's night, I needed the bathroom about half an hour after I'd got into bed. This often happens to me (I know - too much information!) so I got out of bed, went out onto the landing, took a step towards the staircase...and stopped dead in my tracks.
In the corner of the "half landing", lit only by the dim orange glow of an outdoor street light falling through the stained glass of the window, was a black figure. I was terrified and stood rooted to the spot, staring at it.
It was fairly tall, slender and definitely a male and seemed to be dressed in some kind of hooded cloak, almost like a monk, although I could only make out an outline. It had no discernible features - it was just black. The more I stared at it, the more it looked as if it was staring back at me, from tiny, pinpricks of white light where its eyes should have been.
After what must have been maybe ten seconds, I hurried back into my bedroom, switched on the light and hid under the duvet, hardly daring to breathe. Eventually, I must have fallen asleep.
In the morning, it was a beautiful day and the sun came streaming into my room. I almost immediately forgot about the thing I'd seen the night before, dismissing it as a trick of the light, or maybe even the silhouette of a coat stand or some other thing that one of the owners might have placed there without me noticing it.
I never mentioned my encounter to a soul and, three months later, I left the house (I graduated) and moved back home with my parents. I lost touch with the girls I had been living with and the whole incident was, to my mind, forgotten.
Five years went by without any contact with either of them. Eventually, I moved to London.
Coincidentally, one of the girls from the big house had also moved to London and we re-established contact, becoming firm friends again. She had a flat and I started to go there most weekends for dinner or for drinks on her roof terrace. We would stay up into the small hours talking about anything and everything.
One night she started telling me about her Aunt who lived in an extremely old property (dating back to 1000 A.D.). She described how there was a particular room she refused to stay in as she had woken up one night to find a dark entity standing at the foot of her bed.
Now, prior to her saying that, I had no idea she believed in ghosts, so I had never told her about what I'd seen when we lived in the big house together. I mean, I didn't tell anyone, for fear that I would be ridiculed, and besides...it had been a trick of the light or a coat stand, hadn't it?
So, emboldened by the story she had just told me, I started to tell her about that night when we had been students together in the big house. When I got to the point in the story where I'd stepped out onto the landing and was heading for the stairs, I told her I'd stopped in my tracks because I'd seen something in the corner on the half landing -- but she interrupted me before I could tell her what it was. She said:
"Was it the figure of a tall man dressed in black?"
My blood ran cold and I felt instantly sick. She had just described to me something I had seen five years earlier, in the house where we lived together, even though I had never told anyone, even her. She went on to say:
"I used to see it in my bedroom, standing by the sink. Jessica saw it too"
So...my question is this: What was it?
I always thought it was just a ghost, but having tried to find out about ghosts in that area and coming up with nothing, I had stumbled upon internet chat about shadow figures... It seemed to fit with what I'd seen, especially as it was clearly aware of my existence and it had those weird eyes...
It has never appeared to me again and I don't (and have never) suffered from sleep paralysis or anything similar. I do not routinely see entities but I had a cluster of experiences whilst I was a student (no drugs/drink involved ).
I would love any and all ideas and opinions on this one please, as this is my biggest paranormal experience ever and it took five years to fully unfold! I'd really like some help to try to make some kind of sense of it, please.
Thanks everyone and stay safe!