Ghost Stories

Fifth Street House

The following storyreally happend, and it solidified my belief in ghosts. It's a biton the wordy side, but I'd like to give you a feel for the place.Please excuse any spelling and grammer errors - it's getting late.;-)

I was eighteen in 1986; it was also the year I moved in with myboyfriend, Gary. The house we lived in was a faded greenVictorian on 5th Street, in Downtown San Jose. It was suroundedby trees, which was nice in the heat of the day but at night thetrees, and a very weak porch light, lent it a sinister appearance.The house, itself, had a bit of character. There were deadboltlocks on every upstairs door but the bathroom, the floor of whichslanted downward, south to north. Railroad tracks ran behind theyard, and when a train came, the entire house shook.

We shared the second story with two other housemates, Veronicaand Tanya (plus a few felines). Veronica and Tanya were heavyinto the club scene, Gary worked nights, I worked days, sooftentimes I found myself alone in the evenings.

I don't remember when the noises started. I seem to recall itstill being winter because I was getting home from work at 7pmand it was dark already. So here I am, little more than a kid, bymyself with only my books, a kitty and the T.V. for company.Usually around 9pm the activity would start. Sounds of thingsbeing picked up, put down, cupboards opening and shuting and theoccasional water running. It sounded very much like people makingdinner. At first I thought it was the neighbors downstairs. Ihadn't seen anyone coming or going, but I checked with thelandlady anyway: No neighbors had come and gone because therewere no neighbors to come and go. EEK!

Same senario continued to occur, but now 'they' added themuffeled sounds of conversation to the mix. One morning I shouted'goodbye' to Tanya as I was going downstairs, heading off to work.She asked me the following morning if I came back upstairs foranything. "No," I replied, "Why do you ask?"She said after I went down and out the main door, she thought sheheard my footsteps coming back up, but when she poked her headout of her room, there was no one on the landing.

We called a house meeting. We agreed the person or persons whowere lurking about seemed relitively harmless, if a bit noisy.The decision was made to treat he/she/they as though they(?)'lived' with us. It worked out quite well. One night shortlythereafter, I was trying to get to sleep and 'they' were stillbanging around. I gathered my courage and stepped out into thekitchen and said "Hey! Some of us have to get up tomorrow,so could you _please_ tone it down!" Imagine my relief andsuprise when 'they' did. It took me a while to get to sleep.

I believe the house was inhabited by more than just the 'dinnerpeople'. We all had strange and scary dreams and Gary did a lotof sleepwalking. I caught him once on the landing, about to takethe stairs. As I steared him back to bed I asked him what he wasdoing, "I had to check the car" was his response. Onenight Gary woke me with the sound of his heavy breathing. When Iasked him what was wrong, he said he woke up in a cold sweat,overcome with a feeling of terror. Upon opening his eyes, he saidhe saw a figure, like a shadow, hovering over him and when Ispoke it shrank in size as it went back up into the ceiling. Garywas shaking all over while trying to logically analyze whathappend. No such luck. (Even now, a decade later when I writethis, I'm getting that creepy you-better-look-over-your-shoulderfeeling.)

The disturbances continued on into the summer and fall, thoughthe 'shadow guy' never did come back. We moved in October of '87- it took a month for the sleepwalking and the dreams to stop. Inour new appartment, all we had to contend with was a real, live,upstairs neighbor we nick-named Clodfoot Thunderheel for obviousreasons.

Thus endth the saga of the House on 5th Street.

G'Night All,
Zanna