I’ve been under the weather all week. My hope is that it’s just the remnants of the nasty flu bug that tore through our house with a vengeance over Christmas break, and that I’m not getting sick again. What does this have to do with our haunted house? Well, nothing really, aside from the fact that I tend to feel worse when I’m at home, but that might just be because it’s the end of the day and I’m exhausted. It simply serves as an explanation as to why I was having a terrible night last night, which is where the story I’m about to tell you begins.
When I laid down to go to sleep last night, my head was pounding. Not hurting, but literally pounding. Pulsating. Throbbing. It kind of freaked me out. I thought I was going to have a stroke or a brain aneurysm or something. Needless to say, I couldn’t sleep. I would drift off for a few minutes, but then the pulsating would rip me right out of dreamland and drop me back into my cold, uncomfortable bed in my cold, dark room. Probably around 12:30 or so, I turned off the TV and committed myself to falling asleep. I closed my eyes and tried to calm myself with my breathing, attempting to ignore the super bass dance party going on inside my brain. It was working! I could feel the weight of sleep bearing down on me.
And then, right before I fell asleep, I heard it. “Karen.” A woman’s voice, in my ear, clear as day. A voice, I might add, that sounded very much like the female voice caught on many of the EVPs during our paranormal investigation. She said, “Karen.” I bolted upright in bed, the pounding in my heart now matching the pounding in my head. I grabbed my phone off the nightstand and turned on my flashlight app, quickly scanning the room. Nothing. Not that I really expected to see anything, as I’ve never seen anything (or anyone) before. Then again, I’ve never actually heard a voice like that before, either.
Knowing that I most definitely wouldn’t be falling asleep anytime soon after that, I got up. I decided to research my symptoms on WebMD and self-diagnose my illness, which is never a good idea. Especially not at 1 in the morning. For once, WebMD didn’t scare the bejesus out of me. It informed me that I was most likely suffering from a migraine. I’ve had migraines before. Usually they’re really, really painful. This one was just bothersome. I wasn’t completely convinced it was just a migraine, but I decided to take a couple Ibuprofen anyway. Couldn’t hurt. (I also considered taking a Xanax, since one of our ghosts seemed to be in the mood for girl talk, but I refrained.)
In all the commotion, what with me jumping out of bed, turning the TV back on, surfing the internet and getting up to get medicine and water, my husband decided the couch would be the best place for him to try to sleep since he had to get up for work in four hours. So he left me alone. With….Karen? Super. (In his defense, I didn’t mention to him the whole ghost voice thing, so he had no clue that aside from being sick, wide awake and crazy, I was also scared.)
I propped my head up on a stack of pillows, turned the TV to a home shopping network (boring enough that I wouldn’t want to watch it , but having a little company was nice), and tried to fall asleep again. SUCCESS! I didn’t move until my alarm went off, a whole five hours later. I took a shower, then went upstairs to wake the boys up for school. They are still enjoying the newness of our homemade trundle bed, so they were sleeping in the same room together. At some point (probably during my shower), the puppy had joined them under the covers. Our other dog, Sammy, was passed out on the couch downstairs.
I sat at the end of the bed, talking to them both and gently trying to wake them. Turns out, I had some help. There was a loud crash in the hall outside the bedroom we were in, as if someone had thrown something. They both sat up straight. “What was that?” The teenager asked sleepily. I assured them that “something just fell.” (Upon investigation, I discovered that nothing had fallen.) Then, while they were still trying to wake up, it happened again.
It’s hard for me, sometimes, to maintain a calm façade in front of the kids when creepy things happen at home. In theory, I know our house is haunted and I’m cool with it. But when things happen, I get freaked out sometimes. This was one of those times. “Mama, what was that?” E-Man asked. “Ummmm….the wind,” I answered. Yeeaahhhh, we’ll go with that. The wind. Whose name, apparently, is Karen.
I'm in a cold room, but I don't think my chills are due to the temperature.
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