There’s a rumor that a man named Perley Gordon hung himself in the house at the end of the street where I grew up. My street, named Perley Gordon Road, is named after him.
I grew up in a farmhouse that dated back to the early 1900’s. It’s a big, old, wooden building, and when we first moved in, in 2002, I knew something was off. The house felt cold, the floorboards creaked, and I always felt like someone was following me. I lived with my 3 brothers growing up, the youngest being a year younger than me, the second being three years older than me, and my oldest brother being in high school.
For the first week we all slept in the living room while we waited for our furniture to arrive, including our beds. I remember the very first night we spent in our sleeping bags. I smushed between my brothers on the floor when I suddenly woke up.
What occurred next will always stick with me; I saw, what looked like a shadow figure, about 6 feet tall, wearing a brimmed hat.
At first I thought it was one of my brothers, but quickly realized that none of them were that tall. I sat there in disbelief, thinking I was dreaming as I scrambled for my flashlight. But as soon as it came, it disappeared. I woke one of my older brothers and told him, but he quickly explained it away as a dream and told me to go back to bed.
Fast forward 4 years. I was in 5th grade and my younger brother and I were upstairs in the “playroom,” building with LEGO’s when we heard a loud sound. My younger brother got up to investigate and told me to follow him. We went over to look at the stack of boxes in the other room and the whole thing had fallen over. But, here’s the weird part; the boxes weren’t that high, nor could they have easily fallen over. There was no wind and our other siblings weren’t home. The only other person who was there was our mother, and she was in another part of the house.
Scared, we ran downstairs and never spoke of it again.
Around 2007, my two older brothers were up late watching movies in the family room when they heard whispering.
At first, they thought it was me or my younger brother, but realized we were asleep and no one else was awake. This is when they both became believers.
My mother and father were less easily convinced. It took them until 2009 to truly believe something was haunting our house. Things would fall off shelves, paintings or pictures would be straight one day and crooked when they woke up the next. Numerous times my brothers, mother, and I felt extremely cold whenever we walked up the stairs. A few times, while walking into rooms, it would feel like we were being pushed, but no one was around.
For me, the scariest time, to this day, was on Christmas eve in 2004. I, like many kids, believed in Santa and was too excited to sleep. I remember putting my head under the blankets and letting my legs fall off of the end of the bed. I was about to fall asleep when I felt something pull my foot. I looked up from under the blankets, thinking it was one of my brothers playing a prank, but no one was there.
I remember saying, “Ok, you can come out now. I know it’s you,” but no one answered. I was scared, so I stuck my head underneath the blankets a second time but felt as if someone was sitting on my legs. I yelled for it to stop and when I pulled the blanket off my head, I saw what looked like a puff of dark smoke dissipate in front of me. When I awoke the next morning, there were scratch marks on right where I felt something sitting.
I guess I’ll never truly know if anyone was there, but I do know one thing: that house was and is haunted. Although none of my family members were ever really injured, we have seen apparitions quite a few times and many things have been knocked over.
We’ve also heard noises like people talking when no one is home and felt a chill on our backs at random times. Everyone in my family knows our house is haunted and although we know none of the spirits want to hurt us, it still scares us whenever we talk about it.
