Charlie Dog's Run

From: Kimberly (jklinthicum@lts.net)
Story type: Ghost
Location: Troy, OH
Source: Form Submission

Back in 1971 my mother moved back to the area. She rented a small house in Troy, OH. I spent the summer with her and my brother. The house was laid our with connecting roons which circled the stairway. A back bedroom, storage room and the bathroom were to the back of this arraingement. Mom had a half grown dog named Charlie. Both my mom & I had an immeidiate dislike to the house. It just gave us the creeps.

On the first night there mom, exhausted from moving, went to sleep on a matress in the front room. Boxes and furniture were everywhere. (We had concetrated on moving not putting away). Anyway, mom awoke with a start. She heard the noise of a rocking chair. The streetlight illumaited the room and she could see the figure of a man rocking back & forth in a straight back rocking chair. Mom did not own a rocking chair. That and the fact that the figure was translucent gave her (shall we say) quite a start. Mom invoked the Trinity. Asking in the name of The Father, The Son and T! he Holy Spirit who and why of the presence. The answer was simply, *I will not hurt you.* Then it vanished.

When I arrived that morning mom was still upset. She decided that she wanted Charlie there before dark. I remember asking her what she was worried about? The ghost had promised HER no harm. It hadn't said anything about Bryan & me also being out of harm's reach. Everything stayed quiet for a couple of weeks with the exception of the reoccuring heebie-jeebies.

Then one early evening, my mom, brother and myself were watching TV. Charlie was asleep on the floor between the coffee table and couch. Suddenly the dog let out a terrible yelp. Charlie jumped, knocking over the coffee table. Yelping and whining, tail between the legs, he ran into the kitchen. He jumped at the door and tried to get out through the closed window. He then ran into the hallway, tried that window, to the front room and onto my brother's bed, tore down the curtains at that window. All along the path he ! kept up the terrified crying. All along the path he left a trail of urine. My brother opened the inside door. Charlie tore into the front room and lept out through the closed screen door. Mom looked at us and said *we're moving*.

It took six weeks for mother to find another place. In that time Charlie refused to set paw back in the house. We also had other experiences during that time. The blankets were pulled off of us twice. And the upstairs window kept opening. My brother nailed it shut, but the next morning it was open again and the nail was gone.

We asked around the neighborhood: *Hi! - Nice day! - Think it will rain? - Whose haunting our house? etc.* The only information we could get was that *no one seems to stay there long*. Well now, there's a surprise. (The house no longer stands. I moved out of Troy proper over twenty years ago. Having no reason to drive into that neighborhood we only discovered that it had been torn down about 6 - 8 years ago.)