A Christmas Ghost Story...

Do I believe in ghosts? I don’t know. I do believe that strange things happen, hard to explain things, inexplicable things.

I’ve had a few ‘inexplicables’ over the years. As a very young child I would sometimes awake to a horse race pounding across my bedroom ceiling. A full race with horses, jockeys, flying whips, the drum of hooves, sods of turf flying, all careering across my ceiling to the open door which led to the landing.

Once, when I lived in Birmingham in the Eighties, I awoke in the early hours to find a small blond girl standing beside my bed. I watched her for two or three minutes, just standing there silently, and then she was suddenly gone. In that same house I once heard a man’s voice on the stairs clearly say ‘it’s nearly over’ right beside my ear although I was alone in the house at the time. I’ve always wondered what it was that was ‘nearly over’, so much changed so quickly after the voice that it could have been anything.

My wife and I heard another voice a few years ago in our house in Manchester, a woman’s voice calling my name just once from the top landing. We investigated but there was nobody there. And then there is the cat. I, along with a few others, have seen a jet-black cat running around the house on several occasions. A flash of black caught out of the corner of the eye, wandering into rooms almost unnoticed - thing is, we don’t have a black cat.

A couple of years back at our cottage in Wales, Gaynor and I distinctly heard someone climbing the stairs long after everybody was in bed, we went onto the landing to take a look but there was nobody there. And there is a very definite cold spot in the well at the bottom of the stairway - a very, very, cold spot.

Brrrrrrr, it’s enough to give you the shivers. But all of these happenings, intriguing as they are, are all relatively small ‘inexplicables’ compared to what happened to me one Friday evening in the June of 1970 and as they say at the movies ‘This is a true story’.

1970 was the year of the Mexico World Cup, I was thirteen. I was staying at my Grandfather’s forge just outside of Wragby in Lincolnshire with my Mum and Dad. We were visiting my Grandfather for the first time since he had become a widower; my Grandmother had died just a few months previously. I’d always been a little frightened of my Grandmother - she seemed sharp and strict, she bought me socks for Christmas instead of toys, and my Mum said that she could freeze blood with a single look. Worst of all though, she resembled (just a little) the Wicked Witch of the West in the Wizard of Oz, and I’m not sure that she liked me very much. I always had the feeling that she found me a nuisance.

My Grandfather’s house was packed to the brim with us - me, my sisters, and my Mum and Dad. I was sleeping in the living room on the sofa, watching football late into the night for some reason. I’m not a football fan but it was something to watch and I couldn’t sleep. Midnight came, then one, then two – and I still couldn’t sleep. The football had finished long ago (in those days there was no 24 hour telly) and as I lay wide-awake there began to come from the kitchen the sound of clinking china. I don’t know why, but instead of pretending that I couldn’t hear anything or simply waiting for the sound to go away, I got up from my sofa bed and went towards the door through to the kitchen. I opened it slowly and cautiously peered into the darkness of the kitchen over towards the deep porcelain sink which stood to the right of the old iron Aga.

Now I can’t swear that I saw a figure, but I do know that I did sense something standing at the sink in the darkness, and I could definitely hear the clinking of plates and cups as they were being washed at the empty sink. In my minds memory I can clearly see my Grandmother standing at that sink washing those phantom dishes. I even see her turning to look directly at me, remember her smiling that thin cold smile, in my minds memory she’s there as large as… well, not exactly life.

When I think about it my blood runs cold, a shiver goes up my spine, and I shudder as if someone has walked over my grave. All cliché, but I can’t explain it any other way. One thing I’m certain of as my thirteen year old boy self stood in the doorway something dark by the sink turned to look at me. Was it her? Did I see my Grandmother? I think for a second that I did, I remember it clearly enough, but memory is a building thing and I can’t be completely sure.

One other thing is for sure though - that kitchen was freezing just like the cold spot at the bottom of the cottage stairwell, and I had to get away from whatever was standing at that sink. I rushed across the quarry tiled kitchen towards the stable-latched door that led to the stairway. Snatching at the latch I threw the door open and took the first three stairs at a flying stumble. I knew what was behind me, I could feel her reaching out for me - just behind - and for a second I was frozen, not daring to turn… and then - as she reached out to touch me with icy, soap sodden fingers - the adrenalin kicked in and I leaped the remaining stairs in three frantic, thudding, leaps.

At the top of the landing, not daring to look back, I thrust open the door to my Mother and Father’s room and screamed for them to save me!

After I’d calmed a little and I’d told them what had happened, making it clear between sobs and sniffs that there was no way I was going back into the kitchen, my Father went downstairs to take a look. I expected him to come back saying that there was nothing wrong and order me back downstairs. But he didn’t. Instead he returned to the bedroom looking a lot paler than he’d done when he’d taken the steep stairs down to the kitchen and refusing to talk about what he’d seen. No, he didn’t order me back downstairs; instead I was allowed to spend the night wrapped in a blanket on their bedroom floor.

Did my Father see something? Did I? I don’t know. I’ve never asked him about it and he hasn’t spoken of it since. Besides, I’m not sure what I saw or even if I saw anything at all.

Something happened though, a hard to explain thing, and I sometimes still get goose-bumps when I hear dishes clinking together as they are being washed. Let’s just call it one of those odd things that happen sometimes - another of those inexplicables like the girl by my bed, or that black cat, or those footsteps on the stairs... nothing to worry about, nothing to lose sleep over.

Do I believe in ghosts? Well let's just say that it's very cold in the stairwell.