Volume 3: Ghost Stories from Texas (Joe Kwon's True Ghost Stories from Around the World) (7 page)

Borderland Street 5

El Paso, Texas

My mom had a very hard time while mourning my grandmother's death. She fell into a deep depression for a while and it was easy to comprehend her pain.

It was probably about a month after my grandmother passed away, that she decided to communicate. My mom woke up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. She opened the room and found a woman standing right outside our door. My mom was a bit shaken, but even though she realized almost instantly that the woman was floating a foot above the ground and her face was blurred in a strange way, she was still not afraid. The hairs on the back of her neck didn't stand and she felt at ease, very different from how she felt with her other encounters.

The woman's hair was long and brown, and she wore a long white gown. My mom tried to get closer to her, but as she walked, the figure floated away slowly. My mom followed her into the bathroom and then vanished when she reached the shower curtain. My mom was dazed and decided to go to bed. She told my dad about what happened the next morning and she convinced herself it must have been a dream.

The following night, my mom had a dream where she was in a field covered in roses as far as the eye could see. She followed a small path and found my grandmother smiling. She hugged my mom and told her she was ok, that she was happy and that my mom needed to let her go. She couldn't rest when my mom refused to go on with her life.

My mom woke up that morning practically glowing. There was no doubt then that her visitor was real, and that it was her mother saying her last goodbye. I love my grandmother dearly even after all this time. In times of hardship, when it's hard to sleep and I'm stricken with insomnia, I think back of when she used to cradle me in her arms and sing to me. I don't know if it's that I remember her so vividly, but I can hear her voice clearly after a while, right before sleep takes me over.

Borderland Street 6

El Paso, Texas

As time passed, we practically expected the sounds and appearances we encountered almost every night. My parents decided to continue living at my grandparent's house for a couple of more years and another baby brother came along in the process. I was twelve, and my mom and dad trusted and expected a lot out of me. Little by little, I became a latch key kid and with time, they started to leave me home alone to watch my baby brother.

One night my parents went shopping with my grandparents and aunts and uncles went out with their friends, while I laid in bed with my baby brother watching TV. My baby brother started to fall asleep, so I lowered the volume. I started to pass out, when out of nowhere came a loud bang from the window right next to me. My brother and I woke up extremely startled and my brother started to cry. It was then that the television started to change channels by itself and the volume went up full blast.

Frightened, I picked my brother up and ran out of the room. I thought I would be safe out of the room, but then I realized our TV wasn't the only thing that was on. It seemed as every single electrical appliance was on! I didn't know what to do, so I ran to my best friend's house and asked for help. Her mom allowed me to stay at their house until my parents showed up. My parents tried to discredit what had happened by saying I had dreamt the whole thing, but my friend's big brother went to my house after I showed up at their house to make sure no one had broken in. He confirmed that every single electrical thing in the house was indeed turned on when he arrived, and he took the time to turn everything off.

I spent a lot of time at my friend's house after that, even more than usual.

Unfortunately, it took my baby brother a long time to recover. He would wake up screaming and crying every single night until he was about two years old.

Borderland Street 7

El Paso, Texas

This is going to be a different story from my previous ones. I will be posting a couple of sightings that I have encountered in my adult life. I've grown up knowing that there is another world around us. After all I went through as a child, I've learned to be more aware of my surroundings. Many of my friends have commented that I act as a magnet to the paranormal, but I believe that I just tend to be at the right places at the right times.

I grew up, went to college and work the graveyard shift at a hospital in El Paso. I will not say what hospital to protect the privacy of my employers and fellow employees. It's nice and quiet where and when I work, but I can actually say I'm not alone.

There have been many times that I've seen a person out of the corner of my eye as I pass by a hallway. I stop to see if it's someone that needs help, and the person isn't there anymore. There have been times that I've been working in front of a computer monitor and I've seen the reflection of someone walking and standing behind me, and when I turn around, there is no one there.

Chairs have moved by themselves right next to me and it sometimes sounds like someone has walked into the room where I'm at and moving things around. I start to talk to the person, thinking it's one of my coworkers. When I get no answer, I find there is no one there.

Nurses have reported sightings of people that have passed away, and cold breezes coming out of nowhere.

I guess it's not hard to realize that these things happen in a hospital considering people pass away. Sometimes it's scary, especially when you're alone.

Just remember, next time you're at a hospital, and you feel a cold breeze, or you see someone out of the corner of your eye, it may just be someone saying goodbye to this world, or someone with unfinished business.

Mystery Pasture

Hallettsville, Texas

Three years ago, my family and I made our yearly trip to my grandpa's farm out in the country. As we turned off onto the dirt road, civilization started to evaporate every mile.

When we got there, my dad and I went squirrel hunting out in the woods. We were walking on the grass next to the tree line and my dad stopped and I followed in stopping. We heard leaves being smashed, as if someone was walking close to us. We looked around, and saw no trace of animals, or anyone else.

The sound got progressively louder, until it was as if it was inches away from us. Then the noise disappeared.

Later that night, I was sleeping in my grandpa's vacant guest house with my brother and my cousin. My brother and I shared a bed, and my cousin had her own twin bed close to us. I could not sleep, so I stared at the ceiling. I heard footsteps outside of the room, and they were stomping very loud, so loud it woke BOTH my brother and cousin. The footsteps stopped at our door, and then walked off. We all looked at each other.

The last day we were there me and my 145 pound dog were walking around the front yard and my dog stopped at a certain spot and proceeded to growl and whimper at the spot. I ran to the main house and told my step- grandmother about all of what happened that week.

She told me, "This was a slave plantation long before we moved here..."

The Coins

La Porte, Texas

My grandma told this story to me and I thought it was pretty freaky...

My grandma loves (and I mean really loves) to play bingo. One day while she was at home she was reading a magazine and it had an ad for some good-luck coins, so she sent off for them.

After she got the coins, she would take them with her whenever she went to go play bingo, and she was starting to win. After a while she finally took the time to really look at the coins and see all the detail they had on them.

She said to her horror she saw that on all the coins they had the numbers 666 on them, but you wouldn't know unless you looked real close. And all the coins had it in different areas, they weren't in all the same places; each coin was different.

My grandma got freaked out and she threw the coins in the trash. The next day she found them in her nightstand next to her bed when she woke up.

So, she put them in a jar and buried it in her back yard, and the next morning she woke up to the sounds of coins in a jar rolling around under her bed. She got the jar and threw it against the wall and she started to cry from panic and frustration.

When my grandma pulled her self together, she got up to clean the glass and to put the coins up somewhere so that no one could get a hold of them, but they were gone. She searched high and low in her room but never found them. She said to this day she never found out what happened to them.