A Haunting

            Recently I was sitting in my living room watching a marathon of “Murder, She Wrote” on the Hallmark channel when I heard a strange moaning coming from another room. I put down my crocheting needles and went to investigate. When I got to the other room I could not find the source, but now it sounded like the moaning was coming from the room I had just left! There was only one logical conclusion: there was a ventriloquist in my house and he was being a real douche. I was just about to walk back into the living room when a cold chill ran down my spine. I spun on my heels and there, hovering in front of me was a ghost! She looked to be a little girl, no more than eight years old. She looked at me with eyes as black as oil and said "What has been done must be undone. WHAT HAS BEEN DONE MUST BE UN....what are you doing? Stop that!"
           While she was chanting I had begun spraying a can of air freshener at her, in the hopes that maybe it was simply an odor cloud that happened to be shaped like a ghost. But it seemed only to annoy her, so I put it down and stared uncomfortably at my shoes. She continued, "You have one day to right what has been wronged. If you do not, I will inflict a pain upon you such as nothing you've-"

"Did you just pee?" I asked.

"What?"

"Did you just pee on the floor?" I pointed to a puddle that had formed under her.

"FOOL! That is ectoplasm! Do not dare interrupt me aga-HEY!"

I had begun running a shop-vac while she was talking to clean up the puddle, and just out of curiosity I had pointed it at her, sucking her leg into the hose. I tried to apologize, but in a look of fury she dissipated into thin air.

The next morning I awoke, thinking surely it must have been a dream. But when I walked into the bathroom and saw 'Redrum' scrawled on the mirror in lipstick, I knew that not only was I dealing with an unoriginal ghost, but she had also found my secret lipstick drawer, which could prove embarrassing down the road.

I did some research and learned that over 50 years ago a little girl had lived in my house and had died of polio. Why was she haunting me? Did she have unfinished business? I was so confused and dismayed that I ate a whole can of Pringles and took a nap.

I woke up hours later to see the little girl hovering above me.

"You!!" she said, "you have been sleeping?! You were warned!!" With that, she plunged her ghostly hand into my stomach and began yanking out my intestines. I howled in pain as she proceeded to wrap my intestines around my neck and choke me out with them. It occurred to me, in between periods of unconsciousness, that this girl must have watched some really messed R-rated movies or something, because where did she come up with this gory stuff?! It was seriously twisted. When I was seven I would never have thought to strangle a guy with his own intestines, I mean seriously.

It was then that I realized that she had been talking to me this entire time, shouting instructions. I managed to blurt out between chokings that I had been daydreaming and could she please repeat what she said, but she howled in rage and her hair burst into orange and red flames. At this point I did something I regret, which was I laughed a little bit, because her fire-hair was totally clashing with her outfit. I also wish I hadn’t said “SOMEbody needs a makeover,” because I think that’s what caused her to shoot locusts out of her eyes.

I was mentally calculating if there was enough room left in the shop vac for all these locusts when I realized they had all flown out the door and were terrorizing all of my neighbors.

“This is what you get for your disobedience!” the ghost said to me, and I must admit, I felt pretty bad about the whole situation. I had never wanted for my neighbors to get hurt because of this. Except Jerry. He borrowed my hedge trimmers and never returned them, so I was kind of glad the locusts got him. The ghost turned back to me and said “You have ONE more day!” and then vanished into thin air.

I looked down at my stomach. My intestines were back inside me! It was as if they’d never been pulled out in the first place! Except that my shirt was covered in blood. Really?? C’mon! That was my favorite shirt!

I didn’t know what to do. I considered seeing if they were still showing “Murder, She Wrote,” but in the end decided I’d better clear up this whole haunting business. I Googled and Googled for what felt like a good ten minutes, but I could not find anything to help me figure out how this young girl had been wronged. I racked my brain, trying desperately to remember any of the instructions she had given. I vaguely recalled something about a dresser....she couldn't mean that old chest of drawers upstairs, could she?

I must have lost track of time, or gotten distracted watching a video of a cat playing the bagpipes on YouTube, because before I knew it, it was the next morning. I made my way up the stairs to the room with the dresser in it. But as I entered the door, the entire house began to quake. I was too late!

I checked my watch, but the only thing on my wrist was a post-it note which read "Buy Watch". I looked up and saw my dirty socks on the floor transform into poisonous snakes and begin to slither toward me! The toilet from the bathroom began to overflow with lava! Spiders poured out from the closet, each holding a tiny pistol in one of their many legs! My dog entered the room on the CEILING and proceeded to do that butt-wiping scootch move that dogs do.

I fell to my knees and cried out "You MONSTER!! That's never going to come out!!"

A disembodied voice roared "this is your last chance!! Make the switch!" I dashed over to the dresser and pulled open the only drawer which wasnt brimming with blood. Inside was a little dolly, the kind of dolly a little girl would carry around. I snatched it up and just as I did, a Heavenly light shone down onto an identical drawer right next to the one I had opened.

"Do it! DO IT!!" she screamed. The house shook, the snakes hissed, the dog wiped. Frantically I opened the other drawer and threw the doll inside. Everything stopped. The spiders with guns vanished, along with the lava and the snakes. My dog fell on it's head. All had seemed to return to normal.

The next few weeks I spent recalling my experience with that ghastly ghoul, and thinking about how the reason for her haunting seemed wildly disproportionate to all of the terror she inflicted. I mean she killed all of my neighbors, not to mention the poop stains on the ceiling, and all because her dolly was in the wrong drawer. There really should be a ghost governing body that sets a haunt limit for situations like this. And that is why I am submitting this formal request for a loan from your bank to help start my ghost police squad. I am confident you will find my proposal satisfactory and me explanation of the need for 41 million dollars to build "Poltergeist Penitentiary" quite reasonable. I have every confidence that my first four letters were lost in the mail and I am excited to hear back from you soon.

Sincerely,

Andrew