Aurora Magazine 2017

Over the next several years we continued seeing the man in black. Every night he was there. Watching. As Grace got older, she, too, noticed the man. We started calling him “The man in Black.” Grace and I quickly decided that it did nothing to tell Mom and Dad about the man. They did not believe us anyway. My mom would tell us we were just seeing Daddy since he was working odd shifts at the mill. We knew it was not Daddy. One evening while we were watching television, there was the sound of footsteps in the dining room. Grace and I were sitting on the couch. I looked out but no one was there! I could hear footprints but could not see anyone there. I shivered. The footprints came as close as the entryway and suddenly stopped. “Jeannie who is it?” Mom asked me from across the room. Daddy was sitting next to her on the small sofa. “Um….no one is there Mom!” I said looking over at Grace. Grace had gone pale and looked in disbelief. Daddy quickly jumped up to check “Helen, I don’t see anyone there.” He replied. “The house it’s old, just the floors creaking.” Grace and I just looked at each other. We did not know what to say. As I got older, I had a terrible habit of eves dropping on adults. I learned quickly that this was the best way to find out something. I was always being shooed out of the room and I hated that. My favorite place to sit and eves drop was to sit at the top of the basement steps. From there I could hear my mother talking to friends or to anyone on the telephone. One day aunt Pat had stopped by to see mom. I figured this was the perfect time to find out the current family gossip. Mom and aunt Pat were sitting at the table playing cards. “I don’t know why Mom won’t stay with me when they come to visit.” Mom said. “Richard doesn’t like this house Helen; he says he won’t stay here.” Aunt Pat replied. “Whatever happened to him in the dining room, he swears he won’t step foot in this house again. He says that he saw something.” “Pat, we have lived here for years now and I haven’t seen anything.” Helen said. “The girls used to complain about seeing a man in the living room but I really believe they were just seeing John coming home late from work.” I could hear the shuffling of the playing cards. “I don’t know. All I know is it was when Mom was with you at the hospital and Grace was born. He got into that terrible

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