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Speaker 1: Welcome once again, and thank you for being here. I'm

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your host, Nick Ryan. This episode is brought to you

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by my newest supporters Jutta and Snug and Shivers, and

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I'd also like to say happy twenty seventh birthday to

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one of my most devoted listeners, Jordan. Thanks to all

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of you for making the show possible. Tonight's show is

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going to be a bit shorter than usual, but I'll

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be back to my normal schedule soon. In the meantime,

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please remember that you can get access to all of

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my show updates by joining my free Patreon membership. This

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is where I post news about what's currently going on

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with the show and what you can expect moving forward.

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I use Patreon as an information hub, so I don't

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inundate your regular podcast feed with updates rather than episodes.

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So if you're ever curious about what I'm up to,

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you can find a link to my Patreon page in

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the show notes. With all that being said, let's begin

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tonight's episode. And Tonight's encounter comes to us from Maya,

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and Maya's experience is called a presence. Maya says hi. Nick. First,

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I wanted to say thank you for creating a safe

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space for sharing our supernatural experiences. I am an avid

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fan of your podcast, and I am very happy to

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say that I am up to date since I listened

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to it every day at work. Since I was a kid,

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I always believed in the supernatural, especially in ghosts. This

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is because when I was a kid, I saw my

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great grandmother in my living room just minutes after she

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had passed away. I had actually submitted that story to you,

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and to my luck, you shared it in one of

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your episodes. Today, though, I'm ready to share the most

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intense paranormal occurrence that I've had, and this time I

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do recall everything that happened to this day. It gives

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me chills. I'm just starting to write this to you

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and Goosebump start populating my existence. It was the summer

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of twenty twenty when I got accepted to be an

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intern at a research facility in the middle of nowhere

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in the United States. I am from the Caribbean, so yes,

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I was going to be far away from home for

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two whole months and working night shifts on a project

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that needed me to do late night runs to the lab. Emotionally,

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it was a mixture of sadness and excitement. I was

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getting paid really good money, so I definitely was up

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for the adventure. This research facility was part of a

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farm land and the architecture was still the same from

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the seventeen hundreds to eighteen hundreds. I did my personal

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research before getting into the whole thing, and I found

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out that the property was once owned by a wealthy

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family and they had many, many acres of various crops. Sadly,

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all of those crops were operated by slaves that also

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lived in the property in a building called the slave Quarters.

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After my little research, I was left curious to see

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how the place was would actually look in person and

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how the research facility would operate. I finally got to

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the research facility and my breath was taken away by

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how beautiful everything was. The place was close to magical

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ponds everywhere, butterflies all around, flowering plants in every corner,

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and open spaces that felt like they were out of

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a postcard. It was breath taking. The staff showed us

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where the students would sleep, and it turns out that

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this was in the slave quarters. I didn't really know

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how to feel about it, and as a fan of

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the paranormal. It did kind of feel like we were

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an investigating team staying in the most dreadful place of

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the whole property. It was a hallway of rooms on

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the second floor, and mine was the first one up

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the stairs. The dreadfulness and sadness, paired with the loud

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creaking noises of our own steps on the wooden floor,

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plus the unbearable sound the screen door and wooden doors

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made when opening, created a somewhat tense but chaotic atmosphere

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in my room. I do recall that throughout my time there,

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I spent as little time in that room as possible.

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I just really tried only using it for sleeping at least,

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though I was paired with such a sweet and awesome

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room mate, who I will call Lily. She and I

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were very similar in terms of how we lived, so

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it was very easy to live with her. The weeks passed,

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and I eventually befriended a staff member who was also

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doing research. He lived on the property, but in a

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house a little farther away from Oz. We were hanging

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out on the property's private library one night when all

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of a sudden it came to me and I asked him, Hey,

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do you know of anything weird about this property. I'm

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kind of a fan of spooky stuff, and where we

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sleep feels weird at all times. Plus the history I

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don't know now. I will never forget the look in

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his eyes, and it was as if he was surprised

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and a little scared that I picked up on something.

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He then asked, why do you ask, have you seen

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or heard anything? I was already scared of his reaction,

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so I nodded as if to say no. He then said, well,

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there are various stories about this place that I sadly

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found out because I was too curious as you are

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right now. And I say sadly because now I'm scared

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to be alone here and every corner gives me the creeps.

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After that, he started telling me, one by one all

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the things he knew about the place. First, there were

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many archived encounters where witnesses left a written statement of

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what they saw. Many people, on many different occasions saw

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a lady dressed in a black Victorian dress. This lady

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had a transparent dark veil covering her face as if

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she was a widow. The witnesses said that they would

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see her literally levitating throughout the main hallway on the property,

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or even by the main pond. Some accounts had even

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seen a child with her. Her face had no features,

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but you could see her hands, and they were pale

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white and translucent. The second story was about an intern

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night night, while all the interns went out, she stayed

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behind alone in the property. As a big mistake, she

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decided to explore the halls and found herself in an attic.

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A while after that, everyone came home from the outing

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and they found the intern almost paralyzed in her bed.

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She couldn't speak, and she was getting very sick, very fast.

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She finally said, I was in the attic when I

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saw it. It just stared back at me, and then

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everything in the room started to move on its own,

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and I panicked. She died shortly after. Now, after all

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of that, I was so scared, and to be honest,

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my first reaction was to laugh. It may have been rude,

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but I was so spooked that I needed to release

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some tension. He then looked at me and said, you

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can laugh all you want, but there is proof. While

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he said that, he lifted his hand and pointed to something.

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It was a black box on a top shelf, which

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you definitely needed a letter to get to. The smirk

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that I had on my face from laughing disappeared and

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it was official. I was terrified. He then changed subjects

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and later asked me not to tell anyone about it,

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because he was told not the spread information that could

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scare people away from the property. I promised that I

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was going to keep it quiet, knowing that I was

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indeed going to be breaking that promise the day after.

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I then told Lily about it the next day, without

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knowing it was a mistake because she turned out to

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be too scared to look into the matter. I, however,

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needed to see what was in that box, so I

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told some other people, and to my luck, they were

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up to the challenge. One night, we grabbed a ladder

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and managed to get up to the box. We opened it,

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and I immediately regretted all the decisions I had made.

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All the written accounts he had told me about they

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existed and were very well preserved in plastic coverings. The

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account of the intern who died, well, all I'm going

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to say is that it was all true, and there

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were even pictures to prove it. Everything was true, and

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there was even more about the lady in the Victorian dress,

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but I stopped. I needed to stop. Have you ever

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heard of the phrase curiosity killed the cat? Well, my

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curiosity indeed killed any sense of peace and safety that

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I felt while being there. Knowing this happened in the

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first three weeks and I had a whole other month there,

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I was not excited anymore, especially since my job was

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a night shift type of job. We then closed the

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box and we left it in its place. We obviously

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talked about our findings, but we decided to leave it there.

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What happens at the library stays at the library, someone said.

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The days after that were weird, and we tried to

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forget about what happened, and to be honest, we did

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somewhat of a good job. We hung around a lot,

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drank a lot, and had as much fun as we could,

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and in a matter of days I felt okay once again.

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Like two weeks after that, the internship was about to

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be over and the director of the place decided to

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throw a party for everyone one at his house. We

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were all very excited, but obviously sad since I was

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not going to see any of my friends that I

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made ever again. When I saw the date of the party,

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it was my last night of work, so unfortunately I

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was not able to go. The night of the party

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finally arrived and everyone was getting ready. I walked around

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to see if at least one of my friends was

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going to be staying, but no, it turned out that

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everyone was going. The reality that I was going to

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be the only one on the property didn't really hit me,

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as I'm a forgetful person, and I actually found myself

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being very okay with the idea. The hours passed and

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it was around midnight and I was still awake because

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of work, so I decided to get into an article

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that I needed to read. I was in my room

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with the screen door closed and the wooden door open.

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It was a peaceful night, very quiet and serene. The

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light breeze coming through the screen door made the room

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feel comfortable, so I decided to just stay there and

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read my article. I got up to the top bunk

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and with my back facing the door, I started reading.

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I would say that like half an hour had passed

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when all of a sudden, I started to hear heavy

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footsteps coming up the stairs. I knew some of the

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students wore heavy boots all the time, so I assumed

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it was one of them. Not paying too much attention

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to the footsteps, I kept reading since I was about

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to finish and I was getting into an important conclusion

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of the study. Then whoever was coming up the stairs

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reached the top and stopped for a second, but I

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was still very into my article. Suddenly the screen door

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of my room opened wide, and it did have somewhat

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of a little lock that you also had to unlock

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to get in. With my back still facing the door,

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I assumed that it was Lily coming back from the party.

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Four very heavy footsteps then reached my bunk bed, and

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that's when I finally turned around while saying, so Lily,

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how was the party? But this is when I realized

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that there was no one there, but you could feel

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a presence being on the top bunk. I could almost

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feel how my face was close to whatever this was

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in front of me. I was frozen, almost paralyzed, and

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my heart was racing too fast. I gasped for air

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while staring at the door slowly closing. Once I felt

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that it was all gone, I jumped off the top

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bunk and closed both doors, and I turned on every

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light possible. I was trembling horribly, and I could not

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believe what just happened. And I really thought that I

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had fallen asleep and it was all just a vivid dream,

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but sadly it was not. I was fully awake and

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even more now. I tried to go back to reading,

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but I couldn't concentrate. A while after everyone eventually returned

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from the party. I could hear their laughter and I

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could smell the alcohol from a mile away. I was

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not going to ruin their night, so I decided to

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fake that I was asleep. My alarm then went off

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at three a m. To go to work, and I

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turned it off. I decided that I was going to

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give an excuse the next day to my boss. I

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couldn't move from my bed, and some parts of me

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were still trembling. All the stories, the encounters, the evidence

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from the box in the library, what happened to the

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intern that stayed behind all of it flooded my thoughts.

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Days after that, I ran into my friend, the staff

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member who told me about everything in the box. I

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needed to tell him what had happened, but as soon

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as I told him that I had heard and seen something,

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he said, nope. I don't want to know. This place

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already scares me enough. Eventually, the program came to an

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end and I was back home when I told my

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family what had happened. Thankfully, they are very open minded

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and have had supernatural experiences before, so they understood completely

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and they comforted me. To this day, I wonder who

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entered my room and why. Maybe they got close to

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my bed to tell me something that my ears just

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couldn't hear. Maybe they were asking for help. I will

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never know, and that will haunt me forever