he keeps her head in a vase

some personal ghost stories.

2011-06-06T08:51:14Z

posted this to my personal tumblr already but for the amount of times i've repeated these stories over the years, it doesn't hurt to have it up on livejournal, too. this was part of a meme i was doing on tumblr.

i believe in ghosts. i was never raised with religion, i don't believe in a god. but i believe in ghosts and spirits and i guess that makes me superstitious.

part of the reason why i do is because of my own experiences. i have always been irrationally terrified of all of my father's houses because of what -- as i told my mother when i was younger -- i was certain was "monsters". as i grew older i began to call them ghosts, instead. and this fear never went away. it is now to the point where i refuse to visit my father's house, because the feeling of something watching me, being there, is just so overwhelming. whatever i feel is sinister and it makes me feel unsafe. i've asked other friends of mine about this who have been to his house with me and they agree, actually -- saying that my room is the only place in the house that felt secure, safe.

when my father was still on his second marriage (to faye) and my brother jonas was young, they lived in what he told me was a haunted house. this is notable for the fact that my father called it this despite telling me how otherwise, he doesn't believe in ghosts. he laughs at me when i tell him that his house makes me uncomfortable. but this house that he was living in at the time -- that he said was haunted. he told me once they all moved in, he and faye both fell horribly sick. the previous owners had died there. my brother jonas acted unusual, doing things he would never normally do -- dropping the cat from the third storey of the building and so on.

none of this stopped until they moved away. i'm superstitious enough to the point where i wonder if this has been following from house-to-house since then, because i have felt whatever this is in every single house my father has lived in.

when i was younger and we had bunkbeds in my bedroom, i would always sleep at the top. once the lights were off i didn't want to open my eyes again. i was afraid to go anywhere near the floor because i thought something would get me -- i saw things and was terrified. i never wanted to go to my father's house, even then -- i would tell my mother about monsters and ghosts and how they lived at my dad's house.

my mother's houses have always been perfectly safe, save for one. it was a rental, but what was notable about it was that it was surrounded by a graveyard. at first i was okay at that house. comfortable. i would stay in the basement all day long, playing on what was one of our first computers and nothing bothered me. i played in the garden in the backyard despite the fact that just over the fence was a graveyard.

one night when i was trying to sleep in my room i saw a figure. past that point, i was unable to fall asleep without my head buried under the covers. i was terrified that i would see it again. i suddenly became afraid of the basement, despite how much time i spent in there before. suddenly i was full of nerves and the house frightened me. luckily, we didn't live there for long. but that was the only experience i ever had in my mother's house.

my dad's houses continued to terrorize me, but the one that scares me most is the one in rosedale -- the oldest residential district of toronto. there was a tornado shelter in the basement and there were rooms that we could not get open. the windows were so coated with dust that we couldn't even see in from the outside. tunnels lead further into the shelter with the doors jammed shut. we managed to pry one of the windowed rooms open once, and the dust that escaped was so thick we could barely breathe. i remember i couldn't stop coughing. it was a workshop -- with all the rusted tools still in place, belongings scattered, jars full of indiscernible somethings.

i have had countless nightmares about that house. it was a duplex; a tenant lived on the first floor and my dad and i lived on the second and third. i didn't want to go anywhere near the staircase on the second floor or the first because i knew it connected to the basement/tornado shelter. i had nightmare after nightmare of things rising from that basement and chasing me. but nothing ever actively happened down there outside of my dreams.

my father had a library in that house, though. and i would sit and read and at first, i'd be okay. but eventually, after enough time would pass, i started to feel as though i was being watched, and my eyes would always be drawn to one antique dresser he had in the room. i remember i would pluck myself up from the couch, walk over to it, take the keys and throw the doors open to show myself there was no one inside of it. and there never was, of course. but it still didn't shake the feeling that someone was there, watching.

i switched to reading in the sun room instead. thankfully, after a few years there, we moved.

but to my father's present house, which i refuse to even go near these days.

i used to live across the street from it when i was younger with my mother, so you think that living there would provide a sense of comfort. but my dad's townhouse was always strange from the start. when we bought it, the entire house was painted black -- the slats across the windows, the walls, the carpets. checkered marble flooring was used consistently throughout the house, and where the walls weren't painted black they were covered in darkened mirrors. the towering spiral staircase that ran through the house blocked out any light from the sunlights above; the only decent source of outdoor light. i remember the owner even had carousel horses sitting in the front hall by the door. it had an old-fashioned elevator, too -- with black bars that swung across it as the only safety measure to keep you inside of it. (i have been stuck inside this elevator before between floors and it was not a fun experience.) it was... really bizarre.

when we moved in, we tried our best to fix it. we replaced the carpets, painted the walls and window slats. we kept the marble flooring, and for awhile we kept the mirrors because they at least gave the illusion of making our 14'-wide townhouse a little wider.

at first i stayed in that house with my dad consistently; every wednesday and saturday night. and the feelings i got from it were not that strong, either. but slowly i started to have the feeling of being watched again, this time from the front hall on the first floor. i remember i would always end up transfixed by this one banister right before the three steps down to the area by the door. i wouldn't be able to stop staring at it, as though the source came from somewhere around there. i used to risk midnight snacks -- turning on all the lights and sneaking into the kitchen at night. but i would always feel whatever it was watching me, and i'd get so paranoid and uneasy i'd start to shake, heart-racing. by the time i was on my way back i'd be running up the stairs, slamming my door and locking it as if to pretend i could keep whatever it was out. my room was always one place i felt safe in that house.

my dad's been in that house for awhile. my brother was born, arthur, and from the moment that he could talk he called that same area of the house i felt watched from "scary". as he grew older, he got into more detail about it -- telling me about monsters and things he would see there. he was absolutely terrified of that part of the house, just like i was. if anyone went near it he would scream, talking about the monsters there. or sometimes just: "don't open the door, don't open the door!" telling us we would let something in.

this continued for a long time. we had other weird things, too -- disruptions in electronics. my phone signal would rarely work, same with my mother's blackberry. not even the keys to her car (which would work wirelessly) would work, and she would have to open the doors manually. the wireless on our router wouldn't broadcast either, though according to statistics everything should have been working. phone calls would drop, etc.

as arthur got older still, i was requested to babysit him while angela and my dad would go out for dinner. it was around that time i stopped feeling so drawn to the front hall, and instead got really jumpy in the kitchen instead. that time, when arthur's parents left, he instantly ran to the front hall that he used to be so afraid of.

i asked him: "arthur, didn't you say there were monsters here?"

"no, the ghost is hiding in the kitchen now!" he switched from monsters to ghosts and that change in wordchoice unnerved me like nothing else.

i was stunned and called my friend alex on the phone to tell her about what he had said and the sheer coincidence of it. i stood in one corner of the kitchen while i spoke to her, since i had to make arthur dinner. and i told her about the other experiences i had in the house, and some stories from my friends -- theories about how ghosts sap electricity to use as energy to manifest.

right as i said that, the power only in the corner of the kitchen i was standing in went out. lights dead, appliances non-functioning. i screamed.

i remember even making arthur tell my friends about the things he would see. friends that didn't believe me, too -- i had an internet friend that came to visit me for two weeks one summer, and she would always laugh at me when i told her how i felt about the house, how i felt so unsafe. but when she came to visit me she could not stay on the first floor. she instantly felt something too. she didn't want to go near the kitchen, and though she felt okay in my room she didn't want to sleep. it wasn't until the both of us passed out from exhaustion that she finally let me sleep, and she demanded we both leave immediately when we finally woke up.

eventually, whatever was in our house gravitated back to the front hall. it wasn't until about a year ago that i realized something -- that directly behind the banister i'd always stare at and be so drawn to was that old, antique cabinet from my father's library. the one that i would have to unlock and open because i always felt something from it staring at me, the same way i felt something watching me from the hall.

as time passed in that house i became more and more unsettled. the feeling started to spread throughout the house, invading the second floor where my room was. (i suspect this is because there's an opening in the second floor that directly overlooks the front hall.) and lately, i've been feeling the same thing from our basement.

and now, i refuse to go to my father's house at all. it's to the point where my room is no longer there -- it's been turned into an office and i stay at my mother's full-time.

my mother has a friend, janet, who is descended from the man who created the church of spirituality in england -- a spirit medium who told her that when she was a young girl, that she had the ability to see spirits too. and she does.

for years she had her grandmother follow her around, though for some reason never her parents. she sees her dogs that have died, and sometimes, they even speak to her. she had one dog that died -- dodger -- that stopped appearing after awhile, and one of the other ghosts spoke to her and told her: "it's okay, dodger is in a safe place now." she had a woman in elizabethan clothing follow her from house-to-house, and she'd often wake at night to see the woman dressed in black and looming over her. she says there's been plenty of spirits she wished she hadn't seen.

at another house they lived at here in toronto, she said she had a bunch of lively spirits that would play with her electronics. they'd make her TVs flicker and turn the radio on a midnight, and have flapper parties in her living room. her son would yell down at them from his bedroom that he was trying to sleep.

she would also have one bridge she'd walk by all the time with her dogs and she'd get gut-wrenchingly sick every time she went by it, feeling woozy and light-headed. she told a friend about it -- a cop -- and the woman told her that it's probably because there were so many suicides that were committed on that bridge.

she spoke to me about how she sees ghosts, too. and she told me it's not a constant thing -- that she can feel them, but often she has to meditate or really calm herself down before she can see them. focus on them. and she told me she believes that everyone has the ability to see and feel these spirits -- a number of people just choose to shut them out.

hearing this only made me more afraid of my father's house, though. because whatever i feel there seems to be sinister, and the idea that i could potentially see it terrifies me.

anyway. i have... more of these, but these are the main ones for now. this entry is getting too long.

0001 0000

2009-01-09T22:41:30Z

that he hates living here is a fact, and gilbert makes it known. he shows it through the nights he breaks things on purpose, where he drinks until natalia's threats and dark glances mean nothing and the only thing that spills from his lips are memories of the berlin wall, of the poles and russians and the days where he was so cold even his mind eventually went numb.

these nights are more a nuisance for his host than for him, as the next day where he wakes up, head pounding from the alcoholic dehydration, he won't remember anything. he doesn't remember his tirades, where in the times where he isn't being reminiscent of times he tries his hardest to forget, he speaks of the days of glorious prussia, where europe was rightfully his and how one day, he will get it back.

natalia often avoids him when this happens. but in the quiet moments, where he's worn his voice hoarse from his stories, she joins him in the living room. she pours herself ice wine, which is much too sweet for his taste and for hers, but the ice is all she's known and all that she will ever know. she has long learned to make herself comfortable with her fate.

she takes only a single sip, anyway.

he thinks she only pours herself a glass to be polite. when she leaves, he downs the rest of her glass, too sloppy and unthinking to care about inconsequential imprints of pursed lips left pressed to the glass's rim.

& & &

gilbert isn't sure what to think in the first days he stays with her. mostly, he avoids his host; finding himself less than eager to find himself enrolled in staring contests he never wished to enter. natalia keeps to herself for the most part, and whenever she speaks to him, it's usually to scold him.

"you will behave," she tells him. this is her household, and she will not have a disobedient guest. gilbert doesn't have to tell her that her demands are meaningless for her to know, but he does it anyway. his voluntary captivity doesn't stop him from being as rash as he always has been.

and so, he scoffs at her words. "like hell!" he spouts, and her expression remains unchanged as she gazes up at him with empty eyes. she has expected as much from his loyalty. at the back of his mind (littered with meaningless things like self-preservation and patience), he knows natalia is not the person to talk down to. after all, despite her declarations of being otherwise, she is still her brother's sister. he knows she can't be trusted.

by the end of the first week, he's gotten more silent death-threats than he thought possible; more familiar with the cold, hard press of her blade than the sound of her monotonous voice. maybe she thinks she can communicate enough through steely gazes and hands that clutch with telltale reluctance at his insults, but gilbert isn't observant enough for it. he talks enough for the both of them anyway.

she's out for the day, and the house is quiet. as he settles himself into the living room chair (grand, he pretends, like a throne) he removes a single black, leather glove from his hand long enough to press his fingers tentatively to the skin of his neck. he can still feel the cut there, and he curses under his breath.

"shit, that woman..."

as he replaces the glove and reclines with arms casually placed behind his head, he gazes at the crackling fireplace. at least he can be thankful it's warm.

& & &

today is a cold day, and he resigns himself to the house.

in the idle moments, gilbert catches himself almost feeling at home. he's grown used to natalia's unsettling behavior, and he's learned where in the day to find time to relax; sit back, drink. for the most part, he's in the study. he finds himself surrounded on all sides by dark, reliable mahogany - olfactory senses assaulted by the distinct smell of leather and book-bindings. he can be comfortable here. it reminds him of his library.

he drinks from a fine crystal glass, and only vaguely registers the dull ache in his throat from the alcohol when it hits. since coming to minsk, gilbert has had nothing but time with which to think - maids look after the house, natalia has other duties to attend to. he often laughs to himself that she's off visiting her precious russia.

it's funny until he remembers their wager.

his lips set in a grim line, and for a moment, he considers requesting a rematch. after all, this wasn't what he planned. she should have been nothing more than an arm decoration; another epaulette to add to his rank, another useless spoil of war. she would have served her job well had he won, he thinks - a quiet, calculative woman.

"dinner."

the word rouses him from his thoughts, and he tilts his head back down to look at her. natalia stares back with blank eyes - he never heard her enter, not that it matters. a smug smile forms at his lips, and he throws his head back for a moment with laughter. "haha! preparing yourself to become my arm decoration, belarus?"

he refers to her by her country name only. at times, she seems so cold and mechanical that it's hard to think of her as human. but even so, sometimes, gilbert finds himself thinking that she could be pretty. almost like a doll, he thinks; all porcelain skin and perfection and fine, blonde hair. a real decoration, he thinks, and he remembers how he once boasted to natalia that even if he lost, he would win her over anyway.

she just stares back at him; eyes void of emotion. as she leaves the room without a word, victory seems a long ways away.

he's still analyzing her from the desk as he watches her form from behind; the only reason he's observant enough to catch sight of the clenched fist at her side. unfortunately for her, gilbert can never resist an easy target.

"did that hit home, scheisskopf?!"

she doesn't answer, but he feels the chill up his spine all the same.

& & &

it's out of sheer coincidence that he's walking by the front hall when the bell rings. despite referring to natalia's home as some sort of prison, and to his host as being a monster, it hasn't stopped gilbert from treating it as though it really has become his home. and so, it's only second nature to answer as he unthinkingly opens the door.

toris is standing at the doorstep, and gilbert is unsure of how to react to this. despite the fact that toris himself has always been a jittery, fearful person from his suffering under russia, he was still a close friend of feliks. and feliks was one other person the prussian would not forgive; the poles had not made his life an easy one.

liet finds himself stuttering under gilbert's gaze; there's always been something predatory about red eyes. "o-oh. is n-natalia home?"

"that monster?" he raises an eyebrow. he doesn't see why anyone would want to visit her. "she's upstairs. the maid'll probably be fetching her or something."

lithuania's eyes light up, just a little, and gilbert steps aside to let him in. "you're so lucky," he smiles sadly, shutting the door behind him. "i always wished she would stay with me."

"you think i wanted to stay with her? she's fucking creepy!"

the other winces at gilbert's words, as if he took the blow for her. "n-no, she isn't!" liet counters, pausing from hanging up his coat. "she's lovely, a-and-- ah!" the prussian sees a blush suddenly spread across liet's cheeks, and follows his gaze, confused.

natalia is at gilbert's left side, hands folded in front of her and staring at toris.

"n-natalia, i, i had come by to ask--" but toris stops himself - he remembers that they have company. it's hard for him to remember insignificant things like that with belarus in front of him. "how are you?"

it takes her a moment to respond, and it disorients gilbert to see someone attempting to make civil conversation with someone like her. "... i am fine."

"ah, shall we-- i brought wine," liet offers, and the prussian wonders if he's ever been around natalia long enough to learn how she doesn't really drink.

it seems as though she isn't about to let facts like that about her slip, anyway. her only reply is to walk into the living room, and the two men both follow. gilbert makes himself comfortable at his usual chair, the backing towering high above the other ones. belarus sits in the middle of the couch by the coffee table, and toris makes a pest of himself and sits right beside her.

"i asked after you - f-from your brother. he said you had a guest, and i..." the prussian watches in a combination of horror and absolute astonishment as he sees toris place a hand overtop one of her own. "i wanted to visit," he finishes.

belarus only looks down and examines the situation regarding her hands. liet, the man who her brother loves more than even her, is the last person she wants to have touch her. there's a moment where gilbert wonders if she's actually showing some sort of affection when she takes lithuania's hand in both of hers, particularly because of the blissful look on his face.

it changes to dull horror as a sickening crack fills the air; two of liet's fingers bent over backwards at unnatural angles, bones broken. the sufferer doesn't look as if he's even noticed it - he's much too entranced by the woman's presence.

gilbert doesn't realize how light he's been getting off until then.

after the guest leaves, hands mangled but mood lifted, belarus goes to the kitchen and sharpens her knives. he's seen her do this before - it only happens when she's angry.

"what the fuck was that back there?" is his first question as he leans back against the kitchen counter, watching. "hell, you threaten me with knives all the time, but..."

he doesn't expect an answer. she's silent enough when she's in better spirits, and it surprises him to hear her voice.

"deserved it," is her reply, lifting the dagger from the sharpener to inspect it. she runs a finger along its edge, appraising - gilbert wonders how she manages not to cut herself.

"... i hate him," she finishes, possibly the only confession to emotion he's ever heard from her. but even so, he can't see any reason for her to hate toris - not when he's so horribly infatuated and defensive on her behalf. it doesn't matter, though. not really.

"what, that mean you don't hate me?" and gilbert honestly laughs, because the concept is just so absurd.

he's not sure whether or not to feel unsettled when she takes her time to reply.

she opens the drawer to her right, putting away the sharpener. "it doesn't matter," she responds.

for once, his sense of self-preservation kicks in, and he says nothing. she nods at him silently before she leaves, beginning to walk upstairs. meanwhile, gilbert pulls out one of the kitchen chairs and sits, staring at his hands and flexing his fingers.

& & &

when he finally makes his way to the kitchen, he sees natalia waiting for him at the table, and raises an eyebrow. in all the time he's been there, she's never eaten with him.

"where's the maid?" he asks, when it's always the maid who cooks. usually, belarus has better things to do.

"... i made it," she admits. she sits with her back perfectly straight at the dinner table; rigid. gilbert's only guess is that her etiquette - her perfectly-controlled behavior - is an influence the soviet has had on her. his mind travels back to his thoughts from the study, and he figures she would be a perfect diplomatic representative. "eat."

her food is something he doesn't know what to make of, however. he looks skeptically at his seat, but eventually, he joins her at the table. "shit, is it poisoned?"

initially, her only response is to look at him. when he begins to fidget a little under her gaze, she takes her eyes away to stare down at the goulash in her bowl. as if telling him otherwise, she takes her first spoonful, swallows.

for a moment, gilbert considers the possibility that it might only be his bowl that's filled with arsenic, cyanide. but he thinks back to that one, strange visit, and tries to convince himself that she isn't out to kill him. pride doesn't allow him to admit he might already be dead by now if she were.

she doesn't watch him when he finally gives in and tries it, and it's better than he expected. it's similar to the food they would have back home, and for a moment, he wonders if she knows that. but no, she would never be so considerate.

"huh, i guess it might be okay," he says, refusing to admit that he likes it. but belarus is smarter than that, and she can tell from the tone of his voice that he isn't saying the complete truth. she's spent enough of her life listening to others, after all - gilbert has been the loudest of all the people she's come in contact with over the years. she almost prefers it over the silence.

the meal finishes not soon after gilbert finishes his second helping, and he says (even though she doesn't ask) that it's only because he's hungry.

she does the dishes herself, and it feels strange to see someone who looks like they might be so delicate doing something so domestic. but gilbert knows from experience that the russian's looks have always been deceiving, and natalia isn't any different.

"pass," she instructs, placing her cleaned bowl on the counter-top to the right of the sink.

"can't you just get the damn staff to do this?" he grumbles, but passes his empty bowl to her anyway. belarus takes it and rinses it under hot water, scrubbing it down with soap.

"you don't need to stay," she tells him, as there really isn't any obligation.

"shut up," he replies, indignant. "you cooked me a meal."

her hands stop moving for a moment, and she raises her head to meet his eyes.

"... what the hell are you looking at me like that for?"

"... i did not say that meal was for you," she tells him, eyes already back down to the sink.

he pushes himself off from the counter, looming behind her and watching over her shoulder. "fuck you, i'll just pretend. this is just training for you!"

"to be your arm decoration." she deadpans.

"exactly!" it's in his favour to take her response at face-value. "nothing but the best for the glorious prussian empire! together, we'll beat that sissy aristocrat once and for all!"

there's a loud clunk as she places the bowl on the counter to retrieve a towel to dry it with; she makes no effort to respond. she's heard his speeches dozens of times where he's been drunk and insatiable.

"we'll even take that lithuania, and that bastard, poland." he takes a risk here, and places a gloved hand on her shoulder. at least she isn't holding anything sharp. "nothing will stop us! europe will be mine, and you can be at my side in my moment of glory!"

she puts the dried bowls to the side, and the towel with them. it's as he sees her hand reach up to grab hold of his that he's worried she'll do exactly what she did to that lithuania, but she doesn't. she simply removes his hand from her shoulder, and puts the dishes in the cupboard. he's used to her silent responses, but that was something he didn't know how to interpret.

& & &

he comes down the next day, ready to scrounge the fridge for leftovers or a maid he can yell at to prepare food for breakfast. natalia is out today, but there's food already laid out on the table, still partially warm. gilbert only scratches his head in confusion before deciding to eat.

she comes back that evening and he immediately asks her about the meal, what it means. of course, her only response is that she needed to cook for herself, too, which is plausible enough. even he can't argue with that, though he's still suspicious.

he ends up drinking that night in the living room again. the maids have had enough of him, but they don't have the nerve to chase him away, even after he's finally managed to get out most of his usual rants. most of them have gone to sleep when natalia comes down like she sometimes does. she pours herself ice wine that he knows she won't drink, and sits on the couch where he knows she won't linger for long.

but she stays long enough to hear him tell stories of how his world would be, of all the glorious things he would do. he speaks of how she will be the most beautiful of wives, and how he'll laugh in the face of the other, jealous countries when the union goes through, because it's only prussia who deserves the best. gilbert says how even frederick - oh god, how he misses him - would be proud to see the way they would rebuild it.

he calls her by name when she leaves the room, but even in this state he knows it's hopeless. but he catches the hitch in her step and he can tell she's tempted, but it's already too late. she's had her first and last sip of wine already.

the first sip he takes from her glass is always tentative, as if he needs to get used to the taste again every time. it's this time he notices the taste of her lips still left behind on the rim.

he tilts his head back, and drinks it all in.