Stalking Shadows by Debi Chestnut

as did other members of the family, reported seeing a man in the closet of one of the bedrooms. It’s assumed this is the phantom of the man who hanged himself. On several occasions, the young housewife would be pushed toward the closet where the man committed suicide.
    As if that wasn’t enough, the family would wake up every morning to find furniture and other objects moved around the house. In some cases, items would disappear altogether, especially objects kept in the kitchen. The television, washer, dryer, and microwave would also turn on by themselves.
    The family began searching for a logical explanation for the strange events, so they called out an electrician to check the wiring, but no problems could be found with the wiring or the appliances.
    It didn’t take long for the family to become terrified of their house, but with little money and an ironclad lease, they felt they had no choice but to stay. I suspect the lease was intentionally made so binding because of the mass exodus of previous tenants.
    One of the most terrifying events in the house occurred when the young mother was walking by the basement door and something unseen gave her a hard shove toward the basement stairs. Luckily, she was able to catch herself before tumbling down the staircase to the hard floor of the basement.
    Naturally, her husband became quite concerned about the unseen and seemingly negative ghosts in the house that were terrorizing and physically attacking his family, so he decided to investigate.
    He made his way down to the basement and discovered an old cistern that had been sealed up. Judging by the appearance of the concrete, it hadn’t been sealed that long ago.
    Further exploration led him to a newly cinder-blocked section of the basement which was the size of a door. Given the close proximity to the furnace, the man assumed the room behind the cinder blocks was probably the old coal room, used when the house had a coal furnace.
    As he was making his way back to the staircase leading up to the kitchen, paint cans that had been stored on a shelf began to propel themselves off the shelf and pelted the man harshly.
    Screaming in pain and fear, he covered his head with his arms and quickly made his way across the basement to the staircase. He rushed up the stairs, slammed the basement door behind him, and slid the lock into place—an act of futility because the next morning, the basement door was standing wide open.
    That was the last straw. The family quickly packed up their belongings, threw them into the back of the husband’s pickup truck, and fled the property in fear.
    That should be the end of this story, right? Unfortunately it’s not.
    You see, the young housewife had an affinity for mirrors and enjoyed etching mirrors. When they moved into the house, a large mirror was on the mantle of the fireplace in the living room. The day they fled the house in panic, the woman grabbed the mirror off of the mantel and took it with them to their new home.
    Much to their horror, soon after moving into their new house, the same type of activity they’d fled began to happen again. Furniture and other objects would be moved, unexplained voices could be heard, the appliances would turn themselves on, etc. This is when I was called in by a friend of the family’s, to figure out what was going on.
    After hearing the whole story, one thing became perfectly clear: one of the most menacing entities that resided in their old house had come with them to their new home, and it was more than likely attached to the mirror.
    The reason for this is that mirrors can act as a portal between the world of the living and the world of the dead. Ghosts, spirits, and any other types of entity can freely pass through this portal, as easily as you or I can walk through an open door.
    In addition, it’s not uncommon for a spirit to attach itself to an object made of any porous material such as stone or wood. Thus, if the object is moved from place to