Real Ghost Stories: An Elemental Spirit – It was late September in 1996, a month short of my 36th birthday, when due to some turmoil in my life I found myself asking an old friend if I could stay a while at his flat. He was actually a distant relative on my motherโs side and was about sixteen years older than me. Like me his name was Mick. He lived a few miles south in our small fishing town in the east of England. Although I didnโt want to be there and Mick didnโt want me there he was good enough to let me stay.
Mick liked to drink cheap cider, that rough industrial stuff that has never seen an apple. I like a few beers in bars but donโt drink much at home so he mostly drank alone. I just enjoyed watching the TV with him while he drank a 2-litre bottle most every night.
I spent two uncomfortable weeks trying to sleep on Mickโs two-seater cottage settee. I was unable to stretch out but Iโd been homeless before so I wasnโt complaining. A week earlier Mick had offered to sleep on the settee while I got a decent nightโs sleep in his bed but I declined his kind offer, thinking I shouldnโt take his bed on top of being a burden.
On my last night there Mick had had some cider while I got my head down around half past eleven, and I had fallen asleep before Mick had finished watching TV. I awoke Iโd say about 1 oโclock with a slight feeling of unease. No more than a feeling, but the lights were still on. The TV was off, then I was surprised to notice Mick laid on the floor as close to the settee as he could get. It was odd but I assumed heโd ended up there because heโd drunk too much. Then I fell back to sleep.
Next I awoke with a start. I thought it must be about 3 oโclock and I was quite awake. It was like a charged atmosphere, like electricity was around. Then I gasped in pure horror as dashing into view from behind the armchair from right to left, close to the wall opposite, was what I can only describe as a goblin. It dashed along beneath the window-sill towards the TV area in the left corner, covering three or four feet in a second, then without moving its head or looking where it was going, and without making a sound, it dodged between the coffee table and TV and then stood at Mickโs feet looking down at him. It was now about four feet from my face, about a foot distant from the settee. I tried to call โMick!โ as soon as Iโd spotted it but all I could manage was a muted murmur. I tried again but could make no sound and I realized I was paralyzed with fear.
This thing was about two-and-a-half feet tall, with a head about the size of a manโs, and I vaguely remember a small body about the size of a large dollโs. It had very long arms from elbows to wrists and it had to hold its arms out parallel to the floor because they were so long โ about half as long again as our own. Its knees were bent and it was bobbing on its toes as though standing still it was unbalanced. I didnโt notice if it was naked or clothed because my gaze was drawn to its eyes which were large and yellowed. If you hold your middle fingers to your thumbs about an inch apart, they were that big, and they even appeared slightly bloodshot. It had human features but very ugly. Grotesque.
All its facial features were enlarged; big eyes, big ears, thick lips, even prominent teeth. I was terrified and I just remember hoping it wouldnโt touch me or I think I would have died. It looked at me briefly, like it was satisfied to have frightened someone, then to my utter relief it turned and again in total silence it dashed back the way it had come, dodging between the TV and coffee table, beneath the window-sill until it disapperaed out of line-of-sight behind the armchair. As soon as it was out of sight I found I could move and I quickly shook Mick awake. Once he awoke I was no longer alone and I didnโt say what Iโd just experienced. I didnโt know if he would dismiss it or become frightened so I just asked him if he was alright down there on the floor.
In the morning I left Mickโs house and within a few weeks I got my own flat but it was another five or so months, not until the lighter nights of spring, that I was able to sleep without the lights on. I did try but in the dark I thought about that goblin and was afraid thought might attract it.
I think it was attracted to Mick through his drinking, like a pink elephant. A drink demon. I got the impression it wasnโt an evil spirit, just mischievous and enjoyed giving humans a fright. I also wondered if a long time ago โ maybe back in the days of the druids a couple thousand years before Christ โ that that spirit was once a man; probably a very unpleasant man. I think that spirit was the reason Mick offered me his bed, and why he was laid on the floor that night next to the settee. It haunted him, came looking for him, and if so there is no wonder he was frightened.
I always intended to ask Mick about it sometime but he gave up his flat to move to his brotherโs some time after. A few years later he died so I never got to ask him though I did ask an uncle who had stayed there (he was a drinker too). He said heโd seen nothing and I believe him.
Submitted by Mick McNulty, United Kingdom.
