My first house and its "other" inhabitant

Heidelberg (yes, again), 1993

After I got knocked up and married to get my parents off my back, I rented a house in Heidelberg, where I had finished school a year before. I would love to have that little house NOW.
It looked like a doll house on the outside, similar to the house I was staying in now, but on the inside it was HUGE!!!

The landlord was a friendly Afrikaner who owned an electrical store next to the house and when we had a look at the place (myself, my husband and my parents), my dad asked what kind of deposit we should pay, etc and the guy said something to the effect of how he knows newly weds need their money and such, and that he does not require a deposit. The house rent was ridiculously cheap, even for a low income person as myself (I was just out of school and at my first job), but I saw it as the old man wanting to help us out.

I loved that house. It had wooden floors, a stoep (porch) and three bedrooms with a kitchen full of beautiful dark brown wooden cupboards. The kitchen was massive. You actually traveled from one side to the other and it had a look-through in the wall. I don't know the proper word for it, but its like a diner window that you can pass food through to the next room?
You know what I mean ;-)

I was 8.5 months pregnant at the time and commuted to Johannesburg daily, an hour's drive there and back. My parents literally FORCED my husband to work (he was a total deadbeat, which is one of the biggest reasons I dumped his ass that very next month) for a security company, because he had not graduated from High School and it was the only job he qualified for.

So I'd leave for work at 6am and come back at 7pm, and my husband, Paul, would leave for his evening shift at 6pm and come back at 5am. So we hardly spent any time together in the house.
One night he was out on duty again and it was raining hard. Now, I love rain and thunder. Baby, I am straight out of the Addams Family, so I love that kind of weather. It was still dusky and I sat on the porch with some tea, admiring the demonic wind and hammering rain. Bliss.
Until I had to go back in the house.

The town was known for power outages, as Gauteng province lies on the Highveld, which has severe electrical storms in the summer. (See why I'd love to have that house again?)
The power went out as I walked through the front door into the living room, which was the size of a soccer field!!! :-)
Waddling uncomfortably through the pitch dark of the living room, listening to my own footfalls, I felt a terrible feeling of alarm. As if there was someone in there with me, following me very very closely. I dared not turn around and now and then, the lightning would briefly illuminate the room and I prayed silently that it would not reveal anything that might make my heart stop.

I felt my way along the walls to my bedroom for a candle and hopefully some safety, and again almost prayed out loud that I would not touch someone against the wall. It felt like an eternity, getting to my bedroom door and just before I got there, I got what I refer to as the "Hellraiser" effect ---- my skin pulled so taut from gooseflesh, that it felt like I had hooks to my face, tugging back so hard that my skin would split!!! Something was trying to keep me from getting past the threshold and at once I felt like I was walking in one place and not getting any closer to my room. My heart was pounding and I felt warm tears well up in my eyes. Tears from sheer terror.
I felt distinctly how someone was breathing behind me and it took all my energy to get through my door, which I immediately closed behind me.

I ran to my bed and as my room did not have a key, I sat in the picth dark of my bedroom, occasionally seeing my shut door in the flashes of light from outside. I knew I had to watch the door, but I did not want to see.
As I sat staring wide-eyed at my door, the fucking thing creaked open and stood ajar for a minute or so, revealing the vast blackness of the living room and I could feel my baby kicking in anguish as I shook from fear. Then it opened a bit more and I kept telling myself it was the stormy wind that came through under the kitchen door that caused it. Who knows.

I knew I had to shut it again, but I could not move. I was paralysed, wishing my parents would come check on me, alone here in the power failure, but no-one came. The air was filled with static, and not just the weather's. Whatever was behind that door, was malicious and I could feel it as clear as crystal. It was watching me and made no secret of it.
On my way to the door, I sang out loud, and moved deliberately slowly, as not to let the thing know that I knew it was there. I acted like a true skeptic.
My voice was drowned by the occasional snaps and crackles from thunder of epic porportions which had me screaming in starts ever now and then. You know when thunder sounds like Aramgeddon and suddenly cracks its demon whip right next to you? Those.

I got close to the door and noticed a milky figure born right in front of my face!! With every inch of power I could muster, I reached out and shut the door hard! Wham!! I could feel the energy through the door. It was PISSED!!! A hot, evil vibe seeped through to me and I jumped back, hiding behind my baby's crib, but I could not hide from the fear as I heard the angry, heavy footsteps pounding the wooden floors rhythmically into the living room. You know, I have had many many encounters, but this was one of m worst nights ever.
I sat crouched on the floor until my husband came home that morning and when I told him, he just laughed and said :"Oh good, I thought I was going crazy" !!!

Sometimes in the kitchen, I would be convinced that Paul was standing in the living room, staring at me throught the window thingy and I would talk to him and then he'd come through the back door and I would realize I was talking to someone else.

One night we sat alone watching TV. It was Paul's TV. An old type, with press-in knobs to switch on and off. You push the button in and it would swicth on --- and then push it in again and when it comes out, it switches off, right? We heard someone clearly walking from our bedroom, pass us and walk staright to the TV, switching it off!!!! We looked at each other in astonishment, but more amused than afraid. Paul got up and switched it on again. He sat down and true as nuts, it walked loudly past us again, and switched the TV off.

Now it was just plain funny. We laughed out loud, telling it that we wanna watch TV and we won't take any shit from anyone. Paul went and switched it on. Then he walked to our bedroom and got some isolation tape and taped the knobby thing IN, to stay ON. He had not even sat down yet, we heard the footsteps to the TV and we were like two kids waiting for someone to ignite our cherry bomb.
"Click"...we scoffed....."click, click", but the knob would not come out, cause it was taped down. It was HILARIOUS!!! Paul laughed out loud, twirled round and flipped it the bird all over, wherever it may have been in the room. It was the funniest thing how we used good old school tape to thwart a haunting.
Sometimes it can be amusing if you can get past the fear.