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Mask

(NOTE: Time frame, location and other information at the end of this tale.)

From the time I was 10-16 we lived in this house that was, I believe, haunted. My stepfather had a mask from Africa that he was given by his brother. This mask was extremely creepy.    It was a "monkey" mask. The face was sort of like a chimpanzee, only the paintings on the face were ceremonial marks and made it look "angry". The mask was a real ceremonial mask, and due to this, the mouth part moved. It fit over your face and if you opened and closed your mouth, your chin would push the mouth open and closed. This mask hung on the wall near the fireplace in our basement. I was the only one in the family who "lived" in the basement. My parents and sister had their bedrooms upstairs. There was a tv room (where the fireplace was) and my bedroom (with bathroom). Also a laundry room and my stepfathers office. One night, I was having a slumber party. There were 8 of us all together.    As teenage girls sometimes do, we started discussing paranormal things. One of my friends said she couldn't stand that mask on the wall. It was freaking her out. She was getting awfully scared, so I got up and put the maskinto a box.

That wasn't enough for her, so another friend and I lifted another box on top of that one.    She started feeling better. Well, we sat around in a circle on my family room floor and continued discussing odd things. A few of my friends swore up and down that people could raise the body of other people just by thinking about it hard enough (working together of course) and using their fingertips. About the time we started to decide we would try it, we all heard a snap snap snap. We looked over to the wall where the noise came from and there was the mask, right back where it had been before. I still cry whenever I remember these things because they were so terrifying. The boxes were still stacked. The mouth on the mask was moving. We all screamed. And then, from my bedroom we heard a huge explosion of glass.   We were simply terrified.

My parents came running downstairs. The light in my bedroom was on the ceiling, and it had an opaque glass shade that covered it. This glass was very thick (like oven glass).    Well, for some reason that we still do not know, that glass shade broke. None of my friends ever stayed the night at my house again after that episode. I don't blame them. I didn't want to live there either! It took 2 days before I could go to sleep there again. ....

Interesting to note, we had a back yard there that never grew anything but weeds (that for some reason would grow to a certain height and die). When we decided to try and get rid of the weeds and plant a garden, my stepfather dug up some old, tattered clothes. My mother and I freaked out so bad we kept screaming, put it back! put it back! He was a bit shaken too, and since none of us wanted to see what else went with those clothes, he covered it back up and we never went back there again.

Thank you for giving us all a wonderful place to tell our stories!!!

(MORE INFO...)

(This happened between the years of 1982 and 1988 (for me). For my mom, stepfather, and younger sister, they were still in that house for another 3 years, then my mom and stepfather divorced and everyone moved. My stepfather took the mask with him, and refused to believe that it did anything "creepy". (although he did admit that it was a creepy mask, and put it in his office where the rest of us didn't have to look at it). Unfortunately, I haven't had contact with him for a number of years, but I doubt anything has happened with his mask. This happened in a house in the SW Hills of Portland, Oregon (near the tallest point in Portland - Council Crest). All in all my entire family (with or without me) lived in that house for 9 years.)

-aeh49-

(UPDATE: The author of this tale sent the following addition...)

After talking to my sister about what happened after I moved out, she reminded me that my mom had called in a psychic friend of hers to "feel" the house. This friend said that the spirit that was haunting the place was actually the spirit of a man who murdered the man who was buried behind the house! Unfortunately, the psychic was too scared to do anything else. (I don't blame her)

-aeh49-