Ghost Handprints

My wife Jill and I were driving home from a friend's party late one evening in early may. It was a beautiful night with a full moon. We were laughing and discussing the party when the engine started to cough and the emergancey light came on. We had just reached the railroad crossingwhere Villamain Road becomes Shane Road. According to local legand, this was the place where a school bus full of children stalled on the tracks. Everyone on the bus had been killed by an oncoming freight train. The ghost of the children were reported to haunt this intersection and were said to protect peoplefrom danger.

Not wanting a repeat of the train crash, I hit the gas pedal, trying to get our car safely across the tracks before it broke down completely. But the dad-blamed car wouldn't cooperate. It stalled dead center on the railroad tracks.

As if that weren't enough, the railroad signals started flashing and a bright light appeared a little ways down the track, bearing down fast onn our car. I turned the key and hit the gas pedal, trying to get the car started.

"Hurry up, Jim! The train's coming." My wife urged, as if I didn't hear the whistling blowing a warning.

I broke out into a sweat and tried the engine again. Nothing.

"We have to get out!" I shouted to my wife.

"I can't." Jill shouted desperately. she was struggling with her seat belt. we'd been having trouble with it recently. She'd been stuck more than once, and I'd had to help her get it undone.

I through myself across the stick-shift and fought with the recalcitrant seat belt. My hands were shakingand sweat poured down my body as I felt the rumble of the approaching train. It had seen us an was whistling sharply. I risked a quick glance over my shoulder. The engineer was trying to slow down, but he was too close to stop before he hit us. I redoubled my efforts.

Suddenly, the car was given a shark shove from behind. Jill and I both gasped and I fell into her lap as the car started to roll forward, slowly at first, then gaining speed. The back end cleared the tracks just a second before the train roared passed. As the car rolled to a stop on the far side of the tracks, the engineer stuck his head out the window of the engine and waved a fist at us; doubtless shouting something nasty at us for scaring him.

"Th..that was close," Jill gasped as I struggled upright. "How did you get the car to move?"

"I didn't," I said. "Someone must have helped us."

I jumped out of the door on the driver's side of the cara and back to the tracks to thank our rescuer. In the bright moonlight, I searched the area, looking for the person who had pushed our car out of the oath of the train. There was no one there. I calledout several times, but  no one answered. After a few minutes strugglewith her seatbelt, Jill finally freed herself  and joined me.

"where is he?" she asked.

"There is no one here." I replied, puzzled.

"Maybe he is just shy about being thanked," Jill said. She raised her voice. "Thank you, whoever you are." she called.

The wind picked up a little, swirling around us, patting our hair and shoulders like a soft touch of a child's hand. I shivered and hugged my wife tightly to me. We had almost died tonight, and I was greatful to be alive.

"Yes, thank you." I replied loudly to our mystery rescuer.

As we turned back to our stalled vehicle, I pulled out my cell phone, ready to call for a tow truck. Beside me, Jill stopped suddenly, staring at the back of our car.

"Jim, look!" She gasped.

I stared at our vehicle. Scattered in serveral places across the back of our car were several glowing handprints. There were small handprints; the kind that adorned the walls of elementary schools all over the country. I started shaking as I realized the truth; our car had been pushed off the tracks by the ghost of the school children killed at this location.

The wiind swept around us again, and I thought I heard an echo of childish voices whispering 'You're welcome' as it patted our shoulders and arms.Then the wind died down and the handprints faded from the back of the car.
Jill and I clung together for a moment in terror and delight. Finally, I released her and she got into the car while I called the local garage to come and give us a tow home.

Skinned Tom

IN LIFE, Tom was a good-looking guy who liked the ladies. Once he'd dated all the available girls in the area, he started seeing a girl in the next town -- not knowing she was married. Eventually her husband got wind of what was going on and vowed revenge on the two of them. He told his wife he was going out of town for the weekend, then hid in the woods behind their house. As he'd guessed, that evening Tom showed up to take the lady out. The husband followed them to the nearby Lovers' Lane.

Things were getting pretty hot and heavy (if you know what I mean) when all of a sudden the car door was jerked open and Tom came face-to-face with one very huge, very angry-looking dude wielding a hunting knife.

"Oh no!" screamed the girl who had started all the trouble in the first place. "It's my husband!"

"That's right, you cheating @#%&*!" yelled her husband. "And I'm about to teach you a lesson you'll never forget!" He pulled her off Tom, rammed the knife into her stomach once, and tossed her aside. Then he turned back to Tom, grinning maniacally.

"Don't hurt me!" Tom begged. "I swear to God I didn't know she was married!" But the wronged husband didn't listen. He dragged Tom out of the car and skinned him alive with the hunting knife. Then he went to town and turned himself in to the police.

When the police arrived at the crime scene, they found the woman, who was miraculously still alive. But Tom was nowhere to be found.

They say he's still hanging around Lovers' Lane, waiting to catch a couple and "teach" them the same lesson his girlfriend's husband taught him. He's described as a bloody skeleton in '20s clothes, carrying the knife he himself was skinned with. All the teenagers around here grow up hearing "Don't go to Lovers' Lane if you don't want to be Skinned Tom's next victim!"

The Body in the Bed

A NEWLYWED husband and wife went to Las Vegas for their honeymoon, and checked into a suite at a hotel. When they got to their room they both detected a bad odor. The husband called down to the front desk and asked to speak to the manager. He explained that the room smelled very bad and they would like another suite. The manager apologized and told the man that they were all booked because of a convention. He offered to send them to a restaurant of their choice for lunch compliments of the hotel and said he was going to send a maid up to their room to clean and to try and get rid of the odor.

After a nice lunch the couple went back to their room. When they walked in they could both still smell the same odor. Again the husband called the front desk and told the manager that the room still smelled really bad. The manager told the man that they would try and find a suite at another hotel. He called every hotel on the strip, but every hotel was sold out because of the convention. The manager told the couple that they couldn't find them a room anywhere, but they would try and clean the room again. The couple wanted to see the sights and do a little gambling anyway, so they said they would give them two hours to clean and then they would be back.

When the couple had left, the manager and all of housekeeping went to the room to try and find what was making the room smell so bad. They searched the entire room and found nothing, so the maids changed the sheets, changed the towels, took down the curtains and put new ones up, cleaned the carpet and cleaned the suite again using the strongest cleaning products they had. The couple came back two hours later to find the room still had a bad odor. The husband was so angry at this point, he decided to find whatever this smell was himself. So he started tearing the entire suite apart himself.

As he pulled the top mattress off the box spring he found a dead body of a woman.

The Knife in the Briefcase

ONE SUMMER day in Southampton, New York, a woman pulled into a gas station. As the attendant pumped gas, the woman told him she was in a hurry to pick up her daughter, who had just finished an art class in East Hampton.

A very-well-dressed man walked over to her car and started talking to her. He explained that his rental car had died, and he needed a ride to East Hampton for an appointment. She said she would be happy to give him a ride. He put his briefcase in the backseat and said he was going to the men's room quickly.

The woman looked at her watch and suddenly panicked. She drove off quickly, having forgotten that the man was coming back to the car for a ride.

She thought nothing of him again until she and her daughter pulled into their driveway. She saw his briefcase and realized she had forgotten him! She opened the briefcase looking for some form of identification so she could notify him about his belongings. Inside she found nothing but a knife and a roll of duct tape!

Bride-and-Seek

BACK IN '75 a young couple, both 18, decided to get married right after high school. The father of the bride lived in Palm Beach in a mansion and was able to afford a big wedding for them. To make a long story short, they got married and the wedding was beautiful.

After the wedding they had a big reception in an old building and everyone got pretty drunk. When there were only about 20 people left, the groom decided that they should play hide-and-seek. Everyone agreed and the groom was "it." They all went and hid and the game went on.

After about 20 minutes everyone had been found except the bride. Everyone looked everywhere and tore the whole place apart looking for her. After a few hours the groom was furious, thinking the bride was playing a terrible trick. Eventually, everyone went home.

A few weeks later the groom, having placed a missing persons report, gave up looking for her. Heartbroken, he tried to go on with his life.

Three years later a little old woman was cleaning the place up. She happened to be in the attic and saw an old trunk. She dusted it off, and, out of curiosity, opened it. She screamed at the top of her lungs, ran out of the building and called the police.

Apparently, the bride had decided to hide in the trunk for the game of hide-and-seek. When she sat down, the lid fell, knocking her unconscious and locking her inside. She suffocated after a day or so. When the woman found her, she was rotting, her mouth in the shape of a scream.

The Fatal Hairdo

Something terrible happened to a 10-year-old girl who had braids. The little girl had been wearing her braids in a ponytail for the longest time, and apparently the braids were old, at least 2 to 3 months old, and the mother never took them down to wash them or let them air out or anything.

Anyway, the girl had been complaining to her mother about having a headache for about two weeks, but her mother just brushed it off, assuming that she had hit her head against the wall or something. Well, one morning the child again complained to her mother about having a headache while getting ready for school. Again, the mother brushed her off. When the child got to school, she told her teacher that her head was hurting. The teacher assumed that the braids were too tight in the child's hair and attempted to let the ponytail down. When she removed the hair piece and let the braids loose, there was a spider in the child's hair.

The spider had laid eggs in the child's hair and the spiders were eating her scalp. She was rushed to the hospital, where she later died.

This happened in Monroe, La. It was all over the news and in the papers for about a week or so. Please, parents, don't leave braids or any kind of hair extensions in children's (or your own) hair — no more than 2-3 weeks!

The Choking Doberman

MY COUSIN and his wife lived in Sydney with this huge doberman in a little apartment off Maroubra Road. One night they went out for dinner and a spot of clubbing. By the time they got home it was late and my cousin was more than a little drunk. They got in the door and were greeted by the dog choking to death in the loungeroom.

My cousin just fainted, but his wife rang the veterinarian, who was an old family friend of hers, and got her to agree to meet her at the surgery. The wife drives over and drops off the dog, but decides that she'd better go home and get her hubby into bed.

She gets home and finally slaps my cousin into consciousness, but he's still drunk. It takes her almost half an hour to get him up the stairs, and then the phone rings. She's tempted to just leave it, but she decides that it must be important or they wouldn't be ringing that late at night. As soon as she picks up the phone, she hears the vet's voice screaming out:

"Thank God I got you in time! Leave the house! Now! No time to explain!" Then the vet hangs up.

Because she's such an old family friend, the wife trusts her, and so she starts getting the hubby down the stairs and out of the house. By the time they've made it all the way out, the police are outside. They rush up the front stairs past the couple and into the house, but my cousin's wife still doesn't have a clue what's going on.

The vet shows up and says, "Have they got him? Have they got him?"

"Have they got who?" says the wife, starting to get really pissed off.

"Well, I found out what the dog was choking on – it was a human finger."

Just then the police drag out a dirty, stubbly man who is bleeding profusely from one hand. "Hey Sarge," one of them yells. "We found him in the bedroom."