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After the closed-doors incident, it was no more than a day later that the more sinister event occurred. This
time, I came home to find the apartement filled with gas from the stove. Fortunately, this time, one of the windows
had been left open. I used a fan to finish airing out the apartment.
Neither of my roomates owned up to leaving the stove on, and were very adamanant that they had not
even used the thing. This was true enough, as nothing had been cooked the night before. Nor could it have been
"brushed up against" and turned on. The knob to actually start the stove was fairly difficult to turn. It would have
required some actual effort by someone to turn on.
Needless to say, my thoughts were not of the paranormal type. I assumed that someone had a key to the
apartment still and was playing tricks on us. Our landlord assured us this was not so, but as a precaution I
insisted that the locks be changed. This was never done, and, oddly enough, nothing further occurred in that
apartment.
After Nikki moved out, my new friend (at the time) Mike O. moved in. We stayed on in the same apartment
for several months, before an opening in one of the one-bedrooms on the groundfloor opened up. Mike made the
living room his bedroom, I took the actual bedroom.
This apartment is entirely different from the attic in appearance. The living room/bedroom is good-sized,
with the vaulted ceiling and wide, spacious windows looking out on the park across Court Street. A small breakfast
nook leads to a very large tiled kitchen, which had served as the central kitchen for all of the apartments in older
days. A short hall passes the tiny bath and walk-in shower, then on to my bedroom. Making a small loop, a shorter hall
then wraps back to the living room. Of all the places I have ever lived, though small for roomates, it was the best
I had ever lived in.
We converted the breakfast nook into a sort of office, his computer and desk against one wall, mine against
the other. One side, the side with his desk, also looked out onto our little balcony, which was accessible through
double-doors in the living room. Often, one or both of us would play or work late into the night in the office,
computer keys tapping away at a furious pace.
In those days, Mike would sometimes pick up some beer and drink himself to sleep. It's not something
he does now, thankfully, but in those unhappy times it was more than infrequent. One evening, long after he had
passed out, I was researching medieval Europe for a game I was developing. From where I was sitting, I could
see Mike splayed out, bottle in one hand, head propped forward, snoring away. Heather was not there, though
I can not remember why now.
I was wide awake. I emphasize this, only because when it is late and one is not quite awake, the mind can
play tricks on you. I was, however, solidly awake, and had not shared a usual beer with Mike. Mid-sentence,
staring at the moniter, I heard a voice in my left ear say, "Shawn."
The voice was a female voice, and it was said clearly into my ear. It sounded loud, but only because of the
vicinity of the voice. My name had been said abruptly, and that was all. I immediately looked to Mike. No change.
He was a good distance away, and snoring softly. I looked out the window. No one was on the balcony, no one
outside the other window in the drive.
I do not know that all of the events I have mentioned are related, or even by the same "spirit", if the first ever
were. There are certainly enough reasons why the first events could have been naturally caused. And while I will
admit that even wide-awake the mind can play tricks on you, I am as certain as I can be, that someone had given
me a quick acknowledgement that they knew who I was, and that they wanted me to know that they were there.
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