Winchester: Can I sleep with you Mommy?

Our life with Tommy was proving to be a way of life now. We were all used to the noises, knocks, and sound of another child in the house. The dog was still alert to every little happening, and it would still catch my attention, but I knew what it was and it never alarmed me. The night was still an active time in the home. After everyone was getting ready for rest and to go to sleep. Relatively calm, but still active. My husband had to go out to do some training on San Clemente Island and was going to be gone a few weeks. Everything became highly active in the home immediately after he left and continued the entire time I always felt like Tommy was more comfortable when he was not there.

On the first night he was gone, all was quiet. Like there was no Tommy at all. Until the second night. He was back. It was an eventful day taking the kids to the beach and having ice cream on the island. Coming home to play in the backyard and with toys. The children and I watched movies and had dinner. After they had warm bubble baths and milk and were all cozy and ready for bed. Eventually after cleaning up and locking everything up, I too made my way to bed. I was so unrealistically tired. I couldn't wait to get to sleep. I shut off all of the lights except the night lights, got ready for bed all alone in my big comfy bed and slowly dozed off.

It was 3 am when I awoke to the sound of little footsteps making their way into my bedroom. I heard a little boy say “Can I sleep with you mommy”? I was still so tired that I could not fully open my eyes. I gave a weak “uh huh” and I felt the tug on my blankets as a little one climbed into bed with me, and back to sleep I fell. The next morning I woke up all alone.

This continued for the next three nights. I was starting to wonder why my son was having trouble sleeping and wanting to come into bed with me every single night. When I sat down and asked him about it, he did not know what I was talking about. He said he never got into bed with me. Suspicious as it was, I had an idea of what was happening, but I wanted to be sure. After the children went to bed this night, I was again, very sleepy. I easily dozed off with no trouble.

I was again, awoken by a little voice saying “Can I sleep with you mommy?” along with the tugging on my blankets. I opened my eyes and was having trouble waking. I was so tired and just wanted to go back to sleep. I fought it and focused on who crawled into bed with me. My son was not there. It was a tiny sleeping boy, the same round faced boy with the sleek brown hair. It was Tommy. I could not help but fall back asleep. It was so hard to stay awake. In the morning I was, as usual, all alone. This was becoming a habit. Strange obviously, yet not as scary as one would think. I was of course alarming, but at the same time, I was always safe. I was never harmed or in danger. I did not feel like it was a terribly bad thing but still, peculiar. Most people would want to leave in a hurry, or have their home cleansed by a priest and fear for their safety and lives, but I really had no reason for all of that. Clearly, there was still someone here in the home, but it never felt frightening.

I began to become extremely interested in the history of this house. As I said, it was built in 1940, so with that much history and that far back in time, there could have been so many stories if the walls could talk. I spoke with the landlord about when he and his family lived in the house, or any past tenants mentioning anything abnormal happening there. He did admit to strange things happening when they lived there, and that his past tenants had brought to his attention that weird things were happening. He told me that years back he tried to look into the history of the house and the file on it was considered “locked” and there was no way of getting any information. Now, when you buy or rent a home, the real estate companies are required to give you the history of anything that happened in the home back at least 5 years. At least it was 5 years when we were in this house. So if there was a crime, or death, you can be told. Anything before that is not necessary to tell. From the looks of the way this boy was dressed, he was there long before 5 years before. Why on earth would a house file be locked though? What horrible thing could have happened for that information to be locked. It was quite odd, but I knew that I was not alone in having these experiences. As far as I knew, I was the only one not running away scared requesting to break the lease. I was, in a way, starting to embrace it.

To be continued ...