I don’t believe in ghosts but I may have seen one when I was 18.

It was the summer after I graduated high school and I was in Italy, discovering what the world outside of both high school and America looked like.  That night, my sisters and I were staying at a hotel in Rome.  I had a room to myself.  The Vatican was nearby.  At two o’clock in the morning, I could still hear the sound of motor scooters roaring past on the streets below my window.  I naturally wanted to go outside and see what was happening but I had promised my sisters that I would not leave the hotel and wander around Rome late at night.  As they pointed out, I didn’t speak Italian so, if I got lost or into any sort of trouble, there would be no way for me to ask for help.  As well, we were visiting the Vatican tomorrow morning.  I didn’t have to sleep, they knew better than to ask me to do that.  But I did need to stay in the hotel.

So, I took a shower, I put on my usual late night outfit of a t-shirt and underwear, and I lay in bed and I listened to the scooters outside.  When I got bored with the scooters, I turned on the TV and I watched an episode of an American soap opera that had been dubbed into Italian.  I could follow the plot just fine and I found myself wondering if maybe my sisters had been exaggerating the language difference.

Finally, I decided that, even if I couldn’t go outside, there was no reason why I couldn’t step outside of my room and walk up and down the hotel hallway.  It would give me a chance to stretch my legs and work off my restlessness.  Plus, it was two in the morning.  Every other guest at the hotel was probably asleep.  I’d have the hallway to myself.

I stood up and walked over to the door of my hotel room.  As I approached, I felt a chill in the air and I shivered a bit.  At the time, I didn’t think much of it, figuring it was due to me being underdressed and that maybe there was just a random cold spot in the room.  I put my hand on the door knob, turned it, and slowly opened my door.

There was a woman standing directly across the hall from my room.  She appeared to be in her forties, short and slightly heavy-set with long, jet black hair.  She was wearing a shapeless brown dress and her dark eyes narrowed at the sight of me.  What I immediately noticed about her was that her skin was an ashen gray.

I stared at her for a few seconds, not knowing what to say but fully aware that she was glaring at me.

Slowly, she asked, in perfect English that carried not a trace of an accent, “What are you doing here?”

I still didn’t know what to say.

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE!?” she snapped.

I tried to say something but the words wouldn’t come.

“I OWN THIS HOTEL!” she yelled, “WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE!?”

She started to move towards my room.  I slammed the door shut and locked it.

I stood there for what seemed to be an eternity, listening for her.  I was expecting her to start pounding on the door and screaming at me to come out but she didn’t.  Instead, after I shut the door, I didn’t hear anything in the hallway.  I didn’t hear her breathing.  I didn’t hear her walking away.  I didn’t hear anything.

Finally, after what seemed like an hour but was probably just a few minutes, I open the door a crack and peeked outside.  The hallway was empty.  The woman, whoever she had been, was gone.  Still, I wasn’t going to take a risk.  I closed the door again, got back in bed, and I didn’t get out of bed until the next morning.

When I asked my sisters if they had seen the woman, they had no idea who I was talking about.  They hadn’t any seen any woman fitting the description at the hotel.  They told me that I should have called them or the front desk for help and they were probably right but, at that moment, I had been too frightened to do anything.  I had seen enough horror movies to know that calling for help was usually the least effective thing you could do when confronted by a maniac.  It was my sister Erin who told me that the woman was probably a ghost, maybe the former owner of hotel demanding to know why I was in her home at two in the morning.  Maybe she was.  I don’t believe in ghosts but if I ever did see one, it was probably her.

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3. The Neighborhood, This Morning by Erin Nicole
4. The Neighborhood, This Afternoon by Erin Nicole
5. Walking In The Rain by Erin Nicole
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