I moved to South Carolina in 2017. Before then, my experience with ghosts was minimal. I would see things out of the corner of my eye, and I would play it off as my eyes playing tricks on me. When I started my new job at one of the outlet malls, the experiences with ghosts began to pick up.
I had been told that the outlet was haunted. Many ghost stories flew out of my managers mouth and at first, I thought she was trying to scare me. Then signs began to fall off the walls, and I would hear loud noises coming from the empty retail space next to us. However, there are two events that stick out to me. I can’t remember if they were related; my memory is the worst and I don’t remember which event happened first.
The first involves a family that came in. I worked at a children’s store, so it wasn’t odd for kids to come in. I don’t want it to seem like I am judging this family because I am not. They were all super nice and they never did anything weird. It was just a couple of things they said and they overall vibe they gave off. It was a woman, her two kids, and an older man. The mother and her older daughter stayed together while the man carried the little girl, I would say she was about six years old.
You know those kids you see in scary movies, with blonde hair and dark eyes that look all black? That is how this little girl looked. I stayed away because I was totally freaked out. In all reality, she was adorable, and nothing seemed off about her. Until the family came to check out.
The mother and older daughter came to the register first. The man and the youngest daughter came behind shortly after. At the same time the younger daughter was being carried to the register, a clip board that was on a flat surfaced, raised itself into the air and slammed itself on to the ground. The board dropped so hard that it opened, and the papers went flying.
I got scared and the mother asked me what happened. At first, I hadn’t seen the video of the clipboard coming to life, so I made the joke that it had to be the ghosts that are in the store. The mother then began and continued to tell me how her house was haunted so she knew when ghosts were around. And she could guarantee that there were no ghosts here. I didn’t believe her, and when the older daughter told her mother that she thought I was scared the mother turned around to look at me and said, “No she will be alright.” I almost died. She didn’t say it normal either, it was like she was predicting my future.
The second occurrence was when I was waking up to come to work. I was opening that day, so I had to wake up earlier than normal. I had accepted that ghosts were going to be following me everywhere now because after the family left, I checked the camera and saw that the clip board had done everything on its own, including raise itself off the counter (the space that it created could be seen in the video) and at the same time the little girl was across from it. I made the joke that the ghosts could hang out with me if they left me and my family alone. I still live by that today.
Anyway, I pulled the covers off my leg and began to stretch. I will preface this by saying that my nails are short. Like I chew off my nails to make them stubs short. I have soft cotton sheets that have no rough edges. But somehow, I woke up with a claw mark on my leg. It was on my calf, larger than my hand. It had all five fingers, but each finger came to a sharp point, where the nail should be. I immediately took a picture, so there would be proof. I still have it to this day. I told my mom and she tried to convince me that either I did it or my bed sheets did it.
Now I know believing in ghosts is not for everyone, but this couldn’t be explained. I got to work and waited for both of my managers to come in. One of them sprayed me with sage. I didn’t care though. I accepted that demons were now following me.
Ever since those incidents, I have become more in tune with energies around me. I know that they are in my room that I can’t see them. I am content with the fact that occasionally, they make themselves known. I might sound like I’m making it up, but I just see it as me being in tune with my dark side and realizing there are other spirits living in the world alongside me.