Ghost stories

Midway Plantation

I was living with my dad when I was 13 and he had just broken up with girlfriend. He told me in the car as he drove around an apartment complex. "This is where you and I will be living now"

I looked around. There were brand new apartments just across the bridge from the Midway Shopping centers. Around the apartments was old farmland and a pond. And 540 just on the other side of that.
The Midway shopping center was built on the Midway plantation after the owners moved the house across town, away from all construction and bustling new highway. At the time I didn't know that. I just knew the land was a bunch of trees and an old farm.

We settled into our new place quickly and I couldn't have been more excited. I had many friends who lived in the same complex and my dad allowed me to decorate my room however I wanted. A teenager's dream. But really it wasn't long before we started noticing that things were very off. We'd go into the kitchen first thing some mornings and all the cabinets, I mean all of them, and the even dishwasher would be wide open. This happened at least 5 times. I blamed my dad and of course he blamed me. We just both have that kind of humor to pull pranks. But everytime neither of us took the blame.

One night when my dad was home from work, which was a rare occurence, we ate dinner and watched a movie together. Everything was fine and normal. We kept a single lamp on during the movie so that we wouldn't be in complete darkness other than the light from the TV. All of a sudden something near the front door caught my eye and I turned my head quickly to see what it was.

"Did you see that?" My dad asked.

"You saw it too?" I asked.

"Something grey just ran around over there." He said. He got up to look. He checked all the closets and the bathroom near the front door to see what it was and he found nothing. "I know I saw something move"

"I saw it too" i said.

We both agreed it was odd that we both saw something move and yet nothing was there. But we just ignored it and continued watching the movie.

Just a few days later when we were chatting over breakfast we saw something move again except it was near his bedroom and we both got a better view of what it was.

"Was that a cat?!" He ran to the bedroom, again finding nothing.

We both saw the same thing. It was a dark grey cat scurrying throughout the apartment. But how did it get in? Where did it go? I wasn't crazy. He wasn't crazy. We both saw it. The cat appeared and vanished in an instant but we both saw it. Since it was a cat and both of us are cat people we just thought it was cool. Like our own little ghost pet that popped up at random times. It was just a cat. It can't be evil.

Part of me did feel a little uneasy about it. A ghost cat in an apartment? Soon after the second sighting of the cat we saw it more and more. Each time was only for a split second. My grandmother said one day when we were both gone and she was doing chores for us that she saw it scurrying around the corner in the kitchen then disappeared. It made her feel uneasy as well. My dad accepted it with open arms.

One night I was laying in bed while my dad was watching TV in the livingroom. I was in and out of sleep when suddenly I felt a pressure on my chest. I felt my body slowly being pushed into the bed and I was starting to lose my breath. I felt something heavy on my body and I couldn't move. I was too scared and shocked to call out for help. After a few seconds my body felt light again and I was able to move and breathe. I ran to the livingroom gasping for breath.

"The cat. I think it was on top of me." I managed to say. It was like a cat was sitting on my chest and suffocating me as even live cats do.

He didn't have much to say. He told me sometimes he feels like something or someone is sitting in the bed with him sometimes as well. Never suffocating him, but he can feel the bed shifting as if there is something heavy beside him. We both just decided to stick with the ghost cat theory to help us rest.

I noticed unusual things while we lived in that apartment and they always happened randomly. Once I smelled smoke in the middle of the day. I walked all around our building to find the source just in case I needed to call 911. The smell was ao strong like it was in the building, but none of the fire alarms were going off. The same time I smelled the smoke I heard horses and a carriage outside the window. I heard the sound of hooves hitting pavement and neighing and even the sound of raggedy squeeky wheels. It was a sound I was familiar with since I had lots of experience at various horse shows and trail rides. Our apartment was at the back of the the complex and our windows faced the empty field and pond so I wouldn't have been surprised if I saw people riding horses around the field. But I looked and saw nothing. And the smell of smoke disappeared imediately. But I know I didn't imagine it.

My dad also told me I started sleep walking. He said I would get up in the middle of the night, walk to the kitchen and drink from the milk jug. He said it happened quite a few times. Sometimes he would be in the living room watching TV and he would say something and I never responded. My eyes were barely open and I never had an expression on my face. Sometimes if he heard me leave my room he would get out of bed and watch just to make sure I didn't go outside. That was his main concern. He said it didn't bother him that I drank the milk, but it concerned him all the same and I stopped sleep walking after we moved, which concerned me. I don't remember any of it. I don't even recall having any nightmares or dreams on the nights that it happened.

One morning I was standing at the bus stop like usual. One of the kids who waited with me ran to the bus stop and was acting hysterical. The rest of us were half awake and confused. He went on to tell us that he went for a walk around the complex and the pond a few weeks back and took photos with a disposable. He showed us the photos. I was astonished at what was in them. Around the pond and even the sidewalks near the buildings there were greyish white misty figures. They weren't the exact shape of a person but the silhouette showed tall slim figures.

We were all fascinated. I never spoke to anyone other than family about the weird occurances in my building. The kid lived in another building across the complex and when I asked what made him want to take photos he said he kept feeling like he was being watched im his own home. And he went for a walk one day around the pond and saw things out the corner of his eyes. So he decided to investigate. I told him about all my experiences and he said he sometimes smelled smoke too, especially when he felt like he was being watched. He said sometimes his TV would even flip channels by itself.

After moving away I watched a documentary on the history of Knightdale and Midway Plantation. The whole area where the apartment complex and even a few miles around it were all part of the plantation at one point. The documentary showed an old slave graveyard not even a mile from the apartments. The graveyard is still there but it is difficult to find since it is covered in weeds. It is sad to think that maybe the spirits we encountered could have been slaves. It is possible that the construction of the new apartments, new highway and booming businesses could have stirred them up. I don't think they were necessarily angry or mean or evil. I think they were just there as were we. But I'll never look at those apartments the same again. I'll never recommend them to anyone not because they were awful, I just wouldn't want to further disturb the spirits that are there. I hope they get peace as they deserve it.