The Haunting of Windham hospital

"Are you sure about this one?" Gwen Pherson brushed the blonde hair out of her steel blue eyes and smiled at me. "Thomas, are you scared? Hmm? Is that fear I smell?"

"Nah, that's your perfume." We exchanged grins. She knew me well enough to know that investigating haunted locales never bothered me. But this place, this hospital--something about it didn't sit well with me at all.

Two days later we were sitting in the back of Adam Rogers van. Parked in Windham Hospital 's parking lot. Adam was our camera man, Gwen handled meetings and hosted our little cable access show, and I was responsible for the EVPs. We'd explore potential haunted locations, and then confirm whether or not the place was truly haunted. We had yet to find a real haunted place, much to my relief.

"Gentlemen." Gwen's eyes lit up; she loved this. "Welcome to Windham Hospital . Built in the early 1900's, it served as both a hospital and a laboratory for the owner, one Dr. Richard Windham. After the morgue got overpopulated, he built a tunnel that led to another storage unit, which held several hundred bodies."

"So he liked experimenting on the dead?" Adam asked.

"No, people died from his experiments. He was quite mad."

I peeked my head out the window to get a look at this place. It was a big box with several windows, looming at least five floors high. It was getting pretty dark and the moon was casting shadows all across the building's exterior, but I could still make out the American flag hanging on the roof, and the woman standing next to it in her hospital gown.

"I thought this place was deserted?" Gwen and Adam peered out the window and saw her as well. Adam grabbed his camera and we bolted from the van and scrambled across the parking lot. Adam aimed his camera up to the rooftop just as the woman jumped.

She hit the ground without making a sound. We ran up to her, stopping just short when she suddenly sat up and pointed at us

"Leave here at once, you fools!" she cried just before vanishing.

"Well, looks haunted to me!" Adam said as he started to turn the camera off. Gwen grabbed his arm.

"Don't you see? It really is haunted. This could put us over the top!"

"Top of what? We're cable access; we don't even get paid for this!" I listened to them bicker while looking around the building. I just couldn't shake the feeling that I was being watched. Something caught the corner of my eye, and looking up, I could just make out a child looking down at me from one of the upper floors. She smiled and waved to me just before she vanished. I stood there transfixed for a moment, until hearing my name brought me back.

"Ready, Thomas?" Gwen was half leading, half dragging Adam up the front steps. I followed close behind.

The building was cold and dark, moisture dripping from paint-chipped walls. It still had that faint hospital smell to it, mixed with the aroma of decay and death. We made our way by flash and camera light to the staircase. "Fifth floor," Gwen muttered as we followed her up the steps.

There was a sign on the door that read 'PEDIATRICS'. My mind flashed back to the little girl in the window. I wanted so badly to turn around and leave, just forget about the whole haunted thing. Adam pushed open the door and we immediately heard the sounds of children's laughter. Out of instinct I fished out my tape recorder and started recording.

It was like stepping into the past. The hallways were clean, and it smelled sanitized. Children skipped up and down the corridor, a young girl sat in a rocking chair in the corner looking out the window. I recognized her right away.

"Hello again," I said, walking up to her. I could hear Gwen in the background telling Adam to film me talking to the ghost. The girl hugged her teddy bear and looked up at me, a big grin on her face.

"I've been waiting for you," she said, handing me her teddy. I gave it a hug and handed it back. "Don't be afraid, you'll like it here."

I couldn't escape her gaze. "I'll like it here? What do you mean, child?"

The girl looked over at Gwen, who was hiding behind Adam, then looked back at me. "She knows.

She'll take you to the man downstairs."

I turned back to Gwen, who went from being afraid to being petrified.

"Scared ya!" The girl said, laughing at Gwen.

"What's your name little girl?" I asked.

She smiled up at me and said, "You know me."

Suddenly, everything was gone. The corridor looked like the rest of the building, cold and dead. "What did she mean by the man downstairs?" Adam asked.

Gwen looked at me and shrugged. "Let's go find out."

We followed Gwen back down the stairs until we made it to the morgue. She started to push open the door, but Adam stopped her. "Why here, of all bloody places?" he asked.

She grinned at us both. "Don't you get it? 'The man downstairs' must be Dr. Windham himself, since he kept his lab down here."

She pushed past Adam and through the door. I took a deep breath and followed Adam, who was still cussing under his breath.

Like upstairs, the room looked like it must have years ago. Charts and photos lined the walls, surgical tools were spread neatly on silver carts, and in the middle of the room was a tall man in a lab coat performing surgery.

It took me a minute to realize the patient on the operating table was fully conscious and strapped down. His chest was cut open, the skin flaps pinned back. The man was in horrible pain, and the doctor just kept tooling away.

"Good lord," Adam gasped.

The doctor looked up at us, bloody scalpel in hand. "Ah, how is the tour going?" he asked.

"Fine," Gwen answered calmly. He smiled and went back to work. Adam looked through the camera lens, then handed it to me. Through the camera the room looked cold, rotted, and empty.

"Boys, I want you to meet my father, Dr. Richard Windham," Gwen said. The doctor waved to us from the table.

"But he died years ago!" Adam shouted.

Gwen looked at him and smiled. "Dear boy, so did I."

Adam and I both ran for the door. Adam made it just before I did. Suddenly Gwen rammed a scalpel into the back of his neck and pulled him back. I wanted to save him, but I knew it was too late. A hand grabbed the back of my jacket, but I pulled forward and rushed through the door and up the stairs, footsteps closing in behind me. I don't know how many flights I ran up before finally finding a stairway door. I slammed it behind me and placed my body against it. With my ear to the door I listened for the approaching footsteps. But the only sound I heard was my own heart racing and my own breathing.

Slowly, I stepped away from the door and cracked it open. Nothing but a dark stair case. I walked over to the window to see how far up I was. Suddenly, two pairs of hands grabbed me from behind and threw me through the glass. The ground came up before I had the chance to scream, my body bounced from the impact. Before my eyes closed, I could see the little girl--I knew now she was a young Gwen--waving to me from the upper window. Then, darkness.

I woke up in a hospital bed. The sights and sounds of civilization felt good to me. A man walked by my door pushing a cart. He resembled Adam, only younger. He smiled, waved, and went on down the hallway. I tried to wave back and realized my arms were strapped to the bed. I looked around the room, realizing the time frame was all wrong. Nothing computerized, not even a TV in the room. I strained to look out the window and saw the van still sitting were we parked it. Just then Gwen, in full nursing uniform, came in with an orderly and started to wheel me out to the hallway.

"The Doctor will see you now," she grinned. That's when I realized, with sudden clarity, that it was me who was strapped to the table. I closed my eyes and prayed to God that my soul would not be a prisoner of Windham hospital.

Gwen heard me and bent over to my ear. "My dear, you already are."

THE END