.png "Amanda Restover"){kind=small}
horror short stories to read I Visited a Spooky Abandoned Hospital at Night and Something Followed Me Home
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| A Real Life Ghost Story |
Did you know that in some older cultures, they say you should never leave a graveyard or a place of death without walking backward for a few steps, just to make sure nothing is walking in your shadow?
It sounds stupid, right? Just another old wives' tale to scare kids. I thought so too. I thought buildings were just piles of brick and wood and that "hauntings" were just history refusing to fade away. I was wrong. I was so, so wrong.
Why do I even do this?
I’ve always been obsessed with broken things. As a writer who hunts down true horror stories, I find a weird kind of peace in decay. There’s something quiet about an abandoned house, like it’s finally sleeping after a long life. That curiosity that need to see what normal people ignore is what drove me to the edge of town, to a place I’ll call The Ward. It used to be a TB sanatorium, then a psych ward, before they shut it down in the 90s. If you Google haunted abandoned hospitals, you’ll see the threads. People talk about the screaming, the shadows, the feeling of eyes on you. Standard stuff. I’d been to plenty of terrifying haunted houses before. I expected graffiti and maybe a homeless guy or a raccoon. I went there looking for content for the site. I didn’t expect to bring the content home with me.The Silence was heavy
I parked way down the road so no one would see the car. The walk to the fence was fine, just crickets and gravel crunching under my boots. It was a clear night, moonlight making everything look like silver foil. But the second I squeezed through the hole in the chain-link fence, everything changed. It wasn’t slow. It was instant. The air got heavy, like walking into water. And the noise... it just stopped. No crickets. No wind. Just a vacuum. I walked to the main building, flashlight cutting through the dark. The front doors were chained, but a side window was smashed open. I climbed in, glass crunching under my feet like bones. The smell hit me first. Not mold. Not rot. It smelled like antiseptic and copper. It smelled like bleach and blood, sharp and fresh. Which is impossible. The place has been rotting for thirty years.Horror short stories to read: “A Real-Life Horror Story of Phrogging and Home Invasion” click to uncover the chilling truth hiding inside someone’s home.
Upstairs in the dark
I walked through the first floor, snapping photos. Wheelchairs rusting in hallways, probably staged by kids, but still creepy. I was looking for paranormal activity, scanning for orbs or whatever, talking to myself to keep calm. "Look at that paint peel," I whispered. "Great texture." But when I got to the third floor the high-security wing the vibe shifted. It got cold. Fast. Not just chilly, but freezing. My breath started fogging up in front of my face in these violent white clouds. My flashlight started doing this weird pulsing thing, flickering like a dying heartbeat. Thump. Thump.The thing in the surgery room
I ended up outside the operating theater. The doors were wide open. In the middle of the room, lit up just by the moonlight coming through the dirty windows, was the table. And there was something standing next to it. It wasn’t a shadow cast by a tree. It was a mass. Taller than a guy, standing perfectly still. No face, no clothes. Just a black hole in the shape of a person. I wanted to run, but my legs wouldn’t work. I just stood there, frozen. It didn't move, but I could feel it looking at me. It felt heavy, pressing on my chest, squeezing the air out. The pressure was building. It was building and building and building. Then a noise tore through the room a screech, metal on metal, like a scalpel dragging across a steel tray. That broke the spell. I turned and ran. I didn't care about the noise, the glass, the rusty nails. I sprinted, flashlight shaking all over the walls, making the shadows look like grabbing hands. I vaulted the window, hit the dirt, and didn't stop until I was in my car with the doors locked. I sat there gasping, checking the mirror. Nothing. Just the road. I thought I was safe. I thought the horror story stayed at the hospital.It came back with me
The drive home was awful. Every car behind me felt like it was chasing me. But I got home, locked the door, turned on every single light, and poured a drink. "Just panic," I told myself. "Infrasound. Mold spores. You scared yourself." I went to bed at 3 AM. But then I woke up.The uninvited guest
It started small. That’s how demonic attachments work, I guess. They wear you down. First night: the cold. My room is usually warm, but I woke up shivering, seeing my breath again. Thermostat said 72.Second night: the sound. I was just drifting off when I heard it a heavy boot step on the hardwood in the living room. Crunch. Silence. Then another. Crunch. I grabbed a bat, checked the whole apartment. Locked. Empty. But that smell was back bleach and copper.
It’s getting worse
By night four, I was a wreck. I couldn't sleep. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw that black shape.I was on the couch, staring at the TV, not even watching it, when I felt it. A hand. Cold, heavy, resting right on my shoulder. Not a draft. Fingers. I froze. That pressure came back, building and building and building. The air felt static, hairs standing up on my arms. "Leave me alone," I whispered. I sounded pathetic. The TV turned off. The kitchen lights flickered and died. And from the dark hallway, I heard it.
Scrrreeeeeeech. The scalpel on the tray. It followed me. It wasn’t haunting the building anymore. It was haunting me.
Living with it
It’s been two weeks. I’m writing this with all the lights on. I’ve burned sage. I’ve yelled at the empty air. It hasn't left. Stuff goes missing. Cabinets are open in the morning. I wake up with bruises that look like fingerprints. Paranormal phenomenon isn't fun when it's in your house. It’s exhausting. I’m telling you this to warn you. We treat abandoned places like playgrounds. We treat the supernatural like a game. But some games have consequences. I am so tired. But I can't sleep. Because I know the second I close my eyes, that shadow in the corner gets closer. It’s watching me type this. I can feel it. And it’s patient. Do you have a story like this? I know I’m not the only one. If you’ve gone to a haunted location and brought something back, or if you have a spiritual attachment you can't explain, I need to hear it. No one else believes us, but I do.Share your horror story in the comments. Let’s talk about the things hiding in the dark.
.png "Amanda Restover")