It was late November, just after Thanksgiving, and my 18-year-old son was closing on a house he just bought with his father’s inheritance he received when he passed away. I am glad I went because he had no clue what they were asking him and having him sign as we closed on his new house. The young man my son purchased the house from come across very rushed, scattered, sort of like he was running to the bank to cash the check to get another fix. He was clammy, impatient, and peeled out of the parking lot as soon as we signed over the payment for the house. At the last minute he came running in with a handwritten note that we agreed to give him 7 days to clean the bottom apartment out of the house, and not enter the rooms below. I had an extremely eerie feeling right that very moment in meeting him, some major internal alarms were being set off. After this event, we all started to drive to the home my son had just purchased.
The home itself sat at the end of dark city street with very minimal lights on the road. There were other homes close by, but over all it was dark and lonely area. Mainly duplexes that were vacant. The house my son purchased was built to be an apartment upstairs and another apartment downstairs. We found out later that the house was never built to code and it all needs to be torn down because of all the violations, maybe this was why the seller was eager to get the money run?
I had showed up to the home before anyone else. I even called him to see where he was, and he let me know he stopped at a hardware store to pick up new locks and keys to install. While waiting I called my husband to let him know I was there, it was starting to get dark as evening was approaching. On the phone with him I walked around the outside of the home. It didn’t seem too bad perfect for an 18-year kid who wanted his own place and be able to start a lawncare business. As I approached the bottom apartment entrance, I noticed the frame of the door was completely broken like someone had kicked it in. Being the overly curious person, I am, I proceeded to investigate further. I touched the door and it immediately popped right open to a pitch-black room. At this moment I had completely forgot about the handwritten contract the seller made my son sign about not entering this apartment. My husband is still on the phone with me urging me to not go in, wait for my son and his friends to get there. But something had ahold of me, something wanting me to come in and search further.
Stepping into the doorway, I reached around looking for a light switch. I soon found out that light switches here are not where you would look for them. The switches were placed very high or low on the walls, or even lights when you found them turned on in odd places in the rooms. I found the switch and turned it on, immediately I seen this room that had an oversized stuffed chair that had seen many days in the corner of the extremely dirty room. Next to this chair was a coffee can overflowing with cigarette butts. I felt confused slightly as I took in the room but was immediately saddened as I looked around and seen the many liquor bottles, prescription pill bottles, more cigarette butts. It reminded me of someone just sitting in this room drinking bottles of liquor, taking pills, and smoking all day long in this chair. Surrounded by a depressing dirty atmosphere that would consume anyone into the destructive cycle. Another room off this was the bathroom. You could immediately see the toilet from the entrance, just feet away from the chair. Next to the toilet another coffee can full of cigarette butts. Looking for the lights in the bathroom, I started to see that children were also living in the apartment. Walking through the bathroom, I immediately was in a very small kitchen with extremely dim lighting. So, depressing. At this point I am still on the phone with my husband who is begging me to get out, I am not hearing him, he can only hear my reactions as I am opening closets and blindly moving through the dark turning on lights in each of the rooms. The internal feeling, I had while being in this darkness was a total feeling of dread, fear, and doom. Something was still consuming me to walk through this apartment. As I turn on more lights and walk from room to room, I see needles, toys, stains all over the carpet, complete filth. Someone’s children were being forced to live in such a devasting squalor. The apartment had been built without following any codes, so navigating this apartment was hard since the shower was in the kitchen, and bedroom was also off the kitchen. As I got closer to this closed door, I could feel something very evil behind this door, not knowing what I would find, or where it went, I reached for the doorknob and opened it.
Once I realized it was a garage, all’s I could see what piles and piles of someone’s belongings. Lots of children’s items, clothing, boxes full of stuff. But the feeling of this garage felt like my heart was going to explode, I almost wouldn’t have been completely surprised to have found a body in the apartment. The evil feeling was that real, very alarming in many ways. At this point my husband is yelling into the phone – get out of there now! I start to hear him and leave immediately coming back the way I had come in leaving all the lights on. I was really worried about my son now owing this house. The feeling in my gut was this more then he can handle if there is something bad.
After waiting outside for a few more moments, my son and his friends show up. I call them over to the door and tell them what I experienced in this apartment and that he needs to be aware of what is in there in case the police come there to investigate some sort of crime, since he is now the owner of the property. As we are walking through, he doesn’t seem phased and even brushed it off. We walked out turned off the lights, closed the door, and went to the upstairs apartment. The upstairs apartment was a normal living situation. Looked like someone was taking care of it and kept it tidy and problem free. I felt a lot better knowing that he had a place in this house that was halfway safe feeling and helped him bring in cleaning supplies and household items I bought to help him get started in his new home.
When I finally left that evening, as I was driving home, I really felt the need to consult with a priest to walk through that bottom apartment and bless it. I had even talked with co workers and fellow parents about it. To them, it was just another story that they didn’t want to be involved in. As I started to get plans put together to get a priest to come, my son’s life starts to take an unexpected twist into a reckless lifestyle. I began to wonder if I should even take a priest there to deal with a bunch of young men who had never lived on their own and doing really what ever the pleased.
As time went on my son’s behavior was becoming erratic and random. I was having family dinners at my home every Sunday. I did this to keep him connected with us and our extended family. We met every Sunday at 6 pm to eat a dinner I cooked all day after church. This went on for several months, until my son didn’t show up or even call one Sunday. After I dinner, I received a collect call from the county jail, my son had been arrested and held over the weekend. He had pulled a gun on some people that wouldn’t leave his home, shooting the gun into the air to scare them off. Unfortunately, this was the wrong course of action, and he was sent to jail with a possible felony. Over the next few weeks, we went to court and was able to completely avoid any charges at all over the shooting his gun in a weapon free school zone.
One month later, I was getting ready to make Sunday family dinner, and I get a call from the police. The police officer asking me if my son had ever showed signs of being suicidal. The confusion hit me hard. The next I heard was you need to come to your son’s house right away, while his body is still warm. My heart sank, I felt the panic, fear, and numbness all at once and my husband and I raced to his home. Pulling onto his road all I could see was police cars and an ambulance all in the road in front of his home. I found out my son had hung himself in that garage….
As we closed his house, boarding windows, changing locks on doors, I laid a cross in the garage. One of those crosses that you can buy at church. The ones made of olive wood, with a crucifix of Jesus, filled with frankincense and oils. We just left everything how it was, boarding it up to be able to take care of all it later. After finishing up the legal process of his estate, I was finally able to return to his house and clean it out to start selling. Most of the stuff that was in this house, was not my son’s things at all. Most of this stuff was from past tenants that had lived there over the years. I had to rent a dumpster to throw away dozens of people’s belongings. We spent about a week preparing this house for sale and had many friends help me do this. At the very end, I took a couple of things that were his that I wanted, the cross I left, and some things of his dads. The house was now empty, and I sold it... time to move forward from this house. Several months had passed and I no longer was in contact with that house or anything to do with sold and no longer my problem. I had a room in an old office in my house that I used to store my son’s things as he was growing up, ultrasound pictures, baby pictures, keepsakes, boy scout achievements, karate uniforms and belts, all the items from his funeral. I also placed that cross in this room, since I had bought a new one for my house that was not related to my son’s house and his death. On Christmas morning, there was an unexplained fire that tore through this room and destroyed everything in it. I was so beside myself I tried to save his things before that caught fire, but the smoke prevented me from doing so. Our insurance company had a seasoned fire investigator come and find out the cause of the fire. They deemed it as unexplainable since there was no accelerate, or electrical outlets where the fire started. The fire started near the cross I brought back from my son’s garage.
Credit - Nicole Bowman
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