School Spirits (2017) s01e02 Episode Script

I was confronted with something that could not be explained.
Chris.
The ghost appeared to me repeatedly.
Wherever I went, it followed.
I'd never seen anybody scared before like that.
I can see something forming.
That ghost came right at me.
This was something evil that was happening to him.
It was going after his friends.
Do not attack this creature of God.
It felt as though someone had stabbed me with a knife.
It got so bad That I wondered if I would live.
I was a very serious runner in college.
I'd wake up in the morning.
I'd run between six and ten miles before the sun came up.
I'd go to my classes, then, after school, go to the official cross-country or track practice.
Attaboy, attaboy, attaboy, attaboy! Beautiful.
Good job, Chris.
My goal was to make the olympic marathon team for the United States of America.
I wanted to be on the wheaties box.
I wanted to be the next person to wave the flag on the stadium and run around with the "U.
S.
A.
" across my chest.
I devoted every aspect of my life to trying to run as best as I could.
He was strong, had intestinal fortitude for the distances.
My father instilled that in me as a youth.
He said, you know, "I gave you my name.
"That's what I can give to you.
And what you do with it, that's up to you.
" Chris always enjoyed the challenge of the competition.
I absolutely believed in Chris.
One, two, three, whoo! But the training program that Chris was undergoing To your marks! I learned early on in running how to control your body.
And I needed a way to try to tone the outside world out so it was just me running forward to my goal.
And so I learned at an early age, from my grandmother, actually, to count to ten.
Before every race, I would close my eyes, and I'd count.
When I was to ten, I felt as though I was in control of myself.
That allowed me to think more clearly during the race.
My sophomore year started out with great promise.
And I figured, "this is my year.
"This is the year I'm gonna break through that ceiling and Truly make a name for myself.
" Yes! Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! Whoo! I remember, one night, there was a toga party in the dormitory.
Jeff! Jeff was an observer at parties.
He always had a notebook with him or a camera, as though he were going to record life.
I guess I was the eyes and ears of the campus.
I always had my camera with me.
- Hey! - Hey! No, Jeff.
Beth was a very decent person.
It was an important friendship for me with Chris and Jeff because they were really accepting of me as a freshman.
I had a great little group of friends.
It was nice.
It was like our own little family in college.
I remember, one night, I was in my room by myself, working on a paper.
And that was tough, and I had to focus on what I was doing.
- Chris.
- What? I heard someone call my name.
And I figured maybe someone just popped their head in, and there was no reply.
Chris.
And this time, I looked around, and my door was closed.
The windows were closed, and there was no way I could understand that this was possible.
And so I got out of my chair, and I walked to the door and looked in the hallway.
No one there.
My best guess was, it was some kind of joke, some kind of prank.
And so I put headphones on.
I blast the music loud so I couldn't hear anything that they were saying to bother me.
Chris.
In my headphones, over the music, clear as day, I heard "Chris.
" Whoever's doing this to me, this prank, they are good.
I didn't know why they'd play a joke on me or what the reason was, but I knew I wouldn't be a part of it.
Chris.
I knew, eventually, whoever pulled the prank would come over to me and say, "hey, you should've seen your face.
" I waited an hour.
I waited two hours, plus, and not one person came up and said, "gotcha.
" That made no sense.
And I thought, "well, if it's not a prank, what could it be?" And, you know, so I thought, "well, what do I do?" I was a runner, and so when I could, I went for a run, and I wanted to clear my head.
I was trying to put together what could've happened, and I couldn't.
I got back from my run, and as I stood there in the shower Whoa, whoa, whoa! What's going on? My roommate, he was out of breath.
And I said to him, "what happened?" You won't believe me if I tell you.
"And I heard someone call your name.
It was right behind me, and no one was there.
" I felt terrified.
I so wished he had just turned to me and said, "ha-ha, you should've seen your face.
That was the best thing ever," you know? That wasn't the case.
He didn't say that.
Hey, man, um He didn't want to stay in that room that night.
And so I was there alone.
I'm sorry, man.
Maybe I should've opened up to my roommate about what was going on, but I just I couldn't.
I felt nervous.
I felt a sense of uneasiness about what was happening.
And I began looking for a way in which I could calm my mind down.
And my parents had sent me a care package.
At the very bottom of this care package with a nice sweater and letters and money was a box of cinnamon candy.
I loved these cinnamon candies.
And I begin to eat them.
And as I chew on this candy And I hear this hissing sound.
And I decided to go down to investigate.
And I realized It was my tape recorder.
And so I climb back up into the loft.
So I went back down.
And sure enough, my tape recorder was on again.
So I reached over, and I pulled the cord out of the wall.
And I tossed it.
As I went to make my way back up the ladder, I get this strong pronounced chill, this feeling of cold behind me, as though somebody is watching me.
And so I fell back upon my tried and true.
"I'm gonna count to ten.
"And when I get to ten, I'm gonna turn around, and nothing will be there.
" I never made it to ten.
Six, seven Maybe I should've opened up to my roommate about what was going on, but I just I couldn't.
He didn't want to stay in that room that night.
And so I was there alone.
And I hear this hissing sound.
And I realized it was my tape recorder.
And I get this feeling of cold behind me, as though somebody is watching me.
And so I fell back upon my tried and true.
"I'm gonna count to ten.
I'm gonna turn around, and nothing will be there.
" I never made it to ten.
Six - I got to seven.
- Seven I had to look.
I saw a shape.
It looked human.
And I noticed that his legs I couldn't see his legs below his thighs.
The legs of this person were disappearing into the stereo.
And then I start to see this image, this mist, form into a pale face.
Help me.
I couldn't handle that.
I just ran.
I ran for my life.
I ran for my life as fast as I could run.
And all of a sudden, there's this God-awful commotion.
What? He was in terror.
Something had scared him, and it was clearly evident to me that he was in some serious need of help.
I can't I can't believe I panicked.
"I can't believe I panicked.
" He just kept repeating that over and over again.
I kept asking him to clarify, to slow down, to take a breath.
I saw a ghost.
And he looked at me.
I don't know if he thought, perhaps, I was joking with him.
I'd never seen anybody scared before like that.
It wasn't about whether I believed him in that moment.
He believed it.
He got his notebook.
Tell me everything that happened.
That was a way for me to deal with the situation.
I was sitting at my desk Legs were floating into the stereo.
And his neck, it just didn't look right.
Chris' dorm room's two steps away from my room, and yet it feels like it's miles away.
But when we walked into that room, it seemed so ordinary.
And there's nothing there.
I didn't want to stay in that room that night.
I was fascinated by what was going on.
And I thought that maybe we could communicate with it.
Have you ever thought about recording, maybe getting the ghost on tape? Far from being terrified from it in that moment, I wanted to see what else I could witness.
And Chris agreed.
It was very, very important for him to establish that this was something that was outside of his own psyche rather than inside, that he was not hallucinating, that he was not having a mental breakdown.
With the audiotape, it was very important that we control the environment so that any strange, unexplained noises that we did record would be just that, strange and unexplained.
The drawers, the chair, all of these areas, I was careful to note their positioning.
The windows were secured so that we knew they were not open.
The closet door was latched.
And Jeff said to me, "I want you to talk into the tape recorder.
" I was nervous.
I was shaking.
I'm trying to help you.
If you'd like to say anything, I'm leaving this box on.
All you have to do is speak.
It will pick up your voice.
In order to help, I must know why you're here.
I hope you understand.
I posted myself outside the doorway.
Basically, I stood guard that whole time the tape was running.
Oh, my God.
Right away, we saw things were different.
The window had opened.
The chair had moved.
The closet door was unlatched.
Chris.
We rewound the tape.
I was very eager to listen to it; Chris, not so much.
He was afraid that we would actually catch something, and I was hoping that we did.
We heard static for quite some time, and I was relieved.
And then we heard other sounds.
I heard the chair being pulled out.
His eyes got huge.
And he was like he could not believe it that we were actually capturing these sounds.
Almost a gurgling, low-pitched voice.
Jeff nodded his head in approval, like he also heard this sound.
Despite my reasoning or my rational mind, I was confronted with something that just could not be explained.
This confirmed Chris' worst nightmare.
Let's take a picture of it.
Come on.
I'll get my camera.
And I thought, "we should see if we could capture a photograph.
" We should get it on camera.
But I said to him, "I don't know what to do.
" Just call the ghost.
He's like, "Jeff, how do I do that? How do I call the ghost?" Uh, okay, uh Hello, if you're As I said a few words, I could see the closet door begin to shake back and forth.
I thought to myself, "oh, my God.
What is going on?" And he's like, "Jeff, take the picture.
Jeff, take the picture.
" Jeff, take the picture! And I heard a gurgling, low-pitched voice.
Like, he could not believe it that we were actually capturing these sounds.
Come on.
I'll get my camera.
And I thought, "we should see if we could capture a photograph.
" And then I start to see this image.
I can see something forming.
And I see the face, the neck, the eyes.
And I know the ghost is here.
Take the picture! I could see the terror.
And he was shaky.
I snapped the picture, and the flash went off.
That ghost came right at me.
He went right through me.
It felt like every cell of my body froze for a moment and then unfroze.
Where is it? Chris! I'm like, "where is it? Where is it? Chris, I don't see anything.
" I snapped that shot, and I ran out of that room.
I remember going through, flipping each 4x6.
I get to the last one Here it is.
I clearly saw a skeleton and the vertebrae and the ribcage.
I saw a spinal column and the hint of a skull.
No.
No way.
This cannot be real.
It's like the ghost was forming at that moment.
And if we had waited long enough, we may have actually captured it for real.
I was concerned about Chris' state of mind.
I was worried for his health, emotional health.
And I didn't know what advice to offer Chris.
I'm coming to some kind of point, eventually, where I'm gonna have to make a choice.
You know, do I stay, or do I go? And I couldn't tell the building manager why I wanted to change rooms because I felt that they would judge me or perhaps spread the story across the campus.
The last thing I wanted to do was destroy my name.
The ghost appeared to me repeatedly over the next few weeks.
It seemed as though wherever I went, it followed.
The last time that I ran or tried to run, I'd gotten maybe 200 yards, and my legs just wouldn't respond.
They were just weak.
My body was telling me, "shut it down.
Shut it down.
" I was no longer a runner.
I was somebody else I didn't recognize and didn't want to be.
Chris was in a rough spot.
He He was not eating.
He was not sleeping.
He was very withdrawn.
His eyes were not bright anymore.
He just wasn't Chris.
You all right, man? Chris.
Where are you going? Chris, come on.
This was something evil or something really bad that was happening to him.
I was raised catholic, and I decided to call upon my faith.
All through my life, my father was a guiding figure.
I couldn't reach out to him.
I couldn't pick up the phone and even call him.
How would I explain to him mists in the air? There was no way I could speak to him in that way.
He initially delayed seeing the priest because he was embarrassed.
But he wanted this ghost gone.
And I sat there very patiently as he turned page after page.
I believe you.
And he said, "I'm gonna help.
" Around 8:00 P.
M.
, the priest knocked on my door.
- Chris.
- Father Brian.
And he said, "is this the room?" And I said, "yes, it is.
" He placed a candle in the four corners of the room.
And then he began to pray.
Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
And as a catholic going to church, the first two prayers I knew, the our father and the hail Mary.
The third prayer, I had never heard before.
And that was intriguing to me.
I command you, unclean spirit, to obey me to the letter, I, a servant of God, as undeserving as I am.
Do not attack this creature of God or any of his possessions.
And then it got quiet.
And I said to him, "am I gonna be okay?" And he said, "yeah, we're good.
" He said, "a blessing basically commands a spirit to find a different place to rest.
" And I asked the priest, "can the ghost get back in the room?" Not if you don't invite him back.
And I assured him, "no, sir, that is not gonna happen.
" That night, I didn't see the ghost; I didn't hear the ghost.
The following morning, the energy in the room was somehow lifted.
It felt safe.
And then I felt almost like I had a new lease on life, like chance number two.
I felt like it was well, like, I might be able to, someday, do these things again.
I began to think it was all finally over.
I came back from a run.
Once again, I had some sense of peace, some sense of comfort that things would be okay.
Then I was distracted by this shadow washing across the ceiling above me.
I knew I was alone.
There was nobody.
As soon as I turned that water off I began to think, and I hoped, it was all finally over.
I came back from a run.
Once again, I had some sense of peace, some sense of comfort that things would be okay.
As soon as I turned that water off It felt as though someone had stabbed me with a knife.
I ran out into the center of the bathroom to fight.
I'm, like, looking to fight somebody, and there's nobody there.
And I turn to look to the mirror, and then I see.
I see my back is bleeding.
Three long scratches.
I fall on my knees, and I said, "who are you? What are you? You coward! Show yourself! Come out! Come out here and show yourself! And there's nothing.
There seemed to be no end, no answer.
And here I thought things had been resolved, and Things were worse than before.
Next thing I knew, the door opened up, and there was Jeff.
Chris.
Chris was right down on the tile floor in front of the sinks, curled up in pain.
Something had happened.
Chris.
He had been attacked by something in the shower.
He had a line of three scratches running down the length of his back from, like, his left shoulder to kind of his torso.
It was his mid-torso area.
I didn't understand what exactly had occurred.
Come on.
Let's go.
Come on.
Come on.
Come on.
I thought I heard some oh, my God! There were just three scratches.
Chris was completely panicked, completely petrified.
That really made me think that it was evil.
And he clearly was right back where we left off.
I don't know if I'm being punished for something.
Now it's come at me with these physical attacks.
I'm in big trouble.
And I did wonder, "well, could something happen to somebody else or any of us? What does this mean?" It got so bad that I wondered if I would live.
I wondered if I should even try.
It came down to two choices, to kill myself or call my father.
My father was a man of science, very educated, very logical.
As I grew up, almost everything my father said was correct.
Hey.
Hey, dad.
I told him, "look, I'm having a hard time, dad.
" His voice was faltering.
There was no strength in it.
He said, "dad, I'm in trouble.
I don't know what's going on.
" I'm really afraid.
I told him what I'd been seeing, what had been happening to me.
And I don't know what he was thinking.
Dad Dad, this is real.
So he said, "I'll be right there.
" He had lost maybe 15, 20 pounds.
His face was drawn.
The Chris that I was looking at was not the same Chris that I had seen maybe a month or so before.
I told him that I would stay the night, that whatever was there we would deal with together, and that, for at least that night, he would get a good night's sleep.
I'd be there.
Chris went to bed.
I sat in a chair at the foot of the bed for the remainder of the night.
He stayed that night.
And he had a baseball bat and a handgun with him.
I felt this overwhelming presence.
It seemed to emanate from a closet.
I was not sure if I wanted to know what it was.
All I knew was that if something was present, it had to go through me.
I told him that I would stay the night, that whatever was there we would deal with together.
He stayed that night.
And he had a baseball bat and a handgun with him.
Looking into that closet, I was not sure if I wanted to know what it was.
When I woke up in the morning, I woke up with a start.
I it was the first time I had allowed myself to sleep for more than an hour at a time.
And I knew my father hadn't slept the whole night.
I did not know what I could do to help Chris.
I knew that the solution had to come from within himself.
I decided that, for all practical purposes, I would not say anything to him about it Until this day.
I said, "you know you can turn to me.
" You can turn to your mother.
If you need help, call.
And I told him Chris "Move out of that room.
" Until he sees this program, I don't think he has any clue of what happened that night.
I knew he saw something.
I knew my father.
And I knew he wouldn't talk about things that bothered him.
That wasn't his way.
When he told me to change my room, that meant something happened.
I was in my room by myself, trying to study.
Chris.
And then I heard "Chris.
" You know, it was one of those things where I thought, "what?" And I continued to try and read.
But then I heard it again.
Chris.
I was very, very scared, very worried for myself, thinking that, "well, this thing had hurt Chris.
It could hurt me too.
" Chris.
Beth hadn't shown up to my room as she had said she would, and I wanted to make sure she was okay.
Beth? When I got to her door, it was partially open.
Beth, are you okay? There was no answer.
- Oh, my God.
- Oh, God.
All I could see of Beth were her feet.
- Beth! - Beth! Beth? Beth? Come on.
And I said, "Beth, are you okay?" Beth, come on.
Wake up.
Wake up.
I remember just kind of, all of a sudden, coming to and seeing Chris and not really knowing why he was there.
I just didn't know what to do.
I just couldn't take it anymore.
I didn't want to hear it anymore.
I wanted it to leave.
So I just started throwing things, thinking, "maybe I can hit it.
Maybe it will just go away.
" I just needed it to stop.
And at some point, I lost consciousness.
I knew, at that moment, there was no doubt what was going on.
The ghost was in her room.
Like the scratches, this was a whole new level.
It was going after his friends.
It was branching out.
And it was becoming much more serious.
This was my ultimate fear.
Not only now was I being impacted negatively by this thing; Now my friends were.
Because I had in some way failed to seek help properly or deal with things properly or understand, now the terror, the horror, was spreading to people that I cared about.
I realized, "you know what? "This is gonna get worse and worse.
"Maybe I have to just throw caution to the wind, "be brave, and face that thing, no matter what happens.
" I walked into that room by myself.
I was determined to try to do what the priest did Try to re-create some kind of holy environment.
And I was going to invite him in.
And I didn't know what the repercussions could've been if things went wrong.
And I didn't know if I'd leave that room.
I knew exactly what I had to do.
I then said, "this is it.
"I'm here now.
If you want my help, now is the time.
" And I waited.
I walked into that room by myself, try to re-create some kind of holy environment.
I knew exactly what I had to do.
If you want my help, you're gonna have to speak to me now.
Then I got the chills, that feeling, the cold run up my back and my neck and my arms, and I knew the ghost was in that room.
I didn't dare look.
I felt that familiar shadow.
I tried to find the courage to stay in that room and not run.
I knew this was the moment.
And right in front of me, I saw the ghost, clear as day.
I had never seen the ghost this clear.
There was no fading.
There was no ethereal quality.
It looked like a human being.
I tried my best to maintain my focus, looking at those eyes, and I saw sadness.
And I said You have to let go.
"You need to find rest.
And if you want my help, you're gonna talk right now.
" His mouth moved, and So much pain.
I heard "wrong.
" A rope.
I couldn't help but feel compassion for this thing, this person.
Something of what I felt inside of me was, I think, reflected in that ghost.
You know, all that time I ran and I screamed and I yelled, and there I was, feeling sorry for it, this thing that terrorized me and attacked me.
And I felt bad.
I felt bad for it.
I'm sorry.
"You need to find rest.
You just can't stay here anymore.
" I closed my eyes.
One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.
And he was gone.
The next day, I opened my eyes.
"This is a brand-new day.
It's a brand-new start for me.
" It was all right, you know.
- That's nice.
- Yes, it's Jeff! Beth! Hey.
How's it going? - How are you? - Good to see you, man.
How are you doing? After that point, Chris started to feel more comfortable again.
He wasn't walking with his head down.
He was walking, looking out at people, looking up.
I think things are gonna be better.
- Yeah, you look good.
- Thanks.
- A lot better.
- You look really good.
Chris was not troubled from that moment on.
Yep.
Stretch it out.
There's something liberating about being given a second chance.
Look who's back.
Welcome back, son.
And I was gonna make the most of the opportunity.
After the experience that Chris and I had at Geneseo back in 1985 Hey.
- I would say - Oh, my God, Chris.
Yes, I do believe in ghosts.
I'm still a skeptic, but I'm four notches down on the level.
There definitely could be something.
To deny what exists because we just can't measure it or find it does not mean it doesn't exist.
That was the year I began to grow up.
I will never know what the ghost wanted from me, but I will never forget him.