Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-26246705-20150327090405

I grew up in a Synagogue. A very strange sentence to start with I know. My dad became the caretaker of this huge synagogue when I was around 4. Because it was an old office building there was in this place than just being a holy temple including a school, offices, kitchens and loads more across four floors. My family and I lived on the top floor in a massive flat. I’m an only child so it was just my parents and I along with our two cats. A lot of creepy things happened in that place but when I was little my parents would tell me there was nothing to worry about and when I got older I realized that it must have been just me being a little kid that caused it. However in my teenage years I realized just how wrong I was.

One of the duties my Dad had while working at the Synagogue was doing something we called “The Rounds”. When it got late and there was no one else left in the building my Dad would have to go around closing doors and windows, switching off lights and set the intruder alarm from our flat. In my mid teens my Dad had to have a shoulder operation which meant he was off work for a few months and couldn't do the rounds. My parents asked me if I would be able to take over the rounds for my Dad until he was fit again. Although nervous about it I agreed and my best friend Sam who lived opposite said he’d help to. The first few nights were fine; Sam and I would do the rounds while larking about and he would leave at the ground floor exit for me to run up the stairs in the dark (a little scared) ready to get ready for school. But on the forth night something happened.

Sam and I were going around the building when he ran ahead of me into the school section on the third floor (the floor beneath our flat). The synagogue has two main sections the old building and the new building and my flat is above the new section. Sam decided to run ahead and run into the old part. When I found him he looked terrified but wouldn't tell me what had spooked him. After completing the rounds I expected to talk with Sam back to the ground floor exit and run up the stairs but Sam didn't want to. This night he left me at the basement exit next to the offices. After saying goodnight I ran up the stairs that lead to the ground floor, however when I was next to the temple hall something very strange happened. Something grabbed my leg and I fell to the floor in the darkness. Scared out of my mind I ran through the ground floor and up the two levels and back into my flat. Apparently I was running so fast that my Mum could hear me coming from a mile off.

After that incident, Sam wouldn't do the rounds with me anymore and we only hung out at his house of the park. I carried on the rounds without incident for a few weeks and put my fall down to being scared that I was in the building for the first time on my own. But then another peculiar thing happened. I had finished the rounds and I was in my room when my Dad knocked on the door. I came out and he asked me why I hadn't sorted out one of the classrooms. I was confused and Dad took me to our office room at the end of the flat. From the office window you could see across to the last couple of classrooms including one called the art room. As I looked I saw the light was on. I explained to my Dad that I had definitely turned the lights off within that room. At that moment my Dad and I saw a shadowy figure go through the art room and lights went out. My Dad went as white as a sheet as we both knew that if anyone had been in there the alarm would have gone off; so what the hell was that? I didn't do the rounds after that night.

A few years past after that without any incident other than thinking we saw or heard something and then dismissing it as nothing. However one night changed that forever. It was a winter at around 10 o clock and as it was getting late my Dad offered to give my girlfriend a lift home. As my Mum said goodbye to my girlfriend we opened the door and all froze. At the bottom of the dark synagogue’s staircase we could hear children playing. It sounded like an outdoor school playground coming from the darkness. I shut the door and the four of us looked at each other. I clarified I wasn't the only one that heard it but when we opened the door the sound was gone so we took my girlfriend home and didn't mention it again. However something even worse happened next.

My Dad opened the door to go and do the rounds when he heard another sound coming from the darkness at the bottom of the stairs, only this time it was a choir. The congregation at the synagogue sometimes had a choir practice so with a sigh of annoyance Dad checked the car park CCTV. But there were no cars. Dad said he would check what was happening and went downstairs to see what was going on. Around 5 minutes after he went I noticed I could hear the choir without the door being open getting louder and louder. After half an hour with no sign of Dad, Mum and I decided to go downstairs and see what was going on. When we went into the main temple we could hear the choir in full swing with my Dad just standing there with his head cocked to one side and a blank stare on his face. When he saw my Mum and I a big grin came across his face. It was the most unnerving thing I have ever experienced in my life. He started describing a horrific dream my Mum had had when she was a child about a soldier ripping a little girl piece by piece until nothing was left but a skeleton. Mum gasped in horror as she hadn't told anyone, not even my Dad about that. I asked him what was going on and he just muttered in a sinister whisper the three words that still make me cold when I hear them.

“Hello, my Son”

I don’t know why but the way he said those words to me just made me freeze in terror. My Dad and I had always had a great relationship and I always thought he could fight of anything and make me safe, but now he was this creepy shadow of himself staring back at me. Mum and I were frozen to the spot when all of a sudden the choir stopped and Dad stopped smiling and he fell unconscious. When the doctor saw him, he sectioned him under the mental health act and was taken to an asylum. He was apparently suffering from schizophrenia and multiple personality syndrome. Mum and I moved to a new location and I went to University. When I returned I got a job as a security officer and life seemed to be going ok. Mum and I have never discussed that night and I don’t mind that. I just never wanted to hear those three words again.

The problem was last week I did...  