The Ghost Diary

INTRODUCTION TO THE GHOST DIARY

“Help me”

It was with those two words that I began to unravel a strange mystery¾a mystery that I have named, The Ghost Diary.

I met JenniferX on the Internet in late May of 1999. I had created a chatroom on the IRC (Internet Relay Chat) network called ‘ghoststories’. I was hoping to meet other people who were interested in talking about ghosts and the paranormal.

JenniferX came into the chatroom twenty minutes after I created it. What began as a short, friendly chat turned into something more horrifying than anything I’ve ever encountered while studying the paranormal.

“So, are you interested in talking about real ghosts?” she asked.

I found JenniferX to be very intriguing. She was outgoing, talkative, curious, and if she was telling the truth, in her late teens. JenniferX was particularly interested in spirit communication. She liked to talk about séances, Ouija boards, and other various ways that people try to contact the spirit world.

I’ve been in a séance once before, resulting in some spooky and unnerving results, but nothing that I would ever consider conclusive proof of interaction with disembodied spirits.

I’ve never used a Ouija board because they are too unpredictable and dangerous. Maybe I’ve been tainted by Hollywood movies, but I’ve heard more than enough horror stories about this form of spirit communication. It has been said that using the Ouija board greatly increases the chance of poltergeist activity, and at its most extreme, causes demonic possession.

I warned JenniferX about using the Ouija board, but my protests didn’t seem to bother her at all. In fact, she was quite adamant that she was not afraid of ghosts, and desperately wanted to try out the Ouija. It was difficult for me to tell if she was serious, or just another Internet ‘weirdo’ playing games with me. I’ve met a few of these types of people online. They claim all sorts of paranormal experiences, but they are nothing more than drug-induced hallucinations, or the product of a mind that has lost touch with reality.

Either way, within a few months I had lost JenniferX.

During that time, we ran into each other briefly in the chatrooms, and exchanged the occasional e-mail. She was constantly on my mind because I actually feared for her safety and well-being. The typical Internet question of “Age, sex, location?” only revealed this information: 16, F, USA.

I didn’t know her real name, and I had no idea what she looked like, but something about JenniferX had grasped my curiosity and did not want to let go.

With each communication we exchanged, JenniferX became increasingly unbalanced. She was obsessed with spirit communication. All she would talk about were her experiments with the Ouija, and how she had actually contacted a ghost of some sort. She would tell me about her strange dreams, which became more disturbing over time. During the last few weeks of our chats, JenniferX began to hear voices, and would make obscure references to the people ‘next door’.

I realized that she was heading towards the brink of insanity. I wanted to help her, but I felt like my feeble attempts were nothing more than just empty words on her computer screen.

By midsummer, I had lost contact with her completely. The last time we chatted was July 28^th. I tried to e-mail her at the address she’d given me, but I never received a reply. I didn’t know what to think. I was worried, but as the days passed by I tried not to think about her, and finally let it go as some sort of hoax.

On September 8th, I logged on to the Internet, and created the chatroom ‘ghoststories’, as was my routine. I went downstairs to prepare my dinner, and when I came back to my computer, I found something that terrified me more than anything JenniferX had ever told me.

Staring back at me from the monitor, were words I never expected to see:

“JenniferX --> Help me”

I was stunned.

She had logged on while I was away from the computer! I slammed my fist down on the keyboard, as feelings of guilt began to wrack my body. I had missed her and she needed my help. I e-mailed a reply, but there was no response.

I could barely sleep that night. I laid awake wondering if she had killed herself. I didn’t realize that she was that crazy and in need of help. With all the talk of ghosts, I almost expected her to materialize right in the middle of my room!

I was truly haunted.

I finally drifted off to sleep around 4:30am that morning, suffering from mental rather than physical fatigue.

Many days went by after that incident, and I still had not heard anything from JenniferX. It was one week later, that my world would be turned upside down yet again.

A package came for me in the mail. It was a small box, with my full name and address written on it with a pen, but there were no stamps or postmarks.

I brought it up to my room and carefully opened it up. I was puzzled at what I had found. There was a note, and a small, black notebook. My hands were shaking as I unfolded the note. It contained only one sentence, “I was told that you should have this.” There was no signature, or any other indication of who the author was.

I picked up the notebook and examined it carefully. There was nothing written on the outside of it, but when I flipped through the pages it was approximately half-full with handwriting. Each page was dated, and I realized that this book was a diary of some sort.

The first entry was June 16^th, 1999. I read the first page, and I was shocked at what I was reading. It was all about ghosts, and I knew right away that the author was JenniferX. But how did she find me? I never gave her my address, or even told her where I lived. It wasn’t even properly mailed, it was like someone just came by and dropped it in my mailbox. But who, and why?

I continued to read on for the next few hours. It was a diary of her experiments with ghosts and the Ouija board. I don’t think I’ve ever read anything so shocking and terrible. She was insane, there was no doubt about that. At first I couldn’t believe what I was reading. It couldn’t be real, I thought, it had to be a joke.

Going by what was written, I could only assume that she had gone totally insane, and quite possibly, had become a murderer.

The diary ends on September 14^th, 1999. It could have also been the last day of her life. Unfortunately, this final entry leaves more questions than answers.

I cannot explain it any further. I can only leave the contents to the reader to judge for themselves the validity of this diary. I have transcribed it to the best of my ability, but in many cases, the handwriting was very shaky and difficult to understand.

To this day, I’ve never heard again from JenniferX, but the memories of our conversations, and the contents of that terrible diary still haunt me.

Could I have helped JenniferX escape her madness? In reality, I have only become a part of it.

Nigel Kay
Toronto, Ontario Canada
January 2000

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