“My cousin’s friend, Daniel, was asked to house sit a new house while his friend’s family moved their belongings into the house. As the family drove down the coast, Daniel went to the house and it was very empty. Only a few boxes and furniture and an old piano were in the front room. He went upstairs and most of the bedrooms were empty except there was a small woven red ball in one of the empty rooms. He went over and as soon as he picked it up, he heard a women screaming. So he put it down, and as soon as he did, the screaming stopped. He went downstairs to the basement where there was a couch set up. As he stayed down there, he heard footsteps throughout the house and faint piano playing. He went upstairs to find no one had come to the house. In the kitchen, he opened the new refrigerator and suddenly felt someone watching him. He shut the refrigerator and in the reflection he saw a Native American man in full traditional clothing and head dress. He turned around and the man was no longer there. Scared, he returned to one of the furnished bedrooms and tried to sleep. In the middle of the night, he woke up to the feeling of hands tucking him tightly into the blanket all the way up from his legs to the rest of his body. He kept his eyes shut in fear for what he would see. He felt someone pick up his arms and cross them in front of his chest. He didn’t sleep at all that night. The next morning when the family came, Daniel told the family he’d never come back to the house because of what had happened. The family learned that the house had been built on Native American buried grounds and that the tribe traditionally buried their dead by tightly tucking coverings around the body and arms folded flat across the chest.”

This story is a classic example of the problems that arise when disturbing Native American territory. After being forced off their land and treated poorly, the Native Americans have continued to haunt certain areas that they once claimed. The fact that the house was covering burial grounds and not respecting the territory led to the haunting. Some motifs are the footsteps of the ghosts upstairs and the sounds heard. Another is how he saw the reflection of the ghost, but it vanished once he tried to get a proper look. This story exemplifies traditional motifs in ghost stories and the consequences of disturbing Native American territory.