Your True Tales
December 2007 - Page 8
Haunted Brooklyn Apartment
by Lisa Falour
I lived in a haunted apartment in Brooklyn, New York from 1982 until 1994. I've written about this haunted place several times, but would like to share my experiences there with readers of this site, which I visit and enjoy often. I liked the building a lot, and shared Apartment F3 with a roommate from 1980 until 1982, until I asked the landlord for my own place there. Apartment D3 was available because its tenant, Sophie B_____, had "had an accident." I took this to mean she had passed away. Such a large, reasonably priced, rent-stabilized apartment was very sought-after, even in the early 1980s, when this part of Brooklyn was a bit rough and run-down. The building was constructed in the 1920s, on land which had previously had two mansions. It's right on Prospect Park Southwest, and is quiet and residential. A great location, not far from Manhattan.
Sophie's things were still in the apartment when I looked at it to accept the rental or not. She must have been an old Jewish lady, and quite poor. The place was dark and sad, and there were some unsual markings with what appeared to be lipstick in the bathroom. Sort of writing. The landlord said I could have the place, and I asked for it to be painted white. I offered to buy some of Sophie's things, but was informed that they had all been disposed of. With a twinge of guilt, I did not mention that I had looked through her things fairly carefully, and had even kept a few useful items, such as a juice reamer, a bucket, some dishes and glassware, an old camera, etc. No one from her family showed up to claim her effects. Some of my elderly neighbors had known Sophie, and said that she had been an original tenant of the building, but had formerly occupied another, larger apartment in one of the other wings. I saw evidence (photo albums and inscribed books) that she had been married and had had at least one child, but I didn't press the matter. I liked the apartment, and always felt safe and comfortable there. It was a very large one-bedroom affair, with three huge closets and an eat-in kitchen. From the beginning, I noticed that while in the bathroom, I'd hear the sound of bells ringing. I wrote this off to noisy old plumbing. Quickly, I started getting pranked. Just as I'd settle into a nice hot bath in the huge old tub, I'd hear the phone ring. In those days, I didn't have an answering machine, so I'd groan, get up, dry myself off, and hurry to the phone, only to find that it was silent. When I later got an answering machine, set to pick up on the fourth ring, I'd hear the phone ring 8 or 10 times while I was in the tub, and learned not to bother getting up to check. And sure enough, no messages had been registered on the machine. The sound of the ringing telephone was loud and clear, whereas when I'd be brushing my teeth with a little water running, I'd hear only soft ringing noises, of mutltiple bells or buzzers. I got used to it and ignored it. While the apartment was empty during the day and I was off at work in Manhattan, my downstairs neighbor was annoyed by the sound of someone walking around in my apartment all day in high heels, on the wooden parquet floors. The neighbor became so annoyed, she actually took me to court over this, but the judge dismissed the matter, as she was rowdy and unreasonable in nature. I did buy a big rug for the living room, with a pad, and kept explaining to her that I worked during the day and had done my best to soundproof the floors, and never wore shoes at home, but the neighbor was unappeased and remained quite unhappy with me. I often heard strange sounds in the apartment, such as voices, footsteps, and doors slamming loudly, but chalked this up to odd acoustics in an old building. When my boyfriend came to live with me, he complained about noises all day while he was there working on his writing. He said he heard voices "praying" and other odd things. He didn't like the place, and eventually got his own apartment nearby. My friend Angelo came to visit and sleep over many times over the years. He wanted more than a platonic friendship, but I didn't feel that way about him. I found out right before I gave the apartment up that he'd never had a night's sleep there -- he always heard, clearly, someone walking around in the living room all night, and it frightened him. He'd always make it a point to lock the door and latch it before we'd go to sleep, then end up hearing an "intruder" all night. I don't know why he kept quiet about this -- I guess he wanted to continue being invited to sleep over. I sublet the apartment to a woman named Roxanne, a lesbian whose girlfriend, Kim, complained about being disturbed there by various things. Roxanne said they'd both "see things," but didn't go into detail. When her sublet expired, she got another apartment in the building and was very happy there. In 1994, while my fiancé was visiting me from France, he'd hear the door buzzer ring as soon as he'd get into the bathtub, and loud crashing noises, though nothing fell. One night, we both saw a very tall male ghost in the apartment. I saw it only through the crack in a partially opened door -- it was extremely tall, and semi-solid, like grey gelatine. My fiancé saw it clearly and directly. It was a very tall old man with a hunched back, a long coat, and a hat (like Jewish attire). He walked down the hallway by the bathroom and into the living room, turned left, and disappeared around a corner. We knew we had both just seen something very odd, but did our best to stay calm. When I sublet the apartment again in 1994, I mentioned to the woman that the place seemed haunted. Over the next year or so, her partner left her and their son, and she was faced with being a single parent. The ghost seemed to favor women, and was jealous in nature. Had the ghost chased her partner away? I stayed in touch with my subtenant for a long time, and she ended up keeping the apartment. She said she had no problems with any haunting, so I was glad for her. Just before I left Brooklyn in 1994, I spoke to Ricky, the handyman, about my haunted apartment, and he told me that Apartment A2 or A3 (I forget which) on the ground floor of that wing was so severely haunted, he refused to enter it. He heard loud footsteps there on the wooden parquet floor, and saw the floorboards move under some unseen force or weight. It said it was very frightening and he told the landlord what had happened and that he just wouldn't do any work in that apartment, period.
The building has had many tenants over the years, of course, some of them colorful (including a wealthy bootlegger who was murdered). I'd love to hear from anyone who has ever lived in this building, to see if they ever had any odd experiences there. I didn't like seeing the gelatinous form, and my fiancé was pretty unhappy to have so clearly seen the old hunchbacked man, but the haunting was relatively benign, though mischievous, and may have been jealous of love relationships.
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