A Deer's Revenge?

From: Dianne (ravyncat@yahoo.com)
Story type: Ghost
Location: Amarillo, Texas
Source: Form Submission

Well, here are more stories about the house I grew up in. It was very haunted, and all these stories are true.

To give you some background...My parents moved into a three bedroom ranch house when I was three years old. The house is in a suburban neighborhood located about 5 or so miles north of Amarillo, Texas. The neighborhood is called 'Rolling Hills'. My parents got two acres of land with the house and an old barn and stables in the back.

The funny thing about this house is that it had a reputation even before they bought it. It was built in the early 70's, and only the builder had lived in it, and one other family. Noone ever died in this house. Even so, the house was known as "The Divorce House". Both families who had previously lived there had had their marriages end in divorce. Sounds silly, I know, but my own parents divorced within a year of buying the house.

My Mom, and me. my sister, and brother, all continued living in the house. I remember always hating the barn. It was dirty and creepy and full of boxes (stuff my parents never finished unpacking from the move to Amarillo). It consisted of one big room, and a smaller room near the front door. The small room had a sink in it, and the back door was directly across the big room from the front door. The back door led out into the stable area. The stable looked very old and was made out of wood. It had a roof with built in hay/feed bins against the back wall. The front of the stable was open--no wall. The wood in the stable was in bad condition--dry rot--especially in the feed bins. These bins were filled with dirt and sand almost to the top. (We never used them to feed our horse.)

My Dad went hunting and shot a deer a few months before he left. He cut off it's head and (for some f'd up reason) decided to hang it up on the stable wall. It was creepy and macbre, and I remember my folks fighting about it. (Weird note: I distinctly remember him saying that he wanted "the birds to peck out it's eyes." Creepy!) My brother and I figured that the deer would now haunt our barn, and we were scared of the ghost.

Soon after the head was hung up, the wind would blow through the stable and make a horrible moaning noise. The sound terrified me! I was convinced that it was the ghost deer!

The barn stayed creepy for years. When I was about 4, My Mom built a chicken coop into the barn so my sister could raise chickens for 4-H. Anyway, we kept all of our animal food in the barn...which was always filthy and still had unpacked boxes in it!

One childhood trauma was having to go into the barn on windy days to feed our animals. (A horse, chickens, and dogs...if you're curious) The moaning noise would get VERY loud even during the day. And you know, it's windy almost every day in the Texas Panhandle! This was one chore that my brother and I truly hated doing. My sister was nine years older than me, and she refused to do it as soon as I was about 7, and my brother was 6. So it fell on the younger kids. My Mom accused us of being irresponsible and lazy when we complained.

For some stupid reason, that deer head remained nailed up in the stable untill I was about 10 or so. By then my brother, who was 9, and I decided to take it down and throw it away! We did so even though our Mom laughed at us. (She was convinced that all we were hearing was the wind. Funny thing is she actually hated the barn too. I'll post another story relating her experiences. At this time she firmly denied all weirdness.)

We were right about that ghost though....From that day on the moaning sound was never heard in our stable. Not even on the windiest days!

Unfortunately, the poor deer was not the only barn ghost.

More true tales from Texas will follow. I have some more in our barn, and several in the house. Look for "A Haunted Birthday Party", which is one I already posted. I also have stories about my current residence in Austin, Texas. Lucky me.