from our community
Introduction
Ghosts are everywhere. Whether you believe in the supernatural or not, we live in a world surrounded by artefacts, stories, inherited memories, fears, and behaviours.
When I first brought together the writers of Ghost Stories by Candlelight, we sat in a darkened room with candles and told stories to each other. While our playwrights took to their desks to pen the plays which ultimately formed our Autumn 2023 tour, another thought kept percolating in my mind:
everyone has a ghost story.
At HighTide we always seek to democratise writing for everyone, so we sent out the call to our whole community for more original ghost stories. We were delighted with what we got back.
Emma Zadow’s Lady Marsh won the call-out and will be presented as a rehearsed reading at The Seagull Theatre, Lowestoft on 19th October 2024 prior to the performance of More…Ghost Stories by Candlelight. Our other, excellent shortlisted entries are also published in this special collection of Ghost Stories by Candlelight from our community.
Proceed with curiosity, trepidation and sheer delight through these pages of original stories.
Feeling inspired? You can find our guide to writing ghost stories on our website. Filled with tips and exercises from our playwrights to get you started, have a go – if you think you’re scary enough…
Clare Slater, Artistic Director
by Avi Cerf
by Robbie Sunderland
by Kate Challis
by Wendy Fisher
by Emma Zadow
Please note this story contains swearing
by Avi Cerf
Ella: It’s the worst summer ever. The air clings to my lungs. Slowing everything down. The world around me, My thoughts. It’s allDusty. Blurry. Muted.
I was swallowed by a cloud, And it’s pushing me back out.
I’m inside a cloud’s vomit. But I don’t care.
Because today is the best day ever. I’m about to drive alone for the first time.
Just me and Kelly Clarkson and the wind on my face. Hot, disgusting, vomity wind, But still, wind.
In half an hour I’ll come back home, casually toss the keys and Mum will ask:
“Where have you been?”
Oh, me?
Just went for a drive. SOLO. It was lovely. And the car is fine.
Thanks for the car, Mum.
I’m great too. Yes, I know. You’re impressed.
[Engine starts]
Seat. Mirrors. Taking shoes off. Seatbelt. Parking. Gear. Key. Lights. AC. Gear. Release the brake. Gas.
I’m moving.
No. I’m DRIVING.
Just a bit more and -
[Long continuous honk of a car horn]
‘Hey you piece of shit I hope you die in hell you fucking asshole!!’
‘Yeah, I’m a girl, and I’m a better driver than your dad!’
A house of someone I know. A house of someone I know.
A house of someone I- I used to know. My old school. The shopping centre. The hill.
Okay. Breathe. You’re cool. I’m cooool.
It’s Kelly’s time. Spotify.
Greatest hits.
[Playing “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”]
[Female GPS voice.]
‘We’re ready. Head northwest. In 200 metres, turn left.
Turn left.’
YOU FUCKING CUNT!
‘Mind your language in front of your sister!’ Fuck. I don’t care. I’m out.
I’M OUT.
[GPS.]
‘Head northwest. In a hundred metres, keep left.’
When you get there, it catches you by surprise.
As if no one has ever been there before. Wheat. Endless wheat. Nothing else on the horizon. It’s so high.
If you were standing in it, it would’ve reached your chest.
They say, if someone were to check the ground, they’d find human traces of people who lost their way.
You’re a fucking map.
Do your fucking job, you piece of shit.
‘Mind your language in front of your sister’ Okay.
‘Take me home!’
[GPS .] ‘In 100 metres, turn around. Turn around. Rerouting.
In 100 metres Ella, turn around.’ pause.
I don’t believe in such things.
[A white noise blares unexpectedly from the radio, startling her. The music stops.]
[GPS.] ‘In a hundred metres, turn around. In a hundred metres, turn around. Turn around. Rerouting. In 100 metres, keep left. Keep left. Turn around.
You have reached your destination.’
[Ella
And then-
breathes heavily]
I feel it for the first time.
I’m not alone in this car. I stop.
The AC kicks in.
Full force.
On heat.
I try to turn it off.
It’s stuck.
I try the door.
I’m stuck. I turn the key.
It’s dead.
The AC keeps blowing vomit air.
It sticks to my skin.
I try to cough, force it out of my lungs.
It tastes like iron.
I look outside the window.
I can’t see anything but endless Yellow. What would I do?
Call the police?
‘Hello, police? Maps said my name?
‘My car is trying to kill me.’
It’s a car.
It’s a fucking car.
It’s not even a good one.
I don’t even like it that much.
I wanted a dark blue mini cooper.
I turn the key. I push it hard. I drill it into the hole.
The metal feels cold against my skin.
I wish it could spread all over my body.
It’s dead.
I really thought today would be The best day ever. And everything would change. Well.
Everything is about to change.
Dad. Sister. Will anyone show up?
Will anyone talk about me?
No one knows me.
I couldn’t even talk about myself at my own funeral.
‘You can have it when I’m done!’
‘When I’m home!’
I’m the driver!
I’M DRIVING THE CAR!!!
‘Please. God. Please.’
‘I don’t believe in you, but please help me.’ Mum. Dad. Sister. Time. Time I’ve wasted. God.
I don’t believe in god.
I wish I did.
What’s it like to die?
How did she feel?
The funeral. Mum.
If only I had more time.
[GPS.] ‘You have reached your destination.’ I wake up.
The door is open.
I’m out.
I drink it in, the thick summer air i hated but now love so much.
I’m staggering forward.
I’m still barefoot but I don’t care. Anywhere but here.
With every step the ground cuts deeper.
Tears more into my flesh.
I feel a breath on my neck.
[Or was it the wind?]
I can’t run.
Just keep going. whatever happens
The sound is getting closer.
I see nothing but wheat Endless Yellow. Towering above me. The last thought I have is It’s so high. It’ll take days, maybe weeks, before they find me. Don’t look back.
I can’t feel my legs anymore.
Two piles of meat that are connected to my body.
Hair sticks to my face.
I can barely see anything. Doesn’t matter, I don’t know where I’m going anyway.
Behind me, I hear an engine starts.
Just keep going.
If they ever will.
Don’t look back.
Right foot. Left foot. Right foot. Left foot. Left hand. Stomach.
Detective Inspector Robinson’s Report: 24th November
by Robbie Sunderland
Mr Jakery found dead at home. No signs of foul play or suicide.
However two things suspicious about the scene. First, Mr Jakery’s face. It was screaming. Second, the contents of Mr Jakery’s diary. Reading through the previous entries it appears he took a lodger who he referred to as ‘The Neddle Person’.
Attempts have been made to ascertain who ‘The Neddle Person’ is. No one else in the area seems to have seen or even heard of the man. It seems probable that Mr Jakery was delusional or suffering from a mental illness, but the few friends and family he has swear to his sanity and strong character.
What follows are the last passages from Mr Jakery’s diary.
17th November
I can hear the lodger from his room, retching and coughing, but strangely rhythmic. Sounds like he’s saying ‘Akker’ repeatedly. Don’t know what that means, if it’s even a word.
Didn’t like the look of him at first. Long black coat, balding on top, but with silvery blonde straggly wisps which fell to his shoulders. Eyes like a cat, pale skin like his hair. When he smiled with his ragtag face I shivered. I took pity on him so I let him stay.
I suddenly remember the story my father used to read to me as a child. Actually I forget most of it except for the mischievous elven creature called “The Neddle Person” who could paralyse with his voice. When my father described how The Neddle Person would softly sing and laugh as he ate his victims, trapped in their own motionless bodies, I would pretend to go to sleep to stop hearing any more, then stay awake for hours watching the door and waiting. My lodger is almost how I pictured The Neddle Person
The Neddle Person would count his victims in an old English dialect. Something to do with sheep farmers my father said. Wish I could remember how it went.
21st November
So focused on keeping an eye on the lodger that I haven’t kept up with my diary. He’s watching me I’m sure so I must watch him. Each night I hear the same retching noise, that drone of ‘Akker, Akker, Akker’. Occasionally it becomes louder, not as though the lodger was shouting, but as if the sound was getting closer and closer.
Sometimes the sound comes from inside my ear. I researched the sheep farming counting system. In Swaledale, Akker is eight. What’s eight?
Every time I think about leaving my room I start to shake and break into a cold sweat. I am desperately hungry, but I cannot get out.
22nd November
Got to keep writing or go to sleep, but can’t sleep so keep writing.
It took days, but I finally managed to open the door. Got to the top of the staircase, when I saw him, The Neddle Person, standing at the foot of the stairs, glaring up at me. His eyes burned into mine with glee. His sharp yellow teeth bared in a grin, his cracked lips bloody and raw while his tongue darted over them. I felt myself beginning to topple forward and as I did I had a vision of the Neddle Person’s mouth widening, the cracks in his lips became deep trenches, gigantic monstrous teeth ready to crush my body and tear my flesh. Yet there was something inviting about the darkness of his throat, something beckoning me in. For a moment a wave of euphoria flowed through me as I imagined falling. I caught myself before I fell. The Neddle Person started walking up the stairs. I bolted for my room and slammed the door shut. Didn’t hear him follow.
Waited an hour before going back out to the top of the stairs. The Neddle Person was not at the bottom. I listened for him, ignoring the sound of my own heartbeat. Something from down below. Scratching. That was the noise I heard. I couldn’t figure out what it was until now. A very faint scratching. There it is again. I can hear it inside my head, as though something was scratching at the inside of my skull trying to escape. It’s deafening! No, it’s my own pen. It’s the scratch of writing in my diary.
There’s another noise, coughing and spluttering. It’s coming from the stairs. I have to keep writing the scratch will drown it out Akker Akker Akker it’s saying but the scratching is louder footsteps coming down the hall keep writing I am Mr Jakery Thomas Jakery Neddle scratching pen AKKER scratching scratching father Neddle Person I can’t sleep AKKER AKKER AKKER scratching don’t let him eat me NEDDLE scratching skull Neddle Person NEDDLE Person NEDDLE PERSON
by Wendy Fisher
Nursing skills never leave you.
When I left they said I should do some volunteering, a care home perhaps?
It’ll keep you going. I suppose they were right, don’t like being on my own. They meant well I’m sure.
But it’s been a tough few days at the home.
Dropping like nine pins, nasty chesty thing going round.
this is nasty, all overgrown, the hawthorn has taken over. Ouch that hurts! Nasty scratch, that’ll take a time to heal, skin’s like paper.
burning themselves. Well what’d you know, thank you Bob, this is coming home with us.
Good to get out in the air, Bob and I walk for miles, but if he’s not pooing, he’s digging,
BOB!,
come back boy,
come back! BOB!! BOB!,
Squirrels screeching and clicking their teeth sounding off alarm calls everywhere, I can hear Bob digging, I hope it’s Bob, must be….
How on earth did you get through that fence, we never come this way. Oh no,
The branches have woven themselves into a cave, the temperature’s dropped, shivering, damp, cold, making my shoulders tight and tense.
Everything smells fetid and damp, urgh, Bob that mud went in my mouth. Spitting dirt, bits of muck in my teeth.
What have you found? Oh Bob you monkey, it’s an old Nelson’s Inhaler. Let’s have a look, get off, yes thank you I know you dug it up, but finders aren’t always keepers. Get down!
Oh goodness, it still has the glass mouthpiece. I used to wrap a bit of gauze round those, stop the old blokes
How long have we been here? Suns moved round; the space looks bright now almost cheery.
Come on, we need to get back. Beryl will be expecting me, I said I’d read the rest of that Mills and Boon to her this afternoon.
There’s a bit of me feels sorry for Beryl, stuck in a care home. But at least there are people around, she’s not on her own. When she dies she won’t die alone.
Can’t bear the thought of that.
How long would I be there? Would anyone miss me? Would they wait till the maggots crawled under the door?
I told Beryl about our find. Bob digging, me squeezing through the fence, she looked at me, concerned.
What’s up Beryl?
“Was it very overgrown, bit like a cave?”
She knew it. It was where the old sanatorium used to be, her mum had been the Matron there, worked all through the 1918 flu epidemic. She told Beryl all they had to help people was steam, would make Beryl have a menthol inhalation every day to keep her lungs clear, protect her against the smog, the flu, TB all the horrible things they had no cure for. She said her mum was able to smell a chest infection before the person knew they had it.
“She died there”.
Where?
“At the sanatorium. There was a gas leak, the place exploded, she was there alone, the other nurse was on her break. Twenty patients and my mum”.
Oh Beryl, I’m so sorry.
We didn’t feel up to Mills and Boon after that, we had a cup of tea and a custard cream instead.
Put it in pride of place on the windowsill.
Stop barking Bob, you dug it up, get over yourself. I take it down and he runs off with his tail between his legs, crazy dog. Must get an early night, feel a bit rough, too much excitement.
2am, Sounds like the smoke alarm, Bob’s whimpering, pawing at the sheets. Flat’s full of steam, must have left the kettle on.
It’s coming from the inhaler, its steaming, giving off lovely steamy menthol. I should be scared, but its making me feel so much better.
The inhaler washed up nicely, a bit of Beryl history.
“It’s alright Rita, you’ll be fine, just breathe, help is coming, you’re not alone.”
Who is that? Whose there?
“Breathe in the steam Rita, breathe it in, you’ll feel better soon.”
Banging at the door...., Bob barking, you’re not alone.
voices outside.
Ambulance Miss Nelson, can you open the door?
Legs have gone, difficult, crawling…. on…. the…. floor, You called us, are you alright?
Did I? I don’t remember.
It’s alright Miss Nelson, we’re here, let’s get you sitting up and into the ambulance, looks like you might have pneumonia, taking you to the hospital, keep this mask on your face, it’ll help.
Well done with the inhaler, a bit old school but its kept your airways open.
Old nurse eh?
But I didn’t….
Don’t try and talk, that’s a good dog you’ve got there, Bob?
We’ve got a neighbour to look after him, don’t worry,
by Kate Challis
My house is super sweet. I was so lucky to find it and at such a great price. It’s on an old housing estate and out the back there is ancient woodland and springs that protect us from more buildings being developed. I often make offerings to the spirits of the trees and springs and nod at the moon as she rises over the woodland, and the smog of the industry in the valley behind.
Seven years before my son arrives, I live alone. On this night, I am feeling anxious about some break-up or other, or perhaps the autumn darkness has wobbled my brain. I take a little Rescue Remedy and head up to bed, nice and early. As I turn out the light and my body becomes heavy, a grip of loud bangs jerk me back into wakefulness. My heart enters my mouth, blocking my thoughts. Thuds crash at my door; my neighbour’s son, an adult (of sorts), stands twitching and wide-eyed.
I’m a bit different to the neighbours. A bit more of a freespirit than the local families who have been here for three generations, but I’m accepted and welcomed. Especially now I’ve adopted my little boy. Mum-struggles are Universal and he is super sweet too.
His bedroom has the cupboard in it. I don’t want to sleep in there. I’m truly sorry to be a coward. It’s a walkin cupboard, just tucked into the corner, filling the gap between our two rooms. I thought twice about putting him in that bedroom. But really, it’s just a cupboard. It is just a cupboard.
‘Jessie, are you ok?’
‘I’m just in bed,’ I manage to say. ‘Why?’
‘We thought you were burgled. What were those loud bangs about?’ I’m dazed. ‘What bangs?’ I ask.
The neighbour’s son bullishly rants on about the bangs and burglars whilst I feel accused of hiding something nefarious. I have heard nothing but my own lonely unease all evening and although I try and tell him, my heart is taking over, beating fear out with each rabid flutter. What if there is someone in the house, or on the roof, anxiety whispers at me, then shouts.
What if there are people out back waiting for me?
What if there are ghost mice in the attic?
What if he had heard the cupboard.
I call my ex to come over and he looks in each and every space, and berates the neighbour’s son for making a drama and leaves.
When I first moved in, I found pieces of quartz placed over the cupboard doorway in the second room. That was strange, I thought. Perhaps I should have left them, but instead I placed them on my windowsill with the other beautiful rocks I had gathered.
Sometimes the creeping feeling overwhelms me.
Sometimes I try and peek into the cupboard with my extra senses, but the shifts in perception are fruitless, as it keeps on leaking out, shifting and shiftless.
The neighbour’s son smokes a lot of weed. As I lie in the dark, I wonder if the cupboard is filled with the spirit of mis-used marijuana coming through his wall. I make the plant spirit an offering the next day, placing piles of food on the shelves. My hands are steady but my breath quicker than normal.
Over the years, the shadows that have emerged out of the cupboard have included:
A lost child. A lonely mother. Ghost Mice. Displaced plant spirits. Local entities/ Boggarts and Gnomes.
A portal to another, darker dimension, that spills endlessly.
Oh, and the Lizard with the long tongue, but that’s a story for after the watershed.
Now I am a parent. I have to say things like, ‘That noise is from the radiators, it’s the pipes, it’s the neighbours banging.’ Because it really is. And my boy needs to know that his world is safe. And to be honest, the cupboard has never made a squeak that I have heard in the normal realm of the senses. The unease that traces the nerves is too quiet for aural perception, like the wi-fi and radio waves which we live in every day. Except older. Or timeless.
It watches my inadequacies, hears the words I don’t mean to shout at my kid, the decisions I make alone, the friends I invite into his life and those that leave. It sees me fail.
Now, in desperation I turn to the cupboard, and beg for help. I don’t know what to do. Perhaps a deal is brokered, but I am too tired to read the small print. Something in its intangible make-up decides to keep my boy safe, I trust its shadow will never reach his bed.
Instead it turns always to taste my shame.
by Emma Zadow
The last time I came here was supposed to be my final visit. This place has a lot of carbon in its marshes, which brings city folk like me to the coast. I was set up with a local family for my stay—Eve and her brother, Connor. They live in what was once a rustic fisherman’s cottage. Now, it’s a hub for “eco-conversation.”
My job isn’t to deal with the social side of climate change—I’m here for the data. Numbers and figures. You can control data. You can’t control people. This coastal region is key to studying biodiversity. The salt marshes here might be the solution to reducing CO2 emissions. The university hopes to prove it.
My journey to the marshes, however, is another story. The trains were a nightmare—five changes, delays, and no refunds. As the carriages get smaller and the landscape emptier, it feels like the world drops away. Just a vast black void, no lights, no towns, no roads. Just tar black nothingness.
I’d spoken to Eve once before arriving. It wasn’t much of a conversation.
“You’ll be here with us soon,” she’d said in a rough Norfolk accent. She knew I was from the university before I said a word. Then, when I asked about dietary requirements, she hung up.
When I finally arrived, Connor was waiting in a jeep. The bonnet was splattered with fresh blood, and a body wrapped in black bin bags lay in the back.
“It’s only a deer!” Connor laughed. We drove in silence through the flat landscape. At one point, Connor’s tone shifted.
“You saw something, didn’t ya? Out on the marsh.”
I didn’t reply. My mind was still on the train ride, the unsettling reflection I’d seen in the window: sunken eyes staring back at me, watching me. They weren’t my eyes.
We arrived at their house, a saltencrusted bungalow. Inside, Eve was already in the kitchen.
The house was strange, My heart was pounding bymythen,chest tight. like a place frozen in time.
They spoke cryptically, talking about the marsh as if it were alive, a force with its own will. I tried to steer the conversation toward the fellowship and the data I needed to collect. But Eve wasn’t interested in numbers.
She told me a story about the marsh, how it spoke to people, and how its magic bound a brother and sister together. They shared one heart, one mouth. They could never fall in love with anyone else because they were tied to the marsh, cursed to speak for it.
Connor joined in, growing more animated, almost manic. His eyes lit up as he described the “Lady Marsh” who controlled the marshlands, using the brother and sister as her mouthpiece. Eve cracked a crab open on the table as she told the story, her voice growing louder, the atmosphere heavier.
“The marsh took their mother,” Eve said, her eyes staring straight through me. “Swept her into the salt bogs at high tide. She drowned. But the marsh kept her.”
The story didn’t make sense, but there was something in their intensity that made it feel real. Their mother’s death wasn’t just an accident. The marsh had claimed her.
I didn’t sleep that night.
The next morning, I went out to the marshes to collect my data. The numbers were astonishing—oxygen levels higher than anything previously recorded. It was a breakthrough in our research. This salt marsh held the key to carbon reduction, potentially solving the climate crisis. But I couldn’t shake the feeling that something else was at work here. Something beyond numbers and data.
As I prepared to leave, They were the marsh’s eyes. Lady Marsh’s eyes. Watching. Waiting.
That final trip to the salt marshes wasn’t just about science. There was something else out there, something in the wāse—the land between the sea and the shore. That’s what they called it. Those from that pin of land and sea. I can explain the data, the numbers, the ecological breakthrough. But I can’t explain the feeling of being swallowed by that endless sky, or the way the marsh made me feel like
the black eyes from the trainhaunted me. inside it. I was trapped
Ghosts don’t always stay in the past
Feeling spooked?
Everybody has a ghost story within them, and HighTide would love to read yours.
Head to our website: hightide.org.uk and you’ll find our free guide on How to Write Your Own Ghost Story. Full of hints, tips, and learnings gathered from our 2023 and 2024 playwrights – you’ll find everything you need to get you started on your journey.
You can also submit your 1000 word story to HighTide before the 18th December 2024 to be in with a chance of winning our More…Ghost Stories by Candlelight community call-out, and have your story featured in an online e-zine, just like this one!
Full details of how to enter can be found on our website under the playwrights tab.
Come on, have a go, if you think you’re scary enough...