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Out of Bounds

A school ghost story, or a fine method of classroom management?

By Sebastian PhillipsPublished 6 years ago 3 min read
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At the start of the year, I truly hated doing my break duty. I was stuck in the west stairwell, which the hooligan element thought of as their picnic spot. The worst of our school would use it as a place to smoke, to eat their lunch then drop it over the floor, that sort of thing. Senior leadership didn’t seem very bothered. Requests for CCTV to find out who was throwing chairs around never even got an answer. In the end, I decided to use a behaviour management system perfected by the former provost of Eton.

My form group is lovely, but young and a bit gullible. Best of all, they were too nice to ever "hang out" in the West Stairwell.

“Have you ever noticed anything about the place?” I asked.

“Like what, sir?”

“Like, cold spots. Or shadows where there’s no reason for them to be. Or, you know, footsteps, that sort of thing?”

Then I started to look worried, as if I had said the wrong thing. Overstepped some Mark That Must Not Be Crossed. "Actually, forget I said anything, OK?”

The next day, a couple of students dropped by to see me after school. They asked if I knew anything about the West Stairwell being, you know, "not right." I told them that the whole school was built at the same time and it was all perfectly sound. Any story that a workman had been killed there was just a silly rumor.

Some of the worst offenders were in Year Eight. Nasty little brutes who lack the charm of first years or the focus of students heading for exams. As luck would have it, I’m responsible for writing the history lessons for that year. We’d just finished the English Civil War so I did a special lesson for them on witchcraft and witch hunters.

I also broke the habit of a lifetime and invented a fictitious historical character to out into the lesson. I made up an evil sorceress called "Murdering Meg" who lived on the site of our school. She had a garden where she used to go out at midnight and host a witches' sabbat. It only took a few minutes for them to calculate that her garden would have been right at the bottom of the West Stairwell…

“Yes, perhaps, but it’s all nonsense. She vanished centuries ago, she couldn’t possibly be causing problems in a rational age like ours.”

“What do you mean ‘vanished’ sir?’”

“I’m sure she saw which way the wind was blowing and just moved to another town, there were very few records kept in the 17th century, so it would have been easy. OK, there is that stupid folktale which claims she disappeared on the night of the full moon, when the spire of the church was engulfed by that huge bat-shaped monstrosity, but who could believe such rot? It was just the poor building techniques of the time.”

Then someone was out of bounds in the stairwell and their phone died. It probably just ran out of battery but you can’t tell that to a bunch of hysterical children panicking that the Devil is loose on school premises. There was a lot of running and screaming but SLT didn’t notice.

The final step was when I told some students I was going onto break duty in the West Stairwell and accidentally dropped a crucifix from my tweed jacket. It made a good clang, being a large brass one—ideal for waving at vampires.

“Why have you….?”

“No reason! In case I have to cover a Religious Studies lesson later. Seriously, why else would a history teacher have a cross with him? Or garlic? Don’t be foolish.”

It's winter now. It’s dark in the West Stairwell. Dark and very, very quiet. There are no children using it at break time. They huddle outside the glass doors and get wet, or cold, or some days both. I lean on the radiator and look at a sea of bedraggled, frozen faces.

Occasionally, those passing through do claim they hear an insane chuckling. That’s OK. It’s just me, enjoying a cup of tea and the chance to read my beloved M. R. James ghost stories.

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About the Creator

Sebastian Phillips

UK based writer and photographer, specialising in offbeat stories and obscure facts.

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