This book is dedicated to all those who have been there. It's an account of thirty years of stories and what others believe. It is an account of all the incidences which have been relayed to me. No names are used and all stories are recounted as fiction, but someone, somewhere, believes that every single word of at least one of these stories is true.

She hopped in the shower before work. It was a great day - she had done all her planned household chores, and now her second shift job awaited. It wasn't a bad job, it wasn't a bad life. It was normal and mundane, and just the way she liked it. She washed her hair and began shaving her legs when suddenly someone screamed her name from outside the shower curtain. 

It was a deep, gravely voice. She thought at first it was her brother pranking her, or her friend who knew how to get into her house without the key. She poked only her head outside the curtain, because she didn't want either of those people seeing her naked. No one was standing there. She got pissed and screamed, "Who is in my house!? Who the FUCK is in my house?!" No one answered.

It occurred to her that her Chihuahua had never barked. She always barks at whoever came inside. She was, however, staring at the bathroom door, which had been left open. The girl got out of the shower, continuing to ask who was in the house. She searched every room and checked the locks on the doors. Nothing was disturbed. She knew someone had yelled at her, because it was too real to be anything else. 

She started shaking and crying, scared to get back in the shower. She finished her shower routine outside the shower curtain, then she left as fast as possible, eager to get away from the disembodied voice that thought it was funny to make her jump through her skin.

I woke up in the middle of the night and felt a pressing need to check on the children. They were sharing the room next to mine, despite the fact that there were extra rooms, simply because they didn't want to be alone. I peeked in on them and they were both sound asleep, though my daughter had flipped herself head first off the bed again. She never slept right; she would spend a lifetime not sleeping right and sleepwalking. I lifted her back onto the bed and pushed the blankets around her. She never even stirred, thank goodness. I walked out of the bedroom and turned down the hall, where the cathedral entrance to the kitchen ran parallel to the bedroom. I don't know what made me turn my head when I should have walked in the opposite direction to my bed.

A woman was walking out of my kitchen, and I was lucky enough to spot her. She was blue - from her bonnet to her dress to her skin. She wore a dress from the turn of the century, complete with a hoop skirt. Her body was obviously in a corset, and she came from money. She was very rich by her appearance, and she didn't seem to notice me at all. She walked from the kitchen to the dining room, where there was a pass-through, decorated with my plants. She rested her delicate hands on the pass-through, then turned back into the kitchen.

I watched her without moving because I could see right through her. When she reentered the kitchen, I ran back to my bed and hid my head under the covers. It doesn't matter how mature I feel, I will always hide under the covers when I am that scared. I don't even know why she scared me because she never looked at me - she only went about her business.

I fell asleep quickly then woke up early, wondering if it was a dream. I decided to research my little house to see if there were any answers to the blue lady. She was calm and well-mannered, but seemed very occupied. I needed to know, but not now. Apparently the kids needed breakfast. It was mid-afternoon before I could call my friends at the Historical Society.

My friend agreed to come over that night, not knowing why I wanted to know the history of my house. She and I had worked on a number of projects for the town, and she was in the mood for a girl night anyway. After I put the kids to bed at eight, I called her and she arrived a half hour later.

We sat at my kitchen table chatting, but she could tell I was anxious. She pulled a book out of her bag from the Historical Society and flipped to a black and white picture of my house. There was a sign out front that neither of us could read, but the story under the picture stated that my house was a restaurant. She showed me pictures of the inside of the restaurant, where a number of tables sat in my living room. 

She flipped to a picture of the owners, and my jaw dropped. The blue lady stood, in all her glory, next to her husband, somber faced. I finally told my friend about my experience and her face turned white. She turned the page.

My house experienced a fire in the kitchen, destroying the business and the back of the house. The owner's wife died trying to extinguish the flames and save what she had spent half her life building. To this day, she continues to serve customers who have not visited my home in a hundred years.