2:22 — The Ghost of Bradford Lane
by Ovi Catanescu
When Maria and I bought the house at 1014 Bradford Lane in Schaumburg, Illinois, in August 1987, the property was priced well below market value. Being priced under the market was the reason we could afford it. Nobody seemed to want it.
Our Realtor, John Diaz, had shown us many houses in the northwest suburbs of Chicago, all within the amount we could qualify for. We didn't particularly like any of them. Some were in move-in condition, but I didn't like their locations. Then one day he showed us this one.
It was a Campanelli-built, chalet-style raised ranch, located on a quiet street in the heart of Schaumburg. Several parks were within walking distance, including Campanelli Park, the largest of them, with a playground, baseball field, lake, walking trails and benches.
From the outside, the house had character. I liked its sharp architecture and the combination of beige and brown. Behind it was a good-sized fenced backyard, a screened porch and a separate fenced area for gardening. It looked like a great opportunity.
Then we opened the front door. The smell was terrible.
A rug by the entrance concealed ruined mosaic tiles underneath. We found similar damage in the kitchen and bathrooms. Bright orange shag carpeting covered much of the house. The kitchen was ugly and dated, with dark-brown appliances. Everything was so filthy and neglected that you didn't want to touch anything.
We couldn't understand it. Here was a house on a quiet street in the heart of a desirable suburb, close to beautiful parks—and somebody had simply let it deteriorate. We had no idea why.
Not yet.
After we moved in, we began learning about the history of our new home. We had wonderful neighbors. Jim and Celeste, both teachers in Chicago, lived on one side. Ross and Georgia were on the other, and there were also Dick and Doris.
It was from our neighbors that we learned something John Diaz had apparently not included in his sales presentation. According to them, a woman who had lived in our house had killed her husband.
That was certainly interesting information to receive after closing.
We didn't have the means to move again. Besides, we had bought the house because we could see what it might become. We also didn't have the money to hire contractors to fix it. So we did what we could do. We went to work.
Maria and I remodeled practically the entire house ourselves. Little by little, the neglected house began becoming our home. Life continued.
And then something strange started happening.
This was before our son Gabriel was born on December 6, 1990. At night, I began hearing a strange sound. It was difficult to describe. Something like “Pssst.”
The first few times, I didn't think much about it. Then it happened again. And again. Almost every night. Eventually, I noticed something peculiar. Whenever I heard the sound and looked at the alarm clock beside our bed, the large red digital numbers showed the same time: 2:22.
I told Maria. She had a very reasonable explanation: my imagination. She dismissed the whole thing and ignored it. I continued hearing my pssst, continued seeing 2:22, and apparently continued having a very active imagination. Until one night Maria suddenly woke me. “Ovi. I heard it,” she said.
We looked at the alarm clock. The big red numbers said 2:22. Now we had a problem. Because apparently Maria had developed my imagination too. That was the night we agreed: We had a ghost.
After a while, we told our friends Bernard and Hilde about what was happening. Instead of laughing at us, Hilde surprised us with a story of her own. Before moving to their present home, they had lived on Bernard Street in Arlington Heights. Hilde had felt that they were not alone in that house. One day, she said, she even felt somebody touch her neck.
Eventually they moved. Strangely enough, hearing their story made Maria and me feel better. Not because learning about another possibly haunted house was particularly comforting, but at least we weren't crazy by ourselves.
Unlike Bernard and Hilde, however, we didn't have the financial means simply to move. So we developed another plan. Someday we would leave. And when we did, the next house would be brand-new construction. No previous owners. No mysterious history. And, preferably, no ghosts.
In the meantime, we called the priest from our Romanian Orthodox church in Chicago. Father Pavel came and blessed the house. In fact, Father Pavel returned every year for as long as we lived there to bless it. And life went on.
Gabriel was born on December 6, 1990. Alexander followed on October 12, 1993. My brother Adrian and his wife, Valeria, immigrated to the United States and lived with us for about a year. Children were born. Family arrived from Romania. We worked. We remodeled. We celebrated birthdays and holidays.
A house with a dark past became our family home.
Finally, in 1995, we sold the Bradford Lane house and bought a brand-new house at 1430 Falcon Lane in Hunters Ridge, Hoffman Estates. Nobody had lived there before us. Whatever history that house was going to have, we would make it ourselves. And I thought that was the end of the ghost of Bradford Lane. I was wrong.
Maria had been working as a real estate agent since 1990. One day, after we had moved to Hoffman Estates, she was on duty at the Century 21 office, which meant that for a period of two hours, all incoming calls would go to her.
Maria received an ordinary telephone call from someone interested in selling his house in Schaumburg. He wanted a CMA—a comparative market analysis—to find out what his house might be worth. Nothing unusual about that. Maria asked him for the address.
The answer was: 1014 Bradford Lane. Our old house.
Of all the Realtors out there, and all the real estate offices he could have called, he called that Century 21 office during the two hours when Maria happened to be on duty. Was that a coincidence? We will never know. Somehow, the owner of our former house had called the real estate agent who had once owned and lived in that very house.
Maria eventually listed and sold the house. Even more strangely, the family bought another house in Hunters Ridge, the same Hoffman Estates neighborhood where we were now living. During their conversations, Maria discovered something else.
He knew the story about the ghost.
Apparently, when we moved out of Bradford Lane, we hadn't taken everything with us.
Maria eventually listed and sold the house. Even more strangely, the family bought another house in Hunters Ridge, the same Hoffman Estates neighborhood where we were now living. During their conversations, Maria discovered something else. He knew the story about the ghost.
Apparently, when we moved out of Bradford Lane, we hadn't taken everything with us.
Many years later, when Maria and I were living in Algonquin, she received another telephone call concerning 1014 Bradford Lane. This person wanted to know about the history of the house.
Maria was uncomfortable discussing it. She was a Realtor, and she didn't want to become involved in telling ghost stories about somebody else's property. I overheard the conversation. “Give me the phone,” I said. I wasn't a realtor agent. So I told him everything.
I don't know whether he believed me. I don't know whether he eventually bought the house. But I wanted him to know. Whatever somebody chooses to believe about ghosts, I didn't want another family buying that house without knowing its history the way Maria and I had.
Years passed. Bradford Lane became one of those stories from another period of our lives. Until one day in London.
Maria and I were visiting London and walking around Piccadilly Circus when I looked up at the buildings around us. Suddenly, I saw something that got my attention. There, above me, in enormous red digital numbers, was 2:22.
For a moment, I thought I was looking at a clock. Those numbers immediately took me back decades—to our bedroom in Schaumburg, to the alarm clock beside our bed, and to that strange sound in the darkness. Pssst. I immediately took a picture. Then I looked more carefully. It wasn't a clock.
It was a theater advertising a production called 2:22 — A Ghost Story. A ghost story?
Of all the numbers in the world. Of all the subjects in the world. 2:22 — A Ghost Story.
Naturally, I had to investigate. I looked it up to find out what the story was about. Fortunately, I discovered that their ghost was completely different from ours. So I was relieved.
They hadn't stolen my story.
And now, almost forty years after Maria and I first heard that pssst in the middle of the night, I finally decided to tell it myself. Was there really a ghost at 1014 Bradford Lane?
I don't know. I only know what I heard. I know what Maria heard.
And I know what the alarm clock said: 2:22.
And then…?
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