Let me start by professing my skepticism regarding the paranormal and spirits prior to this event.

It was about 6 years ago, I was 19 and school was out for the summer when my best friend and I decided on a whim to take a trip up to South Lake Tahoe in California. I have family up there and being from southern California, it was a prime opportunity to enjoy the beautiful outdoor activities that SLT had to offer; hiking, camping, swimming, mountain biking, that sort of thing. Being the strapping young men that we were, we endured about two days of that, and decided we needed some female company to make this trip more interesting...

So we called up my cousin (same age as me) who was living in nearby Reno, Nevada with some female roommates. She was more than happy to let us crash at her pad and party with them for the remaining few days, so we seized the opportunity and headed down the mountain the very next day.

We arrived in good spirits, and immediately started ingesting spirits (alcoholic kind), little did we know of the spirits we had yet to encounter...

It turns out her two roommates were both adherents of the Wicca belief. One was just a believer while the other was practicing, and who's mother was a priestess of some sort who had been practicing her whole life. I admittedly knew little to nothing about Wicca, and was curious, if not intrigued, so eventually the conversation turned to just that. They started telling stories of seances they had in the past and of the weird happenings that had transpired during them. My friend and I were naturally skeptical, so the girls offered to conduct one, for us, to prove their stories true.

Seeing is believing, right? So I agreed to go along with these two girls to a local cemetery where this seance would take place. My friend and cousin decided not to attend, for their own reasons which I will leave out. The one girl, not the practicing Wiccan, but the believer (we'll call her Bree), had professed a certain "affinity" or "sensitivity" to spirits, so we walked along the cemetery path at night until she "felt" a suitable place to perform. We positioned ourselves on the grass off the path near a row of headstones, but not directly above any graves. In a circle, the practicing Wiccan (we'll call her Theresa) lit a candle and had us repeat a series of chants while holding hands. I forget the actual words spoken, but they were something to the effect of "if there are any restless spirits here, let yourselves be known, etc...."

So nothing happened after about 30 seconds of this. We sat in silence looking at one another, a smug smirk on my face as I realized how gullible I had been to even think anything would happen in the first place. After about 15 seconds of me regretting I was here, Bree's voice dropped about two octaves and solemnly asked "Why are you here?"

Now, I would have laughed it off as acting had it not been for the look in her eyes. She stared at Theresa as she asked this, but then glanced at me, more like through me, and I saw in her eyes, which seemed darker than before, a disturbed look of disdain and anger. It was creepy, to say the least, to see Bree; who not 2 minutes prior was vibrant and jovial, look at me like this...

This took the other girl by surprise, apparently, because with a shaky voice she asked, "what, Bree..?"

"Why are you here. What do you want?" Shortly.

That is when Theresa somewhat re-gained composure and said, "We want to help you."

Silence from Bree.

"What is your name?" Theresa asked. Bree looks around the cemetery as if she had never been there before, slowly saying a name that leaves me at this time, her eyes still full of what seemed like hate.

"How did you die?" Theresa asks.

Bree slaps the candle, extinguishing it and stares right into Theresa's eyes, nearly yelling, "I'm not dead!"

Theresa nearly falls backwards, looks over at me, somewhat horrified, repeating "we want to help you, you're stuck here, we want to help you..."

"LEAVE ME ALONE!" Bree cuts off Theresa's words, almost leaping at her as she sits on the grass, her head swaying back and forth as if in a daze.

That's when I turn to Theresa and say, "End this."

Theresa starts chanting something to the effect of, "wandering spirit, go back to whence you came, leave this body, etc..."

Bree starts shaking her head violently, then slowly, then violently again for about 10 seconds, then collapses backwards in a gasp of air and instantly starts weeping.

We help Bree up and start walking (nearly running) back to the car, Bree sobbing uncontrollably the whole way home. We get back to the girl's apartment and Bree is complaining about how her back hurts. Now, everything up until now could be explained as a well-thought out hoax trying to trick me into believing in spirits and all that, complete with great acting and vocal command, but nothing could prepare me for what I was about to see next. We take off Bree's shirt after her repeated complaints of pain in her back and, let me tell you, what I saw I will never forget.

Her back, from neck to waist, was covered in scratches. I mean, covered. It was like a pack of raccoons had tried to claw their way into her. These were fresh, too, the skin around the scratches was still red as if it had happened just minutes ago. I was at a loss for words, I asked Theresa what the hell caused that, she said it was the spirit trying to get into her. I could have passed the whole thing off as fake until I saw those scratches.

So, we put on a movie in the VCR (a horror flick, go figure). I don't know if this has anything to do with anything, but the movie kept ejecting itself, and the station kept changing to a late-night religious infomercial. We finally abandoned the movie idea and went to bed that night, Theresa and I sleeping in Bree's bedroom to make sure she was alright through the night.

The next day, my friend and I left and went back to SLT. He was still skeptical, even after seeing Bree's back for himself. I, on the other hand, saw something that night that I wouldn't soon forget, and obviously didn't. I only wish I could remember the name that Bree had said, it was Luther van *something*, an old-sounding name. Ever since then I haven't met anyone who performs seances, but I would like to give it a go one more time, just so long as it's not me getting all scratched up. Now, you can take this story with a grain of salt, or however you want, but I'm telling you what I wrote here is true, for I have no reason to lie about it. I thought I would share it with you people and see what your thoughts were, or if you had any similar experiences.

Peace.