Of Someone's account:
This event occurred sometime during my sophomore and junior years of high school. For context, the house I used to live in was approximately 80 years old at the time. It was practically rotting. Often, there would be black mold growing on the windows, and the tap water did not pass certain quality tests. My mother decided that we would be drinking bottled water for the forseeable future. During these years, I found myself staying up far later than anyone else in the house.
The time was 11PM. I was probably playing Minecraft or some other stupid program on my old desktop tower. The heat of the Californian summer makes you very thirsty, so I had the habit of drinking through excessive amounts of water. I already piled up 6 crushed bottles in my little wire basket trash can. There was no air conditioning- only the air flow from a box fan propped against the window at full blast. I got out of my chair, and turned off the light in my bedroom. I slowly opened the door as quietly as possible. My family had very light sleepers, so I would choose to exit without any light or noise. I stepped out into the hallway, walking along the edges of the floor instead of the center, as to not make the floor creak.
After ninja-walking down the hallway, I stepped into the threshold that led to the kitchen. My feet sensed the transition from shaggy old maroon carpet to relatively cooler tiles. The kitchen, like the rest of the house was nearly black in the darkness. So far, nothing had been out of the ordinary. The process was automatic. I had done this a million times before. So, mindlessly, I stared at the floor, making my way to the opposite side of the kitchen where the plastic-wrapped stash of another 30 water bottles sat.
Then, from the corner of my eye, I saw something that interrupted the usual visual cues of the kitchen's environment. I looked up to see a dark silouette.
The light of the street lamps outside crept under the seams folded blinds. The silouette blended so well into the darkness that I could only see it by the obstruction of this glow. It was my sister. My brain was reeling from the sudden jumpscare of my sister just standing in the kitchen in complete darkness and silence. My first instinctual reaction of fear was to grab her by the arms and whisper-shout "What are you doing here in the middle of the night?!" But my hands did not land on her arms. They passed straight through her body.
I stared, baffled, as my hands phased through the shadowy form. My eyes went wide. Adrenaline rushed. Working purely off of animalistic directives, I ran. I ran straight through the incorporeal shadow to the drawstring hanging on the otherside of it. I quickly yanked the drawstring to bathe the kitchen in light. I snapped around to see that there was no one in the kitchen.
My heartbeat was pounding in my chest. I timidly and anxiously gathered two water bottles from the pile while looking at every corner. Between the stove and the fridge. Behind the termination of the counters. Even for shadows in the curtains of the window that hung above the sink. There was absolutely nothing to explain the form I saw in the darkness. I looked to the threshold that led to the living room, which was still swallowed by the darkness. I felt like I was being watched.
I hesitantly grabbed the drawstring and tugged it again. The shadow was no longer there. I quickly walked back to my room and flipped the lights on. Clueless on any practical actions that could ease my fears, I spent another two hours playing games to distract me from the feeling of something assessing my behaviors.
Inevitably, I had to turn off the lights and lay in bed. I scrolled endlessly on my phone all for the sake of forgetting it.
Of course, when morning came, I asked my prank-averse sister if she was in the kitchen last night. To which she innocently said 'no'.