There’s a ghost who lives at the ice cream shop where I work, and we decided to call him George.
George the ice cream ghost first announced his presence by dropping things on our heads. We’d be walking by something attached to the wall or on a shelf high above our heads, and it would spontaneously fall right as we were walking by. White boards, boxes, I even had a water vacuum fall on my head not once, but three times, in the space of a few minutes.
The Salt Incident
Once, I was standing at the cash register. The store was empty, except for a husband and wife who were buying ice cream at the counter. Right before my eyes, about 4 or 5 glass jars of this fancy, flaky sea salt we sell jumped off the merchandise shelf and smashed to the floor as if they had been thrown.
Thievery
Another time, he stole a pair of pliers. I, myself, put them away in a clear, plastic bin. No sooner had I done that when my coworker came back to use them, and they were no longer in the bin. Our other coworker came in the back, and we scoured the entire area, but could not find them. Two days later, they appeared back in the bin, without explanation. (Well, we know the explanation, right?)
I have to wonder what the ice cream ghost needed them for.
Trapped
The doors to the deep freezer are heavy, magnetized, and difficult to open. I have to dig my heels in the floor and pull as hard as I can to get in or out, but occasionally the door will rattle so violently in the frame that it seems like someone is trapped in there. But when we open the door, the freezer is empty.
Washing the Dishes
George seemed like a prankster for a while, until one day when it was taking us a long time to close the shot. It was near one in the morning, and we were all exhausted. I was in the back by myself doing the dishes, and everyone else was in the front. I put the last load of dishes into the sanitizer and took some clean dishes to the front of the shop to put away (which is separated by doors), and I realized when I got to the front that one of my coworkers had forgotten to give me a cup of the clips that we use to clip the ice cream tubs together. Annoyed that I’d have to do another load, I went to the back to grab more clean dishes, and the sanitizer stopped as I was gathering them up. After I put the dishes away, I went to the back to unload the sanitizer, but when I got there, the sanitizer had started again. I was confused. I hadn’t started it, and everyone else had been in the front. Still, I decided to ask.
“Hey, did any of you start the sanitizer?”
“No, we’ve all been cleaning out here!”
I went to the back and waited for the sanitizer to stop. When it did, I opened it up, and there was the cup of clips, clean and shiny.
The ice cream ghost helped me with the dishes on one other occasion. I was washing the spoons, but I realized when I took them out that I hadn’t done a very good job, and would have to put them through the sanitizer again. Someone called my name, so I poked my head through the doors to answer a question. When I turned back around, not only had the sanitizer started again, but the spoons had been separated into two smaller batches, and one of them was being sanitized.
Thanks, George!
The Bathroom Incident
I do have one favorite George story. There’s this guy that I work with that nobody likes. Let me paint you a picture of him so you can get the right idea. He spends at least twenty minutes every day in the bathroom primping his handlebar mustache with a ton of wax and his little, tiny mustache comb. We find his mustache comb in the employee refrigerator, which is just gross. He carries around a pocket knife, is rude to our co-workers and to the customers and spends his entire shift on his phone. Despite repeated efforts to get him to do his job, he refuses to work.
He drives me, and everyone else, absolutely insane.
One day, he went on a break. The time for the end of his break came and passed. We waited for him to come back. He didn’t. We got frustrated, and our manager decided to call him. As he walked through the doors to the back of shop, he heard some pounding on the bathroom door and a muffled voice yelling, “help!”
Mustache Fool was locked in the bathroom.
We tried desperately to open the door, but it wouldn’t budge. We ended up having to call a repairman to come and shave down the bottom of the door. Mustache Fool was locked in there for two hours, playing I Will Survive on his phone. I assume it was George that locked him in there, and I thank him for it.
Sometimes, ghosts are really on the side of good.
I and one other coworker have seen him. It’s always in the very back of the shop, and we’ll see a bright white figure walk across the mirror on the door. George makes life at the shop interesting, and we have adopted him as our shop mascot.
I hope that every has friendly hauntings of their own. Happy Halloween!
For more Halloweek, check out these articles!
My name is Andrea and I live in Los Angeles, California. By day, I am an actor and by night I am working towards a degree in nutritional science.
