This story originally appeared in the book Ghostly Adventures. I edited it slightly for modern consumption, but this seems like a great day trip for the Legends Project.
Laurie’s work as a paranormal investigator sometimes forces her to keep quiet around people she does not know. Many investigators are fine among their own kind, but the outside world is not so accepting. Spending too much time with people who believe in the paranormal makes you think everyone is open about that kind of thing. It only takes a few people giving you that look, the one where you know they will not invite you over for coffee sometime, to keep your stories and your ideas to yourself.
Holiday, Florida, is like that. On the west coast of Florida, halfway down the state but a world away from the lights of Orlando or the history of St. Petersburg, the town is bursting with untold ghost stories and legends. It just takes time, and the right questions, to get them out of people.
Laurie was not sure how her neighbors would perceive her experiences when she moved there. “When I first moved to this neighborhood I kept a low profile. No one even knew I was a ghost hunter for ten years. Over those ten years I heard lots of stories from neighbors about strange happenings around there, and since my ghost hunting pastime became known I have heard even more endless reports.”
One story stays with her. “About twenty years ago I went to a barbecue at a neighbor’s home, a fisherman who had lots of local yokel buddies. Someone started telling a story saying that he had seen a pair of pants with shoes, like a man from the waist down, run across a nearby road on a rainy night. Another man jumped in to say that he saw it too and pretty soon they were comparing notes, and even with all I have seen and heard myself, I chalked this up to just too much beer and a bunch of tall-tale fishermen telling yet another ridiculous tale.”
The story was a legend in the town, but like many legends, there was an air of truth to it. While many accounts came secondhand, there were also people who saw the mysterious pants with their own eyes, making the other stories more believable. Laurie saw the story as legend, but a while later she was confronted herself. “About two years later, I was coming home from a friend’s home. It was late and it was raining, there was a slight fog but nothing blinding. I saw my neighbor’s eighteen-year-old son on the side of the highway near the road that leads to my road. His motorcycle had broken down and he was soaked to the gills. I picked him up to give him a ride home as he lived four houses down from me.
“We were driving down the road that eventually dead ends to my road, and as we came over a rise and into the dip that followed I could not believe what I saw. I was driving my old Bronco, which was very tall, and I had my high beams on, which illuminated the road for quite a distance. There are no streetlights here and the road is very dark at night. The rain was still coming down but only a light drizzle now compared to the earlier downpour. There, about thirty yards in front of my truck, was what appeared to be a man from the waist down, crossing the road into a nearby trailer park.” The ghost had no upper body and she could not see its feet. There was only a pair of pants, suspended in midair.
“I locked my brakes and sat in disbelief and looked over to the boy beside me. He looked scared to death. The youth asked her if she had seen what he had seen. I said that of course I had and he replied, ‘I am so glad. I have seen it before and no one would have believed me so I never told anyone.’”
The clothes matched the description given by the men at the barbeque. “The pants were brown, uniform-style pants, with shoes and a belt, but there was absolutely nothing visible of the man above the belt.”
Although it seems most towns in America have some kind of highway haunting, they are usually full-bodied apparitions, not just a pair of slacks. In fact, it is unusual to see only the clothes of a ghost. While many people feel spirits can exists after death, one of the questions always asked is why they have clothes. That question cannot be answered except to say somehow their remaining energy consists of how they viewed themselves in life. Regardless, the phantom pants are a rarity in the field, even to someone with Laurie’s resume.
The experience made Laurie more open to legends and local folklore. “That evening I learned that no matter how ridiculous something sounds to me, I have to give the benefit of the doubt to people. I have heard several bizarre claims since. I can honestly say that even though I scoffed and shook my head when I heard the tale, I now have to eat my words on the ghost of the traveling pants. I have no explanation for what I saw that night. I haven’t seen it again even though others claim to have.”
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