As The Raven Dreams Podcast - Scary Stories For Dark Dreams - Vol 41 | ATRD Podcast

Episode Date: August 28, 2025

Today we have more than 2 hours of true scary stories with a late night ambience. Scary Stories For Dark Dreams is a collection of older stories, remastered and put together in a long form episode. This Collection includes the following stories; Hiking Stories, Haunted House Stories and Stalkers stories from 2023, and Fall stories from 2022 So, turn down the lights, tune in, and let the haunting tales of everyday people take you down that dark and creepy road. Remember, these aren't just stories... these are true experiences that remind us that our world can truly be scarier than fiction. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to like or rate the podcast, and leave me a comment with your thoughts if the platform your own supports it! I upload episodes every 3 days, so there are 2 days between new uploads. The podcast consists of new scary story collections, Glitch in the matrix collections, and also what I call the "Dark Dreams" collections (which are older stories, remastered and layered with rain sounds). If you have a story to submit, would like to find where to listen to the podcast, or want to find me on social media platforms, all of that info can be found at https://www.astheravendreams.com You can also send stories into my subreddit (r/theravensdream) or email them to me at [e-mail] Want to check out some ATRD Podcast Merch? ➤ https://teechip.com/stores/astheravendreams Or for signed merch ➤ https://ko-fi.com/AsTheRavenDreams I wrote a novel, "The Insomniac's Experiment" by Raven Adams! Check it out on amazon (Or you can email me for a signed copy!) Join Patreon to get early access and support the Podcast! ➤ https://www.patreon.com/AsTheRavenDreams Check out my gaming channel with my pal Ghost_Ink ➤ @superNefariousBros On YouTube TIMESTAMPS One Ad After the First Story, No ads after that Story 1: 00:22 Story 2: 13:05 Story 3: 22:57 Story 4: 34:58 Story 5: 46:28 Story 7: 54:51 Story 8: 1:00:36 Story 9: 1:11:12 Story 10: 1:21:52 Story 11: 1:26:12 Story 12: 1:35:09 Story 13: 1:41:49 Story 14: 1:47:07 Story 15: 2:00:12 Story 16: 2:08:11 ----- Disclaimer ➤ Episodes include a content warning for language and sensitive/disturbing content. Listener discretion is always advised. ALL Audio and visuals on this podcast are copyright of AS THE RAVEN DREAMS / RAVEN ADAMS and may not be duplicated, in any format. Bless This Mess. None of my audio is AI Generated, I am a real person reading real stories into a real microphone. #ScaryStories #UnexplainedMysteries #GlitchInTheMatrix ➤ And Remember; You are loved, you are important, and you are valid. Never let anyone tell you otherwise. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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If you have a board of Viaray. Embarked and profited. Embarked and relax. Ciroat. Bookine. Oh, that also. And profite. Viaray, the voice that we love that

we love. If you have a true scary story you'd like to share with the podcast, go to as the ravendreams.com and click the button to send it my way. Also, if the platform you're on has the option to rate the podcast or leave a comment,

please consider doing so. And as always, thank you. I apologize that this story comes across, strangely, or is way too wordy, but I'm not much of an author, so odds are that some of it may not make cohesive sense. I have never written this down, and I've rarely talked to anyone about these occurrences, but they are all burned very deeply into my memory.

These are core memories from my childhood that will never leave me. When I was a very little girl, my father passed away from a very painful and destructive sickness. I don't recall the exact sickness, but it hit him, and he was knocked down and then was gone within a few weeks. Because of this, we had to move in with my maternal grandparents, and the house that they lived in was a nightmare for me every day that I spent there. The house was like one of those creepy houses that you would see in an old horror movie. Not like a huge, old Victorian mansion or something. Just like the, obviously old with some very ancient architecture.

I thought the house was the coolest thing when I got older, at least how it looked. My grandma was into some weird things, so I think she liked to push the slightly creepy aesthetic. Of course, like I said, staying in the house itself was hell, but the outside appearance was pretty cool, I guess. I don't think things started right off the bat. It was closer to when I was eight or so. Yeah, we lived there through my entire childhood. My first memory of the house was the weird sounds. At first, it was just weird, basic house noises. Or at least that's what I was told. Creeks, bumps, various sounds of steps and doors, shutting.

I remember telling my grandpa that I heard something walking upstairs, but he would tell me that I was just imagining it. There was one day that my grandma and I were sitting downstairs at the dining room table. She was doing something, and I was coloring. And I heard what sounded like normal steps upstairs, but then came to me. the laughter. You ever hear a kid laughing when you darn well know that you're alone in the house? Yeah, it was enough to freeze my blood, even at the age of like seven or eight. The first thing I did was look to my grandma to see if she heard it, and I remember seeing the

look on her face. She was staring at the stove with her eyes wide and a pale face. I think it was then that I knew that it wasn't just the house shifting. and that the laughing wasn't in my mind. I asked my grandma what it was, and she told me not to worry about it. I pushed it. I kept saying that she heard the laughing, too. And after a while, she smacked the counter and yelled at me. Anne-Marie, that's enough.

Leave it alone. It was nothing. After that, whenever I heard things, I wouldn't tell anyone. I didn't mention it to them. I didn't tell them, because I knew that they would. just chastise me for it. Not long after the laughing started, I started seeing the shadow. I'm not talking like a shadow cast by something.

It was a human shape. Always slightly out of focus. I would be doing whatever I did at that age, and I would always start to feel cold. It was a pure instinctual reaction, but I would get the chill and would look up and would always see the damn shadow. I noticed it more upstairs than down, so I started to sleep on the couch, and when my mom asked me why, I told her that I just didn't like my bed or something stupid like that. So, of course, they got me a new bed, and I was told that I had to sleep in my bedroom. The first night that I had to sleep in there was one of the worst nights. It was when things really kicked into high gear.

When I went to bed, I just laid there in my bed unable to fall asleep because I kept feeling cold, kept feeling like I was being stared at. I was laying there with my eyes closed and my blanket over my face when I started to feel this pressure in my chest. It was like someone was pushing me down onto the bed, like hands were holding me down, but it was. When I opened my eyes, there was obviously nobody there. What was there was horrifying.

There was this dark mist hovering above me. It almost looked like a storm cloud, but it was up close and personal. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't scream. I was just frozen there watching as this dark mist slowly took shape. Now, this may sound like sleep paralysis, and it could have been, but it was brought on by something that was not natural nor normal. I was a young child, and whatever this was haunting me.

I watched as this thing hovered above me for a few moments, and then slowly made its way out of my room. When it left the room, I was able to move again, and my heart was racing. I chose to follow it. I chose to see where it was trying to go, and when I opened my door, I watched as this dark cloud made its way a little bit down the hallway and then through the attic door. I immediately ran downstairs and I locked myself in the bathroom. I sat there on the floor crying my eyes out, terrified that this thing was going to come and find me,

that it was going to suffocate me or hold me down again. I eventually fell asleep because when I woke up, It was to my mom knocking on the bathroom door and asking who was there. This was the last event for a little while. A couple of years, I believe, because I think I was around 11 the next time something happened. The next event, though, was the one that really solidified the horror for me. It was the middle of the summer, and I was home with my grandma again. My mom and grandpa were both at work all the time, so...

Really, most of my childhood, it was just she and I. By this time, though, we actually had a small dog named Baxter, and he was my little buddy for a long time. I was sitting in the living room. I think at this point I was playing my Game Boy, and my grandma was sitting in her chair crocheting. Neither of us were making much noise. I think my game of Tetris was probably making the most sound.

When out of nowhere the room was filled with this sound of humming, It was so sudden and it wasn't happy, humming. It was a pained and sadded sound of someone humming out a somber tune, and as they did, it almost sounded like they were sobbing. Again, I heard it in my mind immediately went, Am I hearing things? Or does my grandma hear this too? And when I glanced over at her,

I could tell that she was holding back a terrified look. It was at this point that I tried. took the time to confront this straight on. I was older, and I was at that age where I thought that I was more grown up than I really was. I said, I know that I'm not imagining that. I can tell that you can hear it too. At this point, she just sighed and said,

Yeah, I can hear it too, okay? I just don't want to acknowledge it because, if we do, it might feel invited to stay. At this point, it kind of clicked that she felt. firmly believed that giving whatever this thing was, any sort of attention would make it once to stick around. The humming stopped a few moments later, but it didn't quite end there. When it stopped, we both kind of just sat there in silence, until Baxter started growling. It was completely silent when he just started bearing his teeth and growling at seemingly

nothing. He stood up from the couch and continued his growl at the empty room. and then we heard this loud bang coming from upstairs. We both jumped up. I think we were both kind of freaking out, and my grandma made her way up the stairs and told me to stay there. I, of course, did not listen, and I followed her up. We looked in the rooms, and we pretty quickly found what was the cause of the sound.

When we walked into my grandparents' bedroom, we both saw the lamp that normally sat on the end table on my grandpa's side, had been practically thrown across the room, and was completely shattered. I helped her clean it up and get it all sorted out, and while we were cleaning, she finally explained some things to me. The main thing that she told me was that the house was haunted, and it was haunted by someone that my grandparents knew.

Apparently my grandmother was not my grandpa. his first wife. His first wife lived with him in the house for the four years they were married until she died. She died in the house, in the room that I had been living in. She had an undiagnosed heart problem, and my grandpa actually found her on the floor one day after coming home from work. And she was already cold. Ever since then, this house has had strange things happening. things my grandfather ignored,

things that he told my grandmother to ignore when they got together, and my grandmother had told my mother to ignore it and so forth, until it got to me. The problem was that, apparently, I was the one that the spirit, well, assumed to be the spirit of my grandfather's first wife, was tormenting. She was tormenting me more than anyone else. I broke down and I told my grandfather,

grandmother everything that I had dealt with, things that she never knew about. She hugged me and told me that I just needed to ignore it, basically saying what she had said downstairs. Thankfully, after that, the things that happened went back to the minimal, creepy things, the sounds, the laughing and such. I never experienced that sleep paralysis, and nothing else was ever physically broken. I did see the shadow every once in a while. and it seemed to spend a lot of time near the attic,

which was a bit across from my room. But nothing ever seemed as malicious as that one night. After I moved out and I got my own place, all of it seemingly stopped, which tells me that the spirit was attached to that house, or to my grandparents, probably my grandpaw. I don't know if anything else has happened in that house to them,

though. My grandparents both passed about 15 years ago, and my mom sold the house. I asked my mom about her experiences, but she never wanted to speak about it beyond just saying that she had had them. So, that's my story with the haunted house that my grandparents owned, a house where I was tormented as a kid. There were a lot more happenings before that day, the day where my grandma told me everything, but none of them really come to mind like the ones I've explained. I hope that you enjoyed this story, and I hope it's good enough for your channel, as it's a story that I've wanted to tell for a very long time. Thank you for your time, Raven, and I look forward to many more scary stories from you.

It's never too early to plan your summer story in Europe with WestJet, from rolling countryside to cobblestone streets. begin your next chapter. Book your seat at westjet.com or call your travel agent. Westjet, where your story takes off. The summer immediately following high school graduation, my friends and I were a bit restless. Some of us were waiting to go on out to college.

Some of us were trying to get work here at home. But all of us were in that in-between where our childhoods had officially ended, and our adult lives hadn't yet actually started. It was one of those, we literally have our whole lives ahead of us situations. And one of my friends, Curtis, suggested that we should go on an adventure. Curious, we asked what he meant,

and he mentioned that we should go to a somewhat close national park, don't want to mention which one for privacy, and we should bike through it. his brother, a guy we all knew was a huge fitness buff, had told him about a dense and mostly unexplored biking path that was, in his words, breathtaking. And the more that he told us about it, the more we all seemed pretty well sold on it.

A week later, we had all packed up our gear, told our parents about the trip, gotten the whole, you be careful out there, and call the minute anything goes wrong, speech, and then met up to get the hell out of Dodge. It was just the four of us, Curtis, myself, Shelley, and Josh. We were all super close throughout school, and we had each other's backs, so we were all looking forward to whatever adventure awaited us.

We got there, and let me tell you, the forest greeted us with open arms. The first day was exhilarating. We all biked around, got that quick rush of adrenaline. That hits whenever you go way too fast down dirt paths. We were all loving every second of this trip, realizing how amazing of an idea this really was. We were the kings and the queen of the trails, young and invincible. As we ventured on, the woods had obviously started hitting that point where it was denser, The path was getting a bit more rugged, and the air was getting thick.

We slowed down a bit on this part of the trails, mostly to take it all in. And two words that I want to use to describe it are beautiful, yet foreboding. Then something happened. Curtis was up ahead, and he signaled for all of us to stop, and then yelled back, Hey, hold up. He stopped near an area that was pretty heavy with brush, and we all got to him and asked what was going on. He motioned towards the bushes.

Sitting there in the brush was another bike. It looked a bit older, a bit rusted. There was something unsettling about it for whatever reason. It was just an old bike, but something about it made me feel off. Curtis got off his bike and walked over to lift it, saying, Huh, I wonder who ditched their bike. We all kind of looked around trying to see if there was anyone there, but Curtis made the comment that the bike was starting to rust,

so it had likely been dumped there for a few days, and that there was no way the owner was still around. We kind of all agreed that he was probably correct, that the state of the bike was evident that it wasn't recently used. I was still feeling a bit uneasy, but Curtis said that we should press on. The four of us got on our bikes. The other three started on, and I took up the rear.

I started to pedal to get back to speed, but I paused when I heard what sounded like someone crying out. It was weak, but it was definitely the sound of someone or something in pain. I shouted for the others, and Shelley looked back, but I don't think the others heard me, and I thought they were going to keep going. So, I figured I should take the moment to figure out who or what it was that I'd heard. I headed toward the brush, pushed it aside, and started walking off the path.

I remember asking, hello? Is there someone out there? I expected not to get a response, to be proven that I was crazy. But to my surprise, I heard a very soft... help me, please. I jumped into action, running into the trees and looking for who this was. Then, I saw her. It was a young woman that wasn't much older than I was, but she looked gaunt.

She looked like she'd been out in the woods for a while. Pale, thin, and just looking like she was crawling that thin line between life and death. I will never forget. get the look that she gave me. The way her blue eyes looked like they were glossing over. I wasn't sure if that stare wasn't, oh, thank God, there's help. Or, and at least I won't die alone.

I started shouting out for my friends, or anyone really, screaming for someone to help. I grabbed my bag and pulled out some water and gave it to her, telling her that we were going to get her out of the woods. Thankfully, my friends had realized that I wasn't with them, and they'd come back down the trail, stopping where they saw my bike parked. I heard Shelly shouting, asking where I was, I yelled back and asked them for help. The other three ran into the woods, and were just as shocked as I was to see this poor lady.

Curtis and I lifted her up to carry her back to the path, while Josh and Shelly said they were going to ride back down to get hold of someone to get the medic, or someone out to help her. The time that we sat there felt like forever. Giving this poor girl some water, some of the food that I had, trying to get her knots to fall asleep, you know, just in case.

It was a nightmare. The whole time I tried to talk to her, ask her about herself, ask her about what happened. She said that her name was Sierra, but that she couldn't remember what, had happened. I tried to ask her how long she'd been in the woods, and she asked me what day it was.

When I told her it was Thursday, she stared at me and shook her head, once again saying that she couldn't remember what day it was that she'd gotten stuck out here. The whole conversation was so chilling. She couldn't remember anything about what happened when she'd gotten lost. She couldn't remember why she had gotten lost. She knew that she was out here, that she wasn't injured, and nothing out of the ordinary had happened. But the next thing she remembered was lying against the tree when I was standing there. There was a huge gap of time that for her was just gone.

After a little while, a pair of medics rode up to the trail where we were stationed alongside our two friends. They asked us some questions about where we'd found her, if we'd. we'd given her anything, etc. I took the lead and explained everything, and they nodded along. One of them got on the radio and called it into base, and then mentioned that they were going to have a helicopter come in for a short-haul rescue. And they asked that we not be in the area so that they didn't have any issues with getting her out. They also asked that we head back down to the Ranger Station,

and that they would meet us there for a full statement. The time that we sat there at the station, waiting for them to come back, it was agonizing. When they got back, they asked who found her. I raised my hand saying that I had found her, and he looked me dead in the eyes saying that she wanted him to thank me for saving her life. And he then said that me finding her was what had literally just saved her life. He mentioned that she was closer to death than we thought. that if we'd kept going like we planned, she likely would have died within the afternoon.

I asked if she was able to tell them anything about what had happened to her, but he confirmed that she was still lost for what happened, and that it's likely that she would just remember later, which then restored a lot of my hope as to whether or not she would survive. Saying that she would remember later told me that he fully expected her to live. That's the story of the craziest summer my group of friends has ever had. The only time we went to a national park, and the only time that we ever did a group biking excursion.

I never heard from Sierra again, and I can only hope that she made a full recovery. I will never forget that look in her eyes. I will never forget her weak voice, and the way she looked like a shell of who she likely was. I'm glad that we saved her. But I always freak out mentally about that fact that we all almost just kept going. I attended a local university in 2006, and also lived on campus in one of the dorms.

I actually lucked out and had my own dorm at first, but when they started construction on the older building, which was the dorm I stayed in, I had to move, putting me in a room with someone else. This is where the story began. I was now rooming with a guy named Scott. Scott was cool most of the time that we shared a dorm. He seemed like your normal college guy, too. He did all his homework, went to all of his classes, and he even played baseball. Hell, sometimes he would skip class when he had a hard day at practice.

We got along pretty well, too. We tolerated each other's mannerisms, but also respected our rules, property, and boundaries. However, Scott did dabble in recreational substances. He never did it in the dorm, thankfully, but sometimes it was in the back of the building where security and the other staff typically never went. But things started changing when he decided to experiment with other stuff. When he started falling behind in class, he started taking, we'll call it, enhancements to help with focus. He had told me before that his parents were very uptight and strict.

He wanted to play baseball. It truly was his passion, and he was good at it. But his parents told him it was a waste of time, and if he was going to try to make a career of it, then he would at least have to go to college so he would. had something to fall back on. Very supportive parents. Anyways, so when his grades started slipping, his parents threatened to not pay for the baseball fees, pull him out, and bring him back home to go to a local community college where they could keep a close eye on him. With this thought in mind, he knew he needed to do something,

so he started taking the pills. He definitely improved his grades, but it should be just didn't feel right. He talked about how well it worked for him and even offered me one when I was stressing over a project. I'm pretty against anything like that, and I very firmly said no thank you. And he never offered again, but he did continue to use them. Eventually, though, Scott started to change. He would have these bursts of energy, have me or someone else turn in his work and then crash

and be out of school for days. I don't know how he was able to miss so much class, yet still do the makeup work and homework, without any trouble understanding. When we would hang out in the dorms, watching TV or playing something, he would ask me some pretty mysterious questions. He asked me if I ever considered making money outside of my job.

I thought it was a conversation, so I remember laughing and saying, well, yeah, but I barely have enough time to work, go to class, and eat and sleep now. He then tried clarifying by saying something like, what if it would be passive, and it wouldn't interfere with what you're already doing? Again, I thought this was all hypothetical, and I decided to make a joke about if it was what he was doing,

then I wasn't interested, because I didn't want to miss that much class. Compounding all the work at once was just not my thing. He laughed and said, yeah, you're right, and dropped it. And we just continued what we were doing. He had also asked about what I would do if someone stole something from me. Would my answer change if it was something dear to me, something family-related, something expensive, or maybe something I wasn't supposed to have in the first place? These questions were all being prompted while we were at some hole-in-the-wall bar and grill.

It started as just random questions, but as the subject of the item changed, he started becoming more and more serious. So I asked him if something happened, or if he lost something and we kind of went back to joking. Then I started noticing the real character changes. While we were in our dorm, I was playing something and he was at his desk when I heard him let out a real character changes. really long sigh. I asked him what was up, and he asked me if I ever felt like I was being followed. I told him no. Why would someone follow me anyways?

And he just said that he didn't know. So I asked him the same thing. He paused for quite some time before finally saying, nah, I don't think so. He said no, yet he was starting to. to look more and more paranoid. He started wearing a hoodie, pulled tight when he left the dorm, yet he would only leave the dorm to make an appearance in classrooms.

If he wanted something from the store, he would give me cash and ask me to get it. He also stopped going to his two classes that were in the north building. You had to either walk, which is what he typically did, or drive over to it, which was across from the grounds. The central building was just across the street from the dorms, so it was a much shorter walk. I still feel really bad for this, but one night, I was ready to go to bed for the night when he asked me to get something from the gas station.

It was also across the street, so I got mad and just told him to get it himself. And I just remember the look of fear in his eyes when he said, I can't. I asked him what the hell was going. on and unloaded on the guy about a lot of things. I was delivering his work back and forth, running his errands, and not to mention all the questions people were asking me about him and the questions that he was asking about everyone else. He'd even broken up with his girlfriend, Luna, who he had been with for a few years.

He wouldn't answer the door when she came by, and he always told her to leave, so she always asked me about him and vice versa. I told him I was tired of being a messenger and whatever crap he was in, he needed to figure it out and get his damn life together. He sat quietly for a while and then just apologized, so I went to sleep. The next day, I apologized to him and said that I was just under a lot of stress and that I would go to the store for him. I tried to make light of the situation.

by just saying that he could tell me anything if he needed someone to talk to, but that I would not be a witness on the stand. He laughed and thanked me, and I left for school as normal. Things did not get better, and in fact, he became more and more withdrawn. We had one small window, which he had completely covered in cardboard and duct tape. He only left to go to the showers and toilets, if I was home, and I had no idea what he did when I wasn't. And he freaked out any time someone knocked on the door.

He also stopped showing up to all of his classes, and a few of the teachers even refused to give me the work, saying that he needed to show up. It was about time for the first semester finals, and he was not going to be able to take it home. I told them I had tried multiple times to get him to come in, even if I had to stand by him the whole time, but he would refuse, and seemed to have a panic attack at the idea of going out.

When I told him about this, he seemed more defeated than ever. I again probed and asked what was going on, and that we could figure it out, no matter what it was. All he said was, it's too late. Cops wouldn't want my help either. He wouldn't explain or say anything else about it. it. The day of our finals was in mid-November.

I helped gather his stuff. He had his hoodie on, and we left the building together. I walked him to the first class, and then I went to mine. I went back to his class when I was done to make sure that he got to the next one, but he was already gone. I figured that maybe he got the courage and went on without me, so I continued to my other classes on my own. I checked one more time in his last class and he wasn't there.

So I went to the gas station, grabbed his favorite sandwich, and went back to the dorms to hopefully celebrate. Unfortunately, that would never happen. The door was unlocked, and it looked like our dorm had been ransacked. Stuff was everywhere. Both our beds had been tossed around, books were laying all over the floor, and even a cup of water was knocked over. I tried to pick up stuff the best that I could,

and when I was fixing my bed, I heard my pillow crunch. I checked inside where I found a folded-up piece of paper. It was a note from Scott that said, I'm sorry for what I put you through. I didn't want any of this. I just needed some help, and my parents wouldn't. I can't blame them either, as it was all my fault. fault. I'm doing this on my own free will. Please tell Luna she did nothing wrong either,

and I will always love her. Please, don't try to find me for your safety. I was freaked out. He never really mentioned feeling threatened or like he was in danger, just the feeling like he was being watched part. I told Luna about it first, and she agreed that we should tell security. We did, and they called the cops, who filed a report. They let me keep the note, and they basically closed it off as a runaway since the note sounded like it. They did pretty much no kind of investigation,

they didn't even dust for prints or take pictures. I even found out that he didn't attend any other classes after the first one. It's been years, and I still have no idea, what happened to him. I tried finding his parents or other family online, but I've found nothing. To this day, I still think about it, and I hope that he's safe, but I don't know what to believe. Hell, with the cryptic questions that he always asked, his note, and the disappearance, I'm actually afraid to get involved.

But if he's out there, and he happens to read or read. hear this, I do hope you're okay. And my number hasn't changed, so please, reach out. I have a haunting story that took place around the time that I thought I had my life figured out. My sophomore year in college, I was finally moving out of my parents' house and into a small rental home that was around three blocks from the campus that I was attending. It was a really cute house, a bit rickety. and in need of some love, but

overall it was a nice little house with a bedroom, a bathroom, and a kitchen living room thing. It was like the studio apartment of houses, tiny and's affordable for a college student. I wasn't going to be throwing any parties in it, but

I could at least have a couple of friends over to play games or something. Plus, you look a bit more serious to the opposite sex when you live somewhere that isn't in your mom's basement, just saying. The first couple of weeks were great. There were a handful of things I had to report to the landlord to get fixed, but nothing

that was too serious. There was a bit of a leak from the pipe behind the toilet, and the vent above the stove went out, unlike day number two, but they were really good about getting someone out to fix it. By the end of week two, I was pretty happy with how things were going. and was confident that I could live there for possibly several years. Then I started hearing a knocking. At first, I thought it was someone at my door.

The first night had happened, it was around 8 p.m., and I was eating my pizza and watching NCIS. I was sitting there, and I heard a fairly faint knocking sound. About four thuds. I put my pizza to my pizza. down, got up and opened my door, but there was nobody there. I stepped out and looked around, but obviously there wasn't anything going on outside. I shrugged it off and went back inside to finish my episode when I heard it again.

This time, though, it sounded like it was coming from the other end of the room, over by the window in the kitchen's side, and not the door. I kind of jumped because I didn't expect it. I grabbed my shoes into flashlight, and I did a quick once around the yard to see if there was someone there, but there was nothing. I started kind of playing through my head what it could be. Plumbing issues? Maybe. But it sounded more like a person knocking on a door or wall four times, both times. It could have been a pipe, but the fact that it was in a rhythm and it happened in two different locations,

made me think it wasn't. My next thought was rodents. My parents once had a squirrel eat through part of the wall at the house, and they'd actually made a nest under the bathtub, and it would make noise randomly, so it was possible, but again it felt too rhythmic. The only other thing I thought of was that it was someone messing with me, but if so, why? and how were they so quick to get away from the house when I checked?

In the end, I just made a quick note of it and decided that if it kept happening, I would let my landlord know and we could trace it down. If this were a connected unit like apartment or a townhome, I could have just assumed that it was my neighbors. But this house wasn't connected to anything, and it had some space in the yard, so I was confused. Now, it did happen again, but here's the weird part. It would only happen if I was alone.

If I had someone over or was talking on the phone, it would not happen. There would be no tapping. But if it was just me, I would hear it randomly at night. Almost as if the house itself was screwing with me, making me feel crazy. I even tested this by having one of my friends sleep over for a couple of days. He needed a place to chill for a few anyway, and my couch was always welcome to him. The whole time he was there, which amounted to three days and two nights, it never happened. The day he left, I started hearing it again.

Then, things got weirder. I would come home from class and would find various things out of place. The first thing I noticed was my chairs that I had around my tiny dining table. I came home from class only to find two of them facing away from the table towards the kitchen. If it was just the one chair, I could easily have assumed that it was just me for getting to push it back in after working on classwork. But two chairs? That was a bit strange. The next thing that happened was about a week after that.

I was unlocking my door and I heard a crash like something had broken inside of my house. I shoved the door open like I was Rambo about to take out an intruder, but the house was as empty as I'd left it. I'd walked around thinking that maybe they had run into one of the other rooms, but this house was tiny and there was nowhere to hide. After I cleared the rooms, I went to the kitchen and found the cause of the crash. One of my coffee mugs was on the ground, shattered.

This lent itself again to the possibility of it being rodent, so I got my step-ladder and I cleaned out that cabinet, and there was no indication that there was any way a rodent could have gotten into the cabinet. Plus, the cabinet was mostly empty already, and the only way for a rodent to have gotten in there, and gotten the door open and the mug shoved out, would have been if it was a large rat. There was a small lip on the bottom of the cabinet

to prevent you from accidentally knocking dishes out, for that reason. So it would have had to have lifted the mug over that and then thrown it into the kitchen, which is not something that rats do. There were a handful more things like this. Things moved, things knocked over. One day I even woke up and found the linen closet in the hallway was open,

and literally everything in the closet was on the ground. The linen closet was right next to my bedroom, so... If someone had broken in, I probably would have heard them rifling through the closet. Yet, here we were. Then, about two months after all this started, was the creepiest of the events. I was asleep, fully passed out in the middle of the night, and my eyes shot open. I don't mean like I was asleep and I just woke up. I mean, I was clean out in the middle of a deep sleep cycle,

and the next second my eyes were wide and staring at something. At the foot of my bed was a figure. I couldn't make out any facial features, but it was dark and shadowy looking, like a void in the shape of a person. My heart started pounding. I wanted to scream, but I didn't feel like I could. I sat there watching this thing with sweat pouring over my face.

I watched as it slowly leaned over the foot of the bed. As it did, I was finally able to make out part of the face, the mouth. It was a creepy, toothy grin that was edging closer and closer to me. Not like demonic teeth or anything. It was just normal human-looking teeth, but the smile was just terrifying. What's worse is that I literally blinked in the face. the thing was gone. Just like that.

It was there leaning in and smiling at me and then just gone. Obviously, this was enough to make me question whether or not I honestly wanted to live there. I could handle the oddities here and there. The knocking, the things moving, though breaking my mugs was a bit extra. But actually seeing things, seeing apparitions or manifestations. of the creepiness, that was a bit much for me. At the same time, I didn't really want to lose this house.

It was such a quaint little place, and it was super affordable. I was a bit torn, so I decided to just see how things went. I'm going to skip ahead a bit and just mention that I did end up moving out after the 12-month lease was up. Things moved, things were shifted and broken, and I saw the shadow every once in a while,

but the tipping point was right before I was set to move out. I started hearing talking. I couldn't make out the words, but they sounded like they were pleading in an incredibly unsettling tone. Worse yet, the voices were clearly coming from the walls, not any of the rooms. So, I told my landlord that I'd found a new place and just moved back in with my parents. I kept it amicable between him and I because he was a nice guy, but this place was seriously haunted.

To end this story, I wanted to mention that I know the person that moved in after me. He was a buddy of mine from class, and when he heard that I was moving out of the rental, he asked me to put him through to the landlord. So I did. I told him about the stuff that I went through. I told him about all of it, and he didn't believe me. Well, guess who's a believer now?

He went through the same stuff. The knocking, the shadows, the voices. It pretty much went the exact same, getting creepier and creepier until he could not take it anymore. He lasted two years, though, and he told me that he was starting to have night terrors in that house before he left. and it was making it to where he swears he was seeing things. Obviously, I'm never going to have answers about any of this. It was just a creepy little, haunted house. The last time I drove through my hometown, I wanted to see if it was still standing.

And it is, but by this point it's been condemned. Who knows? Maybe I'll break in and check out how it looks, and see if anything happens while I'm there. If I do, and something does happen, I'll be sure to send you that story as well. A few years ago, when I was about 17, I decided I wanted to go ahead and start looking for an easy job that could net me a bit of spending money. I was still in school, obviously, but I was nearing the midway point of my senior year and was about to turn 18 in less than three months. so I figured I could find, at the very least, a decent retail job that would suffice.

Given the time of year, late September, and the things that I'm personally into, scary, macabre horror things, I figured why not try to work at one of those temporary Halloween stores to get some experience. There were a few of them around my area, and I ended up getting hired at one that's pretty well-known. known for taking over empty shopping centers. Honestly, I loved the job from the first minute that I clocked in. The store was decorated with some of the spookiest things I'd seen. The manager was all about leaning into the scary season, and when October rolled around, she encouraged us to dress as creepy or horrifying as we could,

within reason. Basically, no weapons or masks. but if we wanted to come in dressed up, we were allowed to. We still had to wear the orange aprons, but that was fine by me. Getting ready for work was actually fun for me, and working was something I was actually looking forward to. I didn't dress up every day, obviously, but I did on several occasions, and I absolutely loved it. I could honestly sit here and type out how much I loved this job,

and everything about it all day. But the story is actually about the one thing that completely ruined it for me, and for many others. Because I was one of the younger people that worked there, and the others all had families and lives outside of just going to school, I actually talked with my manager at the start of working there about being a closer for the store. Being a closer meant cleaning up the shelves were necessary, sweeping, basically the normal retail closing checklist. She didn't mind. As long as we were out of the store by 11, she was entirely fine with it. We closed at 9.30 during the week, so it was definitely doable.

One more tidbit of information before I get into what happened, the layout of the store. I'll keep it brief. For the most part, the entirety of the stock was on the outer walls with a few shelves that we could see through to minimize the possibility of theft. There was only really one blind spot in the store, and that was the giant inflatable Grim Reaper that was dead center. It was one of those huge nine or ten foot tall inflatables, and my manager had built a little diorama-like thither,

around it. So there was a small area that we couldn't see past. It wasn't a huge deal, and the decoration was really neat. When I was cleaning the store, I would actually do it in two parts, the front half, which was everything in front of the Reaper, and then the back half. I feel like it made things go a little faster with just a little bit of structure, but that's probably just me. On the night in question, we were really busy from the time I got there to the time we closed. It was in the latter half of October at this point, so people were pretty much going into Halloween overdrive. Thus, at this point, we were pretty much only getting out at 11. Between closing duties and cleaning, we were going to the last minute.

I always felt bad keeping my manager at the store so long. late trying to finish up, but she was typically pretty understanding. So, on this night, I was cleaning up the store, putting things back, and then I moved on to sweeping and mopping. I was done with the front half and was cleaning up the back half. I was sweeping up the dirt from under and around the Reaper when I noticed what looked like headlights shining through the front of the store. My mind immediately went to some person, thinks that we're still open and is looking at our hours. And because I didn't want them to see me and try to ask us why we were closed or something,

I stood there behind the Grim Reaper just waiting for them to go away. Much to my surprise, I heard what sounded like somebody pulling on the door and trying to open it. Now, mind you, the door was obviously locked. The lights were all off. the sign on the door said closed, and the hours posted said that we closed at 9.30 most nights. Nothing about this door looked like it was open, at all. So, again, I was just standing there and rolling my eyes about the fact that this person clearly had zero situational awareness.

After standing there for a few moments, I was actually starting to get annoyed with the fact that they weren't leaving. I could still see their headlights shining in the front, and then the unexpected happened. While I was standing there, I heard the sound of an engine revving, saw the lights moving slightly, and then I heard the sound of glass shattering as they literally drove their SUV through the front of the store. They smashed through the front, and they stopped just shy of the Grim Reaper, meaning that they were less than a few feet away from driving in to where I was standing. I know for a fact that I screamed and shouted a couple expletives, and I immediately ran to the back office.

Fortunately for me, my manager had saw what happened on the security camera, and she pulled me in and then shut and locked the door. She then told me that she was already on the phone with the police. My heart was racing like crazy while I just sat there, I watched the camera screen as these people ran around the store, grabbed as much merchandise as they could, and shoved it into their car, and then tried to drive off.

I was actually able to see on the footage how close they came to me, and they seriously stopped at the inflatable. So if they hadn't stopped at that moment, they likely would have pinned me between their car and one of the shelves. I'm not sure I would have survived that. They grabbed all the stuff, drove off, and then were pretty quickly caught by the cops. I had to guess that they thought nobody was in the store, so they figured they would have time to get away, but we were there, and that definitely caused a wrinkle in that plan.

In my opinion, the plan was pretty stupid to begin with. To go through with a smash-and-grab on a Halloween store where everything would be nearly half-off in a couple of weeks anyway. It just sounds dumb even as I'm typing it. But it was what they planned to do, and it's what they were all arrested for. Unfortunately, this kind of damage wasn't exactly something that could be fixed in time for the season to end, so the store had to close. I got to work a couple more shifts helping get all the stock packed up and ready to be transferred, and getting the store broken down, which was neat, but it was still a sad ending to what will always be the best job that I've ever worked, even if it was only for a month.

I have a story that some people may read and think it's not scary in the traditional sense, and it's really not, but it's still a nightmare situation to be in, and it's a story that I want to tell, so here goes. I used to volunteer for a local search and rescue team near a prominent national park. Our team was flush with medics, experienced hikers, and even a couple canine units that could be called in if necessary. We weren't typically needed, but when we were, we gave it our all, and we absolutely saved the lives of a number of people out there in the woods. What follows is one of the most harrowing events that I have ever lived there.

through, both as a search and rescue member, and in my life in general. It happened on a morning that was colder than normal. It was late November, though, so we knew that we were going to start to get that wintery mix in the near future. The sky was dark, even in the late morning. The clouds blocking out the sun, making it feel even colder out in the forests. We'd gotten a call that we needed to do a full sweep of part of the trails, as there was a hiker that had been missing for around three days.

And each hour that passed made us all feel more and more desperate. With the cold coming in like it was, being out in the elements like this, depending on where he was, things could quickly go from scary to tragic. The area where he was thought to be was rugged, a lot of steep cliffs with some horrifying drop-offs, a lot of terrain that was working against us. By the time that night fell on that first day of searching, the temperature had dropped sharply,

and the sky decided to open up with some freezing rain and a bit of snow, which was going to make the terrain even harder to navigate. Our team started considering the possibility that this was no longer going to be a rescue mission, but a recovery mission. On that second day, one of the canine units had actually picked up a faint scent near a treacherous ravine. We followed, all of us getting that hit of adrenaline with that growing sense of dread crawling all over our brains.

And then we found him. He was lying at the bottom of a cliff, twisted and broken, his face pale and his eyes wide open in the look of sheer terror. We were all pretty visibly shaken as we approached. Even professionals get scared as things come to a head like this. It was pretty clear that he was severely injured. His leg was visibly broken in ways that I can't explain. His body was covered in bruises and cuts, and he was looking pretty bad. We all jumped into action, working to stabilize him.

At first, things appeared to be heading towards a better outcome. We had found him. He was still alive, and if we all worked our back ends off, we could get him out of here, and he would have a fighting chance. But when we all got to him and started to work, things took a sharp turn. He was smiling at us, but his breathing started to get shallow. His pulse was weakening, and his eyes started to fall vacant. We all knew what was happening, and we did ask. everything we could to keep him with us until the helicopter could get to us.

We all worked to keep him going, to warm him up and keep his heart beating, but we couldn't. The man saw us. He knew that we were there, and I can only imagine that he thought that we were going to be able to save him, but we were too late, probably by no more than a few minutes. I will always have those thoughts. That if we had just woken up 20 minutes earlier, if we ran just that slight bit faster, climbed down with a little less regard for our safety, we may have saved him. I will always have that in my mind, that this man was seconds away from being saved but

had slipped away, that no matter how much he wanted to hold on, no matter how much he wanted to hold on, no matter how much he thought that we would be saving his life, his body just couldn't take it any longer. His body was carried away, and we were all left to face the unforgiving wilderness, now tinged with the sadness that we, as a unit, had failed. Unfortunately, the story is just a reminder that there's not always a happy ending, and even those innocent little outings,

can turn into something so much more serious without warning. Ultimately, nature has the final say in how things go, and all we can do is try our best, try to be as careful as we can, and try to prepare for the unexpected. And the last thing that I want to say is, be careful out there. We can do a lot to save people,

but there are times where things do not go as planned. This is a long story, so I'll try to make it as concise as I can. I was a member of the Queen fandom, mainly Freddie Mercury. Queen fans are a surprisingly gross, homophobic bunch of people, and so there were many fights over Freddy's sexuality. I had some theories about him and his psychology, but no one was prepared to listen, and I'd spend far too long in forums arguing with stupid.

stupid people, and I was sick of it, and was about to leave when a woman, Emily Ramirez, no real names are going to be used here, messaged me saying that she agreed with all of my theories, and asked to friend request me. We chatted on Facebook Messenger for ages, testing the water, I guess, to get to know each other. We became pretty close over the weeks, finding out that we both had the same dark, inappropriate sense of humor. Despite a six-hour time zone difference, I'm in London, England, and she was in Texas. We were pretty close,

telling each other all of our personal stuff, fighting trolls together, and, most importantly, laughing. Just hysterically laughing. We even spoke on the phone for hours and hours about Freddie Mercury. His personality, theory, about his songs and pre-fame life story, there was no one else who shared our views, except another woman called Alyssa,

whom she met on YouTube. Emily invited Alyssa to our group chat for a while, but eventually Alyssa stopped messaging, and I sort of forgot about her. At this time, there was no reason to doubt that Emily was real. If she said she was doing something in her life, her Facebook checked out. out. For example, she graduated from law school and celebrated by going on a six-week road trip,

from Houston to Anaheim, stopping at Roswell, New Mexico, El Paso, Sedona, Arizona, the Grand Canyon, and Las Vegas on her way. I'd always wanted to see the American Desert, and she suggested that I should come over and do a road trip with her the next year. As she went, photos appeared in the locations that she told me she was going to, in the order one might logically travel, and I was fascinated by these places that I dreamed of seeing. Emily is a lesbian, and she told me that she had a crazy ex who was out of her league, tall and blonde. And, sure enough, there were photos of the two of them from the previous Halloween. When she asked me for hair dye advice after her hair went wrong from pool chlorine, there were photos to prove it.

She played guitar, and when someone requested a song, she duly posted a video of herself playing it. And she was a bit sick of Facebook in the end, so she deleted it entirely, using a new blank profile for the purpose of staying in contact with three friends, including myself. For a while, we kind of dominated the Queen slash Freddie Mercury forums as sort of experts.

And we even got to know some of his friends from his 80s gay club years. And I had written some articles on him that I was sharing in groups under pseudonyms. Soon, an Italian woman in the forums began to harass both Emily and myself, discrediting our articles. I blocked her, and two German women rose in her place, name-calling. They plagiarized our work that was paywalled and spread it online, saying that we didn't deserve to be paid for lies about Freddie Mercury, so they were giving it away for free. That did die down, but two years later,

one of these people reappeared on a different forum, trying to humiliate me by posting links to old fan fictions that I'd written many years ago on another site that were unrelated to Queen. She'd worked out that it was me from my usernames. She listed all of my usernames across every social media site that I happened to be on and accused me of being many more people who, coincidentally, had similar usernames to mine. All of this was because she was possessive. over Freddy, and was angry that me and Emily were getting heavily involved with Freddy's

friends. I quickly worked out that the Italian and the two Germans were one and the same. She'd been watching me and Emily for two years. I was made redundant from my job, so my lifeline was to sell Queen fan art. Emily helped me build a webpage, and I had some offers to buy prints of my work, until I received about 30 takedown notices from Universal Music Group, saying that I'd been reported personally for copyright. I warned another victim of The Troll who also sold Art to be careful. This girl was a minor, who had actually been doxed by The Troll. After this, the Troll began using my non-Queen art as her profile photos

and calling herself the names of the people that I had drawn. She had also removed my watermarks and was threatening to sell them all on her own site. Both Emily and I quit the Queen fandom, partly because of the troll and partly because we hated the biopic, because Brian May pissed us off, and because we had moved on to other interests. We stayed in contact, but things weren't the same when we had no silly jokes about Freddy to laugh about, and even his friends were bullied off the forums by homophobes and the troll. Emily only kept her Instagram, where she would do live, faceless Q&A's about Freddie.

Then, one night at 3 a.m. UK time, Emily messaged in a panic and asked to call. She was hysterical, saying that she needed to confess something to me. Her name was not Emily Ramirez. It was Alyssa Sanchez. She had tried to tell me ages ago when she invited Alyssa to our group chat, with the aim of phasing Emily out and then Emily would become Alyssa. But she dropped the idea in the end,

because she thought that I'd easily work out that Alyssa had suddenly developed Emily's personality. She said that she had tried many times to tell me her real name, but was embarrassed. Why the sudden confession? Well, the troll had screen-recorded an Instagram live where Emily was showing followers her Freddie merchandise. She had her laptop on in the foreground, and the troll slowed the video down. And, on Emily's laptop screen, she observed a file named Alyssa Sanchez tax documents. The troll called her, threatening to blow her cover online, to tell people that she was never a lawyer and was leading a fake life. So, Emily confessed that she was Alyssa to beat the troll to it, and she apologized about the whole thing.

This was not the end. From here on, Emily will be referred to as Alyssa. The troll, who he found out was a middle-aged woman named Lucy, then phoned Alyssa's mother and cousin, screaming that she knows who they are, that Alyssa still talks to me, and that she will humiliate us and destroy anything creative that we do that invokes Freddy's name. The last I heard was that the troll had pretended to be a rival publisher, in order to obtain copies of a book that Freddy's friends were releasing for legal reasons, which meant that she saw an advance copy of their book before the authors themselves.

I did almost suss Elissa slash Emily out, but I brushed it. off. She said her father was a well-known lawyer in the state of Indiana, but no such person exists. I thought, oh well, maybe American stuff is omitted from a UK search engine. Another time she had filmed herself opening a book that she'd bought, and her nails and hands were different to those in selfies that she'd sent me. I put it down to her simply growing her nails out. One time she said that her dad was Mexican and that her mom was Spanish. But

this later got switched around, and she said that her dad believed Spanish people were superior to Mexican people, and regularly told her he was happy he produced quote-unquote white-passing kids. Well, people make typing

mistakes sometimes, right? Then, she spelled her name differently to normal, and I just brushed it off as bad autocorrect, as her auto correct fails were a running saga for her. Eventually, we video called, and I never understood the point of her fakery. She actually looked very similar to the girl whose identity she had stolen. So I got catfished, and my catfish wasn't even the scary one.

A stalker destroyed my friendship with my catfish, which was for the best in the end. end, maybe. Alyssa doesn't message me anymore, and I do kind of miss her. Lucy still has my art as her profile picture, four years on. And on Queen Forums, she calls herself Alyssa Ramirez, mashing up the two names. Me? I just keep my love for Queen to myself these days. When I was in my early 20s, around 2010, I lived alone.

in a ground floor apartment in what I would say was a decent part of my hometown. It was a bit of a humble but comfortable place. And honestly, I was loving living alone. I didn't dislike living with my parents. I get along well enough with them, but I'm more of a loner. And I like to live within my own confines, not someone else's. For the entire first year, things went really well in my own. my apartment. I loved the area, I'd furnished it the way I liked it, and I was happy.

Then, near immediately after I signed my second year's lease, things started happening that made me reconsider whether or not I was really safe. At first, the things that would happen were incredibly subtle. I would come home from work and would find various things that seemed out of place, but that I couldn't be sure about. The first thing was one day when I got home and found my front door was unlocked. I kind of freaked out a bit at first, but as I thought about it, that morning I was in a super rush because I was running late, and it was wholly possible that I forgot to lock it. I went in and checked everything, and as far as I could tell, nothing had been taken or moved.

I chalked it up to a Hey dummy, that was stupid, moment, and moved on. A couple days later, I came home to my door being unlocked again, and again was incredibly mad at myself for having left it unlocked like that. However, when I went inside to make sure nothing was missing, it pretty quickly clicked that it wasn't my doing. When I walked in, I noticed that the lamp in the corner of my room, my living room was turned on, which to most people wouldn't be a huge deal, but to me, it was a

massive issue. I never used that lamp. It was a room lamp from my room at my parents' house that I took so that they didn't have to deal with it, but I hadn't had to use it because the living room has a ceiling light. I'd put it in a corner behind an extra chair because it kind of looked nice, but I never used it. I checked the rest of the apartment, but again, there was nothing missing. I actually went across the hall and asked one of the neighbors if they saw anyone coming or going from my apartment that day, and they didn't recall anyone being there. I mentioned the whole thing, and they were a bit shocked, but again, they couldn't give me any information.

I ended up calling the main office to let them know, and they mentioned that it could have been maintenance because they were doing pest control on my building at some point that week, but that they should have left a note if it was them. I told them that there was no note on my door and that my neighbor said that they hadn't seen anyone, which made me think it wasn't the maintenance crew.

They told me that they would ask the crew and see if it was them, and then told me to call them back if it happened again and that they would figure out a way to get the situation taken care of. And, of course, something did happen. One night I got home, and when I opened my door, I found an envelope on the floor on the other side of said door, like it had been slid under. I initially assumed it was a note from the office or the maintenance crew,

but normally they just tape those to the front door, not slide them under. I grabbed it, put my stuff down, and opened the letter to see what they had to say. And it made my blood run cold when I read it. It was a typed, an unsigned note that said, You look so peaceful when you sleep. I was freaking out in my head. Who the hell had been watching me sleep? Had someone actually been watching me, or was this some kind of screwed up prank?

There was no evidence that anyone had been in my apartment beyond the lamp, and my door being unlocked twice, which to me was a mountain of evidence, but to anyone on the outside could just be coincidences. Of course, this letter was a big red flag, screaming, I'm watching you. But who the hell was the person that typed it? After the letter, I started taking precautions with everything in my apartment. I double-checked all the locks on the windows. I kept all my curtains and blinds closed. I put Christmas bells on every single door so that I could tell that they were opened.

And I bought a metal baseball bat that sat right next to my bed just in case. I had also reported the letter to the office, who made a police report with my information, and they had an officer that would circle the area multiple times a day to see if they could find anyone suspicious. Despite this, things would still end up happening. I would come home to find my fridge open, my bathroom's sink running, the books on my bookshelf removed and piled on the floor. I seriously thought I was going insane. I begged the rental office to change the locks on my door.

I told them every single thing that had happened, and they were completely unhelpful. Their solution to figuring it out was telling me to get a camera because they couldn't do anything else. This was my home. I was supposed to feel safe here, and the company responsible for that safety was basically telling me that I was out of luck. I was starting to feel depressed and anxious all the time because I was thinking that, this person was going to escalate, and eventually they were going to hurt me, nor worse. I hit a wall mentally. I wasn't sure what to do.

I did end up buying a camera, one that I could hang up in the corner that watched the door, but part of me thought that this person was going to be able to beat the camera, and that they would somehow get in and mess with me without being seen. Of course, that would have been impossible. And the last day of all this was probably the most excited I've ever been. I came home from another day at work to find my door, unlocked, again. I walked into my apartment, more pissed off than scared, and in the kitchen found another envelope taped to a bottle of wine.

I grabbed the letter and opened it, and this time it was a bit more terrifying. The item in this envelope was a printed. photograph of me at work, and on the back it said, you're always so busy. It was a picture of me serving a table that I had waited on only a day prior. I remembered the customer in the photograph, which meant that this person had been in my restaurant, and they were now following me in my everyday life. I started to panic, but quickly turned my attention to the camera in the corner of the room. This guy had the gall not to only walk in, but walk right in front of the camera to get into my kitchen.

When I got to my computer and got the footage loaded, I was speechless. I watched as this man opened my front door with ease, walked in with a huge smile on his face, and put the bottle of wine on the counter. I watched as he put the photo on the counter and wrote his note on the back of it and placed it in the envelope. The reason that I had that level of excitement that I mentioned earlier was because I knew who this was. It was one of the maintenance guys for the property.

I had seen him on the property. I had waved at him. I'd had short, passing conversations with him. I called the office and told them that I had the video of the person breaking into my place, and I asked one of the property managers, to come to my apartment so that I could show them. They did.

And I could tell by the look on his face that he wasn't surprised to see what I was showing him. To wrap this up a bit quicker, I called the police and I showed them the evidence. After he was arrested, it came out that this wasn't his first offense. He had been arrested and reported of stalking numerous other women. The reason that the other people, the reason that the other person was arrested. office manager wasn't surprised was because he knew full well that this guy had done this before. Apparently, he was what they called a second chance hire. They knew that he had a record of stalking, and when I told them that I was being stalked,

they didn't put two and two together. I have no problem with second chance hires. People do deserve a second chance when they make mistakes. but he was a textbook case of We hired a man known for stalking women We have a woman being stalked Maybe we should consider that Thankfully, the police took this all very seriously

And since he had a record They had zero tolerance for his actions And he went away in cuffs And of course after he was arrested, all of the craziness stopped. Obviously, I moved out of that property and into a new apartment. The inaction of the property management was enough for me to break my lease, which I happily did.

I was talking with my sister earlier, and she'd reminded me that we used to live in a haunted house. This was the early 80s, and I couldn't have been older than six. A little background, I barely remember this story myself. I only remember it to the stories that were told to me about my actions. So, I lived in a two-story company house that had three actual bedrooms. One for my mom and dad, one for my sister downstairs, and the last bedroom was upstairs, and that was for my brother.

I got to have the upstairs landing for my bedroom. This was fairly large, but with a stairwell right in the middle. The stairwell had a floor to ceiling poles, I guess to guard the opening. This allowed me to see through the stairs themselves. There was a window directly across from the stairs with no curtains on it. On to the story. So, I often had a hard time getting to sleep because of the window letting in light. This meant that, often, as a child, I would cry and wake up my parents because raccoons or cats would be fighting on the roof, and I thought that monsters were coming to get me.

So, I would often get scolded for waking people up, and I learned to just sit there with these noises while they were going on. Now, another point to my story is that my bed was set against the wall, between the small doors that opened up to access the attic's side. space. I hated these doors for some reason. In an effort to get me to accept these doors as nothing, my sister got me to explore in them. We found stuff from previous owners, and we would pull it out into my room. We had to pull it out because this area had no lights, other than what light leaked through from down below. We found old toys and books. One of these books was a journal from like the late 1800s. To hear my sister tell it,

that was when the weird stuff started to happen. I started seeing these bird-like footprints climb the stairs. You know, three toes forward and one backward. This was impressive because the stairs were hard wood. No rug, no runners, no coverings of any kind. That means that the footprints were pressed into the wood. They would slowly rise back out of the wood as the next one showed up, just like someone was walking up the stairs.

This was accompanied by a blue light that would come out of the little doors that were on either end of my bed. This happened repeatedly for months, and no one believed me. That was until I broke my ankle, and I had to sleep in my sister's room, and she got mine. Now, her experiences were similar. similar to mine. The footprints and the light. There was one difference, though. She saw a long pointed leg come out of the little door. This leg looked like a giant spider's leg. She came down screaming, and she refused to sleep up there again. From then on, I got to sleep on the couch, and she got her room back. The funny thing is that once my ankle healed, I went right back

to sleeping upstairs. I don't know if the experiences kept happening and I had just gotten used to it, or if they'd stopped. For those who are curious, the only memories I have of my life before 11 years old are those of stories told to me, not my own, so I can't tell you if I just toughed it out, or if I didn't experience anything after that.

I live in one of the northern states where temperatures start dropping fast in the fall. Because of this, and since we had a fireplace, we typically had it on instead of the heat. As an adult now, I've learned how much it can really save on heating bills. My parents would usually buy logs and bulk, but we did have a lot of acreage, so just to pad the supply, my dad would cut down some trees or branches around the property. Of course, being around 14 or 15 at the time, I would have to help my dad collect it and bring it back. I never had a problem with it, though.

I enjoyed the fall and winter as well, as the time that I got to spend alone with my dad. We usually just pushed a wheelbarrow around or a small trailer attached to an ATV to lug it all back to the house. depending on the weather. Another normal occurrence when we were out there was the wildlife. We would see birds, rabbits, squirrels, and even dears.

We pretty much coexisted with them all. It may come as a surprise to some, but my family was not a bunch of hunters. They didn't like the idea of killing them, and, in fact, my dad hated the hunting season, because we could hear the gunshots all over. He didn't even own a gun. They were both weirdo, hippie, country folk, but I can appreciate that. Even as an adult hunting does not interest me. Anyways, so when we're out, sometimes, we would name off the birds that we saw or other animals,

and based on what they were doing or how they looked, we would make stories about them. We would even give them a name, a backstory, and sometimes even where they were. they were heading. But when we did come across coyotes, fox, and even one terrifying time a mountain lion, we stayed back and avoided them as much as possible. Besides, we were the ones that were more out of place than them. Sorry for rambling, just wanted to share a bit of backstory of my family, and to possibly explain why we reacted the way that we did to the following events.

So, one fall day, I had to be a bit of back story of my family, and to possibly explain why we reacted the way that we did to the following event. So, one fall day, I had to possibly explain why we reacted to why. so to be to be to be to be to be to be to my to help my dad cut down a tree that was in way of some of the fencing he was putting up. We had to stop to go get a part for the wheelbarrow because one of the legs had broken or something in the middle of me bringing it over. As one simple task normally does, it ended up taking us all day to finish it. I don't remember exactly what all happened, but it was probably the normal, multiple trips

and errands to run, and then by the time we got home and found, and then by the time we got home and fixed the damn thing my mother had dinner started and said that I needed to do my homework before anything else. So, we decided to wait until after I finished and we had dinner before we went back out there. I think we were both feeling pretty worn out, and since it was getting late, my dad suggested that we just take the ATV instead to make the trip easier. So we got back to the tree and started loading up the trailer with the smaller stuff. While doing so, I started feeling like I was being watched.

As mentioned, it was normal to see animals and have some of them just stare, but this feeling was kind of putting me on edge. I started looking around everywhere when I spotted something between the trees, on the other side of the house. At first, it had the shape of a dog, so I thought it was either a stray or maybe a coyote. But the more that I looked at it, the more uneasy I felt. My dad must have noticed me stop and asked what I was looking at, so I pointed it out to him. He stopped as well and stared at the thing. I remember asking him what he thought it was, and after hesitating for several moments, he finally just said, it looks like a rough-looking dog.

I could tell in his voice that he didn't really like this either. Usually, when we ran into potentially dangerous animals, my dad was calm and suggested we move on. However, he would not look away from this thing. I asked him if he was feeling creeped out too, and surprisingly he said yeah. So I started telling him how I was feeling as well. That's when he told me that something just wasn't right about that creature. We both just stood there completely still and watched this thing, until it finally moved.

It started walking along the trees, but the way it was walking was even more unnatural. It had four legs, but it wasn't bending them at the knee. The movement was very stiff. Imagine how a doll would walk without the knee joints, or when you walk your fingers like legs. Sorry if this doesn't make sense, but it's kind of hard to explain.

So, when I saw it walking, I became even more alarmed. I mentioned it to my dad, but he just continued watching it. The thing started walking towards us, which meant that the trees were thinning out and shedding more light on it. That's when we could see more details. This thing was definitely bigger than a coyote, but it looked dishevelled. Its fur was dirty and almost patchy looking,

while it seemed to look dark and have an evil. even darker aura around it, it had bright, glowing, orange-looking eyes. As it got closer, we also started smelling something like rotting. Again, we saw a lot of wildlife, some alive and some dead, so I knew the smell. We didn't smell it until we noticed this creature. As it walked closer, we could make out a moaning sound that almost didn't sound natural. It didn't sound like a person, but it also didn't sound like an animal in pain. This was when the feeling of dread really started to overwhelm me.

But before I could mention it to my dad, without taking his sights off of this thing, he told me to run towards the house as fast as I could. When I heard him shout, run, I took off, only to look back once to see my dad right behind me. He nearly shoved me into the house as he ran in behind me. me, closing and locking the door. My mom and two little siblings were all watching a movie in the living rooms, so she was instantly startled and asked what had happened.

My dad lit out a little laugh and said that we saw a coyote that was looking pretty aggressive, so we decided to run home. She seemed a bit suspicious, but accepted his response, and we went to clean up. I wasn't about to call my dad out. I assume that he did it since my siblings were there, and he also probably didn't want to scare my mom. He probably would have done the same to me if I hadn't witnessed it. We didn't talk about it again that night, and we went and finished gathering the wood the next day, when it was nice and bright out.

I actually asked him about it then if he really thought it was a coyote, and he told me honestly no. He said he didn't know what it was, but he knew it was not a normal animal, and that it wasn't friendly. I asked him what he thought it was, and he didn't answer me for a while. Then, he finally spoke up, and the only thing he said was, it's something we should never think about or talk about again. My dad was not easily frightened, but the tone and his response was enough to make me think that he was serious, and I never brought it up again. Now that I'm older, and after seeing many stories of cryptids and talking to friends that believe in that kind of stuff,

I'm pretty sure this thing was a skinwalker. Regardless, it was a terrifying sight, and those out there trying to find one to witness themselves, I would suggest stopping now. It's really not worth it. I'm not one for believing in any sort of paranormal stuff, stuff. There's just not enough evidence thrown my way personally. But after this, I don't think I can deny it any longer. It's real. A few weeks ago, a couple of friends of mine told me that they were throwing a party at some old abandoned, supposedly haunted house towards the edge of town.

I got a text from one of them asking if I wanted to go, and being the party person that I am, I accept it. Not because I wanted to see if it was haunted, but I just really like parties. And it had been a bit since I'd been to one. Fast forward to that Friday, and I'm in the passenger seat of my friend Mack's car, headed to the house on the edge of our town. I turned and asked Mack, so what's so haunted about this crap hole? He responded with,

Oh, well, a couple lived there about a hundred years ago. something caused an argument and the wife stabbed the husband and while he was fighting for his life, he strangled her. The knife was still sticking out of his chest when he collapsed and he bled out before anyone found them. Mack told me. So why is it charred on the outside if it was just a couple killing each other? He responded with,

That's because they had something cooking and the flame was on the whole time and ended up catching on something near it. and the house went up in flames the next day. We both kind of went quiet after that. The thought of two angry spirits sitting in a house that we were about to spend most of the night drunk in, but then it came back to me that there won't be any spirits because they didn't exist.

We finally make it to the house a few minutes later. It's a pretty big four-story McMansion, casting this dark shadow over the entire yard. The house looks like to be. looked just as black as the shadow. Mack remarked that it didn't look like there was anyone there yet. I asked, want to take a look, see where we can set up?

He said, sure, let's do it. We walked towards the front door and this cold breeze rushed past us, like a gust of wind with no actual force, but the cold following it was undeniable. We both stopped and stared at each other, probably wondering the same thing. What the hell was that? We get to the front door that is just hanging on by a single half-melted door hinge, and walked inside.

The house was just as cold as the gust of wind from before, but it was everywhere. The entire house felt like it was 20 degrees Fahrenheit, and it was like a blazing inferno just outside the door. Why is it so damn cold? I asked. Mack replied with, No idea, you think it'd be warm in here. Just then, a loud bang came from a room somewhere above us, followed by the sound of a large glass object being smashed. We both looked at each other,

obviously realizing the same thing. We weren't alone. Hesitants, we both grabbed something that would, in some world, constitute as a weapon of some sort, and slowly walked up the creepy stairs. Each footsteps sent that creek echoing through the entire house. That's when we heard rapid footsteps behind us, racing up the stairs.

Me and Mack both shot around and stared into the dimly lit staircase. The silence was deafening, almost threatening. We then heard footsteps in front of us, coming from the top of the stairs. We jumped back. down the rest of the staircase and we bolted for the door. The door slammed shut and practically pushed itself back into its old shape. We pretty much slammed right into the door just after it closed. We pulled as hard as we could. With how it looked when we were coming in, it should have

practically fell apart into dust by just touching it, but it was like it was bolted from the other side. Panic started to set in. I swear I could feel the house's cold air going to from foreboding to disturbing and dangerous. Suddenly, I didn't feel like we had entered an empty house. Dude, what the hell is going on? What is this? Max said through panicked breathing. I just stared at him. It had to be ghosts, but ghosts?

Real ghosts. This stuff just happens in the movies, doesn't it? We both were turned around now, facing the inside of the house, which was now a lot darker as it was approaching nighttime. Most of the windows were boarded up, and the door was stuck shut. There we were, staring into this darkness, this deafening silence. And then we heard more footsteps. But these ones sounded close, deliberate, like they were coming directly for us.

We listened in horror. The steps kept getting closer and closer, until I swear I felt a little. large mass or presence directly in front of me. It felt like the air was getting sucked out of the room. After what felt like hours of just holding our breaths with tears in our eyes, we felt the door fall back into its broken position, and the presence in front of us was gone. We wasted no time bolting out the door and never looked back.

We drove away not even bothering to text the rest of our party friends about not going there. For some reason, when we brought it up to the others, they denied that the party was a thing. At least not at that house, or even that day. Confused, Mac checked his phone to make sure the text was from the right number, and it wasn't. It seemed to be a number off. I have no idea what we felt in that house, and I honestly cannot stop thinking about it, but I definitely know for sure now that the paranormal is 100% real. I have never liked the outdoors or being in nature.

I get a lot of crap for this. I prefer to stay inside in the nice AC with all the comforts of home, rather than go outside where there's nothing but bugs, the heat, and people. I appreciate beautiful nature pictures and scenery, but that doesn't mean that I want to be out in it. My sister, however, is the complete opposite of me. She loves the outdoors and always tries to go hiking whenever she can. I like seeing the pictures and hearing about her adventures, but that is as far as I will go.

But for her birthday, she asked me to go on an easy hike with her. We have different ideas about what an easy hike would be. She doesn't really ask much of me, so I told her that I would give it a go, but to understand that I might not be able to do it. We were walking along the path, and we stopped regularly to take breaks. It was a beautiful place, but my feet hurt.

It just wasn't my thing. We had one more trail to go down before we'd go down another one in order to get back to the car park. My sister was talking about how we should do this again sometime. I just wanted to get through the day. We weren't alone on the trails. There were families and small kiddos walking by, couples, older people, and even the odd occasional single hiker. What I'm trying to say is that this trail really isn't in the middle of nowhere and generally has the reputation for being safe.

I hurt my ankle somehow. I don't know how, but it ached. So my sister and I sat down for a while, chatted, etc. Before we knew it, it was dusk, so the sky had that pink hue to it, and it was colder at that point. We got up and started walking home. My legs and ankle really hurt, so I was limping. My sister walked beside me and I knew that she was itching,

to walk faster. She's one of those speedy people who like to really walk fast everywhere. We heard rustling from the trees, and we froze. Neither of us knew what it was, and we held each other's hands, only for a deer to jump through.

Like a cheesy part in some horror movie. We laughed. It was kind of ridiculous. And then the birds and just, I guess the forest, I guess, really just went quiet. It was weird. My sister stopped and looked around to see what was causing it.

She leaned closer to me and whispered that we had to go. Now. I wasn't going to argue with her. Instantly she was on her feet and she pulled me up quickly. I asked her what was wrong and she just told me not to worry. Just to come with her and not to waste any time. We walked at a fast pace, as fast as I could go with my injury in order to get back to the car park, and she would not tell me what was wrong. I didn't ask again, and I figured that she would just tell me when we were safe.

She kept looking to see what was up there, and as we were getting close to the car, she told me to hurry up and just get straight in the car when it was unlocked. When we got back to the car, we got in right away, and the moment we were inside, we locked the doors. Normally, when we got back to the car after doing something, we would just talk or relax. This time she drove off and didn't answer my questions until we drove to a local McDonald's. She pulled into the parking spot, and her hands were shaking. I gave her a moment before I asked her what had happened. She told me that she saw someone watching us in the forest from behind a tree. At first, I thought that she was overreacting, because there were a lot of people there.

She then told me that he was naked, and he had a knife in his hand, and that was why she told me that we needed to go. I asked her how she knew that he had a knife, and she said that she knew it because it got bright and was reflecting, and admitted that she really couldn't be sure, but it was better to get out of there before it got dark anyways than to be out there when it was nighttime. So maybe we were being stalked by some psycho or a murderer. I don't know. I haven't gone hiking since, and my ankle has gotten better.

She's gone hiking again with friends, never going alone, but she has never tried to go back to that first. forest. She told me that she doesn't want anyone to stop her from enjoying nature. When I was in high school, I was friends with this eccentric girl named Lisa. Lisa was one of those strange girls, the kind that wear quirky colors, but also tried to dress goth-esque. And I really did like her as a friend, but she could be a bit much at times. I was on the football team, and while I wasn't in the jock click, I will say that I wasn't in her normal friend group. The reason I ended up being friends with her was because in freshman year,

I actually ended up in a group with her for a final project in our biology class, and I learned that she was a pretty interesting individual. I wouldn't say that we were close friends, even, but we were friends. and we would chat whenever we were together in a classroom or whatever, but nothing beyond that. She never showed any interest in me beyond friendship, and I wasn't interested in her beyond friendship. And that was that. However, in junior year, things did change a bit. I started a relationship with one of Lisa's friends, Shelby.

Lisa actually caught us together, because Shelby. She'll be had a crush on me, and I kind of had a thing for her, too. So, obviously, the relationship had Lisa's blessing. Being with Shelby meant that I did end up spending more time with Lisa. When we would hang out after school, Lisa would typically want to come over. And again, Lisa was all right, but she started to feel like a third wheel. It got to a point where Lisa would start texting me. asking me what I was doing.

And at first, I just thought she was being friendly. At one point, it got to be a bit much when she called me at three in the morning to ask me if Shelby and I were going to hang out that day. I got a bit cross with her, telling her not to call me in the middle of the night. And she just sort of sheepishly apologized and hung up. That day, when I went over to Shelby's house, I told her about the call, and she freaked out, saying that Lisa had been doing the same thing to her, that she had called her every night for the last two weeks, asking about random things.

We talked it through and we both decided that we needed to put up some boundaries with Lisa, especially when we were spending time together. We got to a point where we would make plans to go somewhere, and we wouldn't tell Lisa. We wouldn't mention it around her at all. One weekend, we went to the movies just to get out and go on a date. And after we'd sat down during the previews, who else would show up, but Lisa. She walked in the theater with a large popcorn bucket in her hand, and when she saw us, she

excitedly yelled, Oh my God, there you two are! The entire theater looked back at us, and I'm sure that they immediately thought that we were going to be a problem. I just shushed her and asked her what the hell she was doing. She said that she wanted to see a movie and that she saw us walk into the theater earlier, and that her seeing the same movie was a complete coincidence. I didn't buy it, and based on the look on Shelby's face, she didn't either. Shelby just said something like, wow, what a coincidence.

Lisa sat in the seat next to us, and the whole time she was being obnoxious. It got to the point where one of the theater employees came into the room during the movie and actually asked us to leave. We tried to tell them that we weren't with her, but they didn't buy it. She was being loud and sitting with us, so we were all asked to get out. I didn't want to end up getting trespassed from the movies or told not to come back, so Shelby and I just got up and started leaving. Then, Lisa started yelling at the employee. She started screaming about how everyone in the theater was discriminating against her,

and how she, as an American, was allowed to say what she wanted. I'm going to be honest, I have no idea what she was going on about with all that, but it was embarrassing to be seen as associated with her. I nudged Shelby to go, and she agreed, and we made our way out of the theater as quickly as we could. When we got out, we heard Lisa yell for us and asked why we left her there like that. Shelby actually went off on her, telling her that she was an embarrassment, that she was acting like an absolute idiot,

and that she had completely ruined our date. At this last part, Lisa's shocked face kind of turned to a slight grin, which again telegraphed exactly what she was doing. Ruining our day was her plan, and she'd managed to do so. After Shelby finished saying what she had to say, she grabbed my arm and pulled me away, saying that she couldn't stand to be around Lisa right then. I agreed.

We walked away and got in my car to leave. Lisa just stood there with that same stupid grin on her face, and waved at us, saying that she'd see us around. It didn't end there, of course. It got to the point where Shelby had to block Lisa's number, because she started calling at all hours of the night again. Sometimes she would be sobbing, telling her how sorry she was, some nights she would call and be pretty obviously pretending to be drunk,

and talk about how she and I had slept together, which was a complete lie. One night she called and told Shelby that she was in love with her and that they should run away together and never come back. Mind you, Shelby and I were 17, and Lisa was still 16 at this time. After Shelby blocked her, Lisa started texting and calling me randomly, telling me that she was in love with me, that we should be together. I told her that she was nuts, and that I loved Shelby and wanted nothing to do it.

with her. She laughed when I said this, saying that I didn't love Shelby, and that I was just using her as a means to get with her. I hung up on her, and then I blocked her number. One of the last occurrences happened one day after football practice. At this point, it had been around a month since Lisa had really done anything or contacted either of us, probably because we'd blocked her number. When practice was over, Shelby and I went to get into my car and get home, and when I opened my driver's side door, I saw a manila envelope sitting on the center console. I asked if it was hers, and she said no. I knew it wasn't mine. I got in and grabbed it, and when I flipped it over, my heart stopped. The front said, from Lisa to the love of my life.

I just stared at those words and kind of froze. How had she gotten into my car? And worse, what was going to be in that envelope? Shelby asked what the hell it was, and I told her that I didn't know, and that I didn't want to know. She asked if I should open it, and at first I considered it, but then I had a second thought. I told her not to open it,

and that I knew what we should do. I put my car in drive, and I went straight to Lisa's house. I went and knocked on the door and was actually thankful when her mother answered and not her. I asked her if Lisa was home, and she told me that she wasn't, that she had to stay after school and would be home soon, which was the second blessing in this situation. Thankfully, her parents knew both Shelby and I. They knew Shelby a bit more,

but since I was Shelby's boyfriend, they knew who I was. I asked her if we could come in and talk with her a moment about Lisa, and while she was confused, she invited us in. When we got into the living room, I handed her the envelope, and I told her that I had found it in my car, and I then started telling her about all the things that Lisa had been doing. I told her that I respected Lisa and that she was my friend, but that something needed to be done about how she was acting.

Her mother then asked what was in the envelope, and I told her that I had no idea, that we hadn't opened it. I watched her open the envelope and pull out what looked to be a stack of polaroids. As soon as she flipped through the first few, her face went completely white as a sheet, and she quietly said, Oh my God.

almost as if on cue Lisa walked in the front door and the three of us all looked over at her as she quietly asked what was going on her mother stood up and turned to look at her and when she did I was able to catch a glimpse of one of the photos

it was exactly what you might think it was a photo of Lisa in a very inappropriate way I then stood up and said that Shelby and I should probably leave them to talk about things and her mother told me that she appreciated me bringing this to her attention and that nothing like this would ever happen again Shelby and I left and the whole time we were walking to the door Lisa was watching us with an incredibly angry look on her face which should have left me

feeling guilty but what she was doing was way over the line as we were walking down the front steps, I could hear her mother starting in on her, asking why she was taking nude pictures of herself and giving them to her friends like that. Again, I probably should have felt bad, but there's only so much that one can take until pity no longer becomes an option. As we drove back to my house, Shelby asked if what we did was the right thing to do. I told her that we could have handled it differently, but that it had been months at this point, and that Lisa hadn't gotten the hint. I then mentioned that, since Lisa was still 16, what she had put in that envelope and in my car

was 100% illegal, and that she could have called the cops and told them that I was in possession of those pictures, and I very likely could have been arrested for it. When I mentioned that, I think Shelby understood what I'd have. was saying, and agreed with my sentiment. She asked me if I thought that that was her plan, and I told her that I didn't know, but that I wouldn't have put it past her. That was the last major event with Lisa, thankfully. She still tried to talk to us some, and she would sometimes send us text from a different

number, asking if we could talk about everything, but we pretty much just cut her out, and told her that we were done with her. Shelby and I are actually married. Happily so. And we have a two-year-old now, so thankfully Lisa wasn't able to drive a wedge between us like she wanted. The only reason that I even thought of this story was because Lisa tried to send Shelby a friend request on Facebook, as is the cliche reason. Shelby considered accepting it, and I told her that it was her choice, but also mentioned that junior year was only ten years. years ago, and that there's a high chance that she's still the same person she was.

In the end, I hope that Lisa has a great life. I hope that she finds someone else to fill the role of, quote, love of her life, because it's not me. And I hope that she can live out her days with them, because I never wants to see her again. I've never been much of an adventurer. I prefer spending time indoors and reading books in my lounge chair. But my friend Mark has always had his ways of convincing me to join him on major hiking trips through a remote trail in the nearby woods. It was the middle of the summer. The sun was frying the earth, as it does,

and he'd somehow talked me into going to the trail and spending a few hours outside. sweating my back end off while, quote-unquote, enjoying nature. We set out early, loaded up with supplies and water. The trail was rough and challenging, and in spite of my initial protest, I decided that I had made the right choice. And we were enjoying our time. Laughing, joking, just overall in high spirits. There were a few other people on the trail,

and he would pause and take some advice on which direction to go from other hikers, and they all had suggestions. We decided that we would go a bit further in and take a hike through to a path that one of the older gentlemen we ran into had recommended. As we pressed on, heading up to where the trail the guy had mentioned should be, the trails seemed to grow a bit, I guess, wilder. The trees were a bit taller than before, making the path. path a bit darker, even though it was only about noon. We kept on, but then realized that we had no idea where on the path that we were.

Mark was really good at remembering markers on trails, remembering which paths headed to where, but even he had stopped and looked around like he was lost. It was a neat area, but it was starting to feel a bit chilling, like something was off. Around early afternoon, we stumbled upon a clearing in the thick trees. Mark was excited, despite not knowing exactly where we were, because an opening typically meant people, and we could get this all sorted out and get going back in the correct direction. His excitement broke pretty quickly when we walked out into the clearing,

and the only thing we'd found was an old and weathered cabin. It was pretty clear. merely abandoned, windows shattered, a hole in the ceiling, a door wide open, and the wall was tagged with spray paint. I don't know who Squirt was, but he was there if anyone cares. After walking around the outside, Mark made a comment like, we should check out the inside. I immediately said no, and stated that that was how horror movies started. He waved me off, saying that it was the middle of the afternoon, and that no psycho-killer ever got started at 1.30 p.m.

I guess that was solid logic, because I decided giving it a quick look-over, wouldn't hurt. Thankfully, it was a pretty small cabin, and I knew that it wouldn't take too long to get through the entire building really quickly, and to get out. The inside was a huge, mess, broken furniture, rotting food, and a foul smell that made me gag. But what really caught her attention was a bunch of photographs pinned to the wall.

Now, everything inside this place was awful, trashed, destroyed even. But these photos were clean. They all looked like they were all wiped down and cleaned, like someone had been keeping them there for whatever reason. These were pictures of seemingly random people. They all looked like hikers and bikers on the trail. Obviously, I didn't know any of these people, but I could tell that they were people on the trail based on how they were dressed,

and the fact that they were all taken on the trail that we'd walked. Worse yet, they all looked like candid shots. No one looked like they knew their pictures were being taken. A chill ran down my mind. spine. I had someone been keeping photographs of hikers pinned to the wall of an old abandoned cabin in the middle of the woods. I glanced over at Mark and his face was pale. I asked if he was okay, and he motioned toward one of the photos. It was a photo of him. He told me that he had hiked a trail over this way, not this specific trail, but some of the nearby ones, about two weeks prior.

and the photo would have had to have been taken then. So not only were these clean, but they were pretty damn recent. He was visibly freaking out and said that we should get out of there. I immediately agreed. We left the cabin, Mark looking like he was about to throw up, and started back off towards the nearby trail. But as we started to walk away, I noticed something else. a man standing on the edge of the clearing and watching us.

He was wearing all black, just standing there and watching. He was pretty far away, so honestly it could have been a mannequin or a scarecrow or something, but I'm pretty certain that this was a person that was watching us, mostly because I didn't recall it being there when we first got to the cabin. I motioned slightly toward the man, mentioning him to Mark, trying not to make it too obvious that I saw him. Mark said that he saw him too, and that we needed to run when we got to the trail just in case.

Which, we did. We got to the trail and we bolted in the direction that he thought was the correct one. The whole time we were jogging down the path, I was thinking about that cabin and the guy like, what the hell was all of that? Thankfully, the path that we took was the right direction. and we got to one of the main paths, the one with the markers that were indicated on the map. We kept going and got to the car, and Mark looked like he was about to pass out.

I asked him what that was, if this was some kind of prank or something, and Mark just shook his head saying that he didn't know. I asked him if we should call the cops, and he just said, uh, yeah, creepy cabin in the woods with photographs of random people, watched by a creepy man in black? Yeah, we should tell the police before someone goes missing and ends up buried behind the cabin. So, the police were notified. We told them what we saw and explained where it was.

They told us that they would investigate, but also chastised us for going off the path and technically breaking and entering. Obviously, we never heard anything back from them, and the whole thing remained a mystery for us. Mark and I never spoke about that place again, and when we went hiking, we went clear in the opposite direction of that cabin, not wanting to even think about it. Of course, I do still think about it, and I'm still curious, but honestly, it feels like we stumbled upon something that we were not supposed to. I was nearly abducted early one morning. In June, of 2015 and was a single woman settling into a new apartment with my dog.

The location was close to major shopping centers and only a few blocks away from the interstate highway, but was somehow pretty quiet and felt more residential. Perhaps that's why I didn't feel particularly uncomfortable taking my frail elderly Cocker Spaniel out for an early morning potty break while it was still dark outside. She was suffering from kidney disease, so she needed to get outside at odd times. The street in front of the apartment building was not very well lit. There's a single street light right at the corner, and then no further lighting until well down the street. Parking is only allowed on the side of the street directly in front of my building.

As the building was pet-friendly, management had installed a waste bag dispenser and receptacle at the edge of the edge of the edge of my building. installed a waste bag dispenser and receptacle at the edge of the property furthest away from the building. And usually I had no concerns about walking over to it to toss my dog's bags, even in the dead of night. I felt fairly safe. Besides, throwing the waste bag away in my inside bin made my unit stink. I work from home as a telecommuter, and once my dog and I got back inside, I needed to log into the system to start work. I didn't want to sit and smell dog waste until my morning break, when I could take the trash out

to the dumpster. As I was standing in the front yard with her and waiting for her to finish, an older model boxy maroon sedan turned the corner and drove past us down the street, turned around in the cul-de-sac, and then came back toward us. This wasn't weird to me, as people can only park on the one side of the street, so it's not uncommon for drivers to just do this to get turned around to park. Being new to the building, I figured this person was another resident of the complex, and no alarm bells were going off yet.

However, that changed when the car stopped and parked in the dark area of the street, near the dog waste station, instead of pulling up in front of the apartments. There were no other cars parked on the street that particular morning. and where this car stopped was not close to any other buildings or entrances. Although I thought this seemed strange, I still wasn't all that concerned. Maybe the driver was just coming home from an overnight shift and wanted to park their car in an area they felt would be shaded from the daytime sun. Still, I kept it in my peripheral vision.

A lanky man stepped out of the vehicle, tall with scruffy, dark, blonde hands, hair. He looked to be in his 30s, wearing jeans, a white t-shirt, and what looked in the dim light to be an army green light jacket or shirt. He was smoking a cigarette and didn't approach me, but instead stood in the darkened street next to his driver's side door and stared across the apartment building's yard toward the parking lot. Okay, I thought. He must have a girlfriend or wife that doesn't like him smoking, so he's hiding while finishing his smoke in the hopes that he can't be seen from their windows. Maybe that's also why he parked in probably the darkest part of the street as well. By this time, my little dog had finished reading all of the p-mail in the yard,

and done her business, and I was fumbling with trying to open the waste bag that I'd brought with us. finally managed to defeat the static cling keeping it closed. I slid it over my hand like a glove and bent down to pick up my dog's gift. That's when I noticed the man was no longer standing by his driver's side door, but had instead moves to the back of his car to stand by his vehicle's trunk, still in the street. He was still staring toward the parking lot across the yard, and perhaps it was simply paranoia kicking in, But I got the sense that he was watching me from the corner of his eye.

His posture seemed kind of stiff, not like he was just casually looking off into the distance. It felt predatory. Now, the alarm bells are starting to go off. If he were just innocently finishing a cigarette before going into the building, then wouldn't he be standing on the boulevard where it's safer, instead of the middle of the street where he's at risk of, getting hit by a passing car. As previously mentioned,

I don't like disposing of dog waste in my house trash, but my normal routine of walking to the waste bin at the edge of the yard would have taken me right past this guy, who, if he was truly planning to grab me, would only be a few short steps away. I decided to just deal with a little bit of stink in my apartment until I could get the trash out later. I quickly tied off the bag,

scooped my dog up into my arms and hurried back to my unit. My windows faced the street. In fact, where I'd been out in the yard with my dog was directly in front of my own balcony, so as soon as I got back inside, I ran to my window to see what the guy was doing. That's when his intentions became frighteningly clear. While I'd run back into the safety of my apartment, he'd gotten back into his car and taken off down the street. I looked outside just in time to watch him blow through the stop sign and make a left around the corner,

squealing his tires as he headed toward the main arterial road. That's when I realized that he was waiting for me to walk past him. What he'd intended to do after that, I don't know. But had he grabbed me, he could have been out on the interstate and headed out of the state within minutes. I lived in that apartment for another five years, and I never saw him or his car again. Attached is an aerial view of the area for reference. I've added some colorized markings to show where I was, where the car parked, etc.