Creepy - A Shoe in the Road & April 31st

Episode Date: August 20, 2026

A Shoe in the Road***Written by: Daryl Rothman and Narrated by: Michelle Kane***April 31st***Written by: James Touchinski and Narrated by: Nate DuFort***Content warning: child death***Support the show at patreon.com/creepypod***Title music by: Alex Aldea Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

No. This is creepy. A podcast dedicated to sharing the most famous chilling and disturbing creepypastas and urban legends in the world. Whether these stories truly happened or are simply fabrications is for you to decide. These stories may contain graphic depictions of violence. and explicit language. Listener discretion is advised. Hey, y'all.

You're tuned into AM radio. And that's pretty awesome. Until hipsters start doing it. Then it won't be so cool. And definitely not once people over the age of 30 start listening ironically. Then it'll all just go right back to where it was in the first place. I think that's how things work. Or maybe it doesn't.

Maybe I had just been sitting in the basement of a radio station too long. Don't get me wrong. I've really enjoyed my trip up north, and I will say that the rumors about the rustic inn are true. I think it's only the second time in my life that I wish I had two stomachs, like some kind of a human cow hybrid, so I could eat more pie.

And the hiking up there is so beautiful now that all the smoke has gone from the fires. No, I do think it was a little inappropriate for parents to be letting their children run around so much up there unsupervised. And is it really so hard to just make kids get their hair cut? And I'm not even talking about how all the teenagers now just look like alpacas. These kids look like they'd never seen a hair salon before. Just a bunch of little hairy men running around. I didn't care for it.

And I let the park rangers know. But I just stared at me when I told them about them. so... I don't know. Communication skills have really gone downhill lately. So let's do our part and tell some scary stories. Oh, wait, before I do, a quick thank you to a particular spineless yellow-bellied son of a gun out there

for sending some really cool stuff to the mailbag this week, including a pocket version of the Devils game. I posted a pick on Instagram. I can't wait to use it to finally get some answers around here. Okay, first up, from writer Darrell Roth met a narrated by Michelle Cain. Creepy Presents. A shoe in the road.

Angelique had seen such sad postings before, on milk cartons, at the grocery stores, at gas stations, such as that which she had just stopped on the last leg home from her training in Piedmont.

But it was the last thing she expected to find here in such a bucolic, sleepy little hamlet. Missing. She was ashamed to admit it, but like most folks, she had grown so accustomed to such notices that she typically only glossed over them. Yet something about this one grabbed her attention. The eyes.

The eyes of the young missing girl. Round and blue and full of wonder, but it was more than that. They smoldered with a raw hunger. A zeal reserved for those young enough to. to still believe in life's innocence. She looked a bit like her own daughter, Maddie. The thought of her child brought a smile, though a subdued one, the poor girl.

How devastated her family surely was. Raven, it said, eight years old, from Gilding Springs, just an hour or so from here. A small, poor community. The photo, it said, was taken the morning of her disappearance. The blue eyes were complemented by jet black curls and a wonderfully mischievous grin. She wore a patterned sundress, long white socks, and bright red shoes, a delightfully disjointed ensemble only a child could pull off.

She had last been seen on April 1st, only three weeks ago. Angelique raised. an eyebrow. Maybe there was a glimmer of hope. She touched two fingers to her pursed lips, then pressed the fingers softly against the child's cheek. She paid for her gas, returned to her car, and pulled out of the station. Spring was in full sway, and the days had grown longer, but it was nearly eight, and night was coming. Cool air pooled in these valleys in the evening, a gossamer mist lifting like a veil from the earth. Angelique switched on her headlights and turned back onto the old highway.

Wet daylight remained sank like a fiery anchor in her rearview mirror. The shoulders of the highway grew leaner as she drove, flanked on both sides by dense topiary. She had driven the stretch before, often going chunks of time without passing another vehicle, but never had it felt so meandering and remote. Anxiety wheeled inside her and she turned on. the radio. It was mostly static, so she pressed search and the numbers raced past, struggling to lock in on a signal. Connectivity was always bad in these parts. Finally, it latched on to something. One of the many gospel programs which saturated the airways in this neck of the woods.

Jesus, Angelique muttered, but it was something. Just as quickly, the noise began to unnerve her too, It had grown dark and the road felt so narrow, and the strident preaching seemed somehow a distraction to her visibility. Funny, she thought, the tricks our senses play on us. She turned the radio off. She drove through Bartle's brush and then through Longmire, both towns quiet and dark. The woods spring back up, towering and thick. Gelding Springs was next, maybe five miles further. Angelique peeled her eyes, following best as she could, the swath of pale illumination her

headlights carved through the darkness, only about an hour until she'd be home. She smiled. Maddie would be in bed, her father having tucked her in, but she'd be awake, waiting excitedly for her mother's return. She'd nudge Maddie's door open and there was something in the road. She slowed the car, coming to a stop some 20 feet from the object. She squinted through the mulage of mist and high beams. It was a shoe. A shoe in the road. Bright red and small, like a child would wear.

Angelique peered farther down the highway, then cast a glance in the rearview mirror. Not another car in sight. She angled over to the thin shoulder and part. parked. A shoe in the road was not uncommon, she thought. She'd never stopped before. The last cross-stitch of daylight flickered out in the mirror. The evening pressed in, starless and unequivocal. She killed the engine, set her hazards, and stepped from the car. When she got to the shoe, she paused, then bent and retrieved it. It was cold, small, mud-incrested, but remarkably intact.

She walked to the shoulder gingerly as though trespassing on hollowed ground. Her heart welled as she imagined the delicate foot that had once occupied the shoe, and she thought once again of Maddie. She glanced along the highway, still no one. She turned the shoe over slowly in her hands. What was she doing? It might not be Ravens. Even if it were, what were the odds the child were?

was anywhere near. She turned back toward her car, but stopped abruptly, stayed by something primal, something motherly. She imagined the precious child wandering, hungry and cold, perhaps injured, somewhere in the thicket of grass which ranged out like a budding forest on either side of the highway. Angelique would want, would be desperate for someone to do the right thing. were it Maddie? She gazed off to her right, the land rolled out like a dark sea, where it fused with the mist and ink-black firmament in a ghostly horizon. To her left, a mirror image. The hazards pulsed crimson through the cadaverous mist. Her ears pricked. She cocked her head, listened. There was again a wailing, faint, distant, but they're.

to her right across the field, perhaps an owl. For several moments, nothing more. But a minute later, it sounded again. She glanced up and down the highway, but still no one. Okay, she would call the police, show them the shoe, remind them about Raven, and they would conduct a search, and hopefully find the dear child safe. She withdrew her phone from her pants, pocket, no signal. Injolique cursed softly and paced the shoulder, hoping to grab onto at least one bar, nothing. She breathed deeply in the chilling air and eyed the highway once more. She could simply wait. Someone would come. Her head jerked now as the cry sounded once more. What if she traipsed through the mud and grass and God knew what? Only to fly.

find it was an animal, or nothing at all. She regarded the shoe. What? She asked herself, if she failed to do so, only to later discover she had been the child's last hope. She glanced at her phone, still nothing. She continued pacing, inspecting for some manner of ingress into the fields, perhaps a trotten path along which she might more readily sojourn. spotting none, she powered on the phone's flashlight and stepped across the breach of gravel into tall dew-sliced grass. The heel of her shoe sunk in the soft earth, and she groaned and extracted it and stepped back. She returned to her vehicle, pop the trunk, and removed her shoes. She cleaned the muddied heel with the tissue, dropped both shoes inside, and closed the trunk

before stepping delicately back into the field. She wasn't sure, why she was bringing the little red shoe with her. In her mind's eye, she saw herself finding the frightened child, who would withdraw from her initially, before edging back forward and into her arms, hobbling from exhaustion and fear and wearing the one red shoe, and Angelique would embrace her and tell her she was safe, that everything would be okay now, and she'd sit the trembling child on her lap and slide on the other shoe, and together they'd return to Angelique's car, just a short walk back across the field. The earth was soft and pliant and shaped around her feet like cold hands. Angelique could feel the dew already soaking through her pant legs, the grass thigh high in some

spots. She directed her light and determined a makeshift path based upon the more truncated clusters. It occurred to her where there were fields, there were rodents, and where there were rodents, there might be snakes. She could feel the mist. She continued to where it seemed the cries had sounded. An uncertain thing, a cry in the darkness. It had been a few minutes since the last, and all she heard now was the drone of cicadas, the soft thwop of grass yielding underfoot, and the steady meter of her own breath. An only child in an alien world. Not only, she told herself.

Please. She paused listening. The fog hung about like smoke. She could see no moon, but there was a moon, for it had lent to the mist and anemic spectral glow. The cry, louder this time, closer, puncturing and plaintive. Angelique closed her eyes, straining to home in on its bearing.

She waited for another cry, but it did not come, so she opened her eyes and moved through the grass in the direction from which it had seemed to emanate. She checked her phone again, nothing. A glance back revealed how far she'd gone, how steep of a descent. Only the roof of her vehicle remained visible, and despite the pale illumination, she felt horribly isolated. A coax of cottonwoods loomed 20 yards off, bone white. The cry again.

Close now. It was no owl. It was colder the deeper she traversed, and the damp of the grass rendered it colder still, but she'd come too far to turn back. She made for the cottonwoods, the tiny hairs on the back of her neck, standing on end. The trees seemed skeletal, gaunt.

as though warding the advance of spring. Rooted sentinels footed in a thicket of underbrush. The wailing sounded again from the treeline along with a sharp rustling. Another glance at the phone. No, if she found the child she'd need to call the authorities, but I would clearly have to wait until they made it back to the road. She focused her light straight ahead, almost to the treeline now. When she reached it, her light dissolved within the broom of mist and moonlight.

She lowered her phone and let her eyes adjust. It was cold despite the season, desolate, a forsaken place. Another rustling in her ears pricked. Her eyes narrowed, and she felt goosebumps popping up all over. Mad? She started to call, before correcting herself. Raven? She saw the eyes first.

before more wrestling, before the cherubic sound of the reply, gleaming like bale fire through the obscurity. Help me! Angelique pocketed her phone and rushed forward, brush falling away as the delicate form shaped up before her. She felt the tears welling in her eyes and she extended her arms, still holding the little red shoe, as a small and trembling hand extended forth from the gloom.

Poor girl! Angelique gasped, bending to the whimpering child. It was the eyes again, which froze her, even more than the shock and pain of being tackled by the large grunting figures she hadn't in the slightest perceived. Her breath escaped her as she hit the ground, yet it was still the eyes which seared into her roiling consciousness, timid and innocent a moment ago, yet transformed in an instant and to the most malign expression, Angelique had ever been unfortunate enough to behold. Hold her down!

One of the figures atop her cod, a woman. Cover her mouth before she gets to hollering. The incongruity of what was transpiring had paralyzed Angelique for a moment. She could discern that both figures were female. The whites of their darting eyes pierced the darkness, accentuated by the dirt-streaked visages from which they glowed. Her mind erased, her heart pounded. She exclaimed as the woman on her chest clamped a clammy hand upon her mouth, and now her adrenaline girded her, surging, and she bit down on the grimy extremity, and kicked and twisted with all her might. The woman on her chest

yelped and jerked back, and Angelique seized the opportunity to shove her off. The woman at her legs snarled. Get her! She shrieked, gesturing with one hand. Get back on her! Angelique kicked again, harder, until one leg tore free and she kicked as hard as she could, and her foot landed squarely with the shrieking woman's jaw. The woman screamed and cursed and spit out blood, Angelique kicking all the while. The one she'd bitten dived back atop her, but Angelique had started to roll, and the woman, woman tumbled off and Angelique managed to scramble to her feet. She heard the women snarling and tramping in pursuit. She thought about her phone, but there was no time and likely no signal. She wanted to scream, but her lungs were chilled and searing and knew there was no one to hear her,

and it would be precious breath wasted. Blades of grass slashed at her as she flew past, and now she vaguely registered the pulsing red lights of her vehicle. and angled toward it. So close, and yet so far. Images flashed into mind like the flashing crimson lights. Her sweet Maddie, peeking out the curtains of her window in anticipation of her return, and her husband anxiously checking his watch and trying her phone again. These interspersed with those eyes, those horrible, horrible eyes.

maybe 50 yards now. The sound of trampled grass and guttural cries behind her. Through the tumult of her racing mind, it occurred to her that getting to her car was not enough, that she must have her keys at the ready unlock the door, scramble inside, and start it and race off, all before being set upon once again. 20 yards.

Her resolve surged and she thrust her hand in her pocket for her keys. Her first attempt failed, but she latched onto them with the next desperate try. Almost to the road. The hazards bright and near. She withdrew the keys and raced toward the slight embankment, which connected up to the road to her car, to freedom. Her scream owed more to the shock than pain of being tackled once again. She had sensed they were close, but not that close.

and it seemed as though the grass itself had ensnared her. She quickly rolled onto her back to fend off her assailants. The keys had flown from her hands. It occurred to her that she was still gripping the small red shoe. She hooked it as hard as she could into the face of the one atop her, flailing away with her legs at the other. Her heart thrummed in panic, but her spirits now buoyed because at long last,

the cast of approaching headlights pierced the gloom. They would see her car, and maybe the commotion just down from the road, and pull off. They must. She redoubled her exertions, kicking and pummeling away with the shoe, which now, after several blows to this wretch atop her, glistened a darker red. The sound of the approaching vehicle grew louder. Any moment now it would ease and quiet. Then would come the sound of opening doors, scrabbling feet, and frantic voices.

She continued to fight, even as she felt her energy flagging. She was in good shape, but nothing prepared you, mind-body, or soul, for an ordeal such as this. The beams grew brighter, brighter, than fading. No, dear God, no! The light dimmed. The sound of the engine ebbed, and Angelique groaned as she listened to her would-be saviors, disappear down the highway and into the night. Ain't no one going to help you, spat the assailant on her chest. The woman dragged a forearm across her dripping head, examined it and cursed.

You got her? I got her, replied the one at her legs, wheezing. She crooked her head back behind her. staring off into the darkness. Come on, girl! Angelique closed her eyes a moment, endeavoring to remain calm and regain her senses and strength for one last salvo.

She felt the various grips upon her titan, and the woman's weight upon her chest was making it arduous to breathe. When she opened her eyes and groaned again, part in fear and part in sorrow, at the dark and ghouliques, sight. The child had shaped up out of the shadows, approaching slowly, a vision so grievous that Angelique wished she could unvision it, but she knew she never would. She thought again of Maddie,

and ached on the most cellular of levels, that her sweet angel might lose her mother, and that this once sweet child, who now approached, for were not all children at one time. am innocent, was somehow so unfathomably corrupted. Come, child, exhorted the woman at Angelique's legs. Angelique's eyes flew open and she nearly blanched as she felt her pants leg being delicately rolled up higher along her leg, exposing her ankle and lower calf. Look at her, cackled the other woman. Always so ravenous.

Angelique looked away as the child's. face materialized, large in moonlight, licking her lips, eyes starting this way and that. Come on, one of the women repeated. Come, ravenous one. In her mind's eye, she saw Maddie, innocent and sheltered, in her PJs now, waiting anxiously for her mom to return home and tuck her in. She'd once heard to have a child was forever to have your heart go walking around. outside your body and at no greater time than present had she understood how true that was she watched

the unfolding scene as if in fact from a place of remove floating above herself above all of them upon the theater of this terrible occurrence watching anxiously and hopefully for signs of one last struggle. She saw the little red shoe, which the barefoot woman had finally relinquished. How small and incongruous it appeared in the crucible of this dark and incongruous night. Next, from writer James Tachinsky and narrated by Need to Fort. Creepy Presents April 31st. Today is April 31st. Where is it May?

I can't remember. Hell, not like time matters much anyway. As far as I can tell, it's been six years since the world went to shit. Sitting here upon this log, the flames of the campfire crackle loudly, gnawing into the dried desert wood. It's the heat that warms my face while my back rests against the cold night air. The thumb of my left hand absently finds the scar that bisects my face. My mind relives those first few weeks during the collapse. I toss another log into the glowing embers,

no longer worried of its dancing light being seen in this vast emptiness. The flames pounce upon it hungrily. It's been two years since I've seen another living soul. I thought, could there even be anyone out there to see it? The desert air cools these twilight hours considerably here in Arizona, Nevada. Well, wherever the hell we are, it gets goddamn cold at night. The shivering, I grab another piece of wood, tossing it onto the flames. Craning my head, I looked to the stars twinkling in the endless night sky.

We never had nights like this back in New York. I guess you could now, ever since the population dropped quite considerably, and the power grids have failed. The initial virus was ruthless and tore through the world, but in itself it was relatively tame. Our mistake was the vaccines. They were released in haste to prevent the spread, but what we hadn't realized was that the vaccines didn't stop infection or aid and healing from it. No. They caused the virus to mutate, and over a period of five to six years, the strain that emerged was rapacious and unrelenting. I watched as the world began dying before me, my friends, family, my wife, and my sweet little

angels, so innocent. In 27, as... People were dying off in droves. The power started flickering. Entire towns experienced rolling brownouts. There was hardly anyone around to keep up the equipment. A year later, the world went dark. Now, this wasn't like those old horror movies when a horde of mindless brain-eating zombies chased you down.

No, this was a gradual fall into the pits of hell. People died. The hospitals were overrun and understaffed. Bodies began piling up in the streets. And the looters! Well, they ran rampant and that's when the real chaos erupted. Stores were wiped clean of anything useful. People became just awful. It was total anarchy. You truly don't know what a person's capable of and till they're left with nothing.

They will covet and do whatever it takes. When the quiet old church lady would live next door, took a swipe at me with a machete, all for a bottle of Tylenol, was when I decided it was time to leave New York. Try my hand out west, I guess you could say. I figured there were less people and odds of survival were better. I sure as hell didn't think there'd be any crazy old bitches roaming the open desert.

It's not that I'm a fearful man. Man, don't get me wrong. I've been in a few scraps in my day, but I was in no state of mind and feared that I, too, would become vengeful. Life has a way of making you fall right in line, doesn't it? I'd been out in search of supplies when I happened upon a shop. Through its front smashed picture window, a television dangled upon a twisted mount displaying the pallid face of the president. As he coughed up red into a stained handkerchief, He announced the state of the nation. Every city from New York to L.A. was in shambles.

The feed switched to videos of trash-laden streets to billowing sky rises upon golden horizons. In Chicago, bodies lined the gutters while National Guard tanks rolled through the city. Bucket loaders scooped up corpses in the street of St. Louis, amassing them into piles. There were three, two of which were... burning pyres. L.A. was an inimical war zone. Automatic gunfire erupted in the background while people ran for cover. The female reporter filming all this madness had been hiding behind the smoking remains of a car when a sniper's bullet fired from some hidden alcove stopped her mid-sentence. The camera fell to the street, cracking its lens while its feed landed upon her face. Gaping whole,

her forehead, trickling rivulets of blood into those curious Opelina eyes as she faded into death. I knew I had to get away from all that. There was nothing left for me in New York. And after burying my family, I packed what little I had and started to make my way west. It was not an easy journey, mind you, although the streets remained empty, occupied mostly by rotting remains. There were pockets of anarchists living out their wildest. list of dreams. People whose darkest desires kept hidden in society were now roaming free without shackle and key. My travel from New York remained unhindered until, oh, just outside Cincinnati is

where I ran into a bit of trouble. I knew enough to stay out of the big cities where populations were the densest. Travel there would have been almost impossible anyhow, so I skirted the biggins and stuck to the burbs. I'd been in this little place. I'd been in this little place. place called Marmont and was running a fever from this cut here in my face. Bitched hit me up good with that machete, eh? Survive that, the virus, and dodge a lot of bullets only to have an infection do in me? Boy, if life ain't a motherfucker, eh? No, knowing I had to get some antibiotics, I decided to pop into the nearest pharmacy.

Figured I could stock up on other supplies, too, if it hadn't been rated too much. which it had. It's becoming a bastard trying to find shit you need it. And you don't really know what it is that you'll need either. I took to bust it into homes along the way, but I don't know. It just feels wrong. But a man's got to live, right? I broke into this house in Indiana a couple years ago, and you know what? The fucker was home. He knew I was coming in. He wanted me to, just so he could play his mind-fuck-all games. God damn asshole. Lost the smallest two fingers at my left hand because I am.

I did him up good, though, but that's a whole other story. Where was I? Oh, yeah, the pharmacy. So, I ran downtown in this little shithole town, and things were quiet. I mean, really quiet, like it is now. Coming from New York? Silence scares the hell out of you. But I managed to find this little Monpah drugstore on the corner.

Morts, I think it was called. Didn't look in too bad a shape either. A couple of busted windows, but that seemed about it. Figured I'd take my chances. I went in through the front, had my 45 at the ready. One of the few mementos I'd found house hunting, but ammo was at a premium. Shattered glass crunched under my feet as I crept inside.

over a small counter near the back, a sign read, pick up, drop off. I figured that'd be the place to start looking for some drugs, even though I didn't know what the hell I was looking for. I knew it then as I inched my way in. Something just felt off. Mixed with the silence, there's this undertone of rot. It was a smell of death. I should have turned around and got the hell out of.

there, but I needed something for the infection. Reaching the small counter, I could see into the back through this glass window that had a bloody smear across it, a disheartening sight. It was dark and still, and the stench. The stench that emanated from behind that stained window was atrocious. With gun raised, I used my way behind the counter listening for anything. The smell of decay hit me like a ton of bricks as soon as I opened. in the door, putting my nose into the crook of my arm, I pushed on. What I found was a massacre.

Three corpses, a man, woman, and a small child, mutilated and bloated and bloated leaning against the wall under that window. What the worst part was, though, were their eyes. They were gone. Lifeless hollow sockets watched me as I heaved into the corner. I'd never seen anything like that before. There are some sick bastards out there, let me tell you, but I'd gone in there for a reason, so I brated the shelves being as quickly as I could. Grabbing whatever I found, I shoved it all in my bag. I needed to get the hell out of there.

As soon as I had everything I could carry, I zipped my pack and turned a head out. Just as I had my hand on the door, movement through that bloody head. hamprint in the window caught my eye. I froze. A dark silhouette of a man was easing his way in. I ducked and peered from my hidden spot behind the door. He walked backwards while clutching a pair of feet, feet of a woman he was dragging into the pharmacy. I was trapped. Near halfway to where I was, the man stood and placed his hands on his lower back. He pulled his shoulders backwards and stretched with an audible groan. In front of him lay his burden. The remains of a young woman, her tattered shirt pulled up to her neck exposing ashen breasts. He stood over her corpse,

bent down, and grabbed a handful of dirty blonde hair raising her head near to his face. She gaped in a silent scream. What the fuck did I get myself into, I thought. quick scan for a rear exit revealed nothing there was no way i could get out without him knowing i just prayed that he'd leave but what he did next made my heart cease beating he stuck his hand into the pocket of his dirty jeans and pulled out a small tool from my position i couldn't immediately see what it was he raised the tool to the woman's face and to my horror, jammed it into one of her eyes. With a twist of his hand, liquid oozed under the woman's cheek, as he scooped out her damn eye.

Scooped it out like some maniacal ice cream man. I dropped and cut my mouth to stifle a scream. I couldn't believe what I'd just witnessed, and I knew I'd to get the hell out of there. With the 45 in my hand, I chanced another look, knowing I had to make a run for it, ready to shoot this asshole. Peaking back through the window, my stomach lurched. The bastard was gone.

What the hell? Where did you go, I thought. The woman still lay there upon a sea of broken glass in the middle of the aisle, her one eye missing, the other open, pale and dead. I decided it was now or never and eased open the door. With a quick glance around, I bolted for the exit. acting more on adrenaline than anything. I looked down at the woman as I ran by,

her face streaming tears of red, cried for help. Almost. I was almost there when he tackled me from the side, hidden in the dark aisle behind a shelf. He had waited for me. The gun slipped from my grip and skidded into the dust. Well, look at what we have here, he says.

Pry and eyes. The man laughed men. maniacly and slapped me across my face with one large paw. I was stunned and my vision blurred. He knelt and pinned my arms to my sides. Under his weight, I couldn't move, couldn't breathe. I fought, but was no match. What a lucky day for me, he said as he reached into his pocket, pulling out his hand. I could see what the tool was as he brought it closer to my face. I tried to scream and twisted like I was being jolted by a thousand volts. He held a melon baller before him, a scoop covered in dark red.

Hap, a goddamn melonballer. I told you, there are some sick people out there, or were, guessing there's not too many of us left now. Well, you can see that I managed to get away from that sick fuck, but just barely. He got one eye, though, fucking prick. May he rot in his goddamn grave. After Marmont, I continued out west until I got here. Ran into fewer and fewer folks along the way now. What's it been?

Two years, I said. Haven't seen another living soul. That is, until you. Glad, too. I think it's lonely out here in the middle of nowhere. Far too many nights tasting the bitterness of a cold steel barrel

and left alone for too long your mind plays tricks on you you got to have a hobby something to keep you occupied or just end up reliving all your past mistakes and regrets. Want to know what I did before the virus? I'll tell you. It was quite an interesting career.

You know those game shows where people had to do some crazy stunt or eat something disgusting in order to move on to the next round? Where if you keep beating out everyone else and then win 50K, that kind of shit? Well, you are looking at the guy who designed the stunts for shows like that. Had to come up with dozens of them to keep the producers happy. The more fear-inducing or revolting, the better. I'd been away from it for so long that I started to miss it.

It really was all I knew. And like I said, a person's got to have. have a hobby. Otherwise, you start to go all crazy. To keep myself occupied, I kept right on doing what I'd done for so many years. And tonight, you get to be part of the show. I know, I know, don't fight. You won't be getting your head out of that clamp. Not without a key anyway. See, while you were knocked out, sorry for balking you on the head. I went and hid the key you need. Don't worry. It's somewhere near you can easily reach it. You will need the key to unlock the device that's holding your head in place.

I assume you can see my old 45 pointed right at your temple, right? There's a timer attached to the trigger that'll begin counting down from 60 seconds. And when it goes off, well, I guess that would be game over, wouldn't it? That is, unless you get the key. Get the idea? I will give you one thing to aid in your escape. One item that will reveal you the location of the hidden key. Question is, will you know what to do with it?

Here's the only tool you'll need. Same melon baller that remove my right eye. Remember, 60 seconds. And go. For more information on this podcast, including how to submit your own story for consideration, please visit creepypod.com. You can also follow us at CreepyPod on social media and YouTube. All stories told on this podcast are done so through Creative Commons share-a-like licensing

or with written consent from the authors. No portion of this podcast may be rebroadcast or otherwise distributed without the express written consent of the creepy podcast production team and the stories author.