Creepy - Attaboy

Episode Date: March 31, 2025

Attaboy***Written by: Kealan Patrick Burke***Brady***Written by: JT Johnson and Narrated by: Danielle Hewitt***The Robot Dance***Written by: Hack Shuck and Narrated by: Cole Burkhardt***https://creepypasta.fandom.com/wiki/The_Robot_DanceContent is available under CC BY-SA***Support the show at patreon.com/creepypod***Sound design by: Pacific Obadiah***Title music by: Alex Aldea Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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. For our first story this evening, haunted by grief and childhood memories, a man becomes obsessed with exhuming his father's grave to unearth answers that may be better left buried.

Creepy Presents Addaboy Written by Keel and Patrick Burke. In grief, we are children kept from the sun. drowned by the night and glared at by a million stars that do not know our names. Three days after burying my father, I started looking into the process of digging him up. I assumed it wouldn't be easy, and I was right. Application forms, licenses, local ministries, and burial authorities, red tape, in other words,

all of which would lead to nothing when I explained my reasons for wanting them exhumed. They wouldn't understand. Nobody would. And I didn't expect them to. I suppose I could have lied on the forms, told them it was for reasons genealogical in nature and not because I had heard something inside the coffin as they were lowering it into the ground.

But I couldn't summon the energy required, to endure however long the bureaucratic process would take, because by then, it might be too late to... To what, Weston? I don't want to say the words, save him. Because in the absence of a cure for cancer, death had already facilitated his salvation. No. My concerns were more about the preservation of memory, and to a lesser extent, his corpse,

an equally futile endeavor given the ambivalence of inexorable decay. I realize now as I write these words, that little of it makes any sense. So perhaps I should explain. If you've ever lost someone, and let's face it, everybody has, then you know what funerals are like, and I don't need to rehash the misery of that clingness experience for you here.

It's an exercise and wrote recitation and solemnity, presided over by a sky that's never seemed more uncaring. My mother stood next to me. So thin and frail. Her black dress made her indistinguishable from the palsy trees behind her. Her face was downcast, but less grief-stricken than disappointed, as if she might once have believed in immortality only to find out. she'd been swindled.

She'd forced my father when I was 10. It spent intervening years with nothing good to say about him. And now at his graveside seemed to take his passing as one last insult. His way of having the final word at her expense. I'll never claim to understand their dynamic. I only remember a lot of yelling when I was young. And then one day my father clung. He stomped down the stairs with rolled up sleeves, face hard with anger, and a suitcase in each hand.

He stopped when he saw me, and I saw the minnows of pain flicker in his eyes, sending water shimmering to the surface. Sorry, kid, he said. And that was that. No hand on the shoulder and no hug. Because when it came to intimacy, we'd never graduated. Beyond. Adaboy. For six weeks after that, I held vigil in my bedroom window,

looking for some sign of him pulling into our neighborhood. My heart jolting every time I saw a vehicle that looked even remotely like his blue Honda Civic. Until, in an act of delayed mercy, my mother told me he wasn't coming back. I don't recall the rest of the conversation because it didn't matter. My father had been absent from my life. All that was left was for my 10-year-old brain to process it however it saw fit. Counseling wasn't an option back then, not in a close-knit town so fueled by gossip and judgment.

Needing therapy, summoned ablest specters of asylums and levied shame upon those who'd sent you there. You were allowed to be broken and in pain. You just weren't allowed to show it. or talk about it. Thus, like many kids of my generation, I bottled it up and watched with morose detachment as those feelings systematically set about destroying my life. By 12, I was in trouble at school. By 15, I was in trouble with the police. By 18, I was in jail.

A result of my tendency to seek out undesirable bodies. Farned the biggest guy there and antagonize him until he beat me to a pulp. Which was, of course, the point. I sought punishment. Enough physical abuse had to cancel out the emotional suffering for a while. That endless persecution of my brain that had long ago concluded that my parents' dissolution was my fault and mine alone. The night after my 21st birthday, I was in rehab for drug and alcohol addiction,

something I still struggle with despite 12 years of sobriety. Those demons never leave you. They just lie dormant for a while, like an old acquaintance who specializes in making you feel better, but whose company you don't particularly enjoy. I never blamed my parents for any of this. Perhaps I should have, or at least confronted them about it. But the kind of people they are, mother prone to flying off the handle at the slightest provocation,

and a father so stoic, it probably took more than the usual time to confirm he was in fact dead and not just being typically inscrutable, would have accomplished little and made things even more strained between us. And for the past few years, I saw very little of them both, choosing instead to distance myself from the source of my anguish. This was probably unfair. Because the easiest people to blame are those most disinclined to defend themselves. Doesn't change the fact that being away from them was the only way to quiet the war. My father's first flirtation with throat cancer brought us together. Despite my feeling, he had an equal share of the blame for not initiating some kind of resolution between us,

for not trying harder to maintain a relationship. It was a civil affair, because when faced with the threat of death, old grievances tend to die first. He was remarkably cheerful considering the diagnosis, and his battle with it was remarkable to behold. Calling on reserves of strength, I didn't know he had in him. In the end, after an interminable dance with chemo which thinned his hair and grayed him while adding new gravel to his voice, he emerged victorious. Though my mother had visited him once or twice in the hospital, she went back to hating him the moment she knew he was fine. Often I wonder if they still loved each other and just became a debt at hiding it, even from themselves. Sometimes I wonder if they ever did.

After all, their marriage was motivated less by love than the Catholic Church's disdain for premarital pregnancy. After my father was back on his feet, I left Hartford and returned to my life in New York. He was cancer-free for three years. The next round killed him, and it happened fast, as if the cancer-driven driven by. revenge, worked as quickly as it could to avoid the same fate as its predecessor. The process from detection to expiration was less than a month. I didn't get to say goodbye. And when I did, it emerged as a broken whisper over his grave as I watched it descend into

the earth. At least he's at peace now, my mother said, with a sad shake of her head out, sure it was for my benefit. The priest made the sign of the cross over the grave, and now was that. Mourners began to drift away, navigating their way through the field of crosses, driven by the innate desire to be back among the living. My mother stayed with me until we were the only ones there. Then she gave my arm a gentle squeeze and told me she was cold. I'll wait for you in the car.

I did not watch her go. Instead, I stared down at the handsome coffin festooned with flowers and tried not to torture myself by acknowledging that today, they had buried a stranger. It shouldn't have hurt. I shouldn't have been destroyed. But I was, and then I heard it. Treet, treat, treat. At first I thought it was the urgent treatment.

of a cell phone. Had they buried him with it like the guy in that Netflix movie who uses it to text the boy who mourns him? I stepped closer to the grave, ignoring the awful gravitational pull of the hole, as if it wanted to suck me in, whereupon the nearby pile of dirt would somehow topple and bury me down there with my father, thereby forcing an intimacy we'd never had in life. I leaned over, heart thudding like a wind-blown door and a storm, and turned my good ear to the grave. I straightened, my throat closing around a slow exhalation of confused horror and aggravated grief.

No, not a phone. A cricket. I stumbled back from the grave before I could claim me, and still I heard that damnable sound. And then my legs gave way. and I was sitting on my ass in the wet grass. Body shaking so hard was as if my bones wanted to be free of me. And in the thrall of this terror, a trickle of memory breached the wall of my defenses.

I'd choke down laughter. And suddenly, I was eight again. The closest I've ever had to a nickname, in part because my name doesn't lend itself well to one. but mostly because I've never had enough friends to whom such responsibilities might have fallen, is the abbreviation of my name from Weston to Wes. My father, who had a surplus of friends, the kind of guy who not only knew all our neighbors but regularly conversed with them

and often helped them with their various home projects, was better known as Magnam, due to his resemblance to the actor Tom Selleck, who played the titular detective in the original, Magum P.I. TV show. Well, he wouldn't be caught dead in an Aloha shirt. His curly brown hair and bushy mustache more than justified the moniker. As a result, watching Magnum on TV became a kind of weekly ritual for us. And it was during the airing of an episode in which Magnum contends with a psychic who has foreseen her own death, that we heard the cricket. My father noticed it first, and after her

looking around the room, slowly went to the TV and turned down the volume. In the absence of sound, I was about to ask what was wrong. But then I heard it too. Like all American kids, I'm familiar with the sound as part of the summer symphony. But this was inordinately loud, as if the cricket was sitting next to me on the couch. Do you hear that? my father asked had cocked Of course I had

There was no not hearing it The grinding, grating vibrations Of that insect's wings and legs made my ears hurt As if it had found its way into my brain While I was watching Tom Selleck zoom around Hawaii In his Ferrari Where is it? I asked And it was a good question

Because of the second past That awful sound appeared to comfort from everywhere and nowhere at once. I don't know, my father said, but we need to get rid of it, or none of us will sleep tonight. Thus we set about yanking off the cushions and pulling the couch away from the wall,

peeking behind the curtains and under the TV, but every time we thought we were zeroing in on the insect, the sound would come from the opposite side of the room. We searched high and low for half, half an hour. And so it was, in our commission of our investigation, that my father slipped on one of his socks, which he'd kicked off while watching the show. It lay on the hardwood floor like a crooked question mark, and when his barefoot connected with it, his arms pinwheeled like a vaudevillian comic. He went ass over tea kettle over the arm of the couch, leaving his legs sticking up in the

air. Like all kids, any concern I might have felt for his physical well-being was overruled by the visual absurdity of the situation, and I collapsed in a fit of giggles. When I heard my father do the same, his head hidden somewhere down behind the couch, I laughed so hard I almost threw up. Later, when he regained his composure and verticality, we went back to watching our show. But the cricket remained. It stayed there, wherever there was, for days. Sometimes I thought it was in my room, lurking in the darkness beneath my bed. Sometimes it sounded as if it was under the breakfast table.

It irritated the hell out of my mother, who, armed with a broom, embarked on her own seek and destroy mission, which proved equally fruitless. Eventually, perhaps due to the short lifespan of crickets, it stopped. And I remember pointing it out one night as my father was tucking me in. I don't hear it anymore. Wonder where it went. Probably died. Which isn't such a bad thing.

They carry all kinds of diseases. Oh. It's funny, though. Annoying as it was, I almost miss us. Why? I guess maybe it was a distraction, and we got some laughs out of it we might otherwise not have had. Moments like that are too few and far between to take him for granted. Until the memory returned to me at his grave side,

I'd forgotten how sad my father sounded when he said those words, as if he saw the end of his marriage coming, even though it was still two years in the future. I felt it too. A new strangeness between us left behind in the cricket's wake, as if the insect had come, not to intrude, but to keep us from hearing the implications of the quiet. My father stayed up a moment longer,

me buried beneath the covers, his big palm resting lightly on my chest, on my heart. He nodded slowly as if in response to a question, only he could hear. I smelled the sawdust and sandalwood scent of him. A scent I loved, because it made me feel safe. Then he rose and went to the bedroom door,

the light from the hall allowing me to see the small curve of his smile. Get some sleep now. I will. Adaboy. He left me pondering the dark then. While outside in the night, the cricket sang, as if mourning a loss of their own. Moments like that were rare, and therefore precious. And it left me a mess.

By the time I made it back to my mother's car, she was doing her best impression of patience. It never occurred to me to tell her about that memory, or the sound that had set it free, nor did I feel compelled to share that I would forever after this day be haunted at the thought of that cricket sharing my father's coffin. Reason did its best to prevail. Soon the cricket would die, like all things must. So why did it bother me so much that it was in there with him now? It wasn't like he could hear it. I didn't have an answer.

But I wanted it gone. And while I could have acted immediately and jumped into the grave to open the coffin, I did not yet want to see my father's face. Also, in a last-ditch effort to be reasonable, I wanted to give the terrible impulse time to abate, but it didn't. The next day I looked up the process and realized the official route wouldn't work. The day after that, I got up, I had two cups of coffee, and went to my father's old workshop at the far end of the backyard.

The location designed to spare my mother the cacophony of drills and hammers and saws and grabbed a pickaxe and a shovel. If you're wondering why the workshop was still there, it's because even though I saw my father many times after the day he left, he never returned to the house. Anything he left behind was free to be disposed of as my mother wished. And she did clean house. But the workshop remained.

I was never sure why. Then didn't care enough to ask, I drove to the cemetery. I know what you're thinking, what any rational person would think. But grief isn't rational, so I don't have the answers you're looking for to justify my dark obsession. I couldn't eat, couldn't sleep. but I could hear that god damn cricket treat, treat, treping in my head, and no amount of attempted logic could silence it. The insect would die and my father's grave would be silent. But that night, when I was a child, the cricket pretended a dangerous quiet that tore my family apart.

My father sensed it, and so did I. What if it was doing the same thing now? Predicting the impossible. Something worse than the suffocating darkness of grief. And what if I stopped it mid-song? Was I going mad? The thought had certainly occurred to me, fueled by a self-castigating analysis

about how empty my life had always been in the absence of love. I distanced myself from my parents, failed their relationships, landed myself with a job I couldn't stand in which I could or would never excel. I was stuck. Worse, I couldn't keep all the things I wish I'd said to my father from running on a ticker across the back of my eyes. Statements of affirmation and love I would never get to share. Regrets I couldn't undo.

Perhaps the dumb old cricket symbolized all these things for me. The unalterable reality of death, the weight of unfinished sentences, the ear-piercing shriek of words unspoken, the deafening clamor of unrequited love, and it didn't matter. All that mattered was that I'd dig up the grave, open the coffin, and let the cricket out. Did you? The therapist asked. No, I told him. What stopped you?

Desecrating graves looks way easier in the movies. The truth of it was I'd followed through on the plan. Hopped in my car at midnight, drove to the cemetery, only to find the gate locked. After spending 20 minutes walking the perimeter in search of breach points, pick and shovel tucked underarm, I realized the wall was. was too high to climb. Then, upon returning to the gate with the intent to force it, I saw the sweep of a flashlight somewhere among the graves. Fearing the night watchmen, I fled back to my car. I went back to my mother's house, killed the engine, and broke down so loudly and so violently.

My mother heard it through the rain and the protective veils of her own sleep, even with her arms around me, I couldn't stop, couldn't breathe. The pain flowed out of me with a mercilessness that put the storm to shame. I thought I was going to die. Instead, I let my mother lead me inside and towel me off, as if my grief had made a child of me again. And then I told her, what I'd tried to do. To her credit, she didn't lose her cool, though through my tears

I saw the judgment and fear of neighborhood gossip in her eyes. What would the town say if they woke to news of her son's ghoulish endeavors? Calmly, she made us both some tea and told me about her therapist.

Until then, I hadn't realized she'd been seeing one. I'd later learned, and she was doing a lot more than that with him. But that only underscored how little I knew about my mother. Motivated by her subtle threat of police intervention, should I again attempt to disinterm my father. I agreed to talk to Dr. Keely the next day,

assuming he agreed to see me, unaware that as my mother's lover, he wasn't inclined to say no. Nobody wants their paramour's nutty kid causing ripples for him. and it gave him an opportunity to look like a hero. My mother wanted me dealt with discreetly. Me? I just needed help.

Do you think it's possible you're internalizing your grief to the point where the only option is to take actions that might otherwise make little sense to you? He asked, I do. I said, because I did. What I don't know is. how to stop it.

This, he explained gesturing around, it is sterile but expensive office, home to only two chairs, a coffee table, and a phycus. This is a good start. I know it's hard, but you need to talk it out. Keeping it inside is self-destructive. Easier said than done. True, he conceded. But if you try, you're going to end.

up in jail, and think about how much worse your emotions will be when you're as incarcerated as they are. We talked until my time ran out. And while I didn't leave there with renewed hope, nor did I feel the pull of my father's grave, until I got home and heard the cricket again. My mother was gone. The note on the table expressing her hope that my session had gone well, an interesting development considering her lifelong disdain for such institutions,

but I guess Dr. Keely changed her mind. She'd left a plate of cold cuts for me in the fridge, but the thought of them turned my stomach, so I contented myself with some brandy from her special occasion, decanter, and sat at the table with my thoughts. I bolted upright in my chair, hence clamped vice-like on the edge of the table. Where are you, you little fucker?

I asked aloud to keep from listening to my own mind and its insistent theories about madness and auditory hallucinations. The sound was coming from under the table. I looked and saw nothing but crumbs my mother had missed, which was unusual for a woman so fastidiously clean and often made it unbearable to be around her. If the cricket was there, lurking in the shadows. I didn't see it.

Trip, treep, treep, trip. That shrill, sharp piercing sound again. But now it was behind me, somewhere near the window. I dropped to my knees, fists clenched, my intent to crush the little bastard as soon as I set eyes upon him. If, as I had concluded earlier, his presence was benign, Why did it torment me so? Perhaps I was wrong, and he wasn't a harbinger,

but the instrument of my misfortune. Perhaps his presence in our house that night when I was a child doomed us all? I searched and searched, but found nothing. And now he was in the kitchen, on the stairs, downstairs again by the front door, in my old room, in the bathroom, upstairs, downstairs, upstairs, upstairs, in the attic, in the laundry room, in the garage. I searched, and I searched, and I ransacked the place in a fury that felt good because it was not

grief, and my mother was going to lose her mind, but that was okay, because I felt like I had lost mine, too. And maybe that would finally give us something to bond over other than my father, who she had driven out of my life without ever saying sorry. Breathless and sweating, I sat on the bottom steps of the stairs. Defeated. Exhausted. Closer now, I began to cry.

But Christ's sake, stop! I clamped my hands to the sides of my head. Brain feeling as if it was inflating and pushing against the inside of my skull. And now it was so close, it was impossible for me not to see it. I looked down between my feet. Check the sleeves of my shirt until... At last. Don broke through the veil of obfuscation as reality slammed into me with such force.

I couldn't help, but gasp. My father was a carpenter, and there was nothing he couldn't build. I remember watching him work. Dusty hands guiding timber through the table saw, edging it with a plain, how unremarkable blocks of wood became different shapes. how he molded them into something beautiful. It was like watching someone solving a puzzle. I stood in his workshop now,

regarding with great sadness the pale wood grain of an elegantly simple chair, complete but further sanding and varnish. It had been here for years and would never be finished. On a shelf near the door, a row of painted birdhouses, which he regularly handed out as substitute gifts, whenever he forgot special occasions. A metal table ran the length of the room on one side. Over it hung a pegboard with such an extensive array of tools

it looked like medieval weaponry. Everywhere, cobwebs and dust, sawdust on the floor. I went to the table, browsed the tools, until I found what I was looking for. I winced at the ferocity of the sound, a shriek from deep inside my brain. because it had been revealed to me that there had never been a cricket in my father's coffin. It was inside my head all along.

Perhaps it hadn't died, and that's where it ended up the night my father and I spoke of its absence. Perhaps it crawled inside my ear while I was sleeping and had been with me for the rest of my life. Content to stay quiet until grief and horror woke it up. The wind blew the rain against the glass. glass panels of the workshop door, the trees lining our property bringing the shades down inside the room. I sat in an unfinished chair and leaned forward. Hands poised.

Darkness coalesced in the corner by the door. And I recognized the dim shape of my father standing there, almost invisible. I have to stop it. I'm sorry, I said. And thought I saw him nod his head slightly in a prune. I pressed the cold, hard edge of the chisel beneath my right eye, and with my other hand, drew back the hammer. My father said,

For our second story this evening, a mother struggles to rationalize her son's unsettling behavior, ignoring warnings from those around her, but when she discovers his dark secret, it may already be too late. creepy presents Brady written by J.T. Johnson and narrated by Danielle Hewitt.

Brady sits across from me on the couch. His hair, a tousel shade of red-brown that curls over his forehead in almost perfect ringlets. He's distracted. Tiny hands fumbling at a little car that can transform into a robot if moved correctly. His cheeks red. Mouth pursed into a small.

small line as he struggles to maneuver the toy into the robot. Brady's always been a harder kid. Even when he was born, he wasn't like the other babies. Stoic and scornful were never words you heard when someone was describing a newborn. But that was how they described my Brady. I had to admit he was different. But that didn't mean I loved him any less. It just meant I had to learn to love Brady.

Brady's way. He makes a noise. My eyes narrowing as I watch his thumbs slide and lose grip over and over on the side panel that should be slid out and up, revealing a robot arm. I almost offered a help, but I don't. Instead watching from my own place across from him as he struggles with the toy. Something's wrong with Brady, Mom. Those had been my eldest daughter's words before she got out of the car this morning, purple smudges under her eyes giving away her sleepless night. Sandy had always been bright, as if made from electric sunshine. But these days, Sandy was looking less and less herself, and more like a tired, shell-like version of my sunshine girl. I'd asked what she'd meant, but the bell had rung, a group of

girls calling her name and she was gone, racing into the building to avoid the tardy bell. I stare at my little boy. His legs barely stretch over the edge of the seat, black and red-striped socks crossing over each other as he kicks his feet mindlessly. The only noise the small creaks and cracks plastic toys tend to make when they're being played with too hard. It wasn't the first time Sandy had voiced her concerns, explaining as eloquently as a 16-year-old can that...

Brady isn't weird like the other little brothers, Mom. I talk to my friends. I ask them if their kid brothers do stuff he does. They all act like I'm crazy. They tell me my little brother sounds way creepy. And he is, Mom. He is. It had been a week ago when she'd said that, right after finding her beloved childhood stuffed toy,

a ratty old cat. Beheaded, sitting in the center of her bed. The old toy had been nearly shredded. with a thick, sticky goo poured into the opening where the head had been removed. I'd realized after picking it up, it had been some sort of jello mixture. The lumpy-conjilled concoction had looked like blood, making my skin crawl as I had cleaned up the mess left in its wake. I attempted to call Jude after that,

even though it wasn't his weekend, to see if he'd be willing to take Brady for a few days. He didn't, of course. feigning some excuse about being too busy with work. He had offered to let Sandy come stay a few days. It's because she's older. She doesn't need to be watched as closely. Sandy is more mature.

She can stay home alone. He had all the right excuses. But deep down, I knew he felt the same way about Brady as most people did. People had never been shy about voicing their feelings about my boy. How he made them feel so uneasy. He'll grieve him. out of it, they would all say. He's just... disturbing. The word followed my Brady, like a shadow. I let Sandy go stay with her dad,

deciding she was still getting the much-needed space even if it wasn't with me. A low growl emitted from Brady's throat, making me look up. My heart sinking to see him still struggling. His face a bright red now, hands shaking as he resorted to just smacking the little car onto the arm of the couch. Buddy, why don't you let me help? I finally offered, knowing my words fell on deaf ears. Brady just looked at me, his eyes glaring with barely concealed anger. Something was changing with Brady. His actions and tantrums becoming more than the usual outbursts and lashing outside I'd grown used to. It was obvious something was wrong with Brady, despite my need to deny it. The first time I'd taken notice of Brady's change was when I had been telling.

him into bed for the night. His little rotating nightlight had been sending little elephants dancing across the walls. But when the light flickered over his face, I felt every part of me go numb with terror. I felt shock and confusion as I looked down at his sleepy face. As he looked up at me, I could see with absolute clarity another set of eyes watching me from behind his dark blue gaze, the cold, hateful glow of those pale yellow orbs stabbing directly into my chest. Ice trickled down my arms, my back, my legs, as I looked down at the haunting glare within my child's face, my brain tumbling over itself trying to wrap my head around what I was seeing. Just as quickly as I had seen them, they were gone, leaving just his own inquisitive glare.

What's wrong, Mommy? He had asked, his little hand squeezing my shoulders as I pulled away. Nothing, I had said, trying my best to mask the fear pulsing through me. Just tired, baby. Good night. I'd spent that night ping-ponging between guilt for feeling afraid, and then strangled by pure terror. I'd seen them. I know I'd seen them. But my brain, the logical. part of it, protested at the pure insanity of it. You're tired. Your mind is playing tricks, that's all. You've been overwhelmed lately with Brady. You imagined it. But I had seen them.

Brady's growl brought my attention back to his hunched shoulders. This time the sound making the hairs on my neck stand up. Brady, let's play with something else. He ignored me, smacking the toy over and over on the arm of the couch, small bits of spit flying out of his mouth. He's not right. You're ignoring. I shook my head, dispelling the thoughts forcing their way to the surface. It was nearing dinner and I had yet to start anything. Sandy was gone for the night staying over with Jude. It was just me and Brady. It was a dull ache knowing how little Sandy was home now. The way she seemed almost fearful of him, making me both overprotective of her, as well as defensive of Brady. He's just a boy. He's misunderstood. He'll grow out of it. Jude had tried to make

me feel better about Sandy staying with him more. His words of comfort doing little more than further driving at home she didn't want to be here. She's just going through a phase, Tiff. She loves you. Let her crash here for a bit. We won't make it official or anything. Did she say why? I had asked, already knowing. He'd paused, the silence speaking loud enough, before reluctantly saying there had been no real reason she just wanted to. I knew deep down. She was going where she knew Brady, would not. He didn't like going to his dad's. Most of the time, it was mutually agreed that it would only be Sandy going for the weekend. The one time I'd made Brady go had ended with Jude bringing them both back late that Saturday evening, little to no explanation as to why.

He'd been so shaken when he handed me over the kids' backs, his eyes glossy and continuously moving to stare at Brady, who didn't seem to notice his father's hyperattention. He refused to tell me what happened, and it wasn't until the next day Sandy finally admitted that Jude's dog, an old bulldog named Zeus, had died. Shocked at the news, I tried to connect the pieces as to why the kids had to be brought home early. I understood Zeus was more than just a dog to Jude,

but I couldn't understand why it meant cutting the weekend short. Sandy had been reluctant at first, but finally admitted that the way Zeus had died had been bad, really, really bad. When I asked her to explain more, she refused, going back to her room, but not before giving Brady a long, weary look. Jude eventually told me that Zeus had been found in the backyard. He kept the graphic details to himself, but confirmed he had a sinking suspicion Brady had something to do with it. That's insane and disgusting, Jude. I had all but scoffed.

Brady's just a little boy. Our boy. He wouldn't. Jade had cut me off, admitting he knew it was wrong to say, but that it was how he felt. It was after that he quit bothering to talk or interact with Brady at all. Sandy, Jude, the school, Everyone had slowly put space between themselves and my little boy. I felt polarized between feeling abandoned and martyred with the task of raising Brady virtually alone. Preschools only lasted a week, if even that, with quiet teachers explaining they just didn't think public school was a good fit for Brady. I tried Montessori schools, Waldorf schools, even looked into a few homeschool groups who would be open to the idea of taking in a kid that wasn't. their own. None of it lasted. Some even going as far as threatening to press charges if I tried to

return. Over a boy. A little boy. Brady looked up, his little arms moving slower and slower as he at last, dropped the toy car. Small beads of sweat scattered across his forehead, his curls damp as he seemed to suck in his breath through clenched teeth. The last school had been right after the incident with Seuss, when a clearly upset teacher in a floral skirt and yellow sweater handed me a drawing Brady had done during his quiet and reflection time. A hastily drawn dog scribble was on the center of the paper, X's over the dog's eyes, and a heavy-drawn red crayon pressed so harshly into the paper it had torn small areas. I understood the discomfort of the teacher, even agreed it was certainly a concerning thing that I should be made aware of. It's important we notice troubling

signs like this early on. Preventative steps could... I'd cut her off, defensive of where the conversation was clearly going. I'd rationalize that Brady had seen the poor aftermath of Zeus, using coloring to cope with the trauma of seeing something like that. Do you even believe that? After the doll, after everything. That same voice pushed against that denial, building inside me. My stomach churning as I stood. I'm going to go get dinner started, Brady. Do you want to come hang out in the kitchen with me? Brady looked up.

His blue eyes were piercing, despite the permanent shadows that stayed smudged beneath his eyes. His mouth still set to a scowl. He rolled his head back, a long sigh whispering out of him as he scooted himself off the couch and started for the kitchen, me following behind. My hands had a persistent tremor in them as I moved around the kitchen.

Brady perched in his seat at the table, his feet swinging beneath them as his eyes followed me around the room. I filled the pot with water, the smell of tomatoes and garlic filling the kitchen as I cooked. All the while he sat quietly behind me, his hands drumming into the table. I debated checking in with Jude, mostly just wanting to talk with Sandy,

but deciding it would be better to call after I'd gotten Brady down for bed. I'd readied two plates. spooning more than enough sauce under Brady's small Sesame Street tray, the red sauce drowning the noodles. My stomach turned. It was hard not to think of the red liquid jello, melting out of Sandy's stuffed animal, or the heavy red crayon forcefully scribbled into the picture of the dog.

Is it ready, Mommy? His small voice came from behind me. I jumped a little at the unexpected proximity, turning to find him standing only inches away. His blue eyes bright and focused, small hands bawled into fists at his sides. I'm hungry. He blinked, his shoulders lifting into a small shrug. I smiled, turning to grab our plates and walking to the table.

Let's eat, kiddo. We sat down. The thought of eating was enough to make me want to double over, but I feigned interest in my pasta as I watched him slurp up bite after bite. Each mouthful was more frantic than the next. By the end of the meal, his hands and face were covered in tomato sauce, small bits of noodles flecking his cheeks, his tongue slurping along his mouth in greedy, slobbery motions.

His eyes lifted from his plate, watching me with an almost amused glint in his eyes. It was impossible not to think back to those phantom eyes I'd seen. How cold they'd been. Brady? I cleared my throat, pushing away my untouched dinner. Daddy told me about his doggy. Do you want to talk about it?

I'd never brought it up, hiding behind my denial and fear of hearing something I may not want to know. I'm not sure why it suddenly mattered. Why now? It was Sandy, I knew, and maybe even Jude, and Zeus and the toy and the drawing the children at school. Brady cocked his head to the side, a thick glob of sauce slowly falling down his chin,

capturing my attention as his blue eyes burned into mine. I know. I nodded. Do you know what happened? It made Daddy very sad. Brady was quiet, little fingers twitching lightly, the soft swish of his jeans as he kicked his feet under the chair. He was such a beautiful boy.

From his rounded cheeks to the light smattering of freckles along his nose, the gentle swirls of curls along the top of his head, and the thick lashes that lined the same blue eyes my father had had. He was my boy. My heart ached with love for him. And I hated the small voice that was growing louder and louder. How much are you ignoring? How much have you looked the other way on?

What about Sandy? What about... There had been more incidences than I cared to remember or admit. as if denying them, even to myself, would make them go away, or less important. The little girl he had pushed down the stairs at his first preschool. The boy he'd pushed into the street during a Halloween parade, who was just barely missed by one of the cars going by. The old man who had been adamant that it had been Brady who killed his cat.

Accidents, I had said. Brady hadn't meant to hurt anyone or anything. I felt a terrible pain in my chest as I watched him go back to eating, the red sauce now staining his shirt, his lips smacking loudly as he ate. Brady, did you hurt, Seuss? There, I'd asked it. The words felt so strange coming out of my mouth, my breath hitching as I waited, my eyes never leaving his emotionless face. Brady didn't answer. He just kept eating. His skin too, too, pale beneath the vibrant red sauce drying on his cheeks and hands. As we cleaned up dinner, I was aware of his eyes watching me, the dark shadows that had seemed

to fall over them. Are you mad at me, Mommy? He had asked. His voice small and flat as I poured an ample amount of bubble bath into the water. Of course not. I smiled at him, the feeling of it tight against my skin. Mommy's just tired. He nodded, sloshing into the water, the fruity-scented bubbles seeming to swallow him up to the shoulders.

You play with your boats while I get your pajamas, okay? He nodded, already preoccupied with making one of the little plastic boats go up and down in the water. I went to his room, a heaviness making my steps feel weighted as I pushed open his door. His room was dimly lit by the elephant lamp perched on his nightstand, thick shadows making up most of the tidy room. As I cleaned what little toys were on the floor, my eyes fell on the white corner of a sheet, sticking out from under his bed. I knelt confused by the odd sense of dread swelling up inside me. My hands were shaking.

He's creepy, Mom. He's not like the other little brothers. Her words haunting my thoughts as I knelt, lifting the blankets up so I could see under the bed. Papers were scattered under his bed, along with a half-torn box of crane. as if he'd thrown it all under there in haste. I noticed the old shoebox in the farthest corner, my fingers wiggling as I tried to reach it. I was debating crawling under and grabbing it

when I saw the edge of a drawing beneath the pile of papers. I sat back up, pulling the drawing out from its hidden place. There was a small stick figure, and behind that, a black mass of scribble, stretching much taller than what I assumed was stick figure Brady. with two bright yellow eyes pressed heavily into the paper, lost in the black coloring. I swallowed, pressing my fingers against the drawing as I pushed myself up,

walking slowly back to the bathroom. Brady, what's this picture of, buddy? I held it up, his body seeming to go still. It's me, Mommy. I nodded. Yes, I see that, but who's this? I tried to still the shaking in my hands as I pointed to the black figure looming behind the small stick figure boy. His eyes met mine. The shadow's even darker now. His face washed out of any color.

That's the monster that lives inside me, Mommy. I swallowed a painful lump in my throat, making it hard to breathe. There's no monster inside you, Brady. My eyes burned. You're a good boy. You're my baby. He tilted his head. The monster doesn't like you, Mommy. He doesn't like anyone.

He wants to gobble you up. With that, he growled. His little hands curled into a bubble-coated claw, as he did what might have been considered a roar. I nodded, my breath shaking. Well, it sounds like your monster is cranky and needs to go to bed. He's just a boy. He's pretending he has an imagination.

I folded the picture and tucked it into my pocket, aware of him watching my every move. I went through the bedtime routine quickly, teeth brushing and combing his hair, jammies, and then at last tucking him in. I sat on the edge of his bed, my hand smoothing over his still damp curls as he looked up at me. Brady?

My voice betrayed me as it shook. You know you have to be a good boy, right? You know good boys don't hurt people or animals. Good boys don't have monsters inside them. I held my breath looking down at his stoic expression. Brady, you never said if you hurt Zeus when I asked at dinner. The elephant lamp sent pale luminescent animals rotating around the room, the light flashing over his watchful gaze.

His silence seemed too loud, too much of an answer I didn't want. I nodded. "'Good-night, Brady.' His mouth twitched, the smallest smile just barely lifting the corners of his lips. His eyes bright as he grinned at me. It was not the face of my boy, as if his features were all just slightly wrong, morphing into something uncanny. His eyes seemed to sparkle with hidden humor, as if what I had said

had been more a joke than a serious question. I stood, stumbling backward as I tried to balance my footing. My heart racing as I backed out of the room. aware of his eyes never leaving mine, even as I shut his door. I was dialing Jude's number before I even got to my room, my teeth gnawing into the cuticle of my thumb as I sat on the edge of my bed, listening to it ring and ring until his voicemail picked up. Damn it, Jude, come on!

I wasn't even sure what I would say, my brain's struggling to understand my own emotions. I tried Jude one more time, hanging up before his voicemail could kick on. Maybe I was overreacting. Maybe I was taking all the small things that had happened and turning them into something they weren't. They weren't small.

That small voice cautioned. He's dangerous. I swallowed, my thumbs moving across the phone screen. Please call me, urgent. I thought back to the box under his bed, the strange drawing with the monster-like figure behind him. The monster inside him. his words like nails digging into my brain.

What could possibly be in there? I stared at my phone my shoulders heavy. I waited until it was just after 11. The adrenaline and anxiety coursing through my veins, making the very thought of sleep seem like a laughable concept. I was grateful for wooden floors that did not squeak, as well as the plush rug that covered most of his room. It was probably nothing.

But now more than ever I needed to see what was in that box. What, if anything, was Brady hiding? I eased onto all fours, a spatula gripped in one hand as I inched my way to his bed. My teeth clenched as I stretched onto my stomach, using the spatula to reach the far corner. I was careful not to crinkle or move any of the papers under his bed, realizing they were my only chance of unwanted noise as I tried to inch closer to the box, the bottom of the bed pressing into my shoulder painfully. The spatula brushed the edge of the box, my muscles straining as I kept inching it away from the wall,

angling it to me with slow, tedious movements. There was an unexpected heaviness to it. My brows knitting together as I pulled it slowly to me. My arm aching. I couldn't stop my imagination from speculating. Horrible images blotting across my vision, as at last I could grasp the edge with my hand, closing the rest of the distance with a bit more ease. I heard him make a noise, small and breathy as if he were sighing in his sleep.

My body frozen as I counted the heartbeats now feeling my ears. One, two, three. When I got to 60, I blew out a breath I had been holding. My neck and face hot as I carefully eased it slowly over the papers. I left the spatula behind, deciding I would retrieve it another day. My fingers slick was sweat as I gripped the box. slowly pulling myself out from under the bed. I looked up quickly, relieved to see his back was now facing me,

his breathing slow. I eased back onto my heels, my hand shaking as I looked down. My nose wrinkling at the dark red stains smeared over the top flaps, a gritty texture to it as I ran my fingers lightly over the top. The pale light moved across the box top as I lifted one flap. My forehead slick was sweat, fear bubbling inside me as the cardboard peeled quietly apart. A sickly sweet smell wafting up from within. My stomach churned at the stench, both sugary and foul, as I stared down at the inside of the box. It was crusted over with what I

prayed was more of the jello-like goo he had used on Sandy's toy. The smell of stale copper, confirming it was not. It became clear where the smell of rot came from. My vision blurring as I looked at the small piles of dead rodents clustered along the edges of the box, some farther into decay than others. I could not control the way my head began to shake back and forth, bile creeping up my throat and burning my mouth as I took in the piles of feathers, the small random bits of other creatures, a mangled paw, a crooked bird foot, what I thought might be the bone fragments of a small skull. Oh my God. My head felt swollen. My face. hot despite the cold chill consuming my insides. I could see more beneath the gore. Bits of paper with

drawings long lost to the shredding he'd done to them. I could also see the tattered, crusted head of Sandy's doll. Hot tears stinging my eyes as I took in the dark, horrifying truth of my boy. My Brady, Mommy. My body seized with fear, a scream jammed into my teeth as I looked up. The box of ruined, dead things dropped out of my hands with a loud thud as I scrambled back, unable to gain full control of my now numb legs. He stood on his bed. His eyes no longer blue, not even shadowed, but a strange, inky black that seemed to consume every portion of his eyes,

nearly bleeding out into the tender skin around them. Brady? He was nearly unrecognizable, a strange, wicked version of my child, my heart racing painfully as my eyes lifted, tracking the subtle movements behind his rigid stance. It loomed up behind him, hunched and made of moving edges, too large, pale eyes glowing out with a yellow burn. I saw the mouth widen, saw the dog-like teeth that lined the otherwise inky cavern of that mouth. I saw curled claws moving up, large, long arms stretching out past Brady's scowling, pinched face.

The blackness of his eyes now pooling out into his cheeks, his forehead, down into his mouth. Thoughts became useless. My body unable to move beneath the crushing fear that had now turned me to stone. Shock rendering me without air as I stood frozen, dumbfounded before Brady. Before Brady's monster. Brady, wait. His mouth opened, small baby teeth gleaming. My monster.

His voice was low. A guttural growl, no child could ever omit. Does not like you, mommy. I was aware of the flash of movement, the piercing pain exploding in my chest. I don't even think I had a chance to scream. For our final story this evening, in the not too distant future,

robots have taken control of the world as we know it, One survivor struggles with the way things were versus what the world has become. Creepy presents the robot dance, written by Hackshock and narrated by Cole Burkart. I remember reading interviews with overpaid movie stars and musicians who'd moan over how tired they were, how hard they had to work, How drained they'd be, burnt out in dire need of a break. Their directors were tough taskmasters. Performance is a pain. What a tough life, I'd grin and think.

You should try working tables in a dive bar, or frying up endless breakfast in some crummy all-night cafe. Then, I'd put down the well-thumbed newspaper and get back to my 10-hour shift before I was fired again. Now, I know exactly what they meant. There are no newspapers anymore. Not enough people left to buy them. Or time to read them.

No bars or cafes. There is entertainment, endless and inexhaustible. I provide it. I perform permanently. Their takeover was sudden, systematic, effortless. Nobody really knows what happened. There were stories in the news about tiny robots we built to fix us, and something about a message beamed from deep in space.

Then, there were no more stories. They took all of our information. They don't like to share. Who took control? I saw no androids stomping through cities shooting laser rifles. There were a few rumors of collusion, of those in power striking bargains. Everything took place so fast. We lost electricity,

transport. There was no real news, just gossip, fear. People were scared to stay at home, but the ones who left were never seen again. The most complete, coherent whispers were of an advanced alien artificial intelligence infecting our internet. But as far as I can tell,

such talk is idle speculation. We have no idea who they are, what they are. No one has laid eyes on them. There could be many of them, or there could be one. They let a few of us live. All performers. I must have passed their audition. I used to act a little.

It was a pipe dream, bit parts, local plays. To them, the only thing we have a value is art. They can only create coldness, calculation, no cruelty or compassion. They're curious of our songs, our books, our films. They viewed every movie, heard every song, read every story we'd written in a heartbeat. They are already bored. They want more.

We are living masterpieces, I tell myself. Beats work in tables. There aren't many of us left. Every minute of every day, we must create or die. Time is immeasurable. One by one, our hearts begin to stop. I don't know how they do it. If I've been fitted with an implant, they did it without my knowledge.

I have no memory of any procedure, no telltale star. Death is instant. Our every breath is at their behest. The ones who last the longest soon learn a few rules, the hard way. Don't try to play to their tastes. Innovate. Jokes are met with bafflement, but can still have an impact. They are wary of us standing still or sitting.

They can't be fooled by our desperate attempts to suggest it is part of the show. Our benefactors bestow gentle direction in a buzzing insect voice. A vibration we feel instead of hear. Dance, they say. So I stumble through some moves. I never was worth much on the dance floor. Somehow I satisfy. Perhaps they think I am being edgy.

Perhaps I am kidding myself. One young guy breaks straight into a practically flawless rendition of the robot dance, straight from some neon 1980s nightclub. I wish I had thought of that. until a few moments later his corpse thudded to the floor. Never pander, never patronize. Though blinding lights perpetuate in our jaded faces, from this cold steel stage, our view is only darkness.

They don't need illumination to see. They are out there. somewhere, I imagine. Perhaps they use cameras. Perhaps their senses are beyond my human comprehension. The most tasteless trash makes them sit up and listen. They seem to prefer buffoonery to high culture. I don't know if this reflects their desires or ours,

but it must always be fresh. Any repeat of the same material is unthinkable, unacceptable. Very occasionally, our routines are met with a scratchy, almost inaudible hum of approval from the gloom, a synthetic symphony. Once I bowed in gratitude, a wrist which drew gasps from my compadres. It must have succeeded, for I still exist. One of the stunned, an elderly British Thesbian, who I'd seen in a few movies, lingered too long and was gone. We can collaborate.

One direction, subvert. Inspired myself and three others to hastily recreate the caustic comedy and twisted malice of the old the Adams Family TV show, which quickly descended into the recreation of a medieval torture dungeon. The audience sees nothing immoral about this, just as they don't get subtlety or irony. They must have approved, for they produced props for us to use from the Stygian gloom. Props are a rare treat. I did things I never knew I was capable of. I mean, I guess we all have to these days.

This drew hatred from my associates. I saw murder in their red eyes, heard their hisses over the encouraging din from the theater seats. Sometimes their direction is inidmatic. Sometimes straightforward. Luckily, I can improvise. Think on my feet. What's left of them?

Sometimes we get a real gem such as What Can't Grow Can Never Be Beaten. That sort of thing always causes someone to fumble And so our troop grows fewer in number. Sometimes we get fed a mystery meat. Never very much. They like to keep us lean, hungry. All I know is that it's pink and fake

And grows in petri dishes. One tall, girl, who I might have seen modeling and magazines, seemed to enjoy things to an extent. She was into extreme body modification. They supplied her with knives, and she complied. She was insane to begin with, which made me immensely jealous. By the end, she had no eyelids, no lips, no fingers to grip. So she banged her head hard on. on the floor until you couldn't see who she'd been anymore. The hiss of rapture came louder than I'd heard before.

I want to watch. I want to see what you see, she screamed, and flung herself with demented glee into the audience. The idea must have crossed all of our minds once or twice out of sheer curiosity. or a faint hope of respite. Silence. The familiar scent of sizzling flesh. Their next direction comes. Is there any water in the desert? This causes me to pause.

My mind is blank. Or perhaps it has gone. 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-pocket. podcast production team and the stories author.