Creepy - Day 18 - Adam's Halloween & The House at the Bottom

Episode Date: October 18, 2025

Adam's Halloween***Written by: Lorri Stackhouse and Narrated by: Cole Burkhardt***The House at the Bottom***https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/***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.

Creepy presents the 31 days of horror. Day 18. This is creepy. A podcast dedicated to sharing the most famous chilling and disturbing creepy pastures 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. Good afternoon, Cole.

It sounds like you had a dream last night that you would like to talk about. Yeah, it's been a while since I had a dream that I remembered. Really? Nurse Natalie's notes say that you've woken up screaming every night this week. Well, yeah, but I don't remember why. I remember this dream, though. I see. Please, whenever you are ready.

I don't even know if it was supposed to be about me as much as Adam's Halloween. I waited. Eagerly, I watched chubby fists dip the ladle into the last bowl, swirled it through a frothy layer of floating sherbert and filled paper cups with pink chunky punch. I was next. As I reached for the ladle, the white ruffled cuff of my costume caught on the rim of the bowl. Before it could splash in, I drew my hand away, bumping the unsteady folding table,

and creating tiny, rosy waves inside the glass pumpkin. The adult, supervising the drink table, stowled and moved the lestead. ladle out of my reach. It was Halloween. Glorious, wonderful Halloween. My favorite holiday. Our school gym had been transformed into a riot of harvest colors. Black and orange streamers cascaded from the rafters.

Construction paper skeletons, ghost, and arching black cats danced on the walls. Glowing jackal lanterns lined the edge of the stage. The scent of seared pumpkin flesh hung in the heavy, humid air. Outside the double doors, the Wisconsin air had a clear, steely bite. Kids and their parents were still arriving, stomping the light snow from their feet and rubbing their frozen fingers together. Gusts of chilly air blew inside with each new arrival, but the sweat, breath, and warmth radiating from the children snuffed it out before anyone could get proper.

properly chilled. Costumed kids, frenzied with sugar, darted between the tables laden with delicious treats, orange cupcakes, popcorn balls, candy raisins, and chocolate bars. Apples bobbed merrily in a water-filled metal trough. An area for dancing was cordoned off with bales of straw. A parent, dressed as a medieval knight, stood beside a record player and a stack of vinyl albums. albums. His metal face shield fell with a rusty bang each time he changed a record. The costumes were dazzling. A genie with a sparkling turban parried his jewel-entrusted saber.

A pretty ballerina wearing a pink leotard and tutu smiled at me. Her two front teeth were missing. A dramatic black cape swooped by. Inside was a vampire. His small mouth stuffed with white plastic fangs. A hobo with black shoe polish on his face, stuffed his cheeks with popcorn and chatted with a cowboy, weighed down by heavy leather boots and a lariat upon his shoulder. Ghosts peered from circles cut out of white bed sheets. A princess and a tiny white bride held hands and skipped in unison with the music. I was the only clown. My costume was homemade, sewn by my mother, using swatches of red, green, and blue fabric. Around my neck and wrists were white cuffs, ruffled and heavy with starch.

White grease paint covered my face, except for my nose and cheeks which were swirled with red circles. Instead of wide clown shoes, I sadly had to settle for my thread-barren blue sneakers. Cautiously, I approached the crowd surrounding the metal trough. A pirate was thrashed, his head beneath the water, trying to trap an apple in his teeth. Defeated, he gulped to air and shook himself, showering his audience with water. The girls squealed and several large drops sprinkled on my face. I patted it carefully away, hoping my face paint was still intact. The night was truly magical. There were sack races, pumpkin bowling, and a performance by a magician, although everyone knew he was really just Mr. Olson behind a delude mustache.

While his tricks lacked finesse, his enthusiasm in comedy had the children laughing so hard they were gasping for air. Both teachers and parents pretended not to notice his silver flask, or how many times he raised it to his lips. As the evening reached its crescendo, Principal Williams clapped his hands for attention. The music stopped and the commotion. in the room ebbed. Smiling and holding his arms open wide, he announced it was time for the final event of the evening, the hayride. Woops and claps erupted as the children scrambled to fill their pockets with candy and treats before rushing outside. I hudded the wall to avoid the eager crowd as they hurried past me. The chattering throng poured out of the double doors, trailing

candy wrappers behind them. I hurried to follow. The chill in the autumn air was a sharp contrast to the overheated gym and felt good on my sweaty head. The moon loomed in a black suede sky. Hardy winds tossed the treetops and sent costumes fluttering. Random flakes of snow dusted and whirled. Waiting at the entrance of the school were two fat Auburn horses. clouds of steam puffed from their nostrils as they stomped and jangled their bits. They were harnessed to a long wooden wagon filled with straw. The children climbed aboard, spilling tufts of hay as their small feet scrambled for traction. I pulled myself on board and snuggled down between a linen-wrapped mummy and a scarecrow whose costume blended into the pile of straw.

Parents tossed heavy woolen blankets into the wagon and sternly warned against mischief. The driver, wearing bib overalls with a bright red bandana hanging from his pocket, hoisted himself up onto the wagon seat, and, with a flick of his whip, the team of horses surged forward. There were squeals and giggles as shoulders and kneecaps jostled together. As the wagon lurched and bumped over the rutted road, I threw back my head and bowed. grinned up at the velvety sky. Never had a night felt so perfect. A hayfight broke out, and straw rained down on my face. Laughing, I shook it from my hair, the fuzzy shafts tickling my neck. The wagon left the gravel road for a paved residential street. Families stood on dimly lit porches, waving as we rolled by. The older trick-or-treaters lumbered from howlid.

to house, their bags laden with candy, fingers stiff with cold and costumes hidden by winter coats. They sneered at us in the wagon, calling us babies and squirts, secretly jealous that they were too old to attend the annual party. Too soon, the wagon lurched onto the gravel road and arrived back at the school. As the horses reigned to a stop, children groaned with dissoninged. May. The farmer heaved himself to the ground, secured the horses, and began lifting his young passengers from the wagon, watching as they darted to their waiting parents. Their voices echoed as they disappeared into the darkness, chattering about the candy, the party, and how wonderful their night was. With a nimble leap, I landed on the frosty grass and headed home. A smaller boy,

dressed as a football player, watched next to me. The metal cleats on his shoes made scratching noises as they skidded along the sidewalk. I wanted to talk to him, but the distracted expression on his face discouraged me for making any conversation.

The school was long gone from sight. The streets which had been ringing with doorbells, cries of trick-or-treat, and laughter were empty and dark. The football player nervously glanced back over his padded shoulder and quickened his pace. I matched him step by step. We flew past shadowy houses and empty lots. The black eyes of snarling jackal lanterns stared as we rushed by.

I stumbled on the uneven concrete and cried out, but the other boy ignored me. A quick jog and I soon caught up. We were both breathing hard, but neither of us slowed. Melting out of a thick hedge, a figure emerged onto the sidewalk in front of us. The stranger wore black clothes that blended into the night, but his face was pale, glowing like a ghost. His eyes blazed with an odd fire. My friend jerked to a stop, reeled backwards and froze. The man stealthily approached us, holding his indexed.

finger against his lips, warning us to keep quiet. Another step and another. His arm whipped out and grabbed the football jersey, pulling it towards him. Cleats streached against the pavement as my friend twisted and lunged, trying to escape the man's grip. The man lifted the small boy with one hand easily, pinioned him in the air, and began to speak to him in a deep and dangerous. tone. The boy flailed his legs and arms, eyes rolling with fear. He made a small, squealing sound, too afraid to scream. I couldn't hear what the man was saying, but the sight of my helpless friend broke my temporary paralysis. Blinding rage exploded through my body. My fists clenched, and my eyes felt hot. Taking a great breath, I flung myself.

at the man punching and kicking with all my strength, pummeling him anywhere within my reach. Immediately, the man released his grip on the football player. The boy thudded to the sidewalk and rolled onto the frosty grass. He lay there only a moment before he sprang up and sped down the icy street, cleats shrieking and skidding on the blacktop. The man whirled around, looking for his attacker. Curses spewed from his mouth as he shook his head in bewilderment, but I wasn't finished. The rage continued to burn inside me, incinerating any fear I might have felt. Lunging at the man's stomach, I sunk my fingers into his soft belly. It began to push as hard as I could. Arms pinwheeling wildly, the man scrambled for balance as I pushed him backwards.

He cried out and tried to punch my head, but I kept pushing, gaining momentum, using his unsteadiness to manipulate him backwards further and further, toward an iron fence topped with sharp black finials. I drew in my breath, used the last of my strength, and gave one final shove. I stared down at the lifeless body impaled on the fence in a graceful art. The bright orange moon was reflected in the orbs of its eyes. I wasn't scared, just disappointed. The consuming rage ebbed away, replaced by melancholy. Sadness that my favorite holiday was over again and would not return for another long year.

I sighed deeply as I entered the iron gates, glided along the moonlit path and into a pale marble crypt. Fluffing my starched cuffs, I settled down for the eternal wait for next Halloween. Thank you for sharing that with me, Cole. How did it feel to retell that? Oh, I don't know. Anxious, I guess, but I don't know why.

Do you really think it means anything? I think our dreams always mean something. We are always learning more and more about what our sleeping minds are trying to say. And what's my sleeping mind trying to say? It could be any number of things, really. Your dream begins like a celebration, but it doesn't stay that way. The bright colors, the sugar, the laughter, those are just distractions. They're the mask before the reveal.

And then you transform. You're not helpless, not afraid. You become something else. Rage takes over. Not childish anger, but something older. More ancient. You overpower the man and when he's impaled. Notice what happens.

You don't run. You don't celebrate. You simply accept. Does the fence mean anything, or the fact that in my dream I killed someone? The question isn't who or what you killed out there on the fence. The question is, what did you release in yourself and why? Why does it feel so natural to return to the crypt as if you're only waiting for your next chance to come back? Come back and do what?

I don't know, Cole. Like your co-workers, you all have a lot to process. And we are doing our best to understand why this has all been happening to you so you can heal and move forward. I guess I just didn't realize how long healing tapes. Sometimes it can take a lifetime. But we are doing our best to speed up the process. I'll see you in group in a couple of days. Until then, please let Nurse Natalie know if there's anything else you need, or if you need to talk to me. Thanks, Doc. What the hell is that? Who are you? Please take the recorder and press play. It's okay. It's okay.

I know this is all really confusing, and I'm confused too, but they are here to help us. They want answers just like you do, like I do. They think the answers lie in your dreams. Please share your dream from last night. I know it doesn't make any sense. Just tell them. They are here to help. Um, okay.

If you think it'll help, I can tell you about... The house at the bottom. I started dreaming of the ocean about three months ago. Not the kind of dream where you're flying over a beach or sailing on calm waters. No, this was deeper, colder, and always the same. I was underwater, far, far below the surface. Everything was dim and green, only lit by whatever sunlight could fight its way down. There were no fish, no seaweed, no current, just me, descending.

I never felt panic. I never needed to breathe. I would just sink. And at the bottom, there was always a house. Not a wreck or a ruin, not a coral-covered memory of something lost. A house. Whole, intact. Sitting upright like it had been built on the seabed on my bed.

purpose. A white two-story colonial with black shutters and a sloping porch. No barnacles, no rot, no bubbles, even when the dream version of me opened the door. Every time I saw it, I thought, I shouldn't be here. I didn't tell anyone about the dream at first. It seems stupid. I'd wake up, lungs full of air, heart steady, if not a little fast. Maybe a little disoriented, but not afraid. I'd chalk it up to a weird sleep cycle or stress. I probably just needed to stop snacking before bed. But the dream kept coming back, every few nights.

Then every night. The same ocean, same descent, same house. Always the same. I kept a notebook by the bed and started writing it down after each dream. The detail has never changed. The front door was cracked open, light flickered inside, though I could never tell where it came from. Windows fogged over from the inside. Mailbox crooked.

And a door mat that said, welcome back. I never walked in. I never did more than open the front door before waking up. At least not until almost a month in. I was tired, worn thin. Every morning I would wake up a little less rested than the night before until it barely felt like I was sleeping at all. And every night I would sink down, down, down.

Other things started happening, though. It started simple. I'd wake up with a smell in my nose, like low tide. Then I started waking with salt on my lips and pressure in my ears. Something was changing. Not just in my dream, but in me. I needed to figure out what was going on.

So finally one night I walked up to the porch. I put my hand on the doorknob and I went inside. It's not that I could feel the difference at first. I was in a dream. I wasn't really underwater so I didn't really feel wet or anything like that. So it took a moment to realize that when I crossed inside the house, there was no water in there.

Like the water wasn't allowed inside and had to stay at the doorway. I only really realized that when my movements stopped feeling so ethereal, more real, too real. And I didn't see what I expected, like moldy, warped wood, floating chairs, that kind of thing. Everything was bone dry. The air, if you can call it that, was still.

Dry almost. And I could even smell. Is that normal in a dream? The air was heavy with the scent I couldn't place at first, but later realized it was a smell of old paper and dust. Like a library that had been sealed up for years. The furniture was all covered with white sheets. Every mirror was turned to the wall.

And there was a sound, a low rhythmic creaking, not from the structure, from the second floor, like something walking back and forth slowly across the boards above me. I didn't call out. I didn't want to know what was there. I just stood there, tracking the sounds as a move to. around until I came to what seemed to be the top of the stairs. I woke up before I came down. Sitting up in bed with a gasp, like I'd actually been holding my breath the whole time.

My skin was damp. Not from sweat, I don't think. It felt colder than that. When I turned on the light, there were muddy footprints on my bedroom floor, leading from the foot of my bed to the door and back. That was the first night I had trouble sleeping. I've never had problems sleeping, even as a kid, even as a troubled high schooler. But something about that house bothered me deep down in my bones.

I tried everything, melatonin, whiskey, noise machines. Finally, I just ended up collapsing on my couch and found myself sinking again. Always the same dream. And each time I got a little further into the house. Sometimes I saw pictures on the wall. Faces half erased. A man and a woman holding a child. Their eyes were scratched out.

Other times the hallway would stretch longer than it should have. The floor groaning like it was straining to hold my weight, even though I never heard my own footsteps. But the sound above me never changed. That slow pacing, back and forth, waiting, never coming down the stairs. The first time I climbed the stairs, I didn't feel like I was moving. They probably sound strange, but I remember putting one foot on the first step, hearing the creek, and then I was standing at the top,

heart racing, holding my breath, like all the steps between the floors have been erased. Like the dream didn't want me to remember the journey, only the arrival. There were three doors upstairs, two closed, one slightly open. Behind the cracked one, something breathed, slow and shallow and deep. I didn't open that door. Not yet. I turned the knob on the room to the right. It opened slowly.

Inside was a bedroom. clean, tidy, no dust, like someone had made the bed and stepped out just a moment ago. The comforter was a deep blue. The pillow dented slightly, like a head had just been lifted from it. On the dresser, there was a photo. It was of me. What the hell did any of this mean? I was younger in the picture, maybe 16, standing on a dock, arms around a woman.

woman and a man whose faces were blurred out, warped or faded or water damaged. I'd never seen the picture before. Never worn that shirt to the best of my memory. But I remember the feeling in the pit of my stomach when I looked at it, as if I was the one out of place. The photo belonged and I didn't. That's a part of the dream where I woke up. Later, I stayed longer.

the room with the half-open doors started calling to me, not with words exactly, more like pressure behind my eyes. I don't know if that feeling was my curiosity or something else pushing me toward it. You ever stand in front of something you know will hurt you and feel like gravity is pulling you toward it? That guy or girl that your friends warned you about but you just couldn't help yourself thinking it couldn't be that bad? and even if it was, it'd be worth it.

It never is. That's what it felt like. Eventually I pushed the door open completely. It was cold inside, much colder than the rest of the house. The air hadn't moved in decades. Over the weeks, I'd grown numb to the strangeness, keeping my senses, although muted in my dreams. There was a single chair.

in the middle of the room, facing the wall. A pale arm hung limp from one side, fingers dangling lifelessly. I stepped forward, heart pounding, wanting to leave and not leave at the same time. The figure in the chair was small, curled in on itself. Not quite asleep, not quite awake. Its face was turned away, hair stringy and dark, its skin and awful gray white. white that shimmered faintly in the low light, and etched into the walls from floor to ceiling were symbols I didn't recognize. But they made me nauseous to look at. The thing in the chair whispered,

You knew me. I woke up screaming that night, something I hadn't done since I was a child. My throat burned, my nose bled. My sheets were soaked in water. that smelled faintly of brine. I ran to the bathroom. When I looked in the mirror, blood ran down my face and into my beard. Something moved behind my eyes, just for a second.

A flicker. A shadow behind the glass. And I finally said the words out loud, the ones I hadn't wanted to admit, this isn't a dream. I stopped sleeping as much as I could, but if you ever had a word, actually tried to fight, sleep, try to avoid the inevitable.

The collective human understanding that we close our eyes for at least a few hours every night. Caffeine, loud music, even poking myself with a pushpin in the palm when my eyes would start to droop. Three days I kept myself awake. A self-created zombie. It didn't matter. The house still came. I started seeing pieces of it in my waking life, reflections in puddles that weren't mine. A front door where it shouldn't be at the edge of a parking garage, inside a gas station bathroom, once in the center of my own bedroom wall.

There's never there when I turned back, but I knew what I'd seen, and the water followed me. Drips on the ceiling with no pipes above. Seaweed curled in my left. laundry hamper, a smell thick and sharp like wet wood rotting beneath sunless waves that seeped into my car, my clothes, my skin. I knew the long-term risks and not sleeping included the potential to hallucinate, so I tried to brush it all off until I couldn't. One morning I found my phone soaked through in seawater, the battery totally corroded. still rang once.

The number that appeared on the screen was labeled upstairs. I didn't answer. That day I passed a mirror downtown and stopped cold. There was no store across the street, but in the reflection of the mirror, I saw a door. I blinked and it was gone. I looked behind me, just an empty lot. But when I turned around, In the reflection, I saw behind me, not the real street, but a house.

Far behind, waiting at the end of a sunken road. When I turned back again, it was gone. I started researching sleep hallucinations even more. Dream disorders, associative episodes, everything pointed to stress, exhaustion, maybe early onset psychosis. It should have comforted me in a weird way. naming what was most likely happening to me. It didn't.

Because nothing explained why I kept coughing up seawater. Or why my left hand now bore a ring of bruises around the wrist, as though something had been pulling me down. A purple and yellow handprint wrapped around it. I began to remember things I'd never lived. Moments like memories, but not mine. running barefoot through hallways too long chased by wet footsteps. A birthday party on a stormy cliff.

Candles blown out by the ocean wind. A voice singing from the bottom of a well. Right, no, not a song. A name. My name. And sometimes I'd wake to the sound of footsteps above me. Even in my top floor apartment, I look down more rabbit holes. the idea of curses, that something had attached itself to me, something dark and malevolent.

I burned sage, and I tried burning the notebook I'd written my dreams in. The pages were already warped from being wet and drying over and over again, stuck together by salt. I lit a match, and the fire died. The pages whispered. I threw in the dumpster in the parking garage. The next day it was back on my nightstand, clean and open. On a new page I hadn't written in, with wet ink with three words, You went first.

Something inside me gave in and my body finally collapsed from exhaustion. The next dream, or not a dream. I found myself back in the house. Something had changed. The house was shaking, not violently, just slightly, like a deep engine beneath it had begun to stir. The walls trembled with each step I took. The sound was like breathing, slow and massive, inhaling from behind the walls. And this time when I opened the upstairs room, the chair was empty.

A figure was gone. but scrawled in blood on the wall behind it, as though written with fingernails, was a single message, You broke the surface. I woke up with seawater in my mouth again, choking and spitting. But this time I wasn't in bed.

I was standing in bare feet in the apartment lobby, looking out the front door windows. And outside, in the middle of my suburban street, at least 50 miles from the nearest, body of water, where there had once been an empty lot, was the house. Perfect, still, lit from within. I took a step forward, then the house's front door swung open.

I pushed open the lobby door. The air smelled of salt. I just kept walking forward, never taking my eyes off the house, not even thinking about being barefoot as I crossed the parking line. and in the street until I was at the foot of the house. Was I still dreaming? I stepped through the threshold. Bare foot on wet wood it felt alive beneath me.

Pulsing like a heartbeat. The house swallowed me whole. The porch gave way to a long hallway that stretched impossibly far. The walls were slick, covered in algae in barnacles that seemed to whisper when I brushed past. them, telling secrets I couldn't make out. The ceiling dripped with cold water. Somewhere deep inside, I heard the slow creaking footsteps again. Heavier now, slower, waiting.

I walked on. Room after room unfolded, a nightmare come to life. The pictures were clearer now. The family, faces blurred but haunting. The man's eyes burned red in one. The woman's mouth stretched in a silent scream in another. The child. The child was me.

And the further I went, the louder the sounds of the ocean filled the house, as if the wood and plaster held back a tropical storm. Then the stairs. A spiraling staircase to let downward, not upstairs. Down, into the house's belly. I didn't hesitate. I knew this place. The stairs smelled like mud.

At the bottom, the basement door stood open. Light spilled out. Not sunlight. Not electric. Something ancient. Green, alive. I was drawn through. The room was a vast cavern beneath the sea.

The floor was sand. The walls were smooth and shined like the inside of a giant conch shell. The ceiling arched impossibly high, dripping seawater into shallow pools that reflected impossible stars. And at the center sat a mouth. A great open mouth curved from coral and bone, lined with jagged teeth of oyster shells and broken glass. I knew this was the mouth of the house, the place where it fed.

I heard voices, whispers of those who come before me, faint echoes of screams and lullabies. The mouth was hungry, and it had waited. I felt myself pulled toward the open teeth. I tried to resist, but my feet were no longer mine. They carried me forward into the dark abyss. And then a memory, sharp as a knife. I was a boy again, drowning. I fell into the ocean on a stormy night.

The water swallowed. The water surface returning to a mirror finish the moment I slipped down. I was lost beneath the waves. The house was there waiting, a trap disguised as a refuge. The house was right. I had gone first. I screamed, but no sound came out. The mouth closed.

The last thing I felt was cold, endless water filling my lungs. Woke up gagging. Salt water spilled from my mouth, burning my throat. I was in my bed. The sun was rising. I felt something for the first time in maybe my entire life. Relief, nightmare was over. Or so I thought.

When I looked at my hands, I saw the bruises. The ring around my wrist fading like the receding tide. But on my nightstand, the notebook lay open. And on the last page, a new message appeared in wet ink. Next time you stay down. Don't let me fall asleep again. So you think you can help me now? I don't even know what that dream is supposed to mean

It's on the note card Then return both items to the window We are here to help Wait, why do you want me to read this? Please take the recorder, press the record button And read what is on the note card Then return both items to the window We are here to help

Oh, okay It's supposed to help right? You'll never get out of here unless you tell them your dream. Never. You will sit in this room until you die. They are the only ones who can help you. No one else knows you are here.

You have no friends. You have no family. You only have them. Tell them your dream or they won't help you. I don't understand. is this like reverse psychology or something? The recording said, I mean, I said you would help me if I told you my dream.

You're still going to help me, aren't you? Someone, please help me? 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 Shera-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.