Creepy - Masticate

Episode Date: July 27, 2026

Masticate (starts at: 2:51)***Written by: Sam Obermiller***A Pit Stop to Ponder (starts at: 32:48)***Written by: Sarah Sigfried and Narrated by: Rissa Montanez***Nostalgia (starts at: 56:50)***Written by: Alexander Michael and Narrated by: Owen McCuen***Content warning: suicide ideation***Texas Chainsaw Massacre returns to theaters August 18th! Check the theaters at fanthomentertainment.com***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, everyone.

Please take a moment with me to welcome and thank new patrons, Morgan M. Ray Kippai and Melinda Skatcher. And a special added thank you, thank you, to our five-year-longer Patreon support club members, Lorraine Mandelbaum, Nate Newberry, Jel Rain, Gravy Monkey, Penn-63VW,

Tyler Harrison, Laura Vetter, Alicia Norris, Katie Losey, and Jillian Sepik. All patrons get early commercial-free access to all episodes along with their shoutouts. That includes commercial-free access to all episodes that have appeared on our live feed. Other reward tiers include our exclusive weekly bonus stories and logo merch. To see how you can support the show and get rewarded, please check out the reward tiers at patreon.com slash creepypod. And before we get to the stories, I have something that I'm really excited to share with you.

As you may or may not know, August 18th is Texas Chainsaw Day in honor of the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre by Toby Hooper, as the events canonically took place on August 18th. So, on August 18th, Texas Chainsaw Massacre is returning to theaters for one night only in theaters nationwide, and creepy, in conjunction with Dread Central. We'll have a special promo video we created just for the event featuring myself and our narrators airing before the screening. I am so excited to be a part of such a legendary film in any way, shape, or form. If you're interested in seeing Texas Chainsaw Masker on the big screen and possibly the idea of seeing a creepy narration team performance before the showing begins, you can check out what theaters near you may be playing it at phantom entertainment.com. I'll also add a link in the show notes.

And yeah, there will be more about this in the run-up to August 18th. I just couldn't wait to share. All right. First up, When a nerdy but beloved student is found catatonic after being trapped in a school basement closet, his best friend realizes nothing about the incident makes sense and decides to investigate things himself. From writer Sam Obermiller, Creepy Presents, Masticate. On February 21st, during fifth period, somebody locked my friend Jason in a closet in my school's basement. He'd gone down to clean in his free hour in the fifth period.

That night, he was admitted to NM.C. CH's psych ward for an indefinite stay. By the time Jason's parents realized he hadn't arrived home from band practice, he'd been locked in that closet for five hours. We talked in fourth period that day. German class was always a blow-off. We didn't care, and neither did the teacher. We talked about video games, bullshit homework, mindless small talk.

He tucked his shirt in wrong, and I gave him shit for it. We set plans to see a new horror movie playing downtown that weekend. The bell rang, and we walked her separate ways. I didn't see Jason in sixth period. Nobody saw or heard him until a student had returned to collect their forgotten homework later in the evening. They passed by the basement door on their way to the exit when they heard him scream. Somebody please get me out. The door is locked.

Someone's in here. His voice was hoarse and squeaking, repeating these. desperate pleas over and over. He must have sounded horrible. I think the student that phoned him sees a counselor now. When the custodian and the principal arrived, they found the closet deathly quiet.

He was shivering, huddled in a corner, curled into a tight ball, his hands were covering his ears tightly. His head was between his knees, squeezing his legs over his hands to further muffle any possible sound. He looked like a little. a scared little kid hiding under a blanket, not a 17-year-old about to go off to college.

They don't know if he can go to college anymore. When his mom tried to take his hands off his ears, he screamed, kicked, thrashed, spit, and did anything he could to get his ears covered. He shrieked that he could hear it and begged them to go away. He began to weep, breaking out in desperate sobs, will he scrabble back into his former position. Principal called an ambulance. Jason's mother had started to cry as well,

and Jason's father was torn between comforting her and trying to figure out some way to help his son. Paramedics arrived, sedated Jason, and transported him to NMCH. Jason's mother rode in the ambulance, and his father followed close behind in the family car. He'd been admitted there for the past seven. days. Everybody loved Jason. He was, for lack of a better term, a nerd. We both were, but

Jason was different. Whereas I prefer to keep to myself, Jason goes out of his way to talk to strangers. He helps out with clubs that he isn't a member of for fun. He's nerdy and awkward, but he'd love to help out. His hospital room is a clear representation of how involved he was around the school. Flowers from most of the clubs, friends, some of the teachers that he helped out with even. It's been raining for the past three days, until most of the flowers that people brought Jason have wilted in the window. He's currently staring out at, vacantly casting his gaze over suburban normalcy like he has been since they got him to stop screaming. It was one of the nurse's ideas, I think. Somebody saw that he was covering his ears and gave him a peer of ear plugs.

Simple as that. I took two plugs and tape over both of his ears, but he's stable enough that he can stare and sleep without sobbing anymore. He hasn't eaten since they found him in the closet. He outright refuses to eat anything to the point of needing to be restrained if they would even attempt it. They had to put in a feeding tube. I visited and tried to communicate with him every day since,

but he's not there anymore. I don't know what happened to him in that basement, but he might as well be in a coma. If you stand in front of him, his eyes slide off of you to whatever else is in the room that catches his attention. The doctors said it must be some kind of catatonic state due to being locked in the closet and a horrible case of undiagnosed claustrophobia.

Jason and I have been watching horror movies together since we were old enough to know what they were. We'd taken turns begging each other's parents to let us rent the latest slasher, creature feature, or phone footage movie that caught our eye on TV. We've covered all of the classics. But he always lit up whenever we catch sight of one of his favorites. Jason had a fascination with those movies

that went into the dark spaces, the descent, as above so below, stuff like that. He always joking. his dream vacation is to drag me caving after watching a movie marathon. It was his favorite thing. Undiagnosed claustrophobia. I'm going to that basement. Rich up-to-date schools and upper-class neighborhoods come with a large variety of security infrastructure.

They generally have cameras. There's an alarm. There might even be a guard or two depending on how rich. It'd be incredibly difficult. break into one without the help of someone who worked at the school. Fortunately for me, we did not attend one of the nice schools. After midnight, nobody's in the building anymore. They couldn't afford to hire a night guard if they work for free.

Popping open the side door that our custodian keeps prop to smoke out of I crept through our school towards a basement door. Something has to be in the closet that they didn't see. There's no chance that Jason would be that freaked out from getting stuck in a closet. I stand at the threshold of the basement door. The opening, a black square, cut into the wall ahead of me. None of the lights down there are on, and the overnight lights in school are far too dim

to cut into the pitch. Turning on my phone's flashlight, a small string pull cord is revealed, dangling in the darkness. A quick pull and relief washes over me. While the tiny dust-covered light bulb does little to cut through. the oppressing darkness, it was still a welcome relief compared to before. I entered the basement using my phone to turn on the three other bulbs in the room. To my left sat the large boiler system used for a heating.

It's a hulking metal thing that pumps and winds incessantly. It's a miracle they can keep it running at all. To my right, there is a small work area where the custodians have their tools, a workbench, and various landscaping equipment stored for the season. tucked into the corner, unmarked, and covered in a thick layer of dust, was the supply closet. It was plain, without a real doorframe of any kind, just kind of set into the wall with a seam. A small placard red supply. The doorknob was, similarly plain and out of the way towards a corner.

The thick dust was disturbed where the custodian or whoever had locked him in there had opened it prior. I reached for the knob, realizing that the door very clearly did not have a lock. Odd, considering my best friend was traumatized at the point of catatonia from getting locked in this very closet. The doorknob was smooth, plain. There was absolutely nowhere on the door to insert a key. I assumed that the story must have gotten shifted by the time it got to me. Whoever shoved him in here must have blocked it was something. shuddering at the prospect, I carefully ensured that there were no objects nearby that could fall or block me in.

Regardless of how well-lit the basement was, and despite the fact that I was about to open a completely normal supply closet, I felt a pit of unease in my stomach. Whatever was in this basement closet had turned my friend into a shade of his former self. And it scared me. logically, I can understand that it's just a supply closet. It's been a week since this happened, and it's gone back to regular use for the custodians. It's perfectly safe. Opening the closet is a daunting task right up until I do it.

Then it's just a closet again. It is so plainly just a closet that I feel a little stupid for coming all the way down here in the first place. I reach in and pull the cord, lighting up an array of cleaning supplies, ranging from glass cleaner to rags to a mop bucket in the corner. The two walls on either side were shelves, with the back wall having a small wire rack to hang keys or jackets. In the other corner, opposite the mop bucket, is a spot that's clearly cleaner than the rest of the room.

Mark, some dickhead in my science class, spread of rumor that Jason had pissed on the rest of the room. class, spread of rumor that Jason had pissed himself when it happened, causing more than a few dirty looks his way from Jason's friends. Looking at the clean spot shining from the surrounding grime and dust, it looked like he was right. What could have possibly scared him this much in this closet? Sure, it'd be dark if the light wasn't working. That wasn't the part of any story I'd heard. It had turned on just fine and even looked like they had replaced the bulb since it happened.

As unsettling as five hours in the dark would be listening to that heater shriek, it wouldn't do that to Jason? Shaking off my earlier trepidation, I stepped into the closet to examine the newly cleaned corner my best friend had hit in just a week prior. As soon as I took two steps into the closet, the light bulb above my head winked The room was still lit by the doorway behind me, casting my silhouette onto the wire rack in a rectangular spotlight. I nearly pissed myself before sighing, shaking my head, and reaching up to pull the cord in a futile attempt at the classic turn it off and turn it back on technique. My heart had just started to settle down from its panic at the light turning off when I gave up on the cord and reached further to tighten the light bulb.

Out of the bottom on my peripheral vision, I saw my rectangle of light and narrow and bend swiftly and realized with immediate panic that the door was swinging shut. The world around just in time to see the last crack of light wink out. The door closed with an audible click. Scambling to the door, I pulled my phone out of my pocket and flicked my flashlight back on, fully intending to get the fuck out of this basement. reaching for the knob, I heard a second, louder click coming from the door. The sound was instantly recognizable.

It was so bizarre I was sure that I'd imagined it in my panic until I grabbed and pulled. Somebody had locked it. Someone had followed me in through the side door or was fucking around in the basement and locked me in here. That was the immediate and absolute conclusion my brain came to. until I remember that this door did not, in fact, have a lock. In tandem with this realization, my flashlight turned off. The display followed suit a second later. Panic had said in fully at this point.

I fumbled by the doorknob, using the limited light by the cracks in the door to yank at the handle, turning it frantically. I started tearing up at the sound of three light bulbs in the previous room popping in their socket. cutting my meager light from the door seems to an empty void. Up until this point, the closet had smelled like cleaning supplies, dust, and cigarette smoke. It must be expected from a custodial closet in a shitty high school. When the last of the light went out from the cracks in the door, I began to smell the overwhelming stench of rotten meat.

Have you ever gone on vacation only to realize when you got home that the fridge broke while you were gone? or opened a deep freezer stocked with frozen meat that somebody forgot to plug in and left in a garage over a long hot summer. The kind of smell that pervades the mouth as much as your nose, stings your eyes, and sinks into your clothes. I heard a deep, wet rasp of breath inhale behind me. From where the wire rack was mounted, it's a small three-by-three supply closet. There wasn't space for anyone to be hiding. There were no vents, no cabinets to hide in, no way to sneak past me in this cramped area. I must have imagined the sound in my panic.

In the brief rush of horror, shock, and denial that followed, I came to two realizations simultaneously. The warmth in my legs told me that this time I really had pissed myself. And the hot muggy heat on the back of my neck told me that I was not alone in this closet. I froze, pinned in place by overwhelming terror. The stench intensified, nearly making me gag from the suffocating measma that filled the room. I volunteered over the summer at a nursing home, and in my time there I saw one man die. Nate Boland was not a small man. He didn't take care of himself in any way, shape, or form, smoked like a chimney, drank, and was horribly rude.

He also was suffering from a terminal case of pneumonia. Those huge heaving, wet gasps that he let out towards the end of come to me on nights where sleep was hard to find. Another exhale. It sounded like Mr. Boland. It spoke to me, cruning and garbled words that I couldn't understand through too many teeth. That I could not see, but I could hear them all click and grind. I could smell the rot in them. I could surely feel them if I only reached out and tried.

I didn't. I sank to my knees, strength leaching from my body entirely as I was subsumed beneath the overwhelming feeling that I was about to die, but I didn't die. Its words stuck and echoed in my head sliding across my conscious thoughts like a slug. It was the most revolting experience I've ever felt in my entire life. I didn't understand anything it was saying. It wasn't any language that I knew. The breath on my neck got hotter and that overwhelming pressure increased to an unbearable weight.

It was leaning, stretching, bending closer to me. I could feel it take a long, low breath to the nape of my neck, tasting the air. Me. It was much, much larger than me. I began to sob. We let out a low, contented sigh of what sounded like satisfaction, and the pressure released slightly as it retreated further back in the cramped space.

I felt momentary relief before hearing its teeth click as its sets of jaws, however many it had, began to creak and pop and yawn open behind me. I realized then that I could no longer hear the oppressive bleeding, wine of that hulking boiler. I couldn't hear anything, actually. I couldn't hear my rapid breaths, and I couldn't hear my hands scrabbing at the door handle, desperately tugging at my lifeline. I couldn't hear myself when I started to scream.

Finally, the jaws behind me stopped, they're popping and creaking. And it began to sing. I couldn't hear anything else, but I could do nothing to stop that awful grating, rasping voice as it tore through my skull like a white hot iron. It wasn't hot, though. It was cold and sick and so very, very hungry. I tried to block it out for a while like Jason did. I dropped my knees, screwing my ears shut as tight as possible in the same position that I heard he held. And I screamed as loud as I could for somebody, anybody, to help me.

but I'd come at night. But my school couldn't afford a night guard. I felt a breath cascade over my neck and the stench sit in my head for what felt like hours. Finally, I felt it approach, inching closer to my sweat-soaked skin as I sat, weeping and shaking. I felt a huge mass of cold, rod, dead flesh and muscle

cover the base of my neck and traveled at the back of my head before retreating, followed by another satisfied sigh. It licked me. I blacked out. I dreamt then. I dreamt of a giant feast, a grand table stretching far off to either side of me. Trays and plates covered with cuts of meat in all varieties.

Lamb chops, venison steaks, frog legs, chicken legs roasted to perfection, turkey drumsticks, the size of softballs with any side you could possibly imagine or want. It gorged myself, reaching and biting and drinking and eating and biting and eating. Nothing I ate satisfied me. That gnawing, ever-present hunger clawed at the walls of my insides. Its song had played then, in that beautiful, rasping melody of meat and teeth. The dinner had begun to have. that horrible, rotten taste that I smelled in that closet.

I didn't give a shit. I would have killed someone if they'd gotten in the way of me in that food. I was delirious. The whole times I feasted it sang out to me in that chattering, whispering, sighing tone. It sings of how good it is to gorge and bite and swallow and to taste. How I can help it. How hungry it is. I woke up at home, in bed, undressed.

I slowly swung my head to the other side of the room, seeing the clock illustrate 4.30 a.m. to the rest of the room and bright LED red. My sheets were soaked from where I had soaked it through with sweat and apparently pissed myself. It was all I could do to throw them in a wash and clean the water. up before collapsing back into bed, and then it was Friday. My alarm went off. My mom made breakfast and went to work, and I had school in an hour. I cooked myself as larger breakfast as I can reasonably get away with before being accused

of being a glutton by my father. I caught a whiff of that horrible, rotten stench then and froze up. Examining the fridge someone had forgotten a takeout container in the back of the fridge, I tossed it out, that sour taste leaving my mouth with the closing of the garbage can lit. That dream kept rattling around in my head. I still felt that weird, gnawing hunger. I kept telling myself it must have been some weird fever dream or sleepwalking event resulting in me pissing my bed on a Thursday.

That rotten taste is still in my head, and I can still feel that gnawing hunger. Although much fainter now. School passed by at a snail's pace. Jason was yesterday's news at this point. People were talking about it less. The school had chalked it up to a cruel prank and didn't give a shit enough to look into it any further. Everyone bought the claustrophobia bullshit.

Honestly, at this point, I hope they're right. That he really was just claustrophobic and now whatever sick alternative is rotting in that closet. At lunch I ate my packed food and went up and got a hot lunch from the cafeteria as well. Then a second one. I was insatiable. I just couldn't get quite full. Nothing did the trick.

My mind kept swinging back to food, but that same sick feeling would reverberate in my brain and I'd get nauseous. Thoughts of steak and ribs and burnt ends were followed by that same rotten stench of rot, stinging like acid on my tongue, inexplicably in gnawing pain in my stomach. The implications of this and the dream weren't lost on me. I'd wait until after school, go back down there and check the room for real. I'd prop the door open with one of the cinder blocks laying behind the shop building, bring a flashlight and make sure it was just a dream.

I had to. That rotten stench invades my space more and more as time moves on. A girl in my history class gave me a disgusted look and found a different seat. At least, I'm not the only one that smells it. I have to clear my head. I just have to go back down to the basement. It was after eight when I left the locker room I'd hidden in, hauling the cement cinder block towards my school's basement.

It was just like my dream, which at this point could surely not be just a dream. The hallways were dark and stretching out ahead of me. I felt that slow pulse of fear rise in my chest. I'd arrived at the top of the basement stairs, that familiar expanse of black beneath me. Except this time it wasn't an expanse of black. somebody was down there multiple somebody's actually doesn't it feel weird being down here after what happened the guy was talking over in the corner by the boiler he sounded like he was around my age probably another student what just because some shithead is scared at the dark we're supposed to feel guilty i froze my grip on the cinder block white knuckling a third one pipe

up. The smug bastard laughed then. I heard he pissed himself. Goody fucking two shoes wanted to go and help clean the basement when nobody asked him to. Maybe if he minded his business, he wouldn't be at NMCH right now. His compatriots sounded their agreement with a laugh, patting their friend on the shoulder. These were the guys who'd put Jason in that closet. He'd caught them in the middle of something and they decided he deserved to be in that closet for it. I smelled it then, the cigarette smoke. Whether it's some bullshit teenage rebellious act or to hide it from home, they decided to smoke cigarettes in the school basement instead of behind their garages.

If Jason really did come down here to clean during fifth period, he would have seen them plain as day. He probably would have spouted something about how dangerous and stupid it was to smoke cigarettes in this old-ass basement. Then there was another smell, one that the cigarette smoke was failing to cover, that deep, horrible tang of rotten steak left in the sun. I heard the words then, again, and that rotten pulse echoed and slid around my head like a maggot through mud.

The light above me popped and darkened, as did the light they had on down there, as the room was thrust into total darkness. The door to the basement swung shut behind me. It was there again. I could tell by the all-encompassing smell, the sound of its teeth clicking against each other as its jaws opened and closed in their multitudes. It whispered to me about the boys.

I could understand what it was saying now, what they did to Jason. They tried to tell Jason. what it had told me about that beautiful act of feasting. He didn't understand it. He was scared. He wasn't strong enough to help it, but I can help. It whispered to me of how it could help Jason, that it was old and tired and weak, but

it didn't have to be. And after it wasn't weak anymore, we could save Jason together. whispered in my ear and in my blood and in that rotten pulsing bulb of sick in my head. I couldn't do it without me. How hungry it was. How hungry we were. Tens or twenties or hundreds of mouths chattered and barked and mumbled and shrieked and laughed and screamed and cried to me. Through that mess of meat and teeth that I could almost.

only imagined sat lurking in the dark behind me. I felt the gnawing, beeping chasm sitting in my stomach yawn open even further, nearly causing me to double over in pain. I began to raise its tone to a crescendo, singing and screaming and telling me exactly where those rats were hiding in that basement. The three boys sat huddled in the basement, petrified. One second they were smoking and chatting about some nerd And then next the lights were out

And that giant heater cut off at the same time They tried to call out to each other Tried to whisper in that horrible cramped darkness They couldn't hear each other of course But they could hear it sing It told me where they had But I didn't need it anymore My mouth was flooding with saliva

That rotten stench had deepened, broadened, suffused itself so thoroughly into my senses that I'd gotten used to it. I smelled them then. The salt of their stinging sweat clinging to their skin. A stench of cigarettes clinging to their rapid panic breaths. Drul dropped from my mouth through the hole in the cinder block. and dripped onto the floor. They were scared. It was easy.

Those bastards who had forced Jason into the father's den when he wasn't ready to hear that beautiful melody of biting and ripping and of feasting and biting and tearing and tasting. The time for work is done. And soon will be time for harvest. I'm starving.

And I finally. know what it's been telling me to eat. Next. While taking the scenic back roads on a solo road trip in 1994, a young woman stops at an isolated rural gas station where something feels profoundly wrong and later discovers something even more disturbing about the encounter.

From either Sarah Sigfried and Ariad Virusamontines, creepy presents, a pit stop to ponder. The year was 1994. I was 18 years old. and at my first solo road trip, traveling from my rural home for a week at the beach before I began college classes. I didn't like highway travel and preferred to take the extra time to navigate the back roads. In the days before the wonders of online navigation, I carried an atlas in my car.

Several times on this trip, I had to pull over and check the map. Also, in the back of my mind, I always tried to stay mindful of my surroundings. I enjoyed seeing new sights and exploring new routes. I especially love tales of ghosts, cryptids, and other unsettling stories. I collected them and wanted to visit as many unusual places as possible across my state. While my rowdy classmates were already at the beach, I spent a day quietly wandering old city. cemeteries and stopping at roadside attractions while traveling across Virginia.

As I drove, the mountains gave way to Flatland. I realized that I needed a restroom, gas, and snacks. A highway stretched straight ahead in front of me, and heat lines waved in the distance. Miles and miles of flat farmland lay ahead as far as I could see. I began to shift around uncomfortably in my seat, and my need to stop was becoming more urgent. My hopes were quashed several times as buildings dotted the horizon, only to be shuttered when I arrived.

Eventually, yet another building crept into my view. I didn't want to get my hopes up only to be taunted again by another long-gone diner, garage, or gas station. I wondered if I was being taunted by a mirage in the summer heat. Coal trains, gas, and go. The peeling sign was, ha, hand-painted in thick black letters on a flaking white background. Beside it was an aging Pepsi logo,

one so old that the red had faded into a muted orange tone. I slowed and signaled to turn. I saw an open sign in the window. I pulled over into the parking lot and checked my map. It appeared I was near a Civil War battlefield and would be in Richmond in time for dinner. Black bars covered the window and door. I slowly stepped out of the car.

Instantly, the scent of charred wood assaulted my nose. I looked around for a fire but saw no smoke. No sign of scorching or of charcoal. I didn't even see a grill or a barbecue pit. The scent of melted plastic wafted in the air, although nothing seemed damaged or on fire. I didn't see anything that looked like a trash barrel burning either. I leaned down and sniffed the hood of my car, hoping that the smell wasn't emanating from my engine.

No unusual scents were coming from my car, so that was good. I didn't want to be stranded. Although all seemed well with my car, a sense of dread crept over me. It told me that something was wrong. Even though I was standing under the afternoon sun on a hot June day, my arms erupted in goosebumps. The short hairs that weren't captured in my ponytail stood on edge and tickled the nape of my neck. My legs hesitated when I walked to the door. Dread hung over me.

The aroma of smoke grew stronger at the door. I winced when I reached for the door as the scent of smoke intensified. I almost expected the door handle to be hot. A bell above the door tinkled to announce my presence. My eyes needed a moment to adjust to the dark interior. I blinked and noticed shelves of peanuts, crackers, and beef sticks. A faded Coca-Cola cooler sat against the wall, and to my right, a man sat behind the counter. His eyes stared at me through thick glasses, distorting his face.

He looked me up and down from behind jars of ancient pickled eggs, and pigs' feet floating in a cloudy brine. His greasy brown hair clung to his equally greasy forehead above his oddly staring eyes. Bits of unidentified tissue floated in the pickle jars between him and me. As the clerk grinned at me through yellow teeth, I saw a calendar behind him, depicting a nude model sprawled on the hood of a classic car. Well, howdy there, little miss? His voice sent chills through my body. I didn't like the way he said it.

Whether it was intended to be friendly, it felt creepy. I shuddered. I wanted to turn around and go back out into the warm, sunny day. But my bladder was telling me that I couldn't leave just yet. My instincts were insisting that I run away as quickly as possible and not look back. Would it really be that terrible if I peed my pants? My bladder won the argument. I, um, I need to use the bathroom.

I announced. He smiled and nodded to the back corner toward a door. I rushed toward it. I fumbled for the light and closed the door behind me. And locked it. But to my horror, I looked down to see an inch of water on the floor around my tennis shoes. An exasperated groan erupted from my lips, and I contemplated leaving again. Gross!

Wet toilet paper had disintegrated into a pulpy mess in the nasty fluid. I wanted to stomp back out to my car, but there was no postponing my urgency and there was no turning back from this toilet. My bladder was pitching a tantrum, reminding me of a toddler pulling an exasperated and tired mommy back into the candy store. I carefully heeded nature's call, careful not to touch anything in the bathroom. I looked up and noticed a hole in the house. in the brown-stained ceiling tile above me. It looked like part of the tile had fallen down in a water leak. As I peered up into the hole,

I wouldn't have been surprised to see rats peering back down at me. I almost expected to see myself reflected back from the clerk's thick glasses lenses as he leered down at me from the hole. I imagined him lowering a basket down from the hole with a bottle of lotion inside. I stared up at the ceiling. No rats? No, creepy, clerk, and not even a camera lens, look down at me. Only darkness and nothing more.

I tried to dismiss my discomfort as imagination, but I was aware of my position as a young traveler, alone. I wondered if this awareness also influenced my case of the hebi-jeebies. Once done with the toilet, I was frustrated to find a lack of toilet paper. I reached into my purse and found a Taco Bell napkin and was glad I had absently stuffed it in there. Although I was becoming accustomed to the smell, the aroma of smoke continued to hang in the air. It mingled with dirty bathroom smells of old urine. The bathroom hadn't been clean since Reagan was president. Not surprisingly, there was also no soap available.

I rinsed my hands in the sink and looked up to find a rotating towel. dispenser. Those had always seemed disgusting to me. In theory, clean hands were dried on the clean towel, and the setup was just as sanitary as paper towels. However, the exposed span of fabric was yellowed when it should have been blue and white and a large rust-tinted handprint, stain the towel. Is that dried blood? My warning bells continued to chime. I stared at the handprint. Have you ever been scared by something and felt a jolt of electricity shoot through your body? That's what I felt staring at that handprint. I didn't touch the cloth, but I held my hand up in comparison. The handprint was much larger than mine. I imagine the cashier lurking outside the bathroom,

waiting to knock me in the head and take me hostage. Nope, not going to let that happen. I turned off the water with another Taco Bell napkin and then wipe my hands on my shirt. I perched on one foot to flush the toilet with my shoe. Now that my bladder was satisfied, I could leave. I firmly grasped the pepper spray canister on my keychain and flip the nozzle into the fire position. Just because, I held it as I swung the bathroom door open. To my relief, the cashier was still sitting behind the counter, leafing through a magazine. I hurried out of the bathroom toward the door.

I was going to blow right out of the front door and drive away. However, my heart stopped as I realized that I really needed gas, and I didn't know how long it would be until I got to the next place. This was the sort of place where a person could buy gas, get road snacks, lie in a tanning bed, buy live bait, and ammunition, get a hunting license, and hopefully not get murdered. An ancient faded handwritten sign declared a weight limit for the tanning beds and a list of people who had written bad checks.

I realized that I really wanted to smoke after being on edge. I grabbed a soda from the cooler as I hurried toward the front of the store. And the door. The door was only two steps away from the counter. I didn't want to deal with the sky, but I was going to have to. I need $9 in gas, this mountain dew, and I'd like a hard pack of Camelites, please. I requested of the man behind the counter.

He nodded and put the cigarettes on the counter. I grabbed them and noticed the magazine he had been perusing was pornographic. He didn't ask for ID and likely didn't care how old I was. Yet he stared at me. I noticed more nude calendar pages taped to the wall behind him. My fingers tightened around the same. that can of pepper spray. That's 1150, he said. You're alone? He looked closely at me and smiled through his yellow teeth. His greasy hair was still stuck to his forehead, and his eyes seemed glazed.

My skin tingled again, as the hair on my arms bristled. I almost ran out the door right then. However, I was able to summon a poker face so the clerk didn't know how much he was scaring me. I had some rules I observed while traveling alone. Always pay attention to surroundings. Check in with someone. Always travel with confidence even if you don't know where you're going. And always convey that you will be missed if you don't arrive at your destination in a timely manner. I then thought of a new rule for traveling.

Don't let the gas tank get below half a tank. Also, I resolve to get a portable toilet. We're just passing through, I replied. Anxiety tugged at me toward the door. He continued to stare at me and then looked out the door toward my car. I knew he was looking for the other person to my wee. The creepiness was tangible. He looked back at me and I could almost feel his eyes on my skin.

My roommate is napping out there, I quickly added. meeting my dad at the battlefield. He's a state police chief, but I don't know if this place is in his area. I lied. I wanted to convey that I had an itinerary and I would be missed shortly, and there would be repercussions if anything happened to me. My actual father was an asthmatic accountant who was anything but intimidating. The man stopped staring at me and grunted as he gave me the change.

His demeanor changed from overly friendly, too irritated. His face changed, and the mouth around his yellow teeth twisted into a snarl. He tossed the chained onto the counter and pointed at the door. Then I guess you best be on your way.

He growled. Lots of weirdos out there. I skittered out the door and pumped the gas into my fort escort. I believe you, I said to the clerk, who is still inside, couldn't hear me. I kept an eye in the door as I pumped the gas, ready to throw down the hose

and drive away if the creepy clerk came outside. I looked in the backseat to ensure that no one had snuck into my car. Then I pretended to chat with an imaginary friend who was laid out in the back seat. The building was silent, but the air still smelled like there should be a fire blazing inside. I hurried as I screwed the gas cap back in place and replaced the gas nozzle. I leaped into the car and started it. I spit out of the parking lot and sprayed gravel as I made my escape. My eyes darted into the rearview several times as cold trains gas and go disappeared into the past. I began breathing normally again.

Then I fastened my seatbelt and put my Metallica cassette into the tape deck. I punched in the cigarette lighter and banged the box of camels onto my dash to pack the tobacco. The cigarette lighter knob popped back out. I held the cigarette in my mouth and touched the red-hot tip to it, hearing the familiar sound of the tobacco and paper searing. Somehow, the cigarette smelled smoky. Not like smoky, like a cigarette should be, but smoky like a campfire. I examined the pack of cigarettes, and they look normal, but the scent of a wood fire clung to the box. I wondered if the store used a wood stove in the cold winter months and I was smelling that residue.

I shrugged, drew in the first mouthful of smoke, and exhaled with a smile. I knew this habit was bad for me, but I resolved to quit someday soon. My thoughts turned to wet lay ahead at the beach. I was looking forward to spending quiet mornings sitting on the beach, late nights on ghost hunting tours and enjoying my first trip without a guardian. The week at Virginia Beach was just what I needed before college. I was able to visit with my classmates, but I had the wisdom to book a room at a different hotel. I was able to see them when I wanted to and get away from them when I needed to. So far, the only bad decision I had made on my trip was stopping at that

sketchy gas station. But thankfully, nothing bad happened. Okay, well, two bad decisions, stopping at the gas station and smoking. For the rest of the trip, I rode a bike on the boardwalk, found some concerts to watch on the beach, and met up with my classmates. Before they got too far out of hand, I left them and enjoyed the tranquility of the beach at night after the concerts ended. Sadly, the week went by too fast, and I was heading back home. My car was packed with sandy towels, tacky beach souvenirs, and books that I had bought. I was able to return taking the same routes that brought me to the beach. I made pit stops before the stretch of flat farmland that lacked safe and clean places to stop.

I made sure the gas tank was full, and my bladder was empty before I arrived to the no-man's land. before I knew it, I realized that I was almost back at coal trains. Is it around this bend? The next one? The countryside in the flatlands all looked the same to me. I topped a small crest and the gas station came into view. My heart jumped into my throat as I drew closer and noticed that the roof had caved in. Debris filled the parking lot and black marks scorched the white paint on the cinder blocks. A burned-out truck sat just outside the building.

I carefully pulled off the road, not wanting to drive over the glass that had glinted in the parking lot just outside where the windows had been. There had been a massive fire, and the building appeared to be an empty shell. It was startling that the site had changed this much in a week. My imagination went into overdrive with scenarios of what happened. I wondered if the owners decided the place was a bad investment,

and had an insurance fire. I wondered how old the wiring had been in there. I also wondered about the clerk. I shrugged, then shuddered, and pulled back onto the road. Several miles down the road, I noticed a modern gas station with cars around it. A new strip mall sat just next door. I nodded to myself and thought this would be a good place to stop. I topped off the gas tank and strolled in the street.

inside to pay. I used the clean, modern, and well-lit bathroom. The bathroom smelled of disinfectant and had plenty of soap, paper towels, and even a hot air hand dryer. Then I picked out some snacks and got another large bottle of Mountain Dew. I'm so glad you guys are here. That other place is creepy, I exclaimed to the clerk. This cashier was a friendly middle-aged woman with blue eye shadow, eyebrows that were drawn on and bleached blonde hair. She looked back at me, shrugging her shoulders. Yeah, it's rough what happened, she answered. I nodded.

What happened? I asked, making conversation. I expected to hear there was a gas leak or faulty wiring. The cashier looked around and leaned toward me like she was going to tell me a secret. The clerk over there, just up and killed a customer, and then burnt the place down, she half-whispered. It was a college girl coming back to U.R. after Christmas. She was a youngin. Kind of like you.

I blinked and asked her to repeat herself. I processed what she was telling me and remembered the fear that I had felt in the store. I shivered, realizing I could have been killed there. The clerk continued. Been a rough couple of months. Rough? A couple of months? Wait.

Did she say Christmas? Wait a minute. Christmas? I asked. The cashier nodded. That'll be 10.50. Yeah. Happened about.

Oh, I don't know. Around New Year's, she said, handing over my change. You're talking about the white, cinderblot gas station just east of here? I clarified. Maybe there were two burned-out gas stations. Yeah, cold trains, the cashier replied. My eyebrows furrowed. I had stopped there just a week ago. Another shiver shook me. The bell over the door rang, and I jumped with a start at the sudden sound. I looked up, almost expecting Rod Serling to be walking through the door, preparing to deliver the Twilight Zone episode wrap-up monologue. Instead, a burly trucker meandered in.

Hey, Bernice, he greeted the cashier. Four days later, I received an envelope in the mail, an envelope from an Eastern Virginia newspaper. I had reached out to the newspapers in that area, asking about what happened. I quickly opened the envelope and read the headline. murder and arson at Coltrane's. I inhaled sharply as I saw the photos. They were a bit blurry due to being poor quality photocopy of a dotted newspaper image, but the same, creepy, greasy-haired cashier smiled at me from his muckshot. The man had a history.

Another photo depicted the cinder block gas station before and after the fire. It was in black and white, but the stripe around the street. the top of the building was probably red and the flaking and scorch Pepsi sign was probably the same faded orange. A photo of the victim was included. She was young, with brown hair and a ponytail, and a University of Richmond sweatshirt. I exhaled several times while reading the article. The girl did look a little like me, just like the cashier had said. Other photos included police, police officers in winter coats assessing the scene with firefighters. The date of the newspaper was January 1st, 1994.

I had been there in June, 1994. That was impossible, but a reality at the same time. I have ideas about what happened, but I'll never know. Was it a time slip? I enjoyed the story about the two ladies who traveled back in time, and visited Versailles and saw Marie Antoinette, but I didn't time travel because I was at the gas station in summer, not winter. Why hadn't I noticed the shiny new gas station before Coltrane's?

Did Coltrane's Gas and Go travel forward in time? Did I cross over into a whole other dimension? Was it a ghost? I enjoy ghost stories, but it's hard for me to wrap my brain around an entire ghostly gas station that I had interacted with. And what about those cigarettes and the gas I bought there? They were real.

And the Mountain Dew was real. Sometimes I have to open the Ziploc bag that I'd sealed the cigarette package inside. Each time I doubt myself, I open it and still detect a smoky scent. Notes of campfire with melted plastic in the background. It happened. I know it did. And finally, after losing his beloved wife, an elderly widower begins experiencing impossible visits that blur the line between grief, memory, and something far more terrifying.

From writer Alexander Michael and narrated by Owen McCune, creepy presents, nostalgia. She once told me that we only remember what never happened. It took me years to understand, long after she had died. Now, though I draw breath, I am the haunted house in the story. In life, I became a ghost, a memory trapped in living flesh. Perhaps, as she now promises from the wind-swept dark, death will return me to life. It first began in a moment of melancholy.

The house on the hill creaked and moaned in the winter wind. The view out the bay window was a roiling painting of windswept waves and barren cliff sides. Beyond that, nothing but silence. She came to me then, in that familiar spell of loneliness. So, Dodd. At first I thought there was something in my eye. I rubbed it away and looked again. Still, my dead wife sat before me.

I launched from the armchair, slamming into the wide window. I had no danger of careening to my death. I was in danger of losing my mind. Her form was foggy, like a road sign through a rainy windscreen. I rubbed my eye again. Still, she stayed. Still, she was blurred. The instinct in me caused a fleeing.

I ran from the house to my truck, a monster was always. as time, and we two fossils legged it down the hillside to the tavern. There, after several pints, sat stolid in my belly, I asked myself exactly what I was afraid of. After all, the love of my life had returned. I realized that she had been smiling at me. So, Dod, my dear, departed. The house called me home.

I parked the dinosaur a little ways down the hill. hill, as though she might hear its engine, and limped the rest of the way. The front door was ajar. The fridge ticked and word. The dull roar of the ocean below could be felt through the glass. She was not there. It was just me, the armchair, and the view. The blankness of the ocean stretching out into the gray made me think of what came after this. the ending, the silence. But maybe I was wrong. Maybe death was more like the wild waves.

I slept that night in the armchair as the candles burnt low. My nephew often warned me of this. It did not matter. Her hand on my shoulder accompanied me into sleep. Life had become a miracle. My nephew took me to my doctor a few days. days after that. As nephews go, he's a good one, though he spends far too much time on his telephone. He told me, with perfect surprise, how well I looked. I gave him a little wink. I had a

secret, and I was happy. I had spent two out of the last three days with Sodad. We settled on the couch and simply sat in silence. I did not think she could speak, but that was okay, as I felt her words, I saw her smile, and her warmth covered me like a blanket. At first, I asked her how she was here. She just shrugged, pointed at my face, and simply continued to ooze love. We napped together side by side. My doctor had the same reaction as my nephew. You look well, he said.

You're glowing. I guess I was. Have you changed your diet? In truth, I hadn't eaten much since this miracle began. He looked at my eyes and discovered the cataract. The doc referred me to an eye specialist, and nephew drove me there a week later. The specialist confirmed it.

There was a cataract in my left eye. In truth, I thought I was just going blind and getting old. Inside, I was overjoyed. Maybe that was the reason my love came to me in the fog. If I removed the cataract, she would be clear, and then we could live in absolute bliss. I made the appointment for the surgery, and off we went. My nephew was confused when he drove me home. I assured him everything was more than okay.

To him, I was mad. He could only see the window pain fogged over, but inside this giddy man I was, was as wondrous as the wild waves, and her love for me was as deep as ocean vaults. I never knew when she would visit, for she came and went like whispers on the cliff, but it would be soon. It always was. I could not wait to tell her the good news. My heart swelled. Before the day was out, the house we once lived in together was now redolent with the scent of cherry and maple born from myriad candles, her favorite scent. They burned, and little stars of firelight shed their warmth, wrapping my bones. I still felt her hand on my shoulder

in death, and her arms around me in life. The ghost arrived to candlelight and a picnic blanket on the carpet by the bay window covered in pillows. She joined me there, and we sat and stargazed. once night fell. I eventually told her the good news. I was to remove the cataract, and she would become crystal clear. I looked into her eyes. My reflected ghost stared back at me.

In silence, always in silence, she pointed once again to my face, as she had done on recent visits, before nestling into me. I used to think there was no place like yesterday. We were unbroken, unafraid. But her waiting arms now existed in tomorrow, and life was good.

The surgery went well. I returned home, buzzing with excitement. I waited. Still, I lit the many candles as though they had the power to draw her to me. Still, I waited in the armchair by the window, glad of the shield between the sea and I. The house creaked and moaned. along with my heart. I wandered the hall's face bandaged, limbs weary.

Still, she did not come. The day came when I removed the bandage from my face and opened my eye. My vision was bright. A week passed. My happiness soon faltered. My melancholy returned. The answer came and it gutted me. I could see clearly now.

I discovered the truth while watching an old movie Sodad loved. The armchair caught my devastated weight. Sadad's spirit had lived in my cataract. Perhaps she had even been my cataract, a ghost of flesh slowly insulating me in a world for two. By removing the growth, I had hoped to see her again. But as she had once been swept away from the shore, the tide now pulled her from the waves and into the silence.

I had sent her into death for good. I have a thought, a horrible, dreadful inkling, that these were the best days of my life. Something woke me. Confusion pulled me upright. I could smell something sweet, groaning like the house itself. I rose from the bed and stepped out into the hall. A single candle was burning.

Once again, it was Soudadad's favorite scent. It was usually lilting, yet tonight it clung with a death grip. The light the candle gave off did nothing to illuminate the vast old house, but even so, I could still make out the living darkness that was the sea. I called out. Nephew did not answer. I called again. Nothing answered, save a chittering from behind.

a closed door down the hall. I picked up the candle and made my way slowly towards the sound. Rain began outside, pitter pattering on the windows. The house shook in a sudden gust of wind before returning to sleep. I was so alone here at the edge of the world. My slippers brought me near the door, not but five feet away. A voice like the hissing of a snake whispered my name. The candle slipped from my grip and slammed into the floor.

The flames sputtered and died. Blackness smothered everything. I took a step backwards, pressing my hands against the wall. I could feel no loving presence here. Sardad, my beloved nostalgia, could not be here now. Could she? If so, why was angered now so suddenly corrupting my home? No more lingering in the same.

in the dark, terrified like a child. If she had returned, let her come to me. With my new eyes, the answer would be made clear. My name was ushered once more from someone's throat. A hiss, a whisper. I took two steps towards the door reaching for the handle. The door slammed open. The armchair behind burst into a ball of flame. I fell. A spindly shape stared at me from the corner of that dark cavern behind the door. Face pale, hair, long, white, wild, and moving. The thing held itself against the wall like a spider, staring at me with inhuman eyes. I froze. The fire burned. It let out a guttural cry and bolted right at me. How I managed to fight it off, how I managed to flee to the roared.

goring hillside, I cannot say, beside a shocking series of images and the evidence of my own blood dripping freely from my arms. Despite the rain soddening everything, the night proves just how dark the house had been, how corrupted by this new arrival. The moon returns through fat clouds, showing a world of hurricanes and tearing grasses and hungry waves. The blood, the thing with the moving hair had tried to embrace me, to pull me in and in and in, to pull me inside of it, and its claws flayed the skin on my arms. The house behind? On fire, roaring, dying. Nephew's fear of fire, coming true. Perhaps you will think I set it alight myself with some useless candle, useless old man. I hurried down the meadowed hillside, rocks and heights ahead, and a

realm of space before the sea swallows all. Still, she comes. Her hair alive with crawling crabs and rotting weeds. She does not blink. Her grin remains constant. Yet, in her hunger, she has gained the ability to speak, and her hiss follows me towards the darkness. Why do I run? The love of my life has returned. My now bare feet have brought me to the edge of the world, and I can see the nothingness with fresh eyes, eyes I had hoped to share with her. Now I turn them on the rising hill and see her coming towards me, limbs too long, too lanky, like a spider's limbs, bearing her rotting body. Even now, I know she loves me. I hear her whispers on the wind bearing promises. We had bliss and a loving reunion. And now this angry creature is the alternative to my stupidity.

She pauses behind me. She will not shove me into the depths. She will leave that charming job to me. She once told me that we only remember what never happened. It took me years to understand, long after she had died. Now, though I draw a breath, I am the haunted house in the story. In life I became a ghost, a memory trapped in living flesh. Perhaps, as she now promises from the wind-swept dark, death will return me to life, as it has done for her. I stare at the maelstrom, the abyss,

The whirlpool of the sea is a doorway, out of this world of yearning, into the realm of the past itself. I think of my armchair, the house of wreckage, my body of wreckage, alone. She waits for reunion. I can no longer think of any reason to delay. Fear behind void ahead. Life, part two. 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 common share-a-life licensing or with written consent from the authors.

No portion of this podcast may be read. broadcast or otherwise distributed without the express written consent of the creepy podcast production team and the stories author.