Creepy - Promises We Make In December: Part 1, Chapters 4-5, Part 2, Chapter 1

Episode Date: December 29, 2021

Written by: TW Grim and Narrated by: Joe Stofko***Find our reward tiers at patreon.com/creepypod***You can also subscribe to us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/creepypod***Sound Design by Pacific Obadiah***Title music by Alex Aldea***Intro/Outro Narration by Joe Stofko Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Welcome to the bloody disgusting network. No. This is creepy. A podcast dedicated to sharing the most famous chilling and disturbing creepy pastors 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 books. violence and explicit language. Listener discretion is advised.

The promises we make in December by T.W. Grimm. Part 1, Chapter 4. 10 o'clock rolled by and mom still wasn't home. I dutifully went to bed as I'd promised, 11 years old and all alone in the house once again. I drifted off into a light troubled sleep that rapidly descended into a surreal nightmare. In the dream, I was down in the mind with my father and all the others,

trapped in a partially collapsed tunnel beneath hundreds of tons of unstable rock. It was hot down there, hot and dusty and foul. We were sitting in a circle on the floor of the tunnel, and death was in the circle with us, a towering figure swathed in flowing layers of darkness. his looming presence cast grotesque flickering shadows in the weak light of the miner's lamp that stood in the middle of the circle my father turned to me and gripped my shoulder tightly in his hard calloused hand she never found it he said his face was gaunt and bearded every exposed inch of hair and skin was grimed with a thick mixture of sweat and coal dust it's out in the shed hanging on the wall behind the door.

She swung the door all the way open and never even seen it. When the time comes, you need to remember that, Johnny. I told him that I didn't understand, and death favored me with a black, rotten grin. Dad squeezed my shoulder even tighter and shook me until my teeth rattled. He growled, The shed! Do you hear me? Behind the door, promise me that you'll remember. promise me. I cringed away from the desperation in his eyes and gasped.

Okay, I will. I'll remember. Death rose up like a column of smoke and led out a deafening shriek of fury. The ceiling rumbled above our heads and caved in, raining destruction upon us. I woke up, fighting my blankets with a scream in my throat. I fell out of bed and breathed deeply of the cool air in my bedroom. I could still taste the acrid grit of the cold dust in my mouth. When my heart finally stopped doing flip-flops in my chest,

I realized that I could hear voices murmuring downstairs. It was my mom and Dan back from their carefree night of Chinese food and romance. The voices moved closer, and footsteps began to ascend the creaky old staircase, hers, light and careful, his loud and stumbling. Mom stifled a giggle and whispered, Dan, keep it down. You're like an elephant. He slurred,

You bet you I'm a goddamn elephant. And Mom shushed him with laughter in her voice. The footsteps creaked past my door and down the hall to my mother's bedroom. Her door swung shut, and the house was silent again. I closed my eyes tight and put a pillow over my head.

The awful dream was already becoming fuzzy and indistinct in my head, but I knew there was something I had to remember. I whispered, it's behind the door. And I had no idea what it meant or why it was important. I woke up in the morning with a vague idea that I was supposed to go poke around in the shed, but it was a Saturday. and for most kids back in the 80s, Saturday morning cartoons were priority number one.

I crept downstairs to the sounds of Dan snoring like a buzzsaw from behind Mom's bedroom door and settled down in front of the TV with a bowl of cereal. Mom finally came downstairs during G.I. Joe. Her eyes, bloodshot, and her hair, a tangled mess. She hunkered down beside me and stared at me pensively. You sleep okay last night? she asked, trying to sound casual, and I nodded without taking my eyes off the TV. Mom hovered for a bit longer, then slipped away to make a pot of coffee.

By the time the new man of the house rolled out of bed at noon and demanded some breakfast, I'd forgotten about the dream entirely. I had a new nightmare to deal with, a real-life nightmare, and its name was Dan Tully. Chapter 5. Dan met my mother while she was working the register at the thrift store. In his own words, Dan was, Just strolling down the street, minding my own business, when I happened to look in through the window. And there she was, the prettiest gal I've seen in this town in years. Thereafter, Dan had made it a point to come in regularly and buy some random junk,

so he'd have an excuse to make some small talk. He soon began to shower her with small, thoughtful gifts and offered to take her out for lunch sometime. It wasn't long before Mom broke down and agreed to a lunch date. The lunch date turned into another one, which paved the way for a series of dinner dates. Finally, Mom decided that she could no longer deny what was developing between them,

and I came home from school to find Dan's gleaming Camaro sitting in the driveway. My suspicion and disapproval quickly deepened into dislike, and then outright hatred. Dan was an asshole. He was loud and opinionated, quick to anger, and difficult to appease. My father could be a difficult man to live with, but at his core, he had been a good person, a decent man, who was dealing with the strain of working long hours to provide for his family. Dan, however, always seemed to have a limitless amount of cash on hand, and he threw it around with an arrogant carelessness that set my teeth on edge. He showered my mother with an endless stream of gifts and took us to the Sears outlet to buy a new couch, because our old one wasn't worth a shit.

My old clothes were replaced with designer brands, and there was always plenty of food in the kitchen. From an outside perspective, Dan was the best thing that ever happened to us. Our troubles were finally over. But that wasn't true, and I knew it. Dan was nothing but trouble. While Dad had worked himself to the bone to give us what he could, Dan could just whip out his wallet and pull out a magic train of never-ending hundred-dollar bills. But he didn't seem to have a job.

He claimed he was an investor who could make his own hours. But even a sheltered small-town kid like me knew that most businessmen don't go to meetings with clients at odd hours, especially not while wearing snakeskin cowboy boots, ripped jeans, and a rock band t-shirt. I'm sure Mom had her doubts, too. But what could she do? She was a new widow, with limited choices, a single mother, with a mortgage and bills to pay. I can't fault her for ignoring her instincts

and letting Dan into our lives, or letting him stick around after it became painfully obvious that despite the good guy act, the real Dan Tully wasn't a good person in the slightest. The unspoken potential for violence was always humming in the air around him, an invisible force sealed of cold stares and sharp words. I walked on eggshells when he was in the house, and I hated him for it.

Dan hated me right back. He knew that I could sense he was a fraud, a pretender to a throne that he had no right to claim. It felt like Dan was using us, but I didn't know how or why. All I knew was that there was a snake in our house, and I hated him from the moment I laid eyes on him. Sometime in late June, Dan rolled up to the house with his car overloaded with suitcases, boxes, and garbage bags, filled with clothes. I looked down from my bedroom window with a sinking heart as he strutted up the driveway to the front door, lord of all that he surveyed, Dan was moving in.

I heard the front door open and Dan bellowed, Nora, I'm here with my stuff. Tell Johnny to come on down here and get Give me a hand. I felt my cheeks burn as pent up rage boiled into my bloodstream. I stood in the middle of my room with my arms crossed in defiance until Mom came in and said, You heard him, Johnny. Go do as you're told. You didn't tell me this was happening.

I live here, too, don't I? You should have asked me first. I wanted my words to come out sounding large and powerful, but my voice betrayed me. I sounded weak and tired, a petulant child on the verge of throwing a temper tantrum. Mom's face darkened. I tried to hold my ground as she advanced on me, but I faltered in the face of her raw blinking fury and shuffled backward

until my back thudded against a wall. Mom leaned in close and through clenched teeth, she breathed. You check your tone with me, boy. Yes, Dan is moving. in. I didn't tell you because you don't have any say in this. None at all. I am the adult, and you are my child, and you will accept the choices that I make. Do you understand me? I hate him, I hissed, and I hate you for making this happen to us. Mom's brow twisted, and her hands balled up into fist. Hate me? Hate your own mother?

For what? What did I do? What has Dan done to you, for that matter? "'Bious things and put supper in your belly? "'Hate!' she trailed off, struggling to clamp down on her mounting anger. "'You hate your own mother, the woman who has sacrificed so much for you over the years. "'I can't believe it. "'You ignorant little shit! How dare you? "'You didn't tell me because you know it's wrong, "'and you're only with him because he buys things,' I said, and she flinched.

"'I swallowed back my tears. and pressed on, savagely glad to see the hurt and guilt in her eyes. He's an asshole, and you know it. But you don't care, because he's rich, and he spends his money on us. That's all you care about— Mom led out a tortured little shriek and began to batter my arms and torso with rapid fire punches. I hunched my shoulders against the onslaught and slid down the wall onto the floor, curling up like a pill-bug as she slapped and pummeled me from above.

Your father left us with nothing but debt, she panted. Get that through your thick skull. Do you know what I care about? I care about your future. I care about keeping a roof over our heads. Shame on you for saying that. Shame on you for even thinking such a thing. I stood up slowly and wiped my tears on a thing.

dirty shirt from my laundry hamper. Mom watched me do this, with her hands planted sternly on her hips, but her eyes were haunted, because there was truth in my words, and the truth hurts us in deep places, places that a clenched fist could never touch. I was glad that my words had hurt her,

because I was hurting too. Misery loves company. Mom took a deep breath, and rubbed her temples. She said, you're going to try your best to make this work, Johnny, or I swear to God I will knock you into next week. Now get down there and help Dan get his stuff in the house. Go on. I shuffled down the stairs with bread eyes and went out to help our unwelcome new addition to the house bring in his crap. Dan favored me with an unpleasant smile and said, I was about to go back in there and have a word with you, slow poke, but it looks like your mom already

took care of that. Here, take this into the living room. He shoved a heavy box into my arms, and without warning, an image of the decrepit old shed in our backyard flashed across my mind. The air suddenly fell thick and poisonous, and for a split second, I saw Dan's nasty grim transform into the black rotting leer of a corpse, a rictus of ancient malice that was somehow horribly familiar. My heart lurched, and I stumbled back, almost dropping the box on my toes. I thought, when the time comes, you need to remember that, Johnny. And even though I had no idea what that meant, I knew that it was important.

The hell's wrong with you, he barked. Be careful with that. I got stereo parts. in there, I muttered. Sorry, it's really heavy, and staggered back to the front door on leaden feet. In my heart, I knew that this was the beginning of the end. Something awful was brewing on the horizon.

It was only a matter of time before the storm came roaring in to consume us. Part 2, Chapter 1. The Bacardi bit the dust as predicted. I decided on a bottle of scotch as its successor. I'm surprised by how clear-headed I feel, despite the unsteady wobble in my legs. Confession has a sobering effect on me, it seems. Maybe if I'd been a little more honest with myself over the years,

I wouldn't have developed a drinking problem in the first place. Food for thought, I suppose. So, where were we? Right, Dan moved in. It was like taking a slinchhammer to the frail little snow globe of my existence. He shattered it into a million pieces. A week or so after moving day, a man came to the house looking for someone named Digger. He looked like Frankenstein's monster in dirty Levi's and a leather jacket.

I opened the door as far as the chain would allow, and timidly, asked the ogre standing on our front porch if he'd maybe come to the wrong house. Mom was crouched in the living room with the phone in hand, ready to dial the police and scream for help if the terrifying figure outside the door tried to force his way in. The ogre shook his head and grunted. Don't think so, kid. Pretty sure this is the place.

He crossed his tree trunk arms and blinked down at me, waiting impassively for a response. Confused and more than a bit terrified, I shook my head, no, and tried to swing the door shut. He shoved the toe of his motorcycle boot into the gap and said, Not so fast, bud, I'll ask you again. Where's he at? I stared up in horrified fascination at the teardrops tattooed beneath the man's eye. To me, he looked. He looked at. He looked at. He looked at. He looked. He looked like a nomadic warrior from a Mad Max movie. His hair was a long tangled mop, and his beard was braided into a graying rope that hung down to his stomach.

I've never seen anyone who looked like that outside of the movies before, and it was almost disorienting. I don't know, I squeaked. I don't think he lives here. Mom pushed me aside and barked. Sir, I can tell you for a fact. that no one called Digger lives in this house. Move your put, please.

I'm closing the door. The Ogre placidly rumbled. Digger's real name is Dan. I got the right place. Don't you worry about that. Where's he at? His car ain't here? He told me to meet him here at three.

Mom pulled me away from the door and said, I'm sorry, I don't know where he is. He went out a while ago, but I'll certainly tell him that you were here, Mr. They call me Moses, the ogre drawled. And I ain't going anywhere. I'll wait here until he gets back. Fine, Mom said curtly. You can wait outside. Move your foot. Moses raised an eyebrow at her tone, but he moved his foot. Mom shut the door and locked it.

Moses stared at the door for a few minutes, his expression still placid, and then he ambled off to lurk around an hour driveway and chain-smoke cigarettes while he admired his motorcycle, which he'd decided to park on our front lawn. I watched him from the living room window caught between fear and fascination. Fifteen minutes later, Dan came burning into the driveway, and found Moses standing around in front of the house, leaning against the elm tree, and gazing off deeply into nothing at all.

I could tell by the way he glared at the house that he was less than pleased. He brought the frightening giant inside and called out, Nara, that wasn't nice? This man is my business associate, and he doesn't wait around outside if I'm not here, got it? Dan's tone was relaxed, but his posture was tense with suppressed violence.

Mom shrank back from him and nervously straightened her skirt. She murmured, Okay, I'm sorry. I didn't know anyone was supposed to be coming over. I didn't mean to. Dan shook his head and held up a finger to shush her. You don't need to know if he's a coming. If he shows up, you let him in.

He turned to Moses and said, Come on back to the office, big fellow, let's talk. They went back into the room that used to be my father's den, the place where he'd kept his papers and his prize collection of volumes from Encyclopedia Britannica, a row of thick books like black paving stones, books that had never once been opened. It had been the cozy little cave where Dad would sit at his desk and smoke a pipe of drum tobacco while he listened to an AM radio and puzzled over his taxes. Now it belonged to Dan, and the drum tobacco, encyclopedia collection, and AM radio,

had been replaced with harsh words, secret meetings, and a hulking business associate who had teardrops tattooed on his face. After Moses went clomping out the front door and roared off on his Harley, Dan turned to mom and grunted, You're lucky that boy was in a good mood today. If you caught him on a bad day, he'd probably just kick the door in and make himself at home. Jesus, talk about playing with fire. Why would you bring someone like that to my house? She demanded. Good God, what kind of business could you possibly have with a guy like that? Dan gave her a stern look.

Hear no evil, see no evil, he said. And if you don't hear or see no evil, you don't speak no evil. You get what I'm saying. Mom stared up at him at a loss for words. Dan, patted her on the head and grabbed a beer out of the fridge. See? I'll tell you what. You play it cool, and there won't ever be any cause for trouble, darling. Just play it cool and do what I tell you. Moses became a regular visitor to our home after that, as well as another guy named Donnie, a stocky young man who had a curved scar that ran from the corner of his eye to his chin. Donnie was always clad from head to toe in denim, and he had a disconcerting habit of looking somewhere over your shoulder when he talked to you. As the summer wore on, a pattern soon emerged.

Donnie would come by with a bag or satchel of some kind and leave empty-handed. At some point later, Moses would drop in, and Dan would take him back into his office for a meeting that would usually be. be over within a few minutes. In between these visits, Dan would slip out of the house at odd hours of the day and night to attend more meetings with various people he referred to, without a trace of irony, as clients. I had watched enough cop shows on TV to suspect what Dan was probably up to, but in mid-October my suspicions were abruptly and unexpectedly confirmed. We had been sent home early from school that day because of a localized power outage, and the school bus dropped me off a full three hours earlier than usual.

I was dreading coming home, because I knew that mom didn't get off work until five. And there was a good chance it would be just me and Dan in the house. Just me and good old Dan, with his icy stare and his cruel observations, good old Dan, who would sometimes lose his shit if he thought I was chewing too loudly, or if I accidentally walked in front of the TV while he was watching football. I prayed that he would be out tooling around in his precious sports cars somewhere, but of course the Camaro was in the driveway when I stepped off the bus, as well as the bonus of Moses Harley parked in its customary place on the front lawn.

I cursed unto my breath and went inside. Maserith was blaring away on Dan's stereo, and no one noticed me come in. They were all sitting in the living room, Dan and Moses, and two girls I had never seen before. The girls looked to be somewhere in their late teens. They both possessed identical veins of teased-up platinum blonde hair. One girl was curled up on Dan's lap in the recliner, while the other was just beginning to kneel down in front of Moses, who was sitting on the couch with his pants wide open.

There was a small pile of white powder sitting on a square of unwrapped cellophane on the coffee table, right beside two large stacks of rubber-banded cash, more money than I'd ever seen before in my life. I didn't understand what was going. on, but I knew that I wasn't supposed to be witnessing it. So I slowly backpedaled towards the front door. I was almost there when I tripped over my own gym bag on the floor and stumbled. I flailed for balance and pulled a coat rag down on top of me as I fell. Whomp! I heard Dan yell over the music. Hey, you hear something? I panicked and fought the coats that were tangled on top of me. I was just

Scrabbling to my feet when Dan poked his head around the corner. He looked at me with cold amusement and gestured at the coats that were splayed all over the floor. Well, look at this shit, he sighed. What are you doing here, kid? You should still be in school. We got out early, I stammered. I was just going upstairs, and I tripped over the coat rack. Sorry.

Dan narrowed his eyes and said, Is that right? You were going upstairs, somehow you tripped over the coat rack. The coat rack wasn't anywhere near the stairs, so that's pretty weird, right? Now tell me, how'd that happen? My mouth fell dry as dust. I racked my brain desperately for an explanation.

I was saved by the blonde girl who had been nesting her derrier on Dan's lap when I came in, who wandered into the hall at that moment to see what was going on. Her eyes had an odd, glassy sheen to them, and her pupils were the size of dinner plates. She gave me a wide, sunny grin, and said, "'He's a cutie-digger, is he yours?' Dan started and shook his head. "'Nah, he belongs to the old ball and chain. I was just about to send him out for some ice cream, actually.

I like to treat the little fella every now and then.' I blinked at him in slack-jawed shot. The nearest store was almost seven miles away. Ah, you're a good guy. The girl crooned and she rubbed his bicep in slow, delicate circles. She dropped me a sly wink and added, There's so many handsome men in this house. Some girls get all the luck.

Dan fished a lot of bills out of his pocket and shoved one into my hand. Go on, kiddo. Go into town, get yourself a treat. Don't come back until four o'clock or so, okay? I'm doing some business here. It was a hundred-dollar bill. I jammed it in my pocket and faintly, I mumbled, Thanks.

See you later then. Dan grabbed me by the shoulder and said, Hold up a second. Rachel, go on back to the living room and get another round ready, okay? The girl wiggled her fingers at me and giggled. But-bye, cutie. The second she flounced out. out of view, Dan dragged me out of the front door on my tiptoes. His grip on my shoulder was like a

vice. He crowded me against the railing and grabbed a double handful of my jacket. You don't breathe a word about this to no one, he said. Not your mom, not your teacher, not your little school friends, not anybody. What you saw in there is a whole pile of mind your own fucking business. You get me, little buddy. I whispered, I didn't see anything. Dan nodded in solemn agreement. Exactly. You didn't see anything.

Now, take the money, hop on your bike, and fuck off to somewhere anywhere. I don't even give a shit. Just get out of here. He shoved me down the front steps by the back of my neck and swaggered back into the house. I tried to hop on my muddy old ten-speed, but my legs were trembling too badly, to balance on one foot, and I ended up falling over into the mat of dead leaves and sticks that covered our front lawn. I tried again, and managed to get my ass on the seat this time, then started off from nowhere

in particular, peddling slowly at first, and then progressively faster as the soggy paralysis of fear began to fade, and anger took over. stretches of forest and endless fields of dead withered cornstalks flashed by on both sides, and I kept on peddling, my legs powered by a potent fuel of shame and impotent rage. I peddled and I seethe and time stood still. The world narrowed down to me and the bike and my boundless hatred for Dan Tully. Abruptly, I realized that I was biking past the old old. coal mine, and I locked up my brakes, spraying stones as I shuddered to a halt.

The company had surrounded the mine with a tall wire fence and a legion of warning signs, but all the kids knew that there were places where someone had cut the wire at several points along the perimeter, the handiwork of teenagers looking for a spooky place to get shit-faced and party. I quickly found one behind a watery ditch, now only partially concealed by the dead grasses and withered cat-tails. I stashed my bike behind a scrubby little pine tree and weaseled my way through the opening. I didn't have a plan of any kind. I hadn't even made a conscious decision to go there. I had pointed my bicycle down the road, and it had taken me there of its own accord. The entrance to the mine had been blocked off by a jumble of large rocks

and broken support beams. That was fine and dandy by me. I didn't actually want to go down there. I just wanted to see it, the place where my father had died. I tried to find the entrance to the small shaft the rescuers had drilled to let in fresh air, but almost two years had passed since the accident,

and the mouth of the tunnel was now lost beneath the carpet of overgrown weeds. I didn't have anywhere else to go, So I aimlessly wandered around the grounds for a while, kicking an old can around the parking lot, and throwing stones at the boarded-up buildings. The sun began to wane in the sky, and a cold wind kicked up from the northeast, making me shiver in my thin windbreaker. It was time to make the long ride home and face whatever awful situation

that might be waiting for me there. life with Dan was anything but predictable. The only constant in my life was my hatred for him. I retrieved my bike from its hiding spot and found a tattered piece of paper trapped in my front spokes, presumably blown there by the wind. I picked it out, and almost tossed it aside before the words,

Nora and Johnny, please, jumped out and caught my attention. It was the note my father had written to us while trapped in the mine. Somehow, against all odds, there it was, fluttering against my tire in the wind. I knew for a fact that the note had been thrown into the garbage back in January, along with every other trace of dad that my mom could find and purge from our lives. It should have been buried in the town dump somewhere,

slowly rotting beneath tons of garbage, But there it was. I stuffed the note into my hip pocket, and my fingers grazed the $100 bill that Dan had given me earlier, his hush money. I tore it into pieces and let them scatter in the wind. I didn't want his money. I wanted him to be gone. For even more from Creepy, 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 used under license and may not be rebroadcast or distributed without the express prior written consent of the story's author. Please contact us at creepypod at gmail.com for further information on obtaining the rights necessary to rebroadcast. or distribute a particular story.