Creepy - Three Friends Diner

Episode Date: July 27, 2020

Lights...camera...***Narrated by Danielle Hewitt, Owen McCuen, Michelle Kane, Alicia Atkins, and Steve Blizin***Check out our reward tiers at patreon.com/creepypod***You can also subscribe to us on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/creepypod***Produced by Steve Blizin***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.

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utilizing a full cast of first-rate voice talent and cinematic sound design. It's an award-winning anthology of horror that continues to provide audio chills that harking to a bygone air of radio, while wrapped in a thoroughly contemporary package that's as dynamic as modern film soundtracks. Each episode is a full stereo production and quality earbuds are recommended. If you've heard the creepy episode of The Pastel Man, way back in our first 31 days of horror, that was John Ballantine's brilliant work. If you like our intro narrator, Jostofco, or his performances in T.W. Grimm's Uncle Henry series, I first heard him on Campfire Radio's Rites of Autumn episode. If you like me or the stuff I make, I was inspired to do audio drama

by the episode night delivery. Seriously, if you aren't already listening to Campfire Radio Theater, now is the time to start. So have a seat by the fire and listen to Campfire Radio Theater free at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Now, 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. Creepy Presents

Three Friends Diner Narrated by Danielle Hewitt, Owen McCune, Michelle Kane, Alicia Atkins, and Steve Blissen. To Jeremy Fuentes, PhD, Professor of Cultural Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley. Jeremy, I assume you've heard about the strange discovery made at 918EC,C,EC,CII. 3rd Street, a converted warehouse located on the corner of 3rd and Waller Avenue, in the middle of the Arts District in downtown Los Angeles. The building is currently undergoing renovations. Three weeks ago, construction workers noted a foul odor wafting through the property, seemingly coming from behind what they thought was a solid brick wall. Upon further investigation, however,

it was discovered that the inside measurements of the property did not match up with the outside. There was, in fact, a 25 by 30 space completely unaccounted for. A secret room, so to speak, one inaccessible from any point inside the building or out, was located at the far end of the property along the wall forming the west side of Weller. With permission, the workers broke through the wall to access the otherwise inaccessible area. Immediately, they were floored by the overpowering stench of rotting meat. Pandanas over their noses, they entered the in. enclosure. They'd expected to find an empty space. After all, they had been walled off and unpenetrated

for 20 years, at least. Instead, they found a nice 16mm camera smashed to bits. They found film equipment, all destroyed, crack lights, torn screens, sea stands folded like paperclips, cheap-looking frame paintings and kitsy prop menus scattered like confetti. And three bodies. Three decomposing bodies, and it stayed too disturbing for description, though the term half-eaten has been thrown around. How the equipment or the corpses ended up there is yet to be determined. The walls and roof were not disturbed at any point, nor was there any sign of tunneling under the four-foot concrete floor. The bizarre discovery shocked the entire county. As of now, no one can explain how three dead people and a bunch of fire.

film paraphernalia just appeared within a completely walled-off space, but it was all the more shocking for me, personally, due to the contents of the handwritten account left from me by a former patient of mine. Her name is Catherine Sue. She voluntarily checked herself into the Marsdale Psychiatric Hospital, where I'm an uncalled physician several months ago, and was discharged shortly before the horrific discovery at 9-180's 3rd Street. I'm no longer in contact with the young woman. However, I believe you will find her testimony, a transcript of which I've enclosed, very intriguing. Sincerely, Larry Scher, MD. Testimony of Katie Sue. January 5th, 2015, Marsdale Psychiatric Hospital. Just for the record, shooting Bella Cardone's movie at Three Friends Diner wasn't my idea.

I told her it was probably a scam That no restaurant in Los Angeles With two brain cells to rub together Would have possibly charged us so little For a location so photogenic Again and again I insisted It just felt wrong

I was right I used to like being right A little backstory I'm Katie I'm 21 years old I used to be a junior at Cal State Northridge studying business administration and film production.

I enjoyed the phone calls and the organizing and the paperwork filing that most film students hate, and it built up a modest reputation as a pre-production guru amongst my classmates, as well as friends and acquaintances who attended other schools. Bella Cardone was one of such acquaintances. A 29-year-old international student from Italy, I'd met at a third-rate horror film festival. She'd been employed at a television station in Rome doing something, but dreamed of writing and directing Hollywood movies. She was one of a dozen or so, mostly foreign, enrollees, a year and a half into the two-year's

master's program at New York Film Academy. She was writing her thesis script at the time and asked me for help organizing the production of the film. Her script was about a starving artist working as a waitress. who gets dumped by her boyfriend and has an existential breakdown in which she imagines herself poisoning her customers and getting tortured, culminating with a series of flash cuts of her simultaneously slashing her wrists and drowning in the ocean.

Typical pretentious grad student fair. We needed to lock down five locations, an apartment, a beach, a park, something that could function as a dungeon and a restaurant. The beach and the park were relatively easy. easy, and a classmate of Bella's agreed to let her use her North Hollywood apartment for two days. Another classmate, a quiet little guy named Sandeep, discreetly told me about an S&M store. With a basement dungeon, they infrequently rented out for movie shoots.

I don't know how he came to be so familiar with such an establishment, and I'm not sure I want to know. But it proved ideal for our purposes, which left the restaurant, a notoriously difficult. one for student and independent filmmakers. So when I found a little French place in Encino on Craigslist, got in touch with the manager and played the broke student card so well, he granted us use of his restaurant for a night for a little over $400. I was ready to sign the papers, get the permit, and move on.

It was two weeks before Bella's scheduled first day of shooting, and I had a million other things to worry about. From liability insurance, to catering, to talking Northridge underclassmen into helping out as G&E crew and PAs. Bella, however, thought $400 for a night was too expensive, and remained convinced she could find a better deal. So she went on Craigslist herself and placed a restaurant wanted for student film ad. I'd put up a similar posting three weeks earlier. That's how I found the French place in Encino. and Bella received the exact same responses from the exact same people that I had.

With one exception, an email from GSJ, EGJ, PDG at me.com, which she forwarded to me. It read like this, cheap location for film students, restaurant in downtown Los Angeles, 35 Weller Ave, 100 for day, respond to this email,

we'll send you key. Pay on day of filming. Must be December 3rd afternoon. I was suspicious immediately. A hundred dollars for a day of filming seemed a little too good to be true. Then there was the poor spelling and lack of contact information. And the fact that when I tried to respond to the email, all I got was an error message. And then there was the key.

The key turned up in Bella's on-campus mailbox two days after the email. enclosed in a stained brown envelope with no return address. And if that wasn't creepy enough, it came with a scrawled note. Key to Three Friends Diner. I was ready to call it a scam and be done with it. But Bella thought we should at least go to the address given and talk to someone there. If it was real, she argued, it was too good of a deal to pass up. Movies are expensive, and we were already pushing her budget.

So I agreed to go with her and Hamed Shirazi, the cinematographer, to 35 Weller Avenue. Which it turned out was in the middle of the Arts District. I have a love-hate relationship with the Arts District. It's a cool place to go and meet a friend at her new loft. There's some nice restaurants and amusing wall art. And the dissonance created by graffiti-coated trash cans, barbed wire, and long, smelly lines outside the Social Services building, sharing a block with a yoga studio, BMWs, and a boutique gift shop hawking 80-buck vintage baby sweaters, is ironically poetic.

But the streets are one way, and parking is non-existent. I ended up driving in a triangle for 15 minutes before finally giving up and pulling into a $10 flat rate lot. Weller Avenue wasn't a street as much it was a glorified driveway, a short, narrow alley that branched off of Third Street and dead-ended. A large L-shaped building occupied the east and north sides of Weller. It appeared to be a closed nightclub in the process of being converted into an art gallery. The blackout windows were covered with torn dirty stickers, advertising shows long since played in bands long since broken up.

And graffiti artists, the gang-affiliated kind, not the arts foundation kind, had had their way with both the seafone green walls and the ratty trash dumpster abandoned in the corner. The dingy gray warehouse, which functioned as the west side of Weller, 918 East Third Street, looked completely unoccupied. A sign hung in a window. The building had apparently been bought by East River development. I recognized the name. My realtor father knew some people who worked for that company. They bought old commercial properties and converted them into trendy, pricey apartments. The most prominent visual, however, was the mural that.

painted on the north wall. It depicted the head in the chest of a woman, face tilted eastward. The woman had tan skin, ruby red lips, and flowing hair in varying shades of blue, periwinkle at the tips, darkening to deep lavender at her scalp. Her eyes were closed. In the background, some distance behind her, was what appeared to be an orange grove. It was a beautiful painting and strangely memorizing. If you looked at the woman one way, she seemed young and innocent, sporting a demure grin.

Then if you cocked your head or blinked, lines appeared on her cheeks and her lips rearranged themselves into a pouty sneer. I only saw one door leading into the gray building. It was a very shabby door of splintery, untreated wood, with a brass doorknob and a keyhole. No business name, no street number. This couldn't possibly be the restaurant from Craigslist. Three friends diner, I guess it was called. How did anyone ever find the place? I was still puzzling when Bella and Hammond found me.

Bloody hell! Where's the restaurant? Here, according to my phone, I'm willing to bet money, someone is fucking with us. Bella didn't seem too concerned. Her eyes were fixed on the mural. So pretty. Can we film?

I shrugged. I'm not sure. We might run into some copyright issues, and it doesn't look like we're going to be filming here at all since we're not looking at a restaurant. Bella frowned at me and took the key out of her purse. She walked to the wooden door. Here?

I don't think so. There's no sign or anything. I mean, you can try it, but I'm really doubting that key is going to fit into that. Bella turned the key and pulled at the knob. With a creak, the door opened. Hammett and I rushed to her, and together we stepped inside. I heard Hammond running his hand across the wall,

and then the room was illuminated by a warm golden light. We found ourselves staring at three friends' diner. It was perfect. It was a larger space than I'd assume it would be, rectangular-shaped, the kitchen jutting out from the north wall. Behind the kitchen was a small corridor leading to the bathroom and a little room that could function as dry storage.

The walls were painted that particular shade of deep red, that looks beautiful on film. And the tables and chairs, and diner-style booths, were a nice contrast in black and gray. And each table was adorned with a salt and pepper shaker, an empty bottle of ketchup, and a vase of plastic lilies. Don't get too excited yet, I said to Hammett,

who was examining one of the series of stained-glass lamps from which light was emanating. We don't know how much juice you've got to work with. That's the beauty of it. I don't even need that much juice. If we come a bit early and switch out all these bulbs, I can use the lamps as practicals. Plus, this place obviously isn't open yet, which means I'm not sharing power with anything. He was right about that.

The freezers and the refrigerators were empty and unplugged. The storage room was empty, and there wasn't a plate or a cup or a scrap of food to be found. It was definitely a new restaurant. The latest in the avalanche of trendy urban eateries that had sprung up in the last three years as the Arts District gentrified. Of course it was hard to find. That would lend an air of mystery to the diner, the impression of exclusivity,

attract a Twitter following. I love it. Can you get a permit? I tried to talk her out of it. Something about three friends diner made me nervous. Made the little hairs on the back of my neck stand up. But it was exactly what Bella had been looking for and Hammond had already started planning out shots.

And the little hairs on the back of my neck, didn't stand a chance against cheap, gorgeous, and logistically ideal. The restaurant wasn't open yet, which meant we could shoot during the day, decorate how we wanted, and place the camera anywhere without worrying about being anybody's way. And December 3rd, the date the mysterious proprietors had insisted on, was our scheduled six-day of shooting. Don't look under the horse you get. I think she meant don't look a gift horse in the mouth. That saying is, as a reference to the Trojan horse, given as a token of surrender by the Greeks during the Trojan

war. I don't know why people keep repeating it. Because if the Trojans had looked into the horse's wooden mouth, the Iliad might have ended a little differently. As I said before, I've been forced to park in a $10 lot. And as luck would have it, the attendant's iPhone was malfunctioning, so I couldn't pay with my card. I had no cash. The attendant directed me to a convenience store in Elmada that apparently had an ATM. It was getting dark and I was not thrilled about having to run around downtown alone. A trendy neighborhood six blocks from Skid Row is still a trendy neighborhood six blocks from Skid Row. The convenience store stuck out like Goldtooth.

A little scrap of what the neighborhood used to be, wedged between a cafe and a construction site. A cracked neon sign branded it, Elmada Mart. The ice cream fridge was stuffed with La Micho Ocana Popsicles And the cash register stat behind a pane of bulletproof glass I engaged in a battle With what must have been the slowest ATM known to man And was so preoccupied with mentally cursing the loading screen

That I failed to notice the sole leather customer in the shop Need to pay for parking I turned The man standing behind me was obviously homeless He wore grime-caked jeans in a stained military service jacket, and his leathery face demonstrated the dullness of days with no soap. You a tourist? I nodded and smiled.

I shook my head. Student filmmaker, actually. My friend's going to shoot at the restaurant on Weller. Immediately I doubted the wisdom of sharing this piece of information. I didn't want him to show up and beg for change, but his unshaven face fell, and his tone became one of alarm rather than anticipated. There's no restaurant on Weller. There's just Bessie. I giggled. Bessie? He nodded.

That's what folks around here call her. The old folks say she can change things. Make things appear. Disappear. He leaned in, narrowed his eyes, and dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. If I was you, I'd stay away. They say each 20 years, For one day, Bessie comes corp real and feeds. I was about to ask him to elaborate, to explain exactly who Bessie was and why I should be afraid. But right then, the shop proprietor noticed the homeless man and yelled at him. What I deduced were not nice words in Spanish.

He booked it, and by the time the ATM coughed up my cash, I was back on Almeda. He disappeared. On the way to the car lot, I passed Weller. The blue-haired girl was right where I left her. standing in front of the two-dimensional grove of trees and three-quarters profile, facing westward toward the door of the three-friends diner, eyes closed. Was she Bessie? Then, fear washed over me like a cold shower, and I ran.

I threw a 20 at the parking attendant and got out of there as fast as I could. Something about that mural had scared the shit out of my subconscious. Halfway to the 405 freeway, I figured it out. She, Bessie, was facing the wrong way. Bella's first five days of filming went surprisingly well. So well that when I arrived at the three friends diner for the sixth and final day, December 3rd, I forgot I was scared of the place. Crew call was one.

Hammond had already been there for an hour, switching out light bulbs and unloading equipment with Esteban, the gaffer, and two grips, Miguel and a new girl who said her name was Andrea. Our grip truck was part. out front, partially obstructing my view of the mural. But I could tell that Bessie was facing northeastwards, towards the club-turned gallery, as she had been the first time I saw her, of course. It had been dark that night, and I'd been scared and alone.

I'd seen things that weren't really there. I made my way through the obstacle course of lights and sea stands, set up my iPad at an unused table, and worked on the equipment drop-off schedule as crew members filtered in. I heard Katya's voice at least a minute before she and Bella walked through the door. God, that chick was loud. Bossy, too. No wonder she was such a good assistant director. Then came Vena, the production designer,

carrying a large box of prop-house frame pictures and the menu she designed. Neri, the first camera assistant, set up the airy while her lackey du jour loaded film. Then two more grips, Pete and Ryan. Kaley and Michelle, the freshman P.A.'s. Lisa, the script supervisor, Dante the sound guy, and finally Ming, the makeup artist. Then the actors came, and then Hammett and the guys were setting up lights for the master shot. And then Kashi was calling for last looks, and then we were pushing in for close-ups. The first four hours went smoothly and productively, as we had any right to expect.

And for a short time, we entertained the possibility of finishing early. We were an hour ahead of schedule when we broke for lunch. everyone talking and laughing and enjoying themselves. That's when things started getting weird. Right after lunch, as we were picking ourselves up and resuming our work, one of our freshman P.A.'s, Michelle, went to use the restroom. A minute later, there was a blood-curdling scream. Ryan dropped a C-stand.

Neri nearly dropped a lens. Hammett and Esteban took frantic steps toward the bathroom, as Michelle sprinted down the hall back toward us. Who the fuck was in the storage cabinet? We all looked at each other. Seriously, this isn't funny. You fucking knocked me over. Michelle, what are you talking about?

Michelle was trembling. She looked ready to cry. I went to the bathroom, and I heard this thumping coming from the storage cabinet that's back there. Someone was pounding on the door. We didn't hear anything. Someone was like rammed. against the door. And so I opened it.

And someone ran right into me, then ran towards you guys. She sobbed. Hammond narrowed his eyes. You sure, Michelle? Because we were all out here and no one came running from the bathroom. He was wearing a black hoodie.

I looked over the room to see if anyone was missing. Nope. 17 crew members, four actors, none of whom were wearing a black hoodie. all inside a restaurant with only one entrance. You didn't see who it was? I asked Michelle rather stupidly. Obviously not.

It happened really fast. I just saw the black hoodie and really pale, really white skin. We couldn't solve the mystery. Michelle was really shaken up. One of the grips, Miguel, offered to drive her back to Northridge. He said he had to go too because he had afternoon class. It was hard to miss the tremble in his voice, or the dampness of his palms. And suddenly Kaylee, and the other PA, also had classes, she'd forgotten to mention, and tagged along with them back to campus.

Three hours after the incident, we set up for our last shot in the dining area before moving to the kitchen. Though we'd come to an unspoken agreement that Michelle was either looking for attention or smoking pot in the bathroom, everyone was a little bit on edge, and it had slowed us down. To speed things up, I always had... offered to help Vena dress the kitchen. She'd brought cutting boards, utensils, bread, lunch meat, and enough restaurant necessities to make the empty kitchen look like a busy back of house. At one point, she ran to her car to fetch some plate she brought from the 99-cent store. I was arranging knives on a knife block. I accidentally dropped one. It skidded across the floor

and got stuck under one of the large industrial refrigerators. I knelt down and reached under the refrigerator to grab it. As I did, I heard a creak behind me, a door opening on stubborn hinges. I straightened up and turned around still on my knees. A blast of cold air hit me in the face. I was staring at an open freezer. Ice kicked against the back door in the walls. There were bodies in the freezer. Old, decomposing bodies. Brinkled, leathery skin peeling. off-yellowed bones. Bones that were oddly compromised, shattered, pulverized. Greenish mold clung to the remains of the brain matter

cradled in a crack skull. The putrescent smell of rotting flesh. I closed my eyes and screamed. And screamed. And screamed. And screamed. Katie! What the fuck, Katie!

I heard Hammett's voice. Felt his hand on my arm shaking me. I opened my eyes. Freezer was empty. Empty and turned off. I looked up to see Bella and Venna standing above me. The rest of the crew was crowded around the kitchen entrance, or staring through the window that separated the area from the dining room.

Sorry, guys. I stammered, heart still racing. I thought I saw a rat. Did I ruin the shot? Hammett shook his head. We're done. You sure you're okay? I nodded.

Um, Can I talk to you, Bella, and Katya outside? The three muttered in agreement, and we started across the dining area to the doors as the rest of the crew set up the lights and the camera in the kitchen. I had to tell them. We had to leave now. Someone, something, was trying to impress on us that we were not welcome. I, um... I thought I saw dead things in the freezer.

I started quite pathetically. It was on, and it was cold. and there was the smell. Bella's eyes widen. Hamid cocked his head frowning. Gosh, she crossed her arms. I mean, I know it was just a hallucination, but it felt so real, and I'm not schizophrenic. And the thing with Michelle, and I think we should leave.

There's something really wrong going on here. I'd expected them to laugh at me or treat me like a patient in a psychord. They did neither. Yeah, this place is starting to creep me out too. For starters, where are the bloody owners who hands a stranger the key to their business? Either they're mental or they got some ulterior motive. And I'm getting these sensations.

Like, somebody's watching us. Bella and Kasia nodded. They'd felt it too. We can find another restaurant, I told Bella. All we need is the kitchen. We can easily cheat that. Make it look like it's the same place. I'll do whatever you want me to do, but I think we should consider packing up early.

Bella looked at Kasia, then Hammond, then me. Her expression softened for a second, then she set her jaw. We wait one hour. No problems? We filmed. We decided not to tell the crew, and the one remaining actress, about the agreement we'd come to, out of fear that they'd panic, make a big deal out of what could have been nothing more than the effect of darkness. on a big city. But several of them were undeniably scared and looking for an excuse to leave.

As soon as the four of us walked through the door, Neri and the nameless second AC walked out. We were too immature for them, Neri told Kasha. Dante? The sound guy? Asked Bella if he could head out early, since we didn't need any sink sound for the kitchen scene. Two hours earlier,

he'd been insisting on staying to get various kitchen sounds. And when the last night, lights were set, and the blocking was rehearsed, and the last looks were called for, we found that Ming, the makeup artist, had quietly packed up her kit and left. No big loss. The actress was perfectly capable of applying the simple makeup design herself. Pete, one of our grips, was fairly adept at pulling focus, and Hammid conscripted me to hold the slate.

In our agreed-upon hour had passed, and nothing scary had happened. Finally, Hamid flipped the camera on and Bella called action. The actress unenthusiastically smeared mayo onto bread, stacked lunch meat and lettuce, then smiled evilly. She turned to grab the poisonous cleaning solution from under the sink. And then the lights all went off. Somewhere in the pitch blackness, someone shrieked. There was a bump and a thud, and then the dining room lamps all came on.

Esteban had found the light switch. Someone ran by me. Who brushed against me? That couldn't be an outage. The house lights worked fine. Seriously? Who the fuck pushed me? Hey, guys!

We all pushed our way into the dining area. The grip crew had plugged the five lights we were using for the kitchen scenes into five different electrical outlets amongst the tables. The power cables were spread out, lying across the carpet like a spider web, so as not to draw too much electricity from any one spot. Every cable. had been severed, sliced down the middle, perfect, clean cuts, as though accomplished with a sharp knife.

Who the fuck did that? Because she knew that all ten crew members had been in the kitchen, and that no one person could have cut all five cables at exactly the same time. All right, all right, everybody out, now! Nobody needed to be told twice. We pushed through the wooden door and convened on the sidewalk under the closed eyes of the blue-haired mural girl. The Northridge students huddled together.

Kasha Paced, Venna glared with her arms crossed, and Bella attempted to regain some control over her compromised film set. We cannot leave equipment. Forget this shit. I'm leaving. She stormed off. The actress threw Bella a helpless look, mumbled, call me, and started after Vena. I looked to the four remaining Northridge underclassmen, Andrea, Lisa, Pete, and Ryan. Miguel was going to give us a ride.

I took the bus. Katie... Take them home, all right? I'll stay and help Bella pack up. I can stay tuned. Esteban nodded at them. Okay, cool, I said. I'll come back and help you guys finish up after I dropped them off. Give me an hour or so.

No one spoke the entire way back to campus. The silence was punctured only by Lisa's occasional sob. The two guys stared out their respective windows. I left them outside the dorms and turned my car around, headed back to the 405. I couldn't wrap my head around what I had just experienced. Some esoteric party had lured us to the three friends' diner, left a key with a group of complete strangers, demanded we filmed today, the third,

then hadn't even bothered to show up to collect the suspiciously unsubstantial amount they'd asked as payment. Why? To mess with us? Were we on some kind of hidden camera show? Was there a trap door or a second entrance we didn't know about? Maybe there'd been a projector hidden in the kitchen, creating the disturbing image of the dead, decomposing corpses in the freezer. But how to explain the smell, or the cold? Or the hooded spectre that had produced loud knocks on the storage room door that only Michelle could hear.

On to explanation B, we'd become the victims of the specter the homeless man had called Bessie. She was a ghost or a demon, and we were trespassers on her property. Then why not start with the big stunt, the severed cables? Why this systematic approach scaring one person at a time? And this poltergeist theory didn't explain who led us to the three friends diner, or why? Let us there to scare us away. Three friends diner. As I merged on to the 101, four minutes after midnight, I figured it out.

One hand on the wheel I called Bella three times Then Hammond twice Then Kasha Then Esteban Every single time I was sent directly to voicemail I left messages for them

Pleading, screaming messages Begging them to forget the equipment And run as far away from the three friends' diner As their legs could carry them Then I called 911 And sobbed the dispatcher that my friends were in great danger At 35 Weller Avenue

She calmly assured me that help would be there in ten minutes. I got there first. The streetlights up and down the block had, at some point, gone out. So I found my way to 35 Weller Ave with only my phone and the moonlight to guide me. The dim, bluish beam cast by my cell phone fell on the seafone green east wall. Then the open, half-loaded grip truck. And finally on Hammett, he lay crumpled on the asphalt. a pool of dark liquid expanding around him.

I ran to him screaming his name over and over. He didn't respond. I saw his chest rise and fall feebly as I knelt beside him and felt a faint pulse. I rolled him onto his back. There was a large cut on the side of his head. His hair was matted with blood. His left arm hung in an odd angle.

But the most distressing injury he acquired and the one responsible for most of the blood, was a series of five deep lacerations into his right bicep. The muscle was torn and shattered bone was visible through the mess of ribbon skin and ground meat fatty tissue. The positioning of the lacerations was consistent with the placement of five fingers, latched on to his upper arm, five fingers with very long, very sharp claws.

I tore off my jacket and tied it around his arm like a tourniquet. My consciousness had kicked into overdrive. I operated on quick flashes of disconnected logic. Something had attacked Hamid. It was gone. It was gone. Bella, Kasia, Esteban. Where the fuck were they?

I stood up. Help was on the way. And there wasn't a whole lot I could do for Hammett until the paramedics got there. But the rest of them were still in the three friends' diner. and if my suspicions were justified, I ran to the door, but the door wasn't there. I was staring at a gray unbroken wall. I dashed to the corner of the dead end, and then to the sidewalk, scouring the length of the wall with my phone. I ran back and forth again and again, feeling the hard concrete with my fingers. Nothing. The one entrance to three friends diner

was just gone. Then the streetlights came back on. I took a step back. and my terrifying impression was confirmed. I was on Weller. I was facing the right way, but there was no door. In the distance, I thought I heard sirens. I looked up at the mural, the pretty blue-haired girl with the closed eyes, standing in front of a citrus grove.

She was gone, too. In her place was a shriveled old woman. Skin dotted, with sickeningly detailed moles and age spots. Her hair was the filthy, stringy, disheveled. Mell'd main of a homeless woman. Her open mouth took up the entire length of her cheeks, showing off black, rotten, knife-like teeth, dripping blood. A lot of blood.

Blood that ran down the seafone green wall like rainwater, pooling on the asphalt below. Her eyes were open. Her bloodshot yellow eyes. Her dilated pupils flashing maniacally. Those bulging, staring, impossibly detailed eyes. This was no spray paint.

Her eyes were real. Then her foot-long pupil shifted. And I swear, her fanged smile grew even wider. She was looking at me. This was Bessie. I don't remember the cops showing up, or the fire truck, or the paramedics. I didn't notice them lifting Hammett into the gurney or loading him into the ambulance. I have no recollection of the back of the same.

second ambulance, or the psyche are, or the questions I answered for the doctors, or the drugs. They tell me I was crying and laughing at the same time, and that I kept on repeating. She only wanted three.

All I know is that when I woke up 23 hours later, in the tiny detox room of the private mental hospital my parents had transferred me to, I stayed there for the remaining 49 hours. I was under a 51-50 hold, then went home to La Crescenta with my family. The last I heard, Hammond had regained

consciousness and could speak short words like, hi, or yes. This is a good sign. The brain damage might be less severe than the doctors initially thought. His memory shot, of course. He can't remember traveling to America, much less what transpired the night he sustained his injuries. He was lucky, if such a word can possibly apply to his situation, that his left shoulder had taken the brunt of the impact when he hit the wall. He'd cracked his head on the asphalt at a lower velocity. The doctors aren't quite sure what to make of him. His wounds suggest something through him, like a discarded Barbie doll, against the east wall of the club-turned gallery. I told the police everything, from the strange email in the key to the mural's horrifying transformation.

except the email had disappeared from both my computer and bellas, which had been confiscated by the police as evidence. The key, too, had been misplaced and never found. And the mural in the crime scene photos. It was the same mural it had been before that inexplicable night. The lovely profile of a blue-haired girl with closed eyes. They were also confused when I referred to 35 Weller Street as a diner. for no diner existed there, nor had ever, at any time in the past.

35 Weller Street wasn't even a real address. There had never been a side door to the building at 918 East Third Street, and the building had been completely unoccupied for six months. I insisted. I described in minute detail the deep red walls and the untouched kitchen and the little vases of flowers on every table. I begged the cops to look at the footage we shot. but that would be impossible, I learned.

Our camera was missing, as was half of our equipment. Everything that hadn't been loaded into the grip truck, as was Bella Cardone, and Esteban Serra, and Kachia Malekovic. The three had not been seen since the night I'd been found raving, and Hammett half dead. Their credit cards had not been used. Their cars were still parked on the street in the artist district, and their phones were all off.

The cop spoke to the other crew members. I hope they corroborated my story. They designated Hamid's assault, an animal attack. And the disappearance of Bella Esteban Akashia as a likely attempted visa overstaying. They kept a lot of details from the public. I'm sure they didn't want to explain how a mountain lion managed to grow an opposable thumb

and pick up and throw a man at 60 miles per hour against a wall. As for me, I'm now a voluntary inpatient at the Marsdale Psychiatric Hospital, undergoing treatment for PTSD and an unspecified mood disorder. It's okay here. They let me smoke. And no one freaks out when I wake up screaming in the middle of the night. Too late, I understood the significance of the name, Three Friends Diner. Three Friends.

The homeless man was right. Bessie is real. She can make things appear and disappear. The key, the door, the diner. She's something inhuman and evil. Something that demands sacrifice. She lured us there. She played her little games,

chasing away a few crew members at a time, until she had a manageable number. And she tossed ham it aside like a chicken bone and took her prize. She only wanted three. Three friends. Bella, Kasha, Esteban. To Jeremy Fuentes, PhD,

Professor of Cultural Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley. Jeremy, as a postscript in my last letter, I should add that the three bodies found in the secret room of 9-183rd Street have been identified as the three missing foreign students. Bella Cardone, Katia Milcevic, and Esteban Serra. The police are still at a loss for how the unfortunate young people met their end, though evidence suggests they were mauled by an extremely large, extremely violent animal. We've also learned that the building in 9-180's 3rd Street,

which supposedly housed three friends diner, was previously renovated in the early 1990s. According to the building plans, the secret room, in which the bodies were found, was originally designed as a storage closet, but the company later decided to seal the area off completely, likely after three overnight workers were found dead there. Their bodies were attributed to an explosion, an explosion that no one saw or heard, and one that did no structural damage. Three workers were found dead on December 4, 1994, which is intriguing because the three students, Katie's crewmates, were reported missing as of the early hours of December 4th, 2014. 2014. According to Katie, the email she received stated that the crew must film at Three

Friends Diner on December 3rd, afternoon. A typical film date is 12 hours, putting their end time shortly after midnight, December 4th. I believe Katie's homeless man said something about one day, every 20 years. I look through pictures and books, old copies of the LA Times, slides, news footage, etc. I've included several of the these for your perusal. In every single one, since the warehouse at 9-180's 3rd Street first opened in 1920, the mural of the woman with blue hair is present. No artist that's ever taken credit for this mural, and it's always the same, never dulled

by the rain or the sun or time, not exactly the same. Sometimes a girl faces the west, and sometimes she faces east. Sincerely, Larry Sher, MD. For more information, including pictures and videos of the stories told on this podcast, or to suggest stories for future episodes, please visit us. At Creepypod on Twitter, Instagram. All stories told on this podcast can be found at creepypasta Wikia.com. are protected by a creative commons license.

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