Let's Not Meet: A True Horror Podcast - 14x06: I Never Want to Meet My Best Friend Again (feat. Scaroline)

Episode Date: February 3, 2025

Stories in this episode: Neighbor Scratching on My Door | Anonymous (0:41) My "Biggest Fan" | wynnternow (8:15) I Never Want to Meet My Best Friend Again | shadowsovermexico (15:23) "Her Name Was Rachel." | Plenty-Leader-695 (21:33) "You Need to Get in My Car, Right Now" | andlaughlast (28:10) My Ex-Boyfriend Tricked Me Into Seeing a Body | strawberybb (32:08) The Creepiest Coincidence | pianoslut (35:23) The Man in the Tunnel | Lucid Creates (38:30) He Drove Me to a Forest | Mysterychic88 (41:37) Extended Patreon Content: Almost Kidnapped With My Puppy | CSE Best Friend from Hell | Knovamped Due to periodic changes in ad placement, time stamps are estimates and are not always accurate. Follow Scaroline: twitch.tv/scaroline https://www.youtube.com/@scarolinetv IG: scarolineTV Follow Andy: - Twitch - https://twitch.tv/crypticcounty - Website - https://letsnotmeetpodcast.com/ - Patreon - https://patreon.com/letsnotmeetpodcast - Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/letsnotmeetcast/ - TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@crypticcounty Check out the other Cryptic County podcasts like Odd Trails, Cryptic Encounters, and the Old Time Radiocast at CrypticCountyPodcasts.com or wherever you get your podcasts!    Get access to extended, ad-free episodes of Let's Not Meet: A True Horror Podcast with bonus stories every week at a higher bitrate along with a bunch of other great exclusive material and merch at patreon.com/letsnotmeetpodcast. This podcast would not be possible to continue at this rate without the help of the support of the legendary LNM Patrons. Come join the family! All of the stories you've heard this week were narrated and produced with the permission of their respective authors. Let's Not Meet: A True Horror Podcast is not associated with Reddit or any other message boards online. To submit your story to the show, send it to [e-mail].  Get more done with Grammarly. Download Grammarly for FREE at grammarly.com/podcast.  IQBAR is offering our special podcast listeners 20% off all IQBAR products, plus get FREE shipping. Just text MEET to 64000. Message and data rates may apply. See terms for details.

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If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connects Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. This podcast contains adult language and content. Listener discretion is advised. If you have a story to share, send it to letsnotmeetstories at gmail.com. Enjoy the show. A few months ago, I was assembling a new dresser I had bought in the rear bedroom of my apartment. The bedroom door was open so I was able to see down the main hallway and into the living room where my fiancé was standing with the kids while they were playing. It was about 7.30 PM.

There was then a knock at the door. My six-year-old son immediately ran over to the door and opened it. He knows he's not supposed to, and we're working on it. He must have had a momentary lapse in judgment since he was coming down from all of the excitement of his birthday party. So he just went for the door, probably thinking someone else was stopping by for his party, even though it was long over by this point. There was a woman at the door.

I recognized her as the upstairs neighbor from the other side of the building. She said that she needed help as she walked straight into the apartment, frantically talking nonsense. She said that she was locked out of the building, even though we were in the building. And in that same breath, she said that she wasn't having any trouble getting into her apartment, but she said that she couldn't get into the building. She appeared extremely disoriented and kept saying that she was't get into the building. She appeared extremely disoriented

and kept saying that she was exhausted over and over again. She looked like she was very out of it. She was having trouble balancing and her speech just kept getting sloppier. It seemed like she was in some sort of daze, but to me, I immediately thought that it appeared she was having some sort of episode. As soon as I stepped near her, I could tell something was fishy. She continued to talk in circles, not making any sense.

She started insisting on having us call a bunch of numbers for her, saying that her parents were going to be worried if she didn't check in with them. She lives alone. Her phone was in her hand and it was on the video camera screen, but I could see that it wasn't recording. Her other hand was fidgeting with something in her pocket, rolling it over and over again.

It appeared to be a screwdriver. She was reciting numbers for my fiance to dial, but she couldn't come up with a full phone number. Every number that she gave us to call for help had multiple digits missing. When I told her that the phone number she was giving wasn't long enough to dial, she would switch to a different number, but she would stop saying what to dial halfway through. After this happened about seven times, I finally had enough.

She kept saying that her phone wasn't working, so I told her to try and use my phone, but she ended up just standing there and holding it while continuously talking nonsense. I was thoroughly uncomfortable at this point and upset that this woman had entered my apartment without being invited. The children were nervous, so I told my fiancé to take them to the back of the apartment. I then tried to coax the woman out of our apartment by suggesting, let's go back to your place, come with me, we'll see if it's open. I tried to lead her out of my apartment, but she said she was too exhausted and she needed

to sit. Then she proceeded to sit down on my living room couch. That wasn't thrilled, but I kept my cool. My fiancé then returned to the living room and flanked her from the back so that she couldn't get further into the apartment, or anywhere near the children again. After about five more minutes of trying to convince her to leave our apartment and come with me to check hers out, she finally got up and walked slowly out of ours. I went up ahead of her and was on the stairway, telling her to follow me up the stairs.

On the way to her apartment, she attempted to get into two other apartments that were not hers. Each time she reached for another door, I had to tell her it wasn't her apartment. When I got to hers, the door was wide open. She hadn't caught up with me, so I took a glance inside the door. Her couch cushions had been thrown everywhere, and the living room was in shambles. It looked torn up and turned upside down. When she caught up with me, she went for the door across the hall from hers,

but I stopped her and told her that her apartment was wide open. When we finally went inside hers, she apologized and said, I'm sorry, this is how we had to meet, I'm just so exhausted. I told her that it was okay and quickly headed back downstairs to my apartment. I had such an uneasy feeling that I decided to call the cops and let them know that this woman who I had never spoken to before showed up at my door asking for help and acting disoriented. They said that they would send somebody to check on her. An hour later an officer knocked on her door, but there was no answer, so they left.

At 4.15 a.m., my six-year-old son and one-year-old daughter were still sleeping just as they had been all through the night. My fiancé was still sleeping as well, but I got up to use the bathroom. As I was using the bathroom, I heard a light knock at the apartment door. The knock was so faint that I was second guessing if I was even hearing a knock at all. I called out to my fiance and asked if she had heard a knock at the door. But she said that she didn't hear it.

We both then headed towards the living room together just to see if we heard anything. No sooner did we step foot into the living room than we began to hear scratching at our front door. The unmistakable sound of someone clawing at your door, well, it isn't something that I wish for anyone to hear in the middle of the night. It's truly terrifying. I told my fiance to go be with the kids and make sure that they were okay.

I opened the door. I found the woman from earlier standing at the top of the stairs in front of my apartment, just staring down at our door. It was fucking terrifying. I told her that she needed to get away from my apartment and stay away from my family. I also told her I was calling the cops right away. She then scurried away, presumably back to her apartment. I then called the police. They showed up and asked her competency questions per their protocol, which were answered adequately.

So they said that there was nothing that they could do. This was tough to hear, as the woman was clearly in some sort of state and was now harassing me and my family and disturbing our peace. They told her to stay away from us and left. Now I haven't seen her since, but I can't help but continue to think about it. Ever since the first time she entered the apartment, I've had this pit in my stomach and an uneasy feeling that whatever this is, it's not over. The complex sent her a warning saying that this behavior is unacceptable, and I'm not

sure if much more is happening, but it's making me sick. I don't know what to do or how to feel. At university, I was heavily involved in one of the musical theatre societies which would put on one big show and one small one every year. In my first year, I managed to bag the lead role in the larger show. I was a bit nervous because this was my first major role in anything ever, but I was told that it wasn't a big deal and that most people wouldn't pay half as much attention as I thought that they would. I wish this had been the case though.

We had a run of slightly over a week in a fairly large performance space with about 300 seats. Opening night came and went, and everything was going well until the next day. My university had a kind of love letter page on Facebook. A few of the posts on there are genuine confessions, but it's mostly just jokes. On it, someone had posted something along the lines of, to the girl who played the main character last night, you were very cute. I wish your costume was just a bit shorter, though.

A few people who knew me tagged me in the post. I was uncomfortable by the second half of the post, but I pretty much brushed it off as a friend playing a prank on me. of the post, but I pretty much brushed it off as a friend playing a prank on me. We did the second show, and there was a part where I had to point out to someone in the audience. There was a guy sitting in the second row, who I chose to point at that night. That same evening, there was another post on the confession page, but this time the poster used my real name.

The post said, Annie, thanks for pointing me out tonight, you made me blush. It was signed with the name of my character's love interest, so, again, I wasn't sure if this was something that was supposed to be genuinely flattering or not, so I just decided to ignore it. The third day of the show was uneventful, but on our fourth day, I saw the same guy in the audience. It made me uncomfortable that he had come to see the show for a third time, so I ignored him, even though he was near the front of the audience again.

This meant he'd have to be one of the first people to arrive. Our promotional Twitter account started getting mentions and messages from an account run by a person who was the same guy based on the profile pic. He was asking if we did stage door, which is like a brief meet and greet. He was asking since he'd be able to catch the cast after the show. At that point, everybody knew and agreed that he was being creepy, and one of my friends, Jordan, who happened to be playing my love interest, offered to walk me home after the shows.

Things seemed okay for a day or two, until curiosity got the better of me and I decided to check out this guy's Twitter. It was private, however his Tumblr was linked on his profile. And that wasn't private. And I'm so glad that I quickly checked this out because it was creepy as hell. There was a whole bunch of stuff that he had reblogged about unrequited love.

And some of the posts were definitely about me. He posted stuff in his notes like, I'm her biggest fan and she doesn't even know I exist. I don't quite remember everything since it was a while ago, but he seemed to be under some kind of delusion that I was my character, and that he was the love interest. It was really weird, and I was very creeped out. All of this came to a peak during one of our last shows.

We had two entrances on stage and there is a bit where I had to come in from the back of the audience, meaning I had to go around the entire theater from the backstage and leave the building for a bit. I had a second despair, so I was walking around when I happened to catch someone walking behind me. I turned around, and the very same guy was there. He asked me if he could take a picture with me and explained that he was supposed to catch the show, but it was late.

He knew of the bit in the beginning, so instead of going inside, he waited for me to come out. I told him that I had to be on stage soon, and I started to leave, but he called out after me, yelling at me as if I were playing my character. He straight up recited some of the lines that Jordan's character does and told me to wait until after the show when he would rescue me from the fake love interest. This definitely set off alarm bells, so I just went back into the building and told the stage manager what happened. My stage manager must have notified an on-campus security guard during the show because the guy was gone by the time the show ended.

security guard during the show because the guy was gone by the time the show ended. I haven't seen him since, and I've graduated, so I think this might have scared him off. Still, I'm very upset that he ruined what should have been a fun week of shows, and I'm slightly worried about him. I don't know if the delusion was an act or if he genuinely believed it, but if it was the latter, I sure hope that he got some help. So to my self-proclaimed biggest fan, let's not meet. I used to waste so much time rewriting and re-reading before I'd ever press send on an email or save a document. But not anymore.

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Get more done with Grammarly. Download Grammarly for free at grammarly.com slash podcast. That's grammarly.com slash podcast. My best friend and I grew up in a sleepy wannabe New Jersey town in central Florida, where we were the outcasts. We had met in sixth grade after I'd overheard her talking to another classmate about bionicles, which were my true passion at 11 years old. We became fast friends and quickly became inseparable, and thus began the gauntlet of sleepovers, birthday parties, and family gatherings. We were practically siblings. Her home life was tumultuous, though I can't say mine was any better. We often had a habit of taking refuge at each other's houses.

Like I said, we were like siblings. Her father was an alcoholic, strict, and prone to physical discipline. Her sister was a snobby girl who gravitated towards the jocks when we entered high school. And her mother was a pseudo-vegan hippie love child held over from the 80s. When I was 23 and my best friend was 22, we had another long sleepover in order to help her

avoid yet another fight with her mother. She had recently lost her job at Walmart and I was going into my first shift at Taco Bell the next day. On the drive home the next morning, she excitedly told me that since she had her own vehicle, she was going to start applying to work at pizza places that were in need of a driver. I was proud. It was the first time she'd hunted for a job on her own, as I'd usually been the one to coax her into applying wherever I was working. Not that she ever lasted very long. My first training day at Taco Bell went well. Being a training day, it wasn't a very long

shift, but I had been up early in anticipation as this was my first day on a job in a few months. I got home around noon and informed some of my internet friends that my first day went well, and around 5 p.m. I started winding down, drained from a good day. As I was preparing to lie down in bed, I got a message from my best friend. She was lamenting another fight with her mother and asking if she could come over. I was starting to grow a bit wary of the fights they were having. I had begun to repair my relationship with my family and a few friends, and I had given her advice many times on how

to better approach things. In my eagerness to sleep, I left the message on read and drifted off into slumber. Around 8 PM, I was awakened by her bursting into my room in a panic. Having just been urgently ripped away from a dream, I was groggy and disoriented. I dragged myself to the bathroom to relieve my bladder and came back to my room to find her rocking back and forth on my bed. It was at this time I noticed she was covered in blood. So I asked her what happened. She then informed me that she just saw someone murder her mother with a knife and my mind

went blank. But in the deepest parts of my mind, alarm bells started ringing. Why didn't she call the police? As questions started flooding my mind, I calmed myself down and thought, hey, this is your best friend. You've known her for over a decade. We're the only two people in the world we can count on. This is your best friend. You've known her for over a decade. We're the only two people in the world we can count on."

So I suppressed my feelings and went to inform my sister and stepfather. My mother had passed the year prior and it was roughly a month away from the anniversary of her death. So my family and I were all in a dark place and anti-social as always. It was the only way we knew how to handle emotional issues. When I informed my family, they immediately had the same concerns as me, though they were far more

vocal about it, and I returned to my room, phone in hand. I then convinced my best friend to call the police and stayed with her to hear her explain the details over the phone. She said it was a man in a black ski mask. When the cops arrived at my house, she swore up and down that it was most likely her father. So they sent cars over to check out the crime scene and take her in for a statement. I rode with her in the back of the cop car over to the sheriff's office. Around 2 a.m., my best friend's sister was brought into the station, as was her father. I had to go to work in

just a few hours, so I requested to be taken home by a police officer. At work, I was quiet until my manager asked me what was going on. I told him everything, and he offered to send me home, but I decided to stick around for the rest of my training shift. When I got home, my sister informed me my best friend had confessed. Her mother threatened to kick her out for not being able to find a job, and in a rage, she had taken a kitchen knife and stabbed her repeatedly. My mind froze as I sat at my computer and turned to face my monitor. I was on a discord call at the time and all I could weakly say

was, my best friend just confessed sister, and my platonic soulmate. But please, let's never meet again. This happened when I was walking to my sister's college dorm in the dead of night at 2 a.m., after parking my car in a remote lot. I had had a long plane and car journey riddled with bumps in the road, which was why I was arriving at such an ungodly hour. The campus was empty due to a recent ice storm that had frozen everyone in. The crackling of ice and crunch of my feet were the only sounds I heard as I was hiking

my heavy backpack higher on my shoulder. I was carefully shuffling alongside the road, trying to avoid slipping and guiding myself by the glow of spare streetlights. After a few minutes of walking and some misdirection, I located the entrance to the dorm, a little concrete entryway with a porch light piercing through the darkness. As I was texting my sister to come down and let me in, some blue and red flashing police lights caught my eye. There wasn't any siren, just flashing lights.

The cop car slowly pulled by the curb, and an indistinct man in a uniform stepped out. Nobody else was out there except for me, so I was wondering, do I look suspicious? Did I look like a lost girl due to the backpack? I figured it was entirely possible that he was just checking up on me due to that. However, he walked over to stand near me, but didn't say anything, even though he was seemingly waiting for something.

I clutched my phone, feeling slight anxiety since he didn't address anything. Hi, can I help you? I asked abruptly, turning to look him fully in the eye while taking a tentative step back. I'm looking for a girl who's gone missing in the area. What's your name? And what are you doing here? He asked. Oh, my name's Rachel.

My sister lives here, and she's coming down to get me," I said, gripping my phone even tighter. The officer didn't say anything, so I further explained, I'm staying with her for the weekend. He still said nothing. He just kept standing there. I then said, So, someone's missing on campus? That's awful.

I was wondering if my sister would know who it was. I also wondered how somebody could go missing on a campus in such a safe town. What's the girl's name? I asked. It's Rachel, he quickly answered, and you look like her. Wow, what a coincidence, I replied. Well, it is a common name around here. This was only met with more silence.

I then caught the very welcome sight of my sister coming down the stairs. She buzzed me into her building, and the officer started walking into the building right behind me with my sister coming down the stairs. She buzzed me into her building, and the officer started walking into the building right behind me with my sister's buzz. What does he need to be doing here this late at night? Was the girl missing from this building? I thought to myself. Well, good luck, I said to the officer, referring to the missing girl after my sister greeted

me. My sister and I then ran up the stairs and locked my sister's door behind us, both locks. Then I told her that the cop was looking for a missing girl on campus and I asked my sister if she knew any other Rachels. She said no. After settling into the couch, I googled Missing Girl Rachel, along with the name of the town, and I started to shake when I came across an article about a local cold case. The missing girl in the picture bore no true resemblance to me, but had the same awkward

innocence in her expression that I did. But her name wasn't Rachel. The officer had said that her name was Rachel. He also said that I looked like the missing girl. So what the hell was he even talking about? Also, if a young woman had genuinely gone missing, it would have been all over the news. I even checked on this periodically, but no additional information ever made the headlines. Coincidence or not, benign or not, exhausted or not, the entire strange incident scared me.

It made me wary of walking alone so late at night. Crime is all about opportunity, and in my gut, I knew something about this situation was very wrong. What would have happened next if my sister had not shown up so quickly? This episode is brought to you by IQ Bar, our exclusive snack sponsor. IQ Bar is my go-to snack when I need something quick-filling and packed with brain-boosting nutrition. It satisfies my hunger without the sugar crash, and it's easy to just toss in my bag when I'm on the go. With nine delicious flavors like mint chocolate chip, peanut butter chip,

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roll your mind's eye back to the weeks immediately following September 11, 2001. Everything was overtly patriotic, particularly in the South and definitely in North Carolina where I was living at the time. There are a large number of military installations there, including a very large army base about an hour from my hometown. Nearly every car had, at a minimum, an American flag bumper sticker, and a frightening majority of people thought that anyone with a dark-skinned tone was a terrorist.

Everyone was hypervigilant, and many people took this as an excuse to become overly interested in the lives of their neighbors. Sometimes, this was out of concern for the neighbor's safety, but sometimes it was also out of their own concern. I was eight, and since my whole family was certain my elementary school wasn't going to be the target of a massive terrorist attack, my brother and I continued to walk to school each day. This was never a problem. We walked to school every day that didn't have totally awful weather for almost my entire grade school experience. My brother and I used to walk to school on this paved trail in my neighborhood. I can't remember if recent rain had flooded the creek beside the trail, or maybe it was just because of climate change in general.

But in any case, the bugs were out in full force. So that week, my brother had decided to take a different route and walk along the road. This plan went off without a hitch, until we were walking home one day, and a big black SUV with tinted windows slowed down to a crawl before abruptly stopping in front of us. The SUV had a giant American flag blocking the view of the back windshield and back seat. The driver slowly rolled down the window, revealing herself to be a blonde, middle-aged woman who was wearing large sunglasses that obscured her face. It's not safe for you to walk out here, she called out to us.

It's fine, my brother responded. We always walk home. We don't live far. That was a mistake. The woman rolled her window up and drove a few feet away, before screeching her tires to a halt and rapidly reversing back to us. She then rolled her window down again and yelled, "'You just spit on my car.

I saw you, so I know you did. You need to get in right now so that I can drive you home to your parents and have you apologize to me in front of them." I looked at my brother and we both just shook our heads. So then I said, "'No one spit on your car. Just look at the side.'" But she wasn't having it, still yelling. She said, "'Get in my car right now so I can take you home. I turned to my brother again and without a word, we took off running into the woods. My heart was thumping in my chest and I never turned back,

particularly after I heard her door open and close. We just kept running. We switched back and forth through the streets and woods, taking several different paths, and finally ended up circling back to get home. When this happened, we sort of shrugged it off as, yeah, that was weird. But maybe about 15 years later, when I told the story to a friend, their eyes grew wide and said, she was definitely trying to kidnap you. I've been haunted by this ever since that revelation.

I was dating a guy who I worked at a grocery store with. he had a side job with a morgue where he picked up bodies on call. He would pick up the bodies, take them to the morgue, do the paperwork, tag them, and then put them in the freezer. I thought that what he did was admirable because death is a touchy subject, but I figured someone needed to do these things. He made himself out to be a great person who cares about people.

He wanted to be that guy who was able to get the hard stuff done in a caring manner. Unfortunately, he turned out to be a total creep. The morgue also does funeral services and such, so there are these little rooms with chairs and furniture, and also an office. One night, we were supposed to hang out, and he asked me to meet him at the morgue. It was in the middle of the night, so nobody else was there. This didn't strike me as odd, since I figured I was just going there so that we could meet up.

I assumed that we would leave to go get food or sit in his car like usual. But when I got there, he asked me to go inside instead. He showed me around and I saw all the little rooms and the office. It was kind of neat. It was like being in a horror video game or something, to be honest. And then, he told me to wait, and then left me in the office. A few minutes later, he texted me and told me to come into a room that I hadn't been to yet. It was the room where they got the bodies ready for the freezer and did the paperwork.

I went to where he was asking me to go, and there was a dead body just out in the open in the middle of the room on a gurney. I froze in the doorway because I wasn't expecting to see all of that. It was this old woman, and he wanted me to take a look at her. It was upsetting, and I felt like I had every right to be upset, but he thought that it was funny. So I kind of played along and rushed it off. He finished up and then took me into the freezer to show me the other bodies.

There were about six in total. They were all enclosed in body bags. He also showed me the oven where the bodies were eventually cremated. After this visit to the morgue, I just kind of blocked out the memory of it for a couple of months. When I started having other issues with this guy, I ended up telling a friend about the impromptu morgue tour. My friend helped me to realize that this situation was messed up.

The issues between me and this guy kept piling up so I finally blocked him on everything. I really hope that he leaves me alone now. This happened when I was a younger guy in college. I was driving back to campus from somewhere when I ran out of gas. It was getting dark, so I think it was sometime around 6 or 7 PM. When I realized I was out of gas, I manually turned my car off the main street. Then, with my car's remaining momentum, I glided it until I stopped in front of some random house. I then sat there thinking if there was anyone else I knew with a car.

I had the added disadvantage of needing to think of someone who was also staying on campus for winter break, so no dice. So I then resigned to the fact that I needed to walk to wherever the nearest station was, fill up the little gas can from my trunk, and then walk back to my gar. So I went to grab the canister, but before I started walking, I leaned on the front of my car. I did this so that I could look up directions.

Just then, a woman pulled into the driveway. She was also college-aged, wearing some sort of server outfit, as if she worked in fast food. I was still parked right in front of her house when she noticed me. So, a little hesitantly, she came up to me and asked if I needed any help. Honestly, yeah, I said. I ran out of gas and according to my map, it looks like there's a chevron, but it's kind of a far walk away.

She looked at me like she saw a ghost. At first, I chalked it up to the situation. It was starting to get dark, and some random guy was out in front of her house. I feel like she was just trying to gauge if I really needed help or if I was messing with her. But I couldn't help but notice how afraid she suddenly looked. I tried to assure her that I had a gas can

and asked her if she could go get the gas. I don't need to get in the car or go with you or anything and I can pay you for it," I said. She took the can but refused to take any money, and she left. So I waited there for a while until she came back and handed me the canister. She continued to stand there for a second, and I could tell that she was deciding whether or not to say something.

Then she abruptly asked, do you wanna hear something weird? Of course I said yes, and she continued. Today at work, I got a prank call. It was very weird. The guy kept asking, have you ever run out of gas? After she told me that, we both laughed, since we didn't really know what to say. This genuinely gives me chills every time I think about it.

This happened recently. For some context, my friends and I are teens who like to explore and do the things that normal teenagers like to do. We found this tunnel that acted as a drain under a busy road. We had to crouch and sit on our skateboards to explore it since the height of the tunnel was quite short. As we were going deeper into the tunnel, it was pitch black, and the flashlights from our phones were only able to reach about five feet in front of us, so we were blind to what we were coming across until we were very close to it.

In the tunnel, I remember that the wall was painted red and there were these thin panels of metal with white handprints that were hanging by clothespins. This was odd to see, but we decided to keep going until we reached what we thought was a dead end. However, it was not. On the left side, there was an opening to another tunnel that was more square in shape compared to the rectangle-shaped tunnel that we had been going down. In the distance of the connected tunnel, there was a bright light coming from the outside. The light was shining from above, illuminating a red shopping cart that looked like it contained some random belongings.

We slowly inched towards the light where the shopping cart was. The light turned out to be a big hole in the ground that we could crawl out of if we needed to escape. As we were about to pass the shopping cart, my friend who was in the lead was too afraid to continue. It was still pitch-black all around us, so I decided to take the lead and keep going. I then stepped past the shopping cart and stopped. I don't know what it was, but I was now afraid.

I had a gut feeling that something was back there. So I slowly stepped back closer to my friends and I swear I saw something moving in the depths of that deep, dark tunnel. Before I could even put everything together, a loud echo of someone pounding an object on the wall of the tunnel rang out, causing everyone to scramble for the escape hole. Once we got out, this man ran up to us on the street and asked us what we were doing there. We told him we were just exploring

and explained that there was a violent man who was underground in that tunnel. He told us he likely would have armed us or killed us if we went any further. Even though that was scary and dangerous, I'm glad that my friends and I experienced that together. Luckily, nobody got hurt. I have had the misfortune of coming across a few scary guys in my life. My friends will say that I'm a weirdo magnet, so I'm pretty wary.

I'm clued up now that I'm a bit older, but when I was a teenager and in my early 20s, I was a teenager and in my early 20s, I was very naive. When I was 20, my family, meaning my mom and little sister and I, moved from a small rural village in the Shires to a town down south. It was a huge change, and as I had been having a difficult time, I warmly welcomed the change of scenery. It was a beautiful town and an affluent part of the country, but I struggled to find a job, which was frustrating

as my mom needed a bit of help with money. During our first three months of living there, we became fairly friendly with a middle-aged man who owned a takeaway shop in town. We'll call him Phil. If Phil ever saw us out and about, he would come and chat with us and ask how the family was doing.

He genuinely seemed like a decent, caring person. So, when he said that he might have a job for me at his takeaway shop, I thought that maybe things were looking up, especially since he also said there was a flat upstairs above the shop that I could rent for next to nothing. Phil asked us for our address and told me and my mom that he would pop by in the early evening when he had just finished work so that he could take me to go see the flat. So when I got home, I got myself looking fairly casual but presentable.

I was feeling excited and confident, thinking, wow, a job and a flat. I've killed two birds with one stone here. I just need to show him that I'm sophisticated and would make a great employee. Around 8 PM, he knocked on the front door and my mom answered. He told her that we'd probably only be about half an hour, and he'd have me back home safe and sound in no time. Now, I didn't take my phone with me, as I had no credit on it to call out, but I also didn't think that I would be needing it for a quick trip up the road and back.

In hindsight, this was a pretty stupid thing to do. Maybe if I at least had my phone on me, it would have deterred him from what he was about to do. It was already dark out when we departed since it was March. After I got into his car, we started driving, and he was just chatting away. He was asking how I was doing and telling me what the flat was like. Within a matter of minutes,

I noticed that we weren't taking the conventional route that took us into town. At first, I thought that maybe he was taking some sort of shortcut. I kind of brushed it off. After all, I just figured he knew the area well and I did not. Not even a minute after I realized that we were going in an entire different direction, I started to notice that we were driving away from the populated area and into an area where trees and swamps flanked both sides of the road. My brain was now working overtime, thinking, where is Phil taking me? So I maintained my composure and outright asked, where are we going?

The town's back the other way. I just thought that I would take you on a little tour, Phil said with his normal cheery tone. It's beautiful here. There are so many forests and peaceful places that I would love to show you. I was trying to keep calm and I thought, okay, he seems fairly normal. I guess this makes sense. Why wouldn't he want to show me around?

This is a stunning area full of natural beauty. He's probably just proud and wants to show me where he lives. But the logical side of my brain disagreed, and a wave of panic came washing over me. This voice in my head shouted, In the dark? Hell no. So I just sat there in silence as the two sides of my brain argued with one another. I calmly took in the scenery which was becoming more sinister by the second. I didn't know what to think. All I knew was that every cell in my body was screaming at me to find a way out of this

situation. I started looking for signposts, houses, distinct landmarks, ditches, huge trees—anything that I thought I would be able to use to find my way back if I had to bolt from this car. Phil could sense that I was nervous. So, he just kept talking away. He was talking about what the job would be like and how his staff was friendly. And before I knew it, he had slowed down to a crawl and turned down a muddy road with a dense tree line on one side

and pitch-black open fields on the other. My stomach dropped, and my body contemplated power vomiting all over his car, as the reality of what could potentially happen hit me like a freight train. I thought to myself, if I jump out here, I have to be able to run over muddy fields into literally nowhere. And my imagination started flashing images of him grabbing me before I had the chance

to even get out of the door. So I just sat there, buckled into the passenger seat, not saying a word. When we reached the end of the muddy road, there was a tiny parking area surrounded by woodland with one car parked there. As we pulled up near the other car, it was clear that there were people having sex in it. So I realized he had brought me to a local dogging spot. He then turned to me.

He put his hand on my knee and said, we should do what they're doing. He had a deadly serious expression on his face. But I just gave him this bizarre, nervous laugh paired with a half garbled, high pitched whine. I was trying to show that I was not into it and I wanted him to know I was uncomfortable. I looked over at him and he had an alarmed expression

on his face from my gurgled cackle, which made me sound like I swallowed a potato. It thoroughly freaked him out. So I started mentally congratulating myself for having such a gross reaction. But he persisted. It'll be fun. No one will see us.

No, I don't want to. Plus, I'm seeing someone right now. I lied. He just sat there smiling like the Cheshire cat, waiting for me to miraculously change my mind. After an insanely uncomfortable 30 seconds of this, I said, smiling like the Cheshire cat, waiting for me to miraculously change my mind. After an insanely uncomfortable 30 seconds of this, I said, my mom should be expecting me home now. He replied, I'm sure that she won't mind you being out here a bit longer since

you're with me, you can trust me, you know? I sharply pulled my leg away from his grip and told him again, My mom is waiting for me. She'll start panicking if I'm not home in the next few minutes. Take me home. I looked at him straight in the face so that he would know I wasn't messing around. Okay, that's fine. I'll take you back now. He sighed. Without another word, he reversed out of the parking spot and drove me out of that creepy, seedy place and back home.

I had my finger hovering over the seatbelt button the entire way so that I would be ready to jump out if necessary. As we pulled up outside my home, I breathed a sigh of relief as I could see safety was literally just a few feet away. Before he could stop me from getting out of the car, I got out of there and slammed the door behind me. As I stepped over the tiny little rope fence that surrounds our garden, I heard him get out of the car and my heart sink.

I think I'll pop in and see your mom real quick, he said with this smirk on his face. I think I'll pop in and see your mom real quick," he said with this smirk on his face. I knew he was only doing this because he was freaking out, knowing damn well I was just about to tell her exactly what happened. He was trying to scare me into keeping my mouth shut, or at least delay the inevitable. Before I could react or say anything, my mom opened the door since she heard us pull up. I barged past her and went straight to the kitchen, grabbing a small knife out of the drawer. I then flew into my little sister's room like a madman. Don't you dare fucking leave this room, no matter what you hear, I whispered to her.

She caught a glimpse of the knife as I was stuffing it up my sleeve, and with a panic in her eyes, she whispered, okay. I then walked back into the living room, where he was on the sofa, sprawled out, comfortable, as if it were his own home. I saw red, I swear to God, I felt like the Hulk. So I knew I was ready for this bastard. I then awkwardly perched myself on the arm of the other sofa that my mom was sitting on since it was the furthest away from him that I could manage at that moment.

As he sat there, making small talk with my mom, I kept feeling his beady little wheezy eyes on me and my every move. Why don't you come and sit over here next to me? He asked as he padded the sit over here next to me? He asked as he padded the empty sofa cushion next to him. No, I'm all right here, thanks. I replied as I fidgeted with my sleeve, trying to stop the little knife from falling out.

Just come here, honestly, I won't bite. He laughed as he padded the cushion again. No, I'm comfortable here, thank you very much, I responded through gritted teeth. My mom kept looking back and forth at us, like it was a tennis match, but I could see something registering with her. She could tell that my behavior was off. I was only halfway sitting on the sofa arm so that I was half standing, half sitting, and fiddling with my sleeve.

I felt twitchy as hell as I stared at my mom in the face intensely, mentally trying to speak to her through telepathy. I must've looked crazy. After what felt like hours, my mom told Phil, "'It's getting late now. I think you should go.'" Phil agreed as he got up from the couch

and mumbled something about having to check on something in his shop. When he walked by me, he paused, turned to me, Daisy got up from the couch and mumbled something about having to check on something in his shop. When he walked by me, he paused, turned to me, and extended his hand to shake mine. I kindly offered him my hand, which still had the knife. Taking it with a bit more force than is polite, he soon yanked his grubby mitt back when the tip of the blade jabbed him. He looked it down, saw the blade, and then he looked at me.

I looked at him with such disgust. Phil then high-tailed it out of our home without another word. I then told my mom everything and she was fuming. We discussed going to the police, but there really wasn't any crime committed on his part aside from being a major creep. Sadly, when I mentioned this to a couple of girls who were my age who lived just down our street, they clammed up and shot each other a strange look. They didn't even have to say anything for me to realize that he had probably done this

exact thing before. My family moved away from that area soon after, so I'm happy to report that I never had to see his smug face again. So Phil, let's not meet. I want to thank my guest, Scarolineine for coming on the show this week. Scarra-Line is a live streamer from the underworld. She hosts a scary show on Twitch in the vein of Pee-wee's Playhouse, mixed with Elvira. Surrounded by cursed dolls, thrifted ancient objects, and her pug goblin named Doom, she loves watching, playing, and

discussing horror all day long. Check out the ScareHouse at twitch.tv slash Scareline and tell her your favorite scary movie. She just may allow unseen forces to place you in a faction of the underworld. I hear that she also loves chilis, so we all have that in common, don't we? I've been watching Scaraline's show for some time on Twitch, and I just decided to reach out to her because she had a fantastic voice, and I knew that she would be perfect for podcasting. So let her know that we sent you, check out her show, and try and get her to start podcasting.

I'm telling you, she's got the voice for it. Speaking of Twitch, if you're listening to this on the release day, Monday, February 3rd, I'll be back to my usual Twitch schedule of 7pm Pacific every Monday evening. Tonight we'll be playing a full motion video game titled Erika. It's been on my list for a while. So I'll see you all there. You can check it out at twitch.tv slash cryptic county. Anyways, stick around after the music if you're a patron for your extended version of this week's episode. If you want to get access, just go to patreon.com forward slash let's not meet podcast to sign up and support the show today.

You'll get access to ad free versions of all of our episodes at a higher bit rate with bonus content every single week with stories you won't hear anywhere else. Again, that's patreon.com forward slash let's not meet podcast. Thanks for listening. This week you have heard neighbors scratching on my apartment door in the middle of the night by anonymous. My biggest fan by winter now. I never want to meet my best friend again by shadows over Mexico.

Her name was Rachel by plenty leader 695. You need to get in my car right now by And Laugh Last. My ex-boyfriend tricked me into seeing a body by Strawberry Bebe. The Creepiest Coincidence by Piano Slut. The Man in the Tunnel by Lucid Creates and Finally. He Drove Me to a Forest by Mystery Chic88. All of the stories you've heard this week were narrated and produced with the permission of their respective authors. Let's Not Meet, a true horror podcast. It's not associated

with Reddit or any of the message boards online. Make sure you send your stories into letsnotmeetstories at gmail.com to hear them on the show. And finally, make sure to check out the new episodes of my other podcasts like Odd Trails, Cryptic Encounters, and the old time radio guest at CrypticCountyPodcasts.com. I'll see you all next years ago when I was 25.