Let's Not Meet: A True Horror Podcast - 15x18: The Things You See in the Woods

Episode Date: November 3, 2025

Thanks to Soren Narnia (Knifepoint Horror),  Amanda Goodness/Cassidy Liston (Drinking The Kool Aid), Scaroline (Twitch), Kaydra Brannan (Perplexity), Kaelyn Moore (Heart Starts Pounding), and Jennifer Hollywood for appearing on the live stream! Check out their shows wherever you get your podcasts!    Upcoming Live Shows: 11/17 - Phoenix, AZ @ Rebel Lounge - TICKETS 11/19 - St. Paul, MN @ Turf Club - TICKETS 11/20 - Chicago, IL @ Beat Kitchen - TICKETS Stories in this episode: He Said He Was Their New Dog Walker | jeezduzit (1:38) The Things You See in the Woods | Session (7:04) I'm Not Alone at Home | Adept-Ad-1669 (13:56) I Met a Man Who Would Become a Murderer | ForionK (17:20) Guy Ran at My Car While on the Highway | hahaitsmaya (25:47) Salesman Tried to Break in Our House | paranormalcollector (32:16) He Was Only Wearing a Hat | Karasame840 (35:37) Late Night Tow | whiskey-1 (38:52) Extended Patreon Content: Creepiest Encounter From My First Job | PokéKing  10-Year-Olds Solve a Murder Case | Edith He Watched Me Through the Wall | Lola The Crawlspace Under My Room | Kittycourt Out of Sight | Aysha Due to periodic changes in ad placement, time stamps are estimates and are not always accurate. Want Bonus Weekly Stories? Hate Ads? Join our Patreon for only $5 a month for over 100 hours of bonus content, and it's all ad-free! Send your stories to [e-mail].    Join the Discord:https://discord.gg/84WXQud4gE Follow: - Twitch - https://twitch.tv/crypticcounty - Website - https://letsnotmeetpodcast.com/ - Patreon - https://patreon.com/letsnotmeetpodcast - Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/letsnotmeetcast/ 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.       

Get your tickets for the Let's Not Meet Live shows, November 17th, Phoenix, Arizona, November 19th, St. Paul, Minnesota, and November 20th in Chicago, Illinois. Visit let's not meetpodcast.com slash tour, or just click the links in the show notes. This podcast contains adult language and content. Listener discretion is advised. If you have a story to share, send it to let's not meet stories at gmail.com. Welcome to our annual live stream episode of Let's Not Meet. This is the series where we invite some of let's not meet. This is the series where we invite some of our favorite podcasters and friends of the show to shoot a video of themselves telling a story for the podcast. We feature all of those on

our live stream. If you missed it, don't worry. We've got all of the audio from those stories collected here in this episode for you. If you would like to catch the video version, you can always go over to twitch.tv.com. If you want to check out the full, I don't know, two, three hour stream. It was a long one and we had a lot of fun. In any case, we'll go over all of the guests at the end of the episode. I don't want to keep you any longer than I have to, so let's just get right into it. I'm a dog walker for a small but busy company. I have one client in a somewhat upscale neighborhood whom I go to twice a week in the mornings. Like most people who use dog walkers, they use a lockbox. They decided to keep theirs behind a vase next to

their apartment door. It was already a busy Monday for me, and I was in a bit of a rush. I was hoping to get their Bernadoodle puppy Mia by 9.45 a.m. so I could stay on track for the day. After finding parking, which is usually hell in their neighborhood, I made my way up to their apartment door. I wrapped my hand around the vase, intending to grab the lockbox as usual, but there was nothing there. I wasn't alarmed at first, since sometimes owners forget to put their lockboxes out. It's not super common, but it happens. I looked around a bit more, but I still had no luck. So I texted the owner, whom I'll call Kay for privacy reasons. Usually when I had to text K, I wouldn't get a response since she's so busy, but I texted her anyway, asking her where the

lockbox could be, since it wasn't in its usual spot. About five minutes passed without a response, and honestly, I was getting a bit irritated. I already had a busy day driving all around the city, and this was officially going to make me run behind. So I started knocking since there was a chance her husband could be home. I knocked three separate times before hearing some shuffling upstairs, which confirmed someone was inside. It took a bit, but I heard someone making their way down the stairs. When the door opened, it wasn't Kay, nor her husband. It was just this random man standing in front of me. He was only wearing a white towel that was barely hanging off his hips. He was holding

Mia in his arms and he looked extremely caught off guard. I was confused and caught off guard as well, but I remained calm and figured maybe Kay and her husband were having a visitor stay with them. I even thought one of them might be having an affair, which would explain why the lockbox was absent. Hey, I'm here to take Mia for her walk. I said. The man in the towel then let her run into the hallway, and he handed her leash and collar over to me, which were always hanging on the staircase railing. I also politely asked him to give me the lockbox to keep outside since I needed to get back inside, and he gave it to me. As Mia and I headed out for our walk, I was a bit flabbergasted, since I wasn't sure

what I had walked in on. Who was that guy? Then, during our walk, I got a message from my manager. She asked, do you have Mia? And then she called me. I picked up her call and let her know that I had Mia and we were on our walk. She said she got a weird message from Kay, her owner. She had stated that a man came by earlier saying he was the new dog walker and needed their lockbox code. And I guess her husband gave him the code. Here's the thing. We never set up a new Walker, ever. Remember, I was working for a company, so we were always organized with assigning walks and keeping things consistent. I then let her know about the man in the towel when I got to the apartment and how the lockbox was gone. I told her I wasn't sure if I had walked in on something

or if he was a guest. Well, turns out he wasn't a secret lover or a guest. He wasn't even supposed to be there. The police were called immediately and I was told to absolutely not go back to that home. I called Kay's husband as he was on his way back over, and Kay was in route as well, coming from work. Kay's husband told me he felt so naive for believing that man and giving him the code to their lockbox so easily. He explained he was in a rush, so he didn't assume anything bad was going on. Meanwhile, I continued walking down the street, quite a busy major street, and then I spotted a familiar man across the street. He ran across the street. He ran across towards me, holding a beer in his hand.

Hi, doggy, hi doggy, he tearfully called out. It was the same man from inside the apartment. I immediately turned in the other direction, went down on the side streets, and called Kay's husband. He was nearing the neighborhood and told me he had just seen a man who matched the description of the man I had unexpectedly seen. Once Kay and her husband arrived home, we went upstairs to scope out the apartment,

expecting some items to be missing. But everything was perfectly in place, untouched. The only thing that had been different from how they left it was some dirty water in the shower since it had been used. I was happy no one was hurt, nor was Mia. But how long was this guy scoping them out and the place and possibly me to know they had a dog walker? First of all, let me start by saying that this story is from almost 30 years ago when I was a kid.

I've told very few people of the story since I felt like no one would really believe me. it was the 90s I was hanging out over the weekend with a close friend of mine staying in his house with his family we lived in rural Virginia we spent a lot of time

riding four wheelers and exploring the nearby woods they were across a soybean field when I was visiting my friend that weekend it snowed like an average amount for Virginia four or five six inches

we were beyond excited to take the four-wheelers out in the field in the freshly fallen snow and tear it up a little bit. And once we were bored with doing that, we parked at the edge of the woods and we walked into them away. Now, my friend and I had been

in these woods quite a bit, and we'd seen a lot of things. We came across a lot of old equipment and even some very old rusted-out cars. There were all kinds of things spread throughout this specific area of the forest. Being teenagers, we thought this was very cool. And we often went and check these things out.

And that day, we decided we were going to start to building a fort of sorts back near the debris. Now, I often carried a small hatchet with me when we were riding trails in case a small tree had fallen across one. I walked back to the four-wheeler. And I got it so I could start chopping down this small tree to use as the base of a wall. For the life of me, I couldn't find another tree of the right size after that one was placed. So I started walking around to find something that would work without my friend.

I stumbled across a rotting deer carcass. This didn't bother me growing up in rural Virginia. several of my friends and family members who were hunters. And I'd eaten my fair share of venison. But I noticed that the deer had what appeared to be claw marks on it. I remember thinking, you know, was this prey for another animal that didn't stick around for its meal? You know, what animal would be out here able to catch a deer? Anyway, I went to get my friend to show him the carcass.

He was as puzzled as I was, but we just kind of let it be. And after that, I returned to building our fort. As I was using some rope to tie two smaller trees together, something caught my eye about 50 yards away. It was the silhouette of a person. I yelled, hey! And the silhouette darted behind a tree. Since I was then acutely aware that we were not alone,

I yelled for my friend, and he came walking over and let him know. I'd just seen, and he laughed it off. As he was laughing, I stood up from my sort of squatting position. And I saw the silhouette again. And this time it was over his shoulder, no more than 10 yards away. I screamed, oh shit.

And I immediately took off running for the field. And, you know, I yelled at my friend to follow. I heard him following me as his footsteps grew closer. Then I heard his footsteps start to sound like they were further away. and I turned to look and I saw that he'd split off onto a different path entirely at this point I really

didn't care and I just kept it running and I reached this large ditch it was roughly I'd say five feet or so deep I just jumped across it in a panic I later discovered

how far of a jump that really was and I have no idea how I cleared it. When I reached the field outside the woods, I saw my friend standing about 30 yards down the line. He was hunched over, breathing

heavy. I checked behind me. I didn't see anything, so I started to walk towards him. I said, did you see that? He said, why the hell do you think I'm out of breath? So we jumped on the four-wheelers and we headed back to his house.

not seeing a word. When we got back, I asked him what he saw, and he described the silhouette exactly as I had seen it. We tried to talk to his parents, but they both just laughed it off and said, you know,

I guess you better stay out of those woods. My friend then thought to talk to his grandmother about this since she lived a couple of blocks away, and she lived there, her whole life. She told us about this old sawmill that had exploded back in her time. This explained

a lot of the old equipment and the old cars rusting out. We then told her about the silhouette we saw at which she smiled and told us it's easy to forget that we're not alone even out here in

rural Virginia. Neither one of us has ever returned to those woods. My hand axe is still back out there somewhere, I assume. I had terrible dreams about that day for years, and even now, 30 years later, I'm still occasionally having one. I have no idea who we ran into that day, but I am certainly never. ever, ever, going back to check. This happened last summer when I was just a teenager. Classes were ending soon and I was going on vacation soon as well, so I had a lot going on.

My brother was also undergoing surgery at the time, which is a detail that will become important later. So it all started after a long day of classes on a Monday. I'm always done with school earlier than my parents and my brother get home. So I'm home alone until their days are done. I'm generally happy about this alone time since it means video games galore. So on this particular day, I went to grab the house keys out of the garden. garden shed as usual. But the shed was open. It's not normal for it to be open, but I didn't think much of it and simply figured someone must have forgotten to close the door. So I just took the keys

and I walked towards the house. So I then went up to the door and opened it, but I couldn't turn the key because it was already unlocked. I would like to point out that we always close and lock our door. are very rare. I proceeded into the house and went upstairs to settle in, but I was uncomfortable because I was hyper-focused on every little noise happening in the house, and it was making me anxious. The following day went by quickly. It was a normal day except for the fact that I didn't sleep at home since my brother was having surgery. I slept at a friend's house that night, but as I left home that day, I was responsible for closing the day. I was responsible for closing the doors and I made sure that I closed everything up properly. The day after that, I went to a football

game and came back at night before my parents had come home from my brother's operation. As I walked up to my house, I had a bad feeling. I was feeling anxious, but I didn't understand why I felt like this. My body was telling me not to go in there. I then noticed the door was slightly open. So I froze. Then my parents finally arrived, so I went inside, but I still had this oppressive feeling. I went into the kitchen to make myself some food, and I noticed the big kitchen knife was missing. I asked my mother if she knew where it was, but she had no idea that it had gone. She searched for it for several days after that, but she never found it.

I felt anxious about this from then on, but my parents didn't panic about this until their neighbor told them that they saw a stranger wandering around in the garden. Shortly after hearing of this sighting, I found the big kitchen knife that had been missing on the workbench outside. No one in my family put it there, so I can't help but think it was the garden creeper. I'm not sure what's going on, and it remains a mystery. to this day. Before I begin, perhaps a bit of background information would help you understand my story. I'm currently living in the Netherlands, and I've been a geek my whole life.

Games in particular have always played a major role in my life. starting when I got my first PlayStation when I was five years old. Something about gaming just always got me, and whether it was mechanically or in terms of storytelling, I could always find something to love about it. As I grew older, I got more and more into RPGs, and eventually found my way into World of Warcraft. As I got more involved in that game,

I started joining raiding guilds. For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, Rating guilds are basically a group of players who intend to face the game's hardest content as a team. The second guild I joined was the greatest bloody team of people I had met thus far. One of these people was a Swedish girl who was around my age called Maggie. She and I got along quite nicely, and as it turned out, her mom, who was also in our guild, was actually living in the Netherlands.

So we often ended up in conversations where she asked me to teach her some Dutch, and she'd teach me some Swedish in return. It was all in good fun. Now, fast forward to the beginning of 2013. The aforementioned Guild had fallen apart a while back, and I had joined a new one. I had stayed in touch with some people in the old Guild, but Maggie really hadn't been online that much.

When she did get back online, we quickly caught up. Turns out, she moved in with her mother and had spent the last couple of months improving her Dutch while attending high school. She had also started dating a Dutch guy called William, who was part of the same guild we had met in. He always struck me as a nice guy. Other guild members thought he was a bit direct and perhaps rude,

but since I was also Dutch, I understood. I knew William was the way he was since that was simply how our culture works. And I was always okay with it. When June came around, Maggie and I had recently finished our final exams and we were waiting for our results. One afternoon while we were playing online, I suggested a meetup between the two of us. I really didn't have much to do,

and given that she had voiced her concerns about, finding her footing in Dutch social circles, I figured this would be a nice opportunity to offer to her, to take her to her first social outing in the country. She excitedly agreed and asked if she could bring William as well. I said yes, seeing as he was her boyfriend, and I figured the meetup would feel safer for her if she and William arrived as a couple.

I was looking forward to meeting William as well. A couple of days later, I met both of them in Rotterdam and we had a great day. I showed them around the city since I knew it best. We had some nice conversations, a few laughs, and we ended the day by taking a trip to the Euromost. Before leaving, Maggie had to go to the bathroom, so William and I were waiting outside for her.

I wanted to strike up some conversation with him, so I said, You two make a nice couple. Thanks, he replied. I friggin love her, you know. Honestly, I wouldn't know what I would do without her at this stage. Back then, I didn't think much of that statement. It's just a thing people say when they're in love, so kudos to him. Maggie then came back from the restroom, so he said our goodbyes and parted ways.

A few weeks later, we got our. exam scores back. I had passed high school with flying colors, but Maggie wasn't so lucky. She had failed most of her exams. She told me she was going to be studying for the rest of the summer to properly prepare to have to rerun the last year of high school. I told her that if she needed any help, I was willing to see what I could do, even though I was heading to college. She was very thankful and assured me that she let me know if she needed any help. Fast forward again to September. After our last conversation,

Maggie had practically disappeared from the internet. She hadn't logged into World of Warcraft. She was never on Skype and wasn't even online on Facebook anymore. I asked William in mid-August how she was doing and he assured me she was fine. So I thought nothing of it. I even admired her for her dedication

to focusing on her education. However, During my second week in college, all of that changed. As I was heading to school, I got onto the metro and picked up a free newspaper that happened to be in the seat next to me, and I decided to read it to pass the time. I vividly remember turning to the fourth page and spotting a headline that read, Swedish woman 19, stabbed in own backyard. Even though the article didn't mention a name, I grew very concerned as I realized Maggie was Swedish

and 19. I quickly sent her a text message since we had exchanged phone numbers when we met up and I asked her if she was okay. The rest of the day went by and I heard nothing from Maggie. I eventually figured that if anything had happened to her,

people would have most likely started posting things on her Facebook page. Concerned and scared of what I was going to find, I started typing her name into the search bar on Facebook. Sure enough, it was already filling up with messages from people who had heard she had passed away from her injuries. After inquiring with some other former guild members, it turned out that William was the one who had stabbed her.

She had broken up with them after she got her horrendous exam results back. and he wasn't pleased with that. In the aftermath of the incident, some of the other Dutch guild members and I went to her city to meet up with her friends from school. We attended the memorial that her school had set up and put some flowers at the scene of the crime on behalf of everyone she had played World Warcraft with.

When we met up with Maggie's school friends, we found out William hadn't been half as much, nice as we thought he was. During their relationship, he had been very controlling of Maggie, and after the breakup, he began stalking her and sending her threatening messages. She even went to the police to report it, but they told her they couldn't do anything for her at that stage. After that, she met a different guy, started dating him, but then William found out, and, well, he took matters into his own hands. As I'm thinking back about this, this is the worst part for me.

When we put flowers at the scene of the crime, we stood around for a few minutes, contemplating whether or not we should knock on the door and personally give our condolences to her mother. Even though we kind of knew Maggie's mother as well, we decided against it since we didn't want to unintentionally remind her mother that Maggie's online connections were what ultimately caused. her life.

As soon as we got back to our car, we saw Maggie's front door open. Out of the door came her mother with Maggie's younger sister. I knew that Maggie had a younger sister, but I didn't know that she was only six or seven. I fucking lost it.

When I saw her little head hanging down while grabbing hold of her mother, scared to go around the corner to face all the drawings and flowers people had left there. In writing this post, I found the very recent article that said William is most likely going to prison for 20 years. But honestly, that isn't long enough.

William, I fucking hope you never make it out of there. I'm a 25-year-old female living in a small but heavily populated downtown area and a town in Florida. I don't really enjoy the whole downtown scene due to the fact that I've had many friends get roofied or just meet straight up creeps. So I don't really go out there to meet new people. Plus, I have a really cute dog whom I'd much rather spend my time with. One night, around 7 p.m., I was very bored, so I decided to download Tinder. I'd been on and off the app for years and only saw it as a game to play when I was bored. I wound up matching with someone I went to high school with and decided to go.

meet them for some tea and to catch up around 9 p.m. that same night. After we met up, we wrapped up at around midnight. I decided it would be much easier to just take a toll road back to my apartment. As I was driving, I gave my dad a call since it was late for me and I was getting tired while driving. He lives in a time zone that's three hours behind where I live. About 15 minutes later, I finally saw the exit I needed to take home. So I told my dad I would talk to him later since I was just about home. Then I merged onto the exit ramp plane, preparing for the slight right curve in the road that led to the streetlight at the end of our ramp. Just then, I saw someone running towards my car and waving their arms around. Mind you, I was going about 30 to 35 miles per hour

on this exit ramp. That may not seem like a very high speed, but when someone is running towards your car on foot at 1230 in the morning, it feels like your car is doing 90. I turned on my high beams in case the man running couldn't see me, and I tried to move a lane over so I wouldn't hit him. I suddenly got worried and thought maybe it was some drunk kid who crashed his car, so I thought I needed to help or something. So I naively pulled over to the emergency lane. Then I locked all my doors and made sure all my windows were rolled up before he approached my car, just in case I had fallen into some sort of trap. This guy appeared to be around 21 years old, and he didn't seem like the aggressive type. I've worked in a behavioral hospital, and I've been around very aggressive individuals before.

I've been threatened numerous times, but I didn't feel any threat of aggression coming from him. He was wearing one of those 21-plus wristbands from the bars downtown, so I knew he must have been drunk, but I also noticed his eyes. They were huge. It's probably kind of cliche to say this, but he looked like a deer caught in headlights since his eyes were so huge. He was also sweating profusely. To be fair, we were in Florida, but it was midnight and it was October. So it was sort of cool out for once. He looked incredibly panicked and tried to open my passenger side door, which I had already locked. Hallelujah. I asked if he was okay and if he was hurt, but he said he couldn't hear me through the window. And he asked, if I could just let him into the car so he could explain. I rolled down the passenger side window an inch and said, Nah. He kept repeating that he didn't want to scare me and he was begging for me to not call the police.

Then he explained that he was downtown about six blocks away from where we were and his friends had left him. He said he didn't have a way to get home and his phone was dead. I started feeling kind of bad for the guy, so I asked if I could call someone for him, but the person he told me to call didn't pick up. And then, something switched in him. He got increasingly more confused and kept trying to get into my car.

I know you live over by me, Maria, he said. You know me, Maria. You know me through Anthony. Maria, please just take me home. My name is not Maria, and I don't know anyone named Anthony, but he sounded so convincing that it made me take a hard look. at him. I was genuinely thinking, damn, maybe I do know this guy, but I ultimately didn't, and I tried telling him I wasn't who he thought I was. But then he just started crying and banging on my car.

He was becoming increasingly agitated, so I started getting a bad feeling and asked him to step away from my car since I was going to leave. He backed away, so I proceeded down the exit ramp. Somehow, it didn't end there. I got to the stoplight at the end of the exit ramp, which, to my dismay, was red. I had a second to think about what just happened and decided it would be in the best interest of the guy to call the cop since he was on a highway off ramp where he could easily get hurt. He was literally running towards cars on the exit ramp off a busy toll road at midnight, wearing dark colored clothing. The light turned green as I was on the phone with the 911 operator, and I saw the guy running towards my car in the rearview mirror. My heart fell into my ass as I explained

a situation to the operator and informed her that he was re-approaching my car and I was just trying to go home. She told me to go the opposite way from my apartment so he wouldn't know where I live and to continue driving. I listened to her and I gave her a description of him while I proceeded down an empty road with him still full on chasing my car. At one point, I had to stop because there was a car in front of me at a stop sign. Because of this, he was able to catch up with my car and he proceeded to bang on my back windshield. He started screaming at me to stop and let him into my car. Thankfully, I was able to quickly pull onto a different street and lose him.

The operator heard everything that was going on and asked for my information. She assured me that the cops were on their way to his last known location. And she said, as long as he wasn't following me, I was okay to go home. I never found out what happened or who that guy was. I think he was drunk, but he also had to have taken something else, which caused him to act so aggressively. I have never seen a person who was just drunk or that confused, but also able to fully sprint towards a car. Regardless, let's never meet again. This encounter happened when I was about 10 years old.

It was summertime, so my sister and I were at home alone. Both our mom and grandmother were busy, so neither one of them was able to stay home with us. We were used to being home alone during the summer, so it really wasn't a big deal. We were always able to do what we would typically do at home. But the things that we weren't allowed to do were go outside or open the door, if anyone. knocked. On this particular day, I remember getting up and immediately playing The Sims 2 in our kitchen while my sister was watching TV in the den. A few hours into my gaming, I thought I heard the doorbell ring. At first, I brushed it off and I thought it was my game. But I had turned

all the sound off so I realized this had to be our doorbell. I asked my sister if she had heard the doorbell, but she replied and said that she hadn't. She said it was probably just the show she was watching, and with that, I went back to my game. About 10 minutes later, I saw a man in a suit in the reflection of my computer monitor. He had his hands cupped around his eyes, and he was peering through the glass doors behind me. I slowly turned around and found myself essentially face to face with this strange man whom I had never seen before. I had no idea how long he'd been watching me, but he waved at me like he knew me from somewhere. I called out to my sister, who had yet to even notice the man.

But when she saw him, she grabbed the house phone and quickly called our grandmother. We had seen salespeople in our neighborhood before, but none of them looked like this guy. This guy was wearing an ill-fitting black suit. If that wasn't strange enough, he was wearing this ensemble in the 99-degree heat. He was also carrying a briefcase,

which I thought was a bit strange since salespeople I had seen only ever seemed to have a clipboard or maybe a couple of flyers. This guy then proceeded, to walk around our house to come to the back door. As I was getting up to hide, he reached down and grabbed the doorknob. He started jiggling it forcefully.

Thank God the door was locked. He just smiled at me and then gestured for me to unlock the door. All the noise he had been making then set off our 75-pound lab mix. She was going all that shit crazy. There was no way she was going to let this guy get to us, even if he did manage to somehow get through that door. My sister then told me our grandmother was on the way, and she wanted us to hide in the back of the house in her room until she could get there. Then, my sister handed me the phone, went into the kitchen, and grabbed the biggest knife we had.

I heard her yelling at the guy, saying that we called the cops and they were on the way. When she joined me in our grandmother's bedroom, she told me she lied about calling the cops, but the guy just laughed at her. A little while later, we heard the door open and my grandmother calling out to us, so we emerged from her room to meet her. She told us the man in the black suit wasn't anywhere in sight. She said she walked around the whole perimeter of the house just to be sure, and then she unlocked the door. She ended up taking off the rest of the day to stay with us, which we were very grateful for. It's been 11 years since this encounter, and I still don't know what he had in his briefcase.

So to the salesmen who tried to break into our house, let's not meet. One summer night, my roommate and I were sitting on the couch in our living room, talking and watching Supernatural. At the time, we were two ladies in our late 20s, and we felt safe enjoying the breeze from outside with our clothes, but unlocked screen door just a few feet from us. I was sitting facing the window to our backyard, and I will say this. We weren't completely naive. We lived in a townhouse, facing a ravine, so we had the back porch light on. People could get back there, but for anyone to do so, they would have to walk past ten houses if they came in on the left, or five houses if they came in from the right. It wasn't the safest area around, as it housed mostly students attending

the nearby university, and we knew all the neighborhood drug dealers by name. They were our buddies. This is also why my roommate didn't freak out right away when I began yelling. She thought I was just joking with a friend. Okay, so now that the stage is set, let's move on to the creepy part. As I was facing the window, my roommate was facing me. Her back was to our backyard. At first, I thought my mind was playing tricks on me since I had smoked a little of the devil's lettuce earlier that evening, but it wasn't. Just at the edge of the window, I saw the smiling face of a middle-aged man. Just before I could register what I was looking at, the face backed away from the window and disappeared from view. Not wanting to freak my roommate out, and also just in case

it was nothing, I went silent and got up to go look out the back door. And there, I saw an image that has been burned into my brain to this day five years later. A man wearing nothing but a flat, black cap, was walking up the two steps of our porch toward our unlocked screen door. I yelled at the top of my lungs. Get the hell out of here, motherfucker. I'm calling the cops. The part that stuck with me is the fact that he just held up his hands in an appeasing gesture and silently chuckled as he backed up. And he had a big grin on his face the whole time. He was acting like the fact that he was naked in my backyard and about to come into my house was all some kind of funny misunderstanding. My roommate never saw him.

which I am glad for, but she was mad I didn't tell her what was going on at the time. We called the cops, and three officers showed up and searched the area, but found no one. The part that still freaks me out is how long he was standing out there listening to us. I don't really know if he would have tried to open the door, but the fact that he could have terrified me. I rationalize it now, thinking he just wanted to. reaction, and I'm glad I gave him an angry one instead of a scared one. Naked guy in my backyard? Let's not meet. My story isn't one where I was the target of someone stalking or harassment, but one where I

was the guy who was in the right place at the right time. I'm fairly certain that my intervention may have saved someone I had never met. I'm a career tow truck driver, and this happened back in 2016. I've been towing cars for most of my adult life and will likely do so until I either retire or expire, whichever one comes first. At first I was working for a pretty small towing company with only two employees, and we rotated who was on call each week. It was my weekend to be on call, and it was summer. Since people tend to be out and about

late and whatnot during the summer, I was pretty busy cleaning up accidents and towing cars that had broken down both in the city and off the highway. I was fine with it, and I was paid commission at the time, which meant that the more calls I received, the more money I would make. So it was a Saturday night. Well, technically Sunday morning. it was 2 or 3 a.m. Like I said, I had been pretty busy, so I was tired, a little grumpy, and I really just wanted to go home. However, my phone rang.

It was an insurance company calling to ask if I could tow one of their customers who had broken down on the side of the highway. They gave me the location of the breakdown, which was about 15 miles out of town. Now, I normally wouldn't have accepted the job, but the destination happened to be a dealership that was just a couple of minutes from my apartment. I contemplated rejecting the call, but I was being paid commission, so I figured why not?

I thought I could just drive out to the customer, grab the car, drop it off around the corner from my place, and then hopefully head home and get a couple of hours of shut-eye. So I accepted the job for the toe, and I hopped onto the highway. The insurance company provided me with the customer's first name, which will say was Kara, and gave me a contact number for her. Usually I try to reach out to people who are on this side of the highway to let them know that I'm on route and then I give them an estimated time of arrival. I tried calling a couple of times, but she didn't answer.

But that's not necessarily unusual. After a short while, I saw hazard lights in the distance and I could see a vehicle pulled over on the shoulder. So I turned my strobes on and started slowing down. As I was approaching, I noticed that not only one, was there the late model car that I was looking for, but there was also another car at the scene as well. This one didn't have its hazards on. This other car was parked in front of the car I was supposed to tow. This was annoying, but not uncommon, but I needed to be able to get in front of the broken down car to load it onto the truck, and sometimes people just don't

realize that. Since this other car was there, I instead pulled up behind both cars. standing at the trunk of the late model car which was now directly in front of me was a man and a woman the woman appeared to be in her early 20s and she was dressed to the nimes for a night out she was about 5 foot 1 and she was wearing these tight leatherish pants

and a halter top she had long black hair and she was very pretty the man was about 5 foot 10 and skinny I'm guessing he was no more than 100 and he was wearing a dark hoodie and dirty jeans. They were standing very close to one another, facing each other. She had her arms crossed and he was leaning down talking to her. I stepped out of my truck, approached them both, and introduced myself.

They then separated a few feet, and I looked at the woman and said, Are you Kara? She nodded, and I proceeded to say that I was sent there by her insurance company, and asked what was going on with the car. The man immediately piped up and replied, Yeah, it's just having some fuel issues. It's an easy fix. You can just drop it off at the commuter parking lot.

I'm going to fix it for her there. I was annoyed at this because the commuter lot, that he was referring to, was farther at the highway, and I was already 15 miles out of town. Like I said before, I only took this call because it was supposed to be towed back toward my apartment, and I really wanted to go home.

Also, in order to change the original destination of the tow, we would have to call the insurance company back, wait on hold for, who knows how long for an insurance agent, inform them of the destination and try to get them to pay the extra for the miles to get back to my home after unloading. I really didn't want to do any of this. Lastly, this was a late model car. I'm no mechanic, but the car was very new,

and I knew that whatever was going on with it was likely covered under warranty, so the dealership was truly the best place to go. I explained this all to the guy, but he wasn't having any of it. He grew stern with me and said, Look, man, you just need to take the car to where I tell you to take it.

We went back and forth on this for maybe about a minute, and he never let up. He only got angrier. But it was all for nothing because he wasn't the one named on the insurance policy for this. Kara was. So, the easy way to settle this

was to ask her what she wanted me to do with the car, and I decided that whatever she said she wanted was what I would do. So I mentally crossed my fingers as I prepared to ask her what she would like me to do, mostly because taking it to the dealership was genuinely the better option.

Also, it would get me home sooner. So I turned to look at Kara and ask her the question, but I didn't see her right away. She was no longer standing where she was just a minute ago. I continued not seeing her, and I didn't see her until I had almost turned all the way around because she was standing directly behind me. She was just an inch from my back with her arms still crossed.

I looked down at her, and she locked eyes with me. Her eyes were wide as plates, almost owl-like, and it instantly felt like she was staring into my soul. She didn't say a word, and she didn't have to. After what felt like a double-double-take, I took a step back from her, then looked at him, then back at her. And it slowly started to dawn on me

that maybe something about this situation just wasn't right. So I asked her, do you actually know this guy? She ever so slightly shook her head no in response, The solemn expression on her face, when I asked her about this, will be forever burned in my memory. So I then turned to the guy and remarked, You've got to go, man. Now I'm not a tough guy.

I'm a total beta male if there is such a thing, and I don't care who knows it. I've got nothing to prove. I'm very averse to confrontation, and I'll run at the first sign of trouble. Also, I'm not exactly the biggest of guys. However, I am what I like to call sturdy. I'm 5'8 and about 240 pounds. I have a bit of a gut, but I also have big thighs and broad shoulders. People are generally surprised to find out that I weigh as much as I do,

and I think that might have been my saving grace for what happened next. Without a word, the guy made a move for Kara, so I moved to stay between them. Then he tried to push me out of his way by shoving me in the chest, but since I think he underestimated my weight, he only pushed me hard enough to make me take a single step back. Immediately I took a step forward toward him

and body checked him hard. I did this as hard as I possibly could, and it was hard enough to completely knock him over, basically onto his ass. Since we had rotated during this back-and-forth pushing bit, Kara was now in front of me to my right, somewhat between me and the guy who was trying to scramble back up to his feet.

So then I reached out and snatched the poor girl by her waist, picked her up, spun her toward my truck, and yelled at her to get into the driver's side, and she did exactly what I said. In doing so, my back was briefly turned to the guy who was standing up again, and now breathing hard. I quickly turned to face him, and he got right up in my face. But he didn't do anything. He just breathed.

heaved heavily. I stared at him, though, and I mustered up the best dad voice I could, and sternly said, you need to go. I was shaking at this point, and I was absolutely terrified. I had no idea if he had a weapon or not. I didn't know if he was going to try and fight me. I didn't know what was going to happen. Like I said, I'm not a tough guy, and I don't know how to fight. I've never been in a fight in my life. All of these thoughts were running through my head at lightning speed. After probably 15 seconds or so, which felt like eons,

he just huffed a bit and then smiled with one of the creepiest smiles I've ever seen as he started to back off. He was seething, literally sucking his teeth and rubbing his hands together while he slowly took a few steps backward. Then he made his way to the car, got in, and drove away.

I stayed motionless and kept my eyes on him until I could no longer see his. tail lights. After that, I pulled in front of Kara's car, got it loaded up on the tow truck, and as we made our way to the dealership, she told me through tears that her car had shut off while she was driving. She went on to say that she then pulled onto the shoulder and called her parents since she was on their insurance. Her parents made the call to the insurance company, which eventually dispatched me to her location. While she was waiting, shortly after she called

her parents, the guy pulled up in front of her, walked up to the passenger side window, and tried to talk to her. He asked her if she needed help, but she told him that she was fine and that a tow truck was coming. She dismissed him and told him that she didn't need help, but he persisted. She tried to tell him off, and she tried to roll her window back up so that he would get the hint. But then he stuck his arm into the window and unlocked her door and opened it. She was scared so she jumped out of the car and forgot her phone inside, then ran to the back of the car. She decided to stay put there because this at least put her in the line of sight for traffic. He joined her behind the car and as she was waiting for me, he was pretty lewd with her

and whenever she tried to get back into her car, he would physically block her from getting in. This went on for several minutes until I showed up. And it sounds like I showed up at just the right time. Her parents were waiting for her at the dealership when we arrived, and she told them everything that had just happened. They gave me a $20 tip, because that's all that they had on them at the time, and Kara gave me a tight and clearly heartfelt hug before I left. I never saw her again, but I'll tell you what. Every guy has daydreamed of coming to the rescue of a very pretty girl in trouble, myself included.

You think that you're going to be a hero? Every guy thinks that they're going to slay the dragon, get the girl, and ride off into the sunset like the king that they are in this scenario. But for me, being in that situation, in the moment, it was one of the most terrible feelings I've ever felt in my life. I was forced into a confrontation that I didn't want. I wasn't prepared for it whatsoever, and I had no idea what to expect from the clearly unhinged individual

that I was dealing with. I didn't feel like a hero. I felt like a scared little kid encountering a bully on the playground for the first time. I'm thankful I was able to assist Kara with getting away from this guy but I just hope that I never find myself in another situation like this again. 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, go to patreon.com forward slash let's not meet podcast. You'll get access to add free versions of all of the episodes at a higher bit rate, plus bonus stories every single week in those extensions that you hear about at the ends of these episodes.

I want to say thank you to all of the guests that joined us for this special live stream episode of Let's Not Meet. This week you have heard Amanda and Cassidy from drinking the Kool-Aid, Saur Narnia of Knife Point Horror, Kedra Brannon of Perplexity and Mystery Podcast, our friend Skaroline from Twitch,

Kaelin Moore, from Heart Starts Pounding, and finally Jennifer Hollywood, one of my producers. The stories you've heard this week were titled, He Said He Was Their New Dog Walker by G's Does It, The Things You See in the Woods by Session. I'm not alone at home by Adept Ad169. I met a man who would become a murderer by Forian K.

Guy ran at my car while on the highway by Ha Ha! Ha! It's Maya. Salesman tried to break into our house by paranormal collector. He was only wearing a hat by Karasamee 84 and finally Late Night Toe by Whiskey 1. 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. If you have a story to share, send it to Let's Not Meet Stories at gmail.com.

Finally, don't forget to check out the new episodes of my other podcasts like Odd Trails and the old-time radiocast at Cryptic County Podcasts.com. Follow me on Twitch at twitch.tv.TV slash Cryptic County and be sure to get tickets for this month's live shows at Let's Not Meetpodcast.com slash tour or just click the links in the show notes. We'll see you all next week. Everybody stay safe. I'm a long-time listener, and this is my first time listener, and this is my first time submitting.