Scary Horror Stories by Dr. NoSleep - My neighbor is a serial killer, but I know something he doesn't

Episode Date: July 27, 2022

🎧 Be sure to check out my new True Crime podcast called Crimehub. Just search Crimehub in the search bar to find it. 🎉 Ad-free episodes + bonus episodes: https://www.patreon.com/drnosleep �� YouTube: https://youtube.com/c/DrNoSleep ✅ Send all advertising inquiries to: [e-mail] Author: Matt Doggett Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/MatthewDoggettAuthor/ Website/Newsletter sign up: matthewdoggettauthor.com New Book Releases: https://www.amazon.com/Matthew-G-Doggett/e/B08FD5378Z DISCLAIMER: This episode contains explicit content. Parental guidance is advised for children under the age of 18. Listen at your own discretion. #drnosleep #scarystories #horrorstories #doctornosleep #truescarystories #horrorpodcast #horror Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A summer wind stirred the trees outside my window. The leaves rustled in the darkness. The cool breeze coasting through my bedroom, bringing with it the potent aroma of plant life and full splendor. Face up on my bed, lying with my eyes open, I thought I could see the currents of wind and the tendrils of molecules that rode upon them. Sometimes.

I thought I could see things other people couldn't. The hidden splendor of the mundane, and uninspiring. I thought I could see breathtaking beauty, where others saw only wretched ugliness. And if I thought I could see those things, maybe I could. The sound of a car engine rolled through the window and into my ears. The familiar sound of tires shifting from asphalt to concrete followed. I reached over to the nightstand and picked up my phone to check the time, seeing that my mother answered an earlier message about what to watch on our weekly movie night. It was 2.13 in the morning. And my mother wanted to watch rear window,

a classic. I swung my feet off the bed and padded over to the side window that looked upon my neighbor's house. I still wore my comfortable house clothes, consisting of sweatpants, a blank, three-quarter-sleeved baseball shirt, and black socks. The red glow of brake lights went out just as I reached the window, but the running lights on the big blue SUV were still on. My neighbor got out of the SUV and walked up to the attached garage, holding out a small black rectangle. It was his garage door opener, and he was pressing it repeatedly,

but the door stayed stubbornly shut. As he turned back around, clearly frustrated, He looked up at my window. I stepped back from the glass, my heart suddenly thudding away in my chest. Percy Douglas was an imposing man who lived alone in the house next door. He had the square jaw of an action hero and the body of an aging college football lineman who didn't have any energy left for exercise. Even under the dark shelf of his brow, I could see his bright and intelligent eyes gazing up at my window.

He wore a dark purple polo shirt and black slacks with black shoes. His arrival home had caused the motion sensor light to come on at the side of his house. With this illumination reflecting off the window, I was confident he couldn't see me. The window was only open a few inches, not enough for him to see and pass the screen. Percy stood perfectly still, making me realize what he was doing. I stepped further back from the window, just per seableness. before the motion sensor light timed out and went dark. I could no longer see Percy, and I knew he couldn't see me either.

I had started to notice his strange behavior about a week ago and wondered what he was up to. He'd always been a strange, off-putting kind of man. We were around the same age, but only had one or two things in common, and sometimes I got the feeling that he didn't like me very much. still, I waited for the motion sensor light to turn back on. My heart was still hammering away, and I didn't dare step back to the window until I knew he couldn't see through it anymore. I listened, counting the seconds. I assumed that he had somehow moved without setting the light off

again. Maybe he knew its radius well enough to move around it. But why would he need to do that? Still, I stood, listening, counting. unmoving. At two minutes and 40 seconds, the light came back on. I moved quickly, looking out again to see Percy walking around the open door of his still running vehicle. He leaned in, replacing his garage door opener on the sun visor. Then he turned the vehicle off, shut the door, and tracked around the back. He locked the vehicle with his remote before walking up the path to his front door. I stood there for a long time after he went inside, wondering what was going through his head as he stood in his driveway for over two minutes and 40 seconds, not moving a muscle.

It was a long time, and thinking about him staring up at my window for those long minutes gave me chills. But there was excitement in those chills. When the light turned off again, I moved away from the window. I could see that the shades were all drawn on the side of Percy's house that faced mine. I went back to my bed and laid down, although I didn't think I would sleep. I've never been much of a sleeper. My mother used to call me her little night stalker when I was a child. I listened to the wind through the leaves of the hickory tree in my front yard.

I heard the occasional nightbird singing and the lonely echoing bark of a faraway dog. I wanted so badly to hear a distant train whistle to round out the sounds of the beautifully melancholy night. Instead, I heard the opening of a car door from Percy's house. Quickly, I was out of bed and several feet back from the window overlooking his driveway. There was no light on this time. He'd turned it off. I caught a glimpse of him moving hastily along the path to his front door. something heavy in his arms.

Since his back was to me, I moved closer to the window, trying to glimpse what he was holding. Whatever it was, he had it wrapped in dark blankets. Soon, he was through his open front door and out of sight. The back of his SUV was still open, and a circle of color against the dark upholstery in the cargo area caught my eye. It was a bright pink scrunchy. Percy's dark figure moved out of the house and down the three wide wooden porch steps.

I moved back into the darkness of my bedroom, just as the dark hollows of his eyes lifted to my window. His eyes only shifted away from my house when he came to the SUV. He froze, looking down at the bright-colored scrunchy. Then his head whipped back up to my window. I didn't dare move. I thought I was far enough back in the room that he couldn't see me, and I knew that movement would give me away. So I stayed, unable to take my eyes off him.

Long seconds passed before he turned and shut the cargo door on his SUV quietly. Then he glanced back up at my window before heading inside. It was only when he was inside that I realized I was holding my breath. I pulled air into my lungs and went over what I'd seen. what I thought I'd seen. The thing he carried into his house could have been a person. It certainly could have. A small person.

Maybe a teenager or a small woman. But I didn't actually see anyone. I wasn't sure. It was the scrunchy that made me think he'd gone out and kidnapped someone. Maybe even killed them already. Someone who had a pink scrunchy in her hair. I realized I needed proof. I needed to know exactly what I was dealing with before deciding on a further course of action.

I couldn't go jumping to conclusions or lobbying accusations. And I knew Percy, maybe not all that well. But I'd been inside his house. I knew the layout. If there was a woman or a girl in there, like I thought there was, then I had to do something about it. I couldn't let him do something to her if she was even still alive. I could never live with myself if he did something to.

tour and I let it happen without lifting a finger. And although I was frightened, I knew it was the right thing to do, and that pinch of excitement inside was growing a little bigger. So I pulled off my baseball shirt and pulled a light, black long-sleeve shirt on. I left my dark sweat pants and socks on. I wouldn't need shoes. Better to not have shoes on for sneaking around at night. Putting my phone in my pocket, I went downstairs and headed out the back door, turning my own motion sensor light off before doing so. I didn't want a chance tripping Percy's motion sensor light in case he turned it back on. So I scaled the wooden fence our yards shared and landed softly in the grass in his backyard.

The back of his garage was directly to my right, and the rest of his house further on, clenching my jaw. I tried not to pay close attention to the fact that the grass in his backyard looked healthier than the grass in mine. I moved beyond the garage toward the slightly raised back deck. The shades were all drawn at the back of the house, but I could see light around a couple of the downstairs windows. A shadow moved across a window I knew corresponded to the living room. Then it moved back, stopping. I ran forward as fast and quietly as I could. Getting underneath the window just as two fingers cracked the wooden blinds and Percy peered out. He certainly was a paranoid one.

He dropped the blinds and his shadow moved away. Then he turned off the light. I waited several minutes before moving over to the deck and patting up the stairs to the back door. I was certain it would be locked, but I had to try it anyway. Sure enough, locked. I tried a window next to the door, locked too. Then I moved back down to the ground and headed over to the garage. There was a back window to the garage, the inside of the pane slightly dusty and featuring a few stringy cobwebs. Before I even pushed on it, I knew it would open. And as I pressed my palms against the cool glass, I felt a thrill of excitement course through me.

There was fear there, too, of course. If there was one thing I knew for sure, one thing I'd learned during my lifetime, It was that fear and excitement went together like blood and slaughterhouses. I pushed up with my hands, and the garage window moved, just like I knew it would. Going in through the back door or one of the windows would have been better, but the garage would work just fine. I was sure Percy wouldn't have locked the door between the garage and the house. Lifting the window all the way up, I saw that a low shelf obstructed my path with old cans of paint,

varnish, and other typical garage items. Reaching through the window, I moved them, committing their original positions to memory. Percy's prize possession was in the garage, obscured by a car cover. It was a 1979 Dodge Challenger, dark blue with a white racing stripe. It was in pristine condition, and I'd never seen Percy drive it. I climbed through the window, stretching my leg over, feeling the cool concrete floor through my sock. As I brought the other leg in, I pivoted, knocking down a can of armorall, which clattered loudly against the floor. I winced at the sound, freezing for only a second before snapping out of it and springing into action.

When the door to the garage opened, I was underneath the muscle car, lying against the smooth concrete floor and looking toward the wooden steps that lead up to the house. The smell of new oil and the tang of well-tended rubber filled my nostrils. The window was closed, and I was confident that I'd gotten everything back in its place, but I still held my breath, waiting as the long seconds ticked by. I could see that the door to the garage was still open, spilling a thick beam of yellow light down the stairs and over the empty spot in the garage. And in that beam of light, Percy's shadow loomed. He stood there, motionless for so long, I thought it was a mannequin,

or that he'd fallen asleep standing. Soon enough, he stepped back and closed the door, leaving the garage. Lazzang sur-gillet, puissance-molyne, for 15 minutes. We'd say that's their dojo. Pre-a-joo? Vive the pleasure with Leo Jo. The casino in-line that proposes the most recent machine-ass-ass-ass-sou and the games of casino in direct. Profite to 50 tours gratu on Big Bass Bonans.

without exigence of mis, and with payment instantane. Hey, I've gained. Woo-hoo! Sentire the pleasure. Play-Ojo! 188 and plus,

1, 1,000 depots only expuant to Ontario. 50 tours gratu, on the machine-a-sub-Bas, Bonanza, depot minimum of $10. DeVosue to be in a

responsibility, the conditions apply. We're in front of Via-Rai, embarked and profite. Embarque and celebrate. Rigolet,

publiced, publiced, savoured, and admires, and profite. Via-Rai, the voice that we I forced myself to breathe in slowly, knowing that if Percy was pressed against the other side of the door,

he could hear me draw in a gasping breath. After waiting five minutes, just to be sure, I slid out from underneath a challenger, somewhat reluctant to leave the smooth and comfortably cool concrete floor that had pressed against me like a lover. I thought he would have been stupid not to lock the door after that. But when I crept up the wooden steps and turned the knob slowly, I found it was unlocked. I didn't like that, and I realized I had no way of protecting myself from him. Up until then, I could have been a teenager sneaking back into his own house,

trying to make sure he didn't wake his parents up. But with that blatantly unlocked door, I sensed the true danger I was courting. I knew there was a girl in there. Deep down, I knew it. I also knew Percy was dangerous. Of course, every man is dangerous. So was every woman, and, to a lesser extent, every child. But some men are more dangerous than others.

This I knew very well indeed. I'd lived my life keenly aware of that danger. But where it had seemed abstract as I'd made my way into his yard and then his garage, it now seemed real. I knew Percy, and what I knew about him led me to believe that he was more dangerous than most, capable of more than most. So instead of opening the door to the house, I moved back down the stairs and searched for a weapon.

I chose a hatchet that was hanging from a pegboard over a workbench adjacent to the stairs. Its heft was a comfort. Its black rubber grip textured handle feeling right in my hand. Back up the stairs into the door, I turned the knob slowly with my left hand, feeling the latch bolt slide out of the hole in the strike plate. The whisper of the mechanism hidden within the wood seemed loud in the dark garage. Holding the hatchet up with my right hand, I eased the door open, revealing a laundry room, redolent of detergent.

Pristine white appliances hunched to my left, gleaming darkly. Moving into the small room, I eased the door shut behind me, keeping one eye on the open doorway ahead. Up beside the doorway, I stood and listened hard for any sign of Percy or the girl. The hallway beyond the laundry room was dark, and I knew that it led to the kitchen, the living room, and the front of the house. Had there been a light on downstairs anywhere, I thought I would have seen some evidence of its elimination.

I heard nothing but the silence of an empty house, only I knew the house wasn't empty. The thrill of excitement was still pulsing through me, putting my senses on edge. It was tinged with more fear than I would have liked, but there was little I could do about that. I had a job to do, a girl to get to. I took a deep breath and stepped into the doorway, looking down the dark hall. About three feet ahead into the left was the doorway to the kitchen, which in turn opened onto the living room. Beyond the kitchen doorway, the hall led to the front of the house, where I knew there was a sitting room and an office. I crept toward the kitchen doorway. Hatchet

still held up in my right hand. As I craned my head to look into the dark kitchen, I saw a piece of paper hanging from a string affixed to the top of the doorway. I leaned in close to read the words on the paper and the limited light from the kitchen appliance displays. Hello, Saul. The paper read. The two words sent my heart rocketing into my throat. Percy knew I was in the house. A loud pop sounded behind me, followed in quick succession by two vicious pinches on my back,

and then searing pain. My muscles locked up as currents of electricity shocked my body, feeling like thousands of bees had crawled under my skin and all stung me at once. My grip tightened on the hatchet as the muscles in my hand contracted. No longer able to control my legs, I fell sideways, hitting the doorway and then crashing to the kitchen floor face first.

Suddenly the pain stopped, but a foot jammed down on my right hand, and something sharp pricked the side of my neck. Then Percy sat on my back and wrenched the hatchet out of my hand. Consciousness faded slowly as whatever he'd injected me with took effect. At first, I thought the whimpering sound was coming from me. But as my groginess cleared in fits and starts, I realized it was coming from the young woman Percy had abducted. I opened my eyes, looking at the unfinished ceiling in Percy's basement.

I was strapped to a chair with duct tape, facing the wooden staircase that led upstairs. The walls were covered with sound insulation foam, and there were sheets of plastic hanging here and there. My arms and legs were secured to the wooden chair, but my mouth and head were free of tape. I could hear the girl behind me, but I couldn't turn enough to see her. Percy stepped in front of me, his bright blue eyes looking forlorn. Oh, Saul! He said in a high-pitched voice that didn't match his body. I had always found it weird. It was almost as if he was doing it on purpose, changing his voice for some reason known only to him.

What are you doing sneaking into my house? My heart slammed around in my chest, but my voice was unethical. wavering when I spoke. Did you see me in the window? Of course. Percy said. I knew he was lying. He was a bad liar.

Let me go and nothing will come of this, I said. Things can go back to normal. Sure. Percy said, waving a hand theatrically. And what about her? She leaves with me. But I worked so hard to get her, Percy said, cupping an elbow in one hand,

the other hand stroking his action star jawline. He pretended to mull it over. I shook my head. You don't want to do this. You're right. I didn't want to do it like this, Percy said. But you've left me no choice, Saul. But look at it this way. At least you'll get to watch her die before I kill you. Won't that be nice? Percy, I'm pleading with you. Don't do this. Let me go. Please. From one friend to another, don't do this. Percy smiled at me. shoving his big hands into his pockets. I always knew this was the real you, bleeding for your life like some teenage boy. You put up a good front, but I always saw through it.

Pretty sad and horribly unattractive. He stepped behind me, causing the girl to scream through her rag as he did something to her. Whatever it was, it didn't last long. I figured he was just messing with her to piss me off. He stepped back in front of me and smiled again. I must get changed, he said. It's nearly three in the morning already. Percy walked upstairs to change.

As soon as I knew he was gone, I smiled. I wiggled in the seemingly sturdy wooden chair. It had padless wooden armrests and legs. The pads on the seat and back of the chair were dark maroon faux leather. I had sat in the chair many times before. I knew it wasn't part of a set. I increased my side-to-side motion until, I felt the joints at the armrests start to loosen and crack. Then I switched to a forward

and backward motion, pressing my back part against the seat back repeatedly until I felt it start to give. Then I stopped moving and listened for footsteps from upstairs. I heard none, which told me that Percy was still up in his bedroom, changing. Inhaling deeply, I flexed every muscle in my body, pushing out with my arms while trying to stand up with my legs. The chair creaked at the joints, then cracked. Then the armrests broke, and I stood up. The wooden armrests still strapped to my arms with tape. I reached back and down, grabbing the seat with both hands and yanking it up.

It cracked and broke away, leaving only the legs attached to my calves. Turning around, I saw what he had done with the girl. She was a beautiful young blonde with creamy white skin and wide green eyes. She had on colorful pajama pants and a plain white V-neck t-shirt, and she was fixed to a kind of medical table propped at a 45-degree angle. Her hands, feet, hips, and shoulders were all secured to the heavy-duty table with straps. I whispered, telling her to keep making her distressed noises. She nodded, the hope in her face sending a rush of elation through me.

I moved the broken chair into the corner of the wide basement. Then grabbed a large knife from a plastic-coated workbench arranged with all kinds of nasty tools and implements. Walking on my toes so the wooden legs wouldn't touch the ground, I stepped underneath the stairwell. It was a skeleton staircase, so I would be able to see Percy's feet as he walked down them. I just had to make my move before his head got low enough to see down into the basement. I waited less than a minute before I heard his footsteps in the hall upstairs. Then I heard the basement door open. His bare feet appeared at eye level on the staircase.

I positioned the knife, waiting until he stepped down two more stairs. His right foot landed, and I slid the blade along the back of his foot, severing the Achilles tendon. Percy cried out and tried to retreat, but I reached up with my other hand and grabbed his left foot to keep it there.

I reached around with a knife and dragged the blade across the tops of his toes. Percy cried out again, and, with both feet injured, collapsed on the staircase. I ran around it up the stairs, easily dodging his ineffectual kick and stabbing him deep in the left thigh with a knife. Grabbing his feet, I yanked him down the rest of the stairs and into the middle of the floor as he blubbered and struggled. He was dressed in frilly white lingerie, his hairy body bulging around the thin articles of clothing. I wiped my bloody hands on my sweatpants as I stood over and. him. He gripped his leg around the protruding knife, making choking noises and small,

I pitched wines. I quickly grabbed another tool from the workbench, this one, a large cleaver, before stepping back over to him. He gasped, his face pale and soaked in sweat. A few well-placed cuts on the chair, a bit of tampering with your garage door opener and making sure the garage window was unlocked, I said, you're too predictable. How did you know I'd go after her? he said, gesturing at the girl. I looked up at her, a thrill of anticipation running through me, as it had every time I'd looked at her over the last two months. How could you not? I said.

I mean, look at her. The minute I brought you along to follow her that day, I knew. You're a terrible liar, Percy. The girl's eyes were swimming in tears. She whipped her head back and forth, crying and bucking against the table. I looked back down at first. Percy and at the brilliant blood flowing out of his wounds. I told you she was mine.

I found her first, but I knew you couldn't resist. I saw it in you. Why didn't you just stop me then? He cried. Why go through all this trouble? You're joking, right? If you don't know the answer to that, you don't know me at all. And you never have.

I waited, looking into Percy's eyes. He didn't understand. Oh, for God's sake. I said, This is the most fun I've ever had. The risk of being killed or caught? The danger of it all. My God, nothing like it.

Nice job with the node and the taser gun, by the way. I didn't expect such theatrics. Couldn't help but laugh. Please, Saul. Percy said. Please don't do this. We can share her like we have all the others. I shook my head.

Too late. The feeling of the meat cleaver striking Percy's flesh was exquisite. As his inside spilled out in all their intensity, I thought I could see his soul escaping from the flesh, riding on unseen currents like sparkling dust moats, like stars in the night sky, moving so fast as the galaxies rush past each other, but seeming so slow. When Percy was in pieces, I turned toward the girl, the main event. I was so excited I could hardly contain the feeling of gratitude, of wonder. I wanted so badly to see what her soul looked like when it left her body. I wanted to smell the blood and guts. I wanted to experience those things that other people

couldn't. The hidden splendor hiding inside her, waiting to come out. I wanted to see breathtaking beauty where others would only see wretched ugliness.