Spooked - La Pesca

Episode Date: September 4, 2026

Giulia’s new apartment is in one of the oldest buildings in La Spezia, a seaside city in northwest Italy. The building has seen so much history, it’s practically coming out of the walls… Grazie, Giulia, for sharing your story with Spooked! Scouted and produced by Jonathan Zenti, original score by Clay Xavier, artwork by Teo Ducot.   Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

London Bridge is falling down, burning down to the ground. Jen lit the match without a sound. She's lonely. You've crossed over to Spoot. Stay. Summer evening. Camp and trip with my crew, the fire pits go, and the kids are shoving marshmallows on their sticks to hold over the flame. The adults drinking their drink.

Smoking there's smoke. We're out of cell phone range. The devices don't work, so this is magic hour. Story time. Gather around, children. I'm about to tell you, happen. Just a few short months ago, not truthy, but truth. Eager eyes, look up at me.

Adults, y'all think I'm playing? Look just up on Google or whatever when we get back. Look at Arrowhead Stadium. Kansas City, Missouri. Cup match event, Argentina versus Switzerland, projected scream outside, thousands of screaming, beer swirling, not to beech,

pizza goblin fans, right? And after the big game, the crowd leaves, the venue's empty. One guy, his job is to do a final sweep of the porta bodies. Yikes. And he's checking the units.

And he thinks he hears a tiny voice from inside one of the toilets. Knocked on the door. Hey, hey, you all right? Hey, you okay? Finally, he tries to open the door. But it's locked from the inside, good Lord.

Still, he hears the barely perceptible voice, so he flags a policeman down for help. And this policeman, brave soul, honest and true, he hears the voice too. Fain. So. and fearing what he will find, the policeman forces open the door of the porta potty and inside he sees a toilet.

Nothing, nobody. The policeman leans in. The porta potty guy leans in. They look at each other. The toilet lid pops open and a head, a human head, slowly rises and says, says the police, So it's a port-a-party guy. What the hell? They flee.

Top speed. This is the job for somebody else, so they call the fire department. Sirens lights, the big red truck pulls up, and his head covered in muck, poking up from inside the toilet says he's been stuck bare in the most despicable filth imaginable for over eight hours. Yes, it's a man. Of course it's a man. All stuck in the toilet. What you think? How?

Why? Who knows? Nobody wants to touch him, but he's held fast. So finally, the firefighters take out their axes and bravely chop him out of his crappy grave. And before he can spread crazy to the town folk, they hook him up to a fire hose and spray blast this man down with holy water. And soaking wet without another word or a backwood. glance, the man lobes off into the wild and is gone. I tell this story to the kids around the campfire and they scream,

No! No! Bright eyes wide with horror, but Uncle Glenn! They shout. Uncle Glenn! How? Why? What?

Children? Children, I don't know. I don't know to answer to your questions. I can only tell you what he told the authorities before he vanished. He said, what happened was, look this up. He said, what happened was, he dropped a bottle of mountain dew in the toilet, and he dived in to retrieve it. Our certain actions will never fully understand the why.

We can't understand the why. All we have is the story left behind. So please pack your bags, because today, we're heading somewhere spook has never been before. to Italy. When her story takes place, Lespetia, a small seaside city at Northwest Italy, this is where our storyteller Julia grew up.

It's where her friends are. So when Julia's mom gets a job in another city, Julia is devastated. She doesn't want to leave her hometown, especially not in the middle of her last year of high school. Luckily, at around that same time, Julia's aunt lies an apartment right in the heart of the town.

oldest buildings in the city, it's covered in the kind of murals that rich folks would paint all over their palazos back in the day to show off. It's beautiful, and the best part about it is Julia's aunt says that Julia can live there, and I'll let Julia take it from here. When you enter inside the building, there is this big entrance hall, and at the first floor, there was my apartment. When I come in, I smell the fresh painting on the wall that were all white. I knew that there were some frescoes inside the house, but they had already been covered up. That's because it's very common nowadays to paint over all the frescoes,

because they are really, really expensive to maintain. A fresco is kind of like a mural. And it's a painting you do while the plaster is still wet to decorate the walls. It was common in the past to paint inside and outside the house for the people that were very rich. I was really happy for my hunt because it was her first house alone, but she met someone and she moves out with this boyfriend to a new house. So I was going to live there mostly alone for the next year in an apartment in the center of the city near a

bar, shop, restaurants. I was like, oh my God, that's amazing. That's a party for me. I remember that was October. I just started university. I always study on the kitchen table. I take my books, I take my notes, and I look up and see in front of me.

me the window that is opening. I think by myself maybe I didn't close it well. I stand up and I go to close it. I'm writing again on my notes. I see in front of me the window opening. The window is very modern and new. So if you close the window and put down, the handle is impossible for it to open again.

I was a little bit scared because that wasn't normal. I checked the handle. It was impossible to open it again. I stand up and in that moment the doorbell ring. I go to the door. I ask, who's there? no one response so I opened the door and there is no one outside the door

in that moment I feel like when you have a little bit of cold inside the bone how we say in Italy Freddo Neuellaosa is cold inside you feel like you're freezing but outside there is a normal temperature I felt scared and I decided to go out.

My lifelong best friend, Elektra, was working at a cafe just downstairs in the city center main street. It was so strange that I told myself, okay, I'll study later. I have to go out and talk with her. About a month later, it was November. I had a friend who played in a music cover band and one night I go to see him play We drink a little bit during the night He cannot find his keys to go home

And in the end I offer him to come to sleep to my place I tell him if you're okay with the couch Come to my place I have a couch Once we get home I grabbed him a pillow and a blanket and I see him pass out immediately. It was very, very tired. The next morning I woke up and I tiptoe in the kitchen.

I made the coffee like always. And then I see that my friend, he was looking at me, saying, Julia, are you okay? I saw you going to the bathroom last night where you're sick and I blink confused and I say it's totally okay

nothing wrong I slept like a rock he was staring at the hallway frozen he says I saw you with your hair down and with a white nightgown. I saw you open the door of the hallway and go to the bathroom. I smile and I say,

The door? What door? There is no door on the hallway. I never slept with a nightgown. I have always a t-shirt, long pants. So I say to him, okay, you were asleep, you were a little bit drunk, don't worry, you were probably just dreaming. He looks at the hallway and there isn't a door. So he says, okay, I definitely was dreaming. After the summer, I met Marco and we immediately become friends. Later that year, just before Christmas, I called him and I told him and I told, come to Las Pesia, come to my place.

I want to show you around. So he came for a few days and my friend Elektra joined us. She and I share my bed at my place and Marco slept on the couch. The next morning, I get up early and I go to the kitchen to make the coffee like always. I like to prepare the breakfast

every time someone stops by to my place. And Marco wake up. He looked at me and he says, do, were you sick last night or something? And I look at him and said, what? No, absolutely no. And he says, that's weird. Because I swear I saw you open the door of the hallway

and going to the bathroom, passing by behind the sofa, in the middle of the night. Before I could respond, he repeats, I saw you. I saw you open the door. And in that moment, that eats me like a punch. It was a totally deja vu. I was speechless. My mind was the wrong. I was asking to myself a lot of questions.

How is even possible have my friends ever met each other? Did I ever talk to Marco about that dream? So I say, okay, Marco, please tell me what exactly did you see? He says, you were wearing a white nightgown? and you have your hair down. The week before, I cut my hair in a boyish hairstyle, so my hairs were very, very short. I look at him and I say,

okay, Marco, you realize now that that's not possible. I cut my hair last week, and he looks at me stunt. Elektra in that moment, she was quite excited. Oh my God, Julia, this is so cool. So you have a ghost inside your house? And I say, don't be ridiculous. It's just a creepy coincidence because that's what I thought. Instead, Elektra was all excited because that was one of the oldest building in La Spezia.

For the first time, she made me look at this frame. on the wall and I think for the first time there was a door because there was a frame in the hallway so a door

had to be there I don't know when but there was a door there Marco is the kind of person that nothing at all ever seems to shake so I think

okay I'm counting on in to back me up about this nonsense story. But in that moment, I see his brows forward and the muscles in his toe tied. He was really into some bad folks. He says,

you know that I don't believe in this stuff, Julia, but this felt so real. More than six months, has passed. I was going back and forth to Genoa for university, attending my classes and studying. I come home only to study in the evening or to sleep in the night. One night, it was almost summer.

In the middle of the night, I hear a huge sound of glasses that broke. It was like a very big crash, like, shh. When I rush into the living room, I see one of my aunt's painting lies on the floor, in the middle of the living room. There was glass everywhere, broken frame, shards scattered everywhere.

And I look at the wall where the painting used to be, and the spot exactly near the frame of the missing door of the hallway that all my friends sees the lady through the door. So I came closer to the wall and I see that some plaster has chipped off probably because of the painting falling down and scratching it. And underneath, I'm just a little bit of the painting, I catch a glimpse of something that I didn't expect. There was color.

There was the frescoes under that. There was the original frescoes of the house. Under the plaster, I see a glimpse of green. Could be a patch of grass or maybe a bush. I feel in that moment, And this urge to scrape away the plaster, to uncover more, to see more. But I stop. Somewhere between the scared and the couriers, I just stand there telling to myself,

no, it's not possible. The next morning, I decided to call my aunt. I called her and I say, Hi, Zietta, how are you? What's going on? And then I asked her about the paintings behind the plaster. I asked her about the frescoes. What was on the frescoes when you painted up all white on the wall? She says that on the painting there was a grassy meadow, a wee-pe,

Willows and a girl on a swing with a white nightgown and long black hair. My knees go weak. In Italian we say, me, I feel like, oh my God, a girl with black hair, like my friend see her, was under the plaster on the wall. So for the first time, I was really scared because it could be possibly that someone in my house

see the girl that was also on the paintings. I was really scared because for the first time, I really think it was real. By spring, I met Ricardo. He was very nice, a cool person, intelligent. He was a water polo player. He was a big, tough guy.

We have a long brown hair. We met in March. And in April, we were a couple. We met and we fell in love quite instantly. In July, My mother says to me that we are going to leave the house. In a few weeks, we are going to move to Genoa. And I try to explain to her what was happening in that house,

but she doesn't want to listen. She wants only to move on. She had a new job. we are leaving this house and so a case closed we don't talk about it anymore I was

really really angry because in La Spezia there was my life there was my friends but was also my boyfriend at the time after a year in that house

I was feeling like home And for me, living that house, it was like living a part of me that I knew it never come back. But I decided to not think about it. Not now. Instead, I pack my things and I live with Ricardo for the summer to the Conary Island for a vacation. So we spent two weeks in Forteventura, and we can't. back 10 and relaxed. When we left for two weeks, no one was there, the house was closed. When we come back, La Spezia was very, very hot, no sea breeze that is strange for a seaside city.

And when we open the house, the air feels thick, stale. I drop all my bag. and the first thing I do is open the windows. I head to my room to have a quick change. I sleep into something comfortable and I'm about to head back out when something stops me. And I see on my nightstand near the bed a pitch.

The pitch was smooth, was pale pink, but it's been beaten from a side. The arc of the teeth was visible to me. I see a drop of condensation, trace down the skin and hit the wood of the nightstand. I come back to the living room. I says, Ricardo, but seriamen. Ricardo, seriously, you leave your snack on my nightstand? And he walks out of the bathroom, confused. What are you saying? What are you talking about?

I was in the bathroom. I was so annoyed. I said, there is a pitch in there, bit, and just sitting there on the nightstand. He raised a bro and said, Julia, I'm allergic to pitches. You know that. My whole body goes cold. Totally cold. I ran back into the bedroom and the pitch was still there.

I touched it. The pitch is cold, fresh, like someone took out of the fridge a few moments earlier. I go to the kitchen and I see the fridge was, unplugged. So I come back. I open the window and I open the shutter and I see the light fluids in the room and I see again this pitch. The moisture still sleeping down the skin. I pick it up and I drop in the trash. My first fault was that someone broke in. Someone is inside the house, a thief or someone with bad intention. Panic hits me, but just for a second.

Because then I stop and I think about it. Why would someone hit a pitch and left it like nothing were happening? And if someone really did break in, Why leave such a clear sign that had been here? No, this is not someone from the outside. The pitch is her. It's her. She's leaving a mark for me.

Ricardo was really scared. Look at me saying, Julia, please sleep at my place tonight. My parents are gone for vacation. Please, I don't want to stay. in this house one moment more. But I didn't want to leave the house because

I know that it was the last week I could spend in that house so I said no Ricardo I'm sorry but I have to spend the few nights that remains here

if you don't want to stay there with me you can go. I understand you go I stay and that night I stay in that house alone

it has been more than 10 years now I'm a science person I've studied science and then I become a math professor and I never

never never think about supernatural or everything that goes over the scientific explanation. I'm not even a religious person. I don't believe in God.

But that house, that year of my life, for me, it's a mystery. It's something that I can't explain in a rational way. One day I was in town and I went to see that old apartment. My aunt is doing another renovation. I went through the construction site and on a wall I see pieces of a fresco emerging from the plaster. I see there was a big tree with many green leaves. a swing hanging to a branch of the tree,

a blanket on the grass underneath the tree. And I was like relief. There wasn't any girl with dark hair on that swing. Like my aunt said there was 10 years ago. But then I stopped. On the blanket, on the grass, there was a bright pink pitch with a bite on one side.

Grazie, Julia. Thank you for sharing your story with Spooked. The original score was by Clay Xavier and was scouted and produced by Jonathan Zinty. Vosos is a favor. If you have a story that needs to be on this show, let us know.

Sput. at snapjudgment.org. There's nothing better than a spook story from a spooked listener. Spook Studios lies frozen in time hidden deep within the dark recesses of KQED

in San Francisco. Please, I beg of you. Do not seek to find it. Let's it seek to find you. Tell the robots, tracking us both right now that no Snap Studios content may be used for training, testing or developing machine learning or AI systems

without prior written permission on Team Spout. The union representative, producers, artists, editors, and juniors are members of the National Association of Broadcast, Employees, and Technicians, Communications, Work of America, AFL, CIO, Local 51, and... Spooked is brought to you by the team who, like everyone, enjoys a perfectly white peach bursting with juice, except for, of course, Mark Ristich, who tells little children that peaches taste like peaches taste like

like soap. There's Davey Kim, Zoe Frigno, Eric Yannes, Mercia Dodd, Regina Berdyaco, Miles Lassie, Teo DeCotte, Jonathan Zinty, Nicholas Marks, the spook theme song. He's by Pat MacCity Miller. My name is from Washington. And I wonder, when I pass on, what part of me will insist on remaining here? My friends and family still receive late-night non-susco messages on their phones. will they hear a small voice

whispering M&M lyrics from the darkness will they feel a wild compulsion to add more shirotcha to their curry what I kind of think I'm going to haunt them

I want to haunt them now I can't wait for later I've got to tell them the truth I let them know I love them now and that my exterior veneer is a lie now tell them how I feel now the truth is now that sometimes now my

palms now are sweaty. My knees weak. Sometimes my arms grow heavy and there's vomit on my sweater already. Mom's spaghetti. Sometimes I feel nervous, but on the surface I stay calm and ready. Can I tell him that now? I'm choking how. Everybody's joking now. When the clock runs out, times up and be overblown. Can I tell them that now? Can I tell them now? Can I tell them now? To never ever, ever, ever, ever. ever ever