The Lets Read Podcast - 109: Episode 097 | Abandoned Houses & County Fair Stories | 23 True Scary Horror Stories

Episode Date: September 21, 2021

Welcome to the ninety-seventh episode of The Lets Read Podcast! This podcast includes narrations of true creepy encounters submitted by normal folks just like yourself. Today you'll experience horrifying stories about Abandoned Houses, County Fairs & The Worst Neighbor Ever... HAVE A STORY TO SUBMIT?► www.Reddit.com/r/LetsReadOfficial FOLLOW ME ON - ► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/letsread.official/ ► Twitter - https://twitter.com/LetsReadCreepy ►YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/letsreadofficial ♫ Background Music & Audio Remastering: Simon de Beer https://www.instagram.com/simon_db98/ PATREON for EARLY ACCESS!►http://patreon.com/LetsRead

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the family decided against it. No consensus about what to do with it could be arrived at, therefore it would be left to decay for another decade or more before I would stumble upon it. My aunt and I were going through my mother's things and discovered an old family photo album. Mom had gone off on one of her journeys and no one was sure if she'd ever return. Her and I had been having an on and off relationship for years so there was a lot about the family I didn't know. I came across a picture of her and I when I was just a baby but I didn't recognize the house we were standing in front of. I inquired and my aunt told me about the old Wheeler family house that had once belonged to her parents. No one had been there in over a decade and she wasn't even sure if it was still standing.

So, after half an hour of badgering, she agreed to take me out to see it. That following morning, we headed out of town through 30 miles of cornfields until we came to a turnoff that led down a long weedy gravel road. As we crested the hill I was taken aback. The house I saw before me, despite being run down, was still breathtaking. In its prime it must have been the finest home in the county. My aunt pulled up within a few yards of it and we got out. From what I could see, nobody but the occasional mowing company had been there in a very long time.

I couldn't help but be in awe of the place. The vibrant pink and blue paint had long faded from its soaring towers and the massive porch was beginning to sag in a few places. Before I entered, I wanted to take in every bit of the wonderful facade as I could. Around the back was the remnants of the old horseshoe pit and, what I was told, my grandfather's Ford pickup. Although the big house had long seen its best days, I knew I hadn't seen anything that could have compared. Maybe one of those beautiful Victorian mansions in San Francisco. Even those would be dwarfed in comparison to this. When I was ready, we climbed the concrete steps and entered through the back entrance. From the moment we cracked the door, we were overwhelmed

by a hideous smell coming from inside. We assumed it was a normal part of having a house sealed for so long and continued with our search. Everything appeared as if it had been left where it was on my grandmother's last day, almost like a time capsule or museum. The lights were even still working. Only later did I discover that my mother had been paying the bills all these years and hopes someone would return and live there someday. Walking from room to room and seeing all the beautiful antique furnishings, I couldn't stop wondering why I had never been told about the house. Regardless of our frequent estrangements, I would have helped my mother with the upkeep of it.

It was downright insane to me to leave such a beautiful place to rot. Then again, my mother's strange ways were the main reason for our frequent falling outs. As we made our way to the second floor, the smell only got worse. I suggested we cut our visit short and just take a quick look around. Every door was closed, so I went for the closest one and stuck my head in. This must have been a guest room or spare. Upon the bed laid a beautiful and elaborate quilt easily over a hundred years old. My aunt was going through a cedar chest in a room next to me. I joined her and we discovered another much older photo album and decided to bring back

with us to look at later. She closed the door behind us and I made my way toward the last room. Unfortunately, the closer I got to the door, the stronger the smell got. I was reluctant to open it, but I thought if the poor critter was where I could get to it, I'd take it outside and give it a good burial. Cracking the door, the stench slapped me in the face and I lost focus for a moment. When I regained my composure, I was met with a terrible sight. Before me was not a dead forest creature, but a human being. The bloated body, now unrecognizable, laid curled up silently on the bed. I could feel my knees begin to buckle, so I turned as quickly

as possible away and out of the room. My aunt was confused by my behavior and stuck her head in before yanking it out, quickly again. We both ran down the stairs where the smell was less potent and I called 911. The officers spent a few minutes in the room before coming back out with a small piece of paper and a driver's license. One of them joined us at the table where we were sitting and asked a few questions about my mother. This made me nervous and I began demanding he explain himself. A serious look came across his face and he told us that the body appeared to belong to my mom. I didn't want to believe it at first, but when he handed me her license I knew it was true. My aunts and I held each other for a long time and cried. The officer gave us a few moments before interjecting himself again. Then he asked me if I knew why she would take her own life. I had naturally assumed

my mom had died in her sleep. She was an older woman but the note he handed me made everything clear. She had been depressed for a long time because of being at odds with each other and the last time we spoke, some things were said and she feared she couldn't take it back. The morning after our argument she decided to return to the only place that she'd ever been happy. Although she claimed to not be sure of what she was going to do at the time, the poor state of the house just sent her over the edge. The last sentence asked that I not blame myself for her death and that I move on with my life. The ending read simply, Goodbye, Mom. A couple of weeks later, after everyone had time to deal with their grief, I brought the remaining family members together.

After seeing the old house and realizing how the poor condition of it hurt my mother, I proposed we try to raise the money to renovate it. In light of what had just occurred, I wanted to at least try to create something positive from our tragedy. I was given their blessings and went to work. It took some time, but on the first day of spring 2018, the Historical Society allowed me to lead the first tour of the newly restored Wheeler Mansion. A great day could have been much better had my mother been there with me. No matter our differences, it was her who inspired me and the one who truly made it all possible. For the hunting season of 2017, I got in on a lease with a guy from work. I didn't have time to check the area out before the season started,

so the inevitable occurred and I got lost my first day. That morning I left the camp just before dawn. I'm not the kind that hunts from a stand, I'm your traditional stalk and shoot type of hunter. Since I wasn't familiar with Elise and I stupidly left my GPS back at the camp, I had to stick to the main paths in order to not get lost. Most of the morning I did well, however as I grew tired I lost focus and veered from the trail. In my defense, I came across this really fresh set of tracks. Of course, I had to follow them. The sucky thing was

that they continued on to a neighboring property and I had to stop following them. When I looked up, I realized I was way off the trail and didn't know how to get back. The rest of the day was spent trying to find my way back to camp. About an hour before dark I noticed a run down house and cabin in the distance. By now I wasn't sure whose property I was on. I hoped that if somebody was living there they could help me but as I got closer I could tell the place had been abandoned for a good while. I knocked to make sure but with no reply I made myself at home. My first goal was to get a fire going. After I did that I began combing through the cabinets for food and other things I thought could help me. Not much but a questionable can of chili and some candles were found.

I heated up the chili over the fire and combined it with a half-eaten bag of chips. After dinner I looked through the bedroom and discovered an old map of the area. I wasn't sure how accurate it would be after all that time, but I was happy to find it. I spread it out on the floor in front of the fireplace and planned my course for the morning. I was shocked to see that I had veered over five miles from where I'd started. At some point, I must have dozed off. During the night, I had a super vivid dream that a man was sitting in the chair next to me and just staring. He never said a word and when I jerked awake and saw that I was alone I was relieved and quickly fell back asleep. The following morning I woke up at 6.15 and got

my stuff together. I made sure the fire was completely put out and headed back to camp. I just stepped from the house when I came face to face with a strange man. The guy from my dream, in fact. I was confused at first, and when he spoke, I knew my dream had really happened. This man was holding an old Marlin 3030. Not an odd sight for a hunter during deer season. This dude didn't look like a hunter though. He wore an old dirty backpack and normal bright yet dingy street clothes. His eyes had a very crazed look to them that made me uncomfortable to gaze at. I was surprised but regained my calm

and said, good morning. Instead of saying it back, he just stared at me with those crazed black eyes. I began to say something but he interrupted and asked what I was doing in the cabin. Before I could answer, he blurted out that it was his place. I continued and explained what had happened the day before. The entire time I was telling him this, he was gripping the rifle so tightly his knuckles were beginning to turn white. His behavior was beginning to scare me. The only thing I wanted to do was get back to camp and then home. The last word had barely left my lips before he angrily told me that it was his place. It appeared to have been empty for quite a while, but I wasn't going to argue with him.

I apologized as quickly as I could and went on my way. For a good hundred yards or more, I kept looking behind me. I was waiting to get shot in the back. Every time I looked back, he was staring maniacally back at me and death gripping his gun. It took a couple of hours to find my way back but by then I'd had plenty of time to dwell upon our encounter and I was truly freaked out by then. It actually hit me. The guys that were still in camp were happy to see me and asked what had happened. I just said I got lost and camped out for the night, never mentioning the nutcase that I met. I doubt that they take it seriously anyhow.

The whole experience had me so scared I wanted nothing more than get home. The other guys must have thought I was crazy. After throwing all my stuff into the back of my truck, I tore off out of there and never returned. I knew I'd never be able to feel safe knowing that kook was somewhere out in the woods, possibly watching our party. That following Monday, my friend asked what had caused me to leave so abruptly. I made up some lie about my wife being sick. I'm not sure if he even believed it. Nothing was said about it again and maybe, just maybe, things are better that way.

This story may be too fantastic to believe, but I promise it happened. It was the last months of 1999 and my first marriage had just ended. When we began discussions, I agreed to let my ex continue to live in our house with the kids. As a result, I was thrust onto the market for a new home. For the time being, I was crashing in an extended stay hotel living on fast food. Finally, as that spring approached I found a place I loved. The only disappointing part of the deal was that it had been uninhabited for going on seven years. The woman that had lived there before had died and her heirs had

let it sit empty. It was eventually agreed upon to put it on the market and that's when I came upon it. Despite the probable long list of repairs, the price was too good to pass up. The morning of March 3rd, I picked up the keys and signed the papers. The house was officially mine and I got to work immediately to make it livable. I replaced a broken window and a few other things before I moved in two weeks later. I hadn't been there two days before I received a visit from a pair of detectives. They sat me down and told me the craziest thing I'd ever heard in my life. According to them, the nice little old lady who had lived there, Sharon, had an abusive husband named Walter. She claimed Walter left for the store one morning and

never returned. Because of his history of abuse, she didn't report his disappearance. The couple's only child, Melinda, didn't either. Her mother had told her Walter had been having an affair with a woman from his job and had likely ran away to be with her. Melinda took her mother's story at face value and the woman bid Walter good riddance and moved on with their lives. Within the year, Sharon, now a free woman, began a relationship with her neighbor, Joseph Poole. She was granted a divorce and the couple were married not long after. The pair lived out their lives in the house. Not everyone was so eager to believe Sharon's story and the police were asked by Walter's sister to investigate his disappearance. Year after year, the trail always led back to Sharon, but the detectives on the case never had enough proof to arrest her. Then, about 15 years after he went missing,

a new pair of detectives were put on the trail. They went back to Walter's sister, now a very old woman, and asked if she had any idea how Sharon could have disposed of her brother's body. For the first time since the case began, she recalled an incident that took place not long after Walter's disappearance. She was visiting Sharon, hoping to get information as to where her brother had moved to and she happened to notice a large patch of the backyard where the ground had been tilled up and roses had been planted. This struck her as odd because it was still in the middle of winter and at least four months before planting season began. The bushes would surely die in the brutal Michigan winter. She asked Sharon about this and she simply said she wanted to get ahead of things. The sister had no reason to disbelieve her at the time and accepted the story. For the first time in a long time, the police had a direction to follow. However, they were frustrated by the judge's denial of

a search warrant and the case soon ran out of steam, as it had so many times before. Life would proceed and over the years the case would be forgotten. That was until a new police chief was hired and he launched an initiative to clear the city's open cases. My visitors were assigned the case. After a little research they discovered Sharon and her new husband had died and the house had a new owner. The reason for their visit was to ask if I would allow them to dig up the yard to look for Walter's remains. I was naturally shocked by all I'd heard and needed time to think about it. After taking a few days to consider the request, I gave them the okay. The following morning, twenty or so cops, accompanied by a backhoe, began their search.

I want to say I was surprised by what they found, but after hearing their story, Walter's skeleton being discovered was almost expected. At the end of the day, everything seemed to work out for the best. The cops managed to close a 50-year-old mystery and Walter got to be put away alongside his loved ones. The only downside was Walter's sister didn't live to see it. She deserved to be there for the funeral after all the time she had put in the search for him. The situation had made me do a lot of thinking since it was brought to my attention. From all reports, old Walter was not good to his wife or respected their marriage.

Maybe Sharon had a good reason to put an end to his nonsense. The problem I have with what she did is that by killing Walter and hiding his body away in the garden, his innocent sister who had hurt no one, was left with a terrible notion that she and the rest of his family had been abandoned by him for a young piece of tail. Then as time carried on, and she had come to terms with the strong possibility her brother was dead, she had nowhere to go to mourn him. And that, to me, my friends,

just doesn't feel right. There was the empty house on my street that all the kids thought was haunted. I'm not sure how long it had been there, but I'm almost positive no one had lived there during my lifetime. The style in which it was made differed drastically from the other houses around it, so I think it might have been built far earlier than the others. The talk among the grown-ups was that it belonged to the guy who built the housing addition, and when he lost all of his money, he shot himself in the study. After his death, his estate got stuck in probate, so the house sat empty. I haven't found anything supporting the story, but it went a long way to reinforcing the house sat empty. I haven't found anything supporting the story but it went a long

way to reinforcing the haunted mansion idea. I spoke to an older kid who had been inside it before and he claimed there were satanic stars painted everywhere. I now know he was BSing me but as a 7 year old that scared the life out of me. There was a big field between that house and the rest where we used to play. Once or twice, a kid would hit a ball into the yard and have to go get it. It was funny to watch them try to hop over the wrought iron fence and back as fast as they could. They almost always tripped coming back over. Then one day, it was my turn. And now, I wasn't laughing. A group of us kids had been playing football all afternoon. The team I was on had just scored a touchdown and I was chosen to kick the field goal.

We had this old metal structure that we used to kick through. It was stuck off in the corner of the field and we had to drag it out to use it. My team set it up about 20 yards from the old house. It was obviously too close but kids don't always think things through before they do them. The kid playing center hiked the ball to our QB and I nailed it straight between the bars and on through one of the upstairs windows. I watched helplessly on as it happened knowing I couldn't stop it. The second it came into contact with the glass, all the other kids took off. All except one. The kid who the ball belonged to. He'd just got it a few days

before for a birthday present. He knew he was going to be in serious trouble if he didn't come home with it. He didn't have to say a word. Tears were already beginning to roll down his face. I suppose I could have told him to F off and let him to his doom, but that's not my nature. I assured him I would go get his ball back, but he had to go in with me. This made him far more scared. I'm sure inside his head he strongly considered leaving it where it was, but he knew we had no other choice. As he choked back the sobs he nodded and we made our way towards certain death in our minds. We entered around the back to prevent being seen by nosy

neighbors. I tried the knob and was surprised to see it opened. Fortunately the laced curtains were light enough for us to see our way around. The scary graffiti was nowhere to be seen. Actually the inside almost looked untouched other than white sheets draped over the furnishings. Once I realized that it was nothing like I'd ever imagined, the old house lost much of its hold over me. My friend was younger and it was obvious he was still terrified. I had begun looking around at all the old pictures but he wanted to get out as quickly as possible. Several times he had to pull on my shirt to get me moving.

The second floor was similar to the first except for the terrible smell. All the rooms were open but the one at the end of the hall. We looked through the others until we came to the closed door. I opened the door and the smell got a lot worse but I wasn't concerned about where it was coming from at the moment. Both of us pulled our shirts over our faces and rushed into search. I was rummaging through the sheets and a shrill scream came from behind me. I spun around and saw my friend with his hand over his mouth, pointing at a man laying on the floor. We both stood still and waited for him

to move. For a second I thought we were in big trouble, however the longer we stood there it dawned on me. He was the source of the smell and it was because he was dead. I lost my cool after that and yelled out, he's dead, let's get out of here. My friend was hot on my heels. We didn't stop until we reached my house. When we caught our breath I realized we'd left the ball behind and neither of us wanted to go back in so after a long time we gave up and went to my parents and told them what we had found. They were cool about it. Actually, first they made sure we were okay and they called 911. The two of us sat at my bedroom window and watched the police go in and out of the house. When the paramedics brought the man's body out, a police officer followed behind him

with a football. He brought it over and talked to us for a while. We thanked him and he left. A couple of days later, there was a small paragraph in the paper talking about our morbid discovery. Us kids had been coming up with all kinds of horrible causes of death for the man. In the end, it turned out to be a run of the mill drug overdose. Most of us quickly fell back into our normal lives and didn't talk about it unless it was brought up. My friend said his parents had asked him once if he had anything to do with the thing in the paper. Perhaps wisely, he played dumb and just let it go.

To their dying day, I don't think they knew how close he came to losing that ball forever. I was on my postal route one morning when I got the idea. A small part of my route cuts through this old abandoned neighborhood. At the end of the cul-de-sac sits the decrepit two-story house. Something like you'd seen in an old horror movie. This was where I was going to do it. You see, I have this friend, Phillip. We are part of a ghost hunting group in our spare time. It's a pastime I really enjoy and derive a lot of excitement from. Phillip, however, is terrified of anything supernatural. Something as average as a cheesy ghost video on YouTube scares the life out of him. I'll never understand why he puts himself through one of our investigations. I asked him once why he did it and he said it was a way to face his fears,

something he'd heard about on TV. This put the kernel of an idea in my head. When I saw the house, it grew into a full blown plan. I was going to pull a joke on Philip. When it was over hopefully his fear of spooky things would be defeated. Anytime I can get a good laugh and help a friend at the same time seemed like a win-win to me. I called him up that afternoon and told him we had a new house to investigate that Friday night. He sounded excited and I couldn't help but laugh knowing what I had in mind for him. I had two days to get what I needed and set everything up. I'd stop in during my route and look for the best places to rig my equipment.

There were signs of people but from all I could see they had not been around for a long time. Finally Friday night came. After work, I parked my car a few streets over and walked to the house. I wasn't expecting Phil for another hour. I took this time to complete any last minute tasks. I got done with 15 minutes to spare and crawled into my hiding place. Within minutes, I heard footsteps approaching outside. I bit my left to stifle my giggling. I'd never felt so much like a child at that moment. Mere seconds after I heard the footsteps, my phone vibrated with a text message. It was Philip. He said he was held up by a train near

his apartment and was running late. This was bad news. Phil lived almost 30 minutes away. I'd have to lay crunched up in a hidey hole even longer. The steps entered the house echoing down the massive hallway. Wait a minute, this is when it hit me. If Philip was a half hour away, who was here? Voices of at least two men came bouncing down the hall toward me. One man had noticed my equipment and sounded very angry. I heard loud bangs a few seconds later from what I can assume was my

stuff being smashed. The second man had a slight slur to his voice and his words were far more aggressive. If I find out who did this, I'm going to cut his head off and put it on a pole outside. Maybe that'll keep people out. My heart began to beat like it was trying to break loose from my body. I wasn't sure what they were capable of and hoped that they would leave without realizing I was still there. I did my best to not make any noise. I continued to listen and then heard something I dreaded. One of the men, the drunk one, found my bag. I had stuck it in a hole under the stairs to hide it. Even then I wasn't sure that they knew I was still there, at least until the other man began calling for me to come out. He said if I made

them look, they were going to make me sorry and they found me. All doubt was removed with that statement. I could hear them going from room to room, opening closets and doors. They were a few rooms away and I decided I needed to get out of there that second. When I heard them enter the room next to me, I made a break for it. I didn't dare look back and within seconds, I could hear footfalls behind me. So I pushed myself even harder and it seemed to work. The closer I got to my car, the footfalls behind me. So I pushed myself even harder, and it seemed to work. The closer I got to my car, the footfalls seemed to grow quieter. Still, even then, I didn't dare slow down. I ran around to the driver's side of the car and unlocked the door as fast as I could. This was the first look at my two pursuers. I was pleased to see them almost

a hundred yards behind me. They were gasping and fighting for every breath. I wasn't taking any chances though. I started my car and tore out of there without looking back ever again. That was when I remembered Philip was on his way. I made up some quick BS text and sent it to him. I did so just in time. I was four or five blocks from the house when we met each other across the intersection. He pulled up to me and I began spinning some yarn about a wrong address. He must have believed it. He shrugged his shoulders and turned around and headed for home.

I followed him for about a mile just to make sure and then turned off for my own place. To my knowledge, Phil still has no idea how close he was to being assaulted by a pair of angry squatters. The same likely applies to the practical jokes I was planning. After my run-in with them, things got put into perspective. I realized the joke was a childish thing to do in the first place. I put stupid stuff like that behind me now. I'm in no position to tell folks how to live their lives. If he wants to live in

fear, that's his choice. God knows there's worn down or you need a new wheel, wherever you go, you can get it from our tread experts. Until May 30th, purchase four new Michelin passenger or light truck tires and receive up to $70 by prepaid MasterCard. Conditions apply. Details at Michelin.ca. Find a Michelin tread experts dealer near you at treadexperts.ca slash locations. From tires to auto repair, we're always there at treadexperts.ca locations. No one knew where it came from. We all went to sleep the night before and it was there the next morning. Not even the owners of the house on both sides had a clue how it got there. Neither homeowner ever heard as much as the hiss of air brakes during the whole of the house on both sides had a clue how it got there. Neither homeowner ever heard as much as the hiss of air brakes during the whole of that night. The only real indication of how it

arrived was the trailer it was sitting upon. I was still relatively young at the time, around 13, but the subject was a hot topic around the neighborhood and every person I spoke to, whether a kid or an adult, was eager to talk about it. Our neighborhood was somewhat new and off by itself, and it wasn't out of the ordinary for folks to dump things out there. Dogs and cats were the most common, but one or two cars would turn up every year. A house, though, no one ever seen that, or expected it. The days passed, but no information could be gotten from anywhere. Soon it began to take on a spooky and haunted reputation. Along with its phantom-like arrival

in the dark of the night, it did look a little similar to that house from Psycho. The stories first reached me while I was talking to a friend's younger brother. Among the grade school kids, the house was becoming a very real symbol of fear although it was just an old empty house to me. This fear didn't prevent some of the more adventurous of them from entering and exploring it. I witnessed a particularly funny episode just by chance. While loafing aimlessly around the streets, I was passing by in time to see a preteen boy running from the house in terror, claiming that something had grabbed him. Whether his imagination had gotten the best of him or an

older kid was having a bit of fun, the horror put upon this abandoned house had fully taken root in the neighborhood. While all this was going on, a real boogeyman had been forgotten about. I'll not put his actual name here, not because of privacy, but that of his victims. We'll call him Rudy. Rudy had grown up in the neighborhood and, until he was arrested, was well-liked, but a lot of the parents had voiced their fears early on because of his habit of hanging around younger boys. When he was released from jail, he was allowed to move in with his folks. Anyone who wasn't aware of his proclivities beforehand knew now. Every parent in the

neighborhood watched him closely, but when the ghost house popped up, people's focuses shifted. A few of us teenagers were riding our bikes around the neighborhood. The father of a boy we'll call Bill was looking for his son. I overheard him speaking to a young kid close by asking if he had seen him. Nonchalantly the boy said that he had seen Bill going into that ghost house with Rudy just a few minutes prior and this got my full attention. The shock of the father's face is still crystal clear in my mind. I turned around and watched the father run full speed into the house. Most of us there stood transfixed as we saw Bill's dad disappear inside. Things were quiet for about the first thirty seconds, then all of a sudden, a loud ruckus broke out, followed by Rudy flying out of the doorway and onto the ground below.

Bill's dad was close behind. He leapt onto Rudy, throwing fists as he landed. Bill came out a few seconds later crying for his dad to stop. His dad ignored him, standing up and kicking Rudy to the ground over and over. Rudy eventually got to his feet and ran for home. Bill and his dad were right behind him. I continued to watch until they disappeared from my sight. Bill and Rudy would both claim later on that nothing had happened between them. Either way, Bill's dad had the support of most of the community and Rudy declined to press charges on him. Rudy would eventually move away and out of the minds of most of us until he was arrested three years later for abducting and killing two boys near his new home.

Only then did we realize how lucky Bill had been. That night as I'd fallen asleep, I remember wondering what was going to happen to Rudy and Bill's dad. When I woke up, things were normal for a summer morning. Around nine, I was making a bowl of cereal when I got a phone call. It was a friend of mine and he was short of breath and excited. The ghost house, it's gone man. I hung up and hopped on my bike. When I arrived at the end of the street I looked down and saw the empty lot as it used to be.

I rode down to it and a small group were gathered talking to the neighbors. It was much the same as the morning when it appeared. They hadn't heard or seen anything strange. It seemed to leave just as silently as it had arrived. To this day I haven't met a soul who knows anything about that house. Sometimes I think I dreamt the whole thing up, but then I speak to an old friend from the neighborhood and my memories are confirmed. Of course I don't believe it was haunted or anything like that, but I know for sure that something was wrong about it, and I pray that I never see it again. I was too young to remember what the house originally looked like.

My mom showed me pictures taken with the old couple standing out in front of it a few times. The husband passed away in early 1995 with no one left around to help her day to day. His wife sadly had to go off to a nursing home. By most accounts, they were a much loved part of the neighborhood. With their loss, there seemed to come a rapid decline in its fortunes. The sell-offs were gradual at first. Before anyone caught on, almost 20% of the homeowners had moved on to greener pastures. Not all of those owners sold outright. A small group decided to hold on to their properties and rent or lease them out. This unfortunately began to attract tenants of a much lower income level.

In a matter of a few short years, the neighborhood had sunk so low, only a handful of those original families from 30 years before were still around. Those that replaced them rarely stayed longer than 6 months at a time, and the damage they managed to do in that period was often things that couldn't be fixed with a little drywall and sod patches. I think I was around 13 or so when I began to notice how bad things were. It wasn't out of the ordinary to see open deals and shootings had become a commonplace. The last few remaining original families were far from happy with the way things had turned out, but there wasn't much they could do. Most of them were older couples previously unfamiliar with any form of crime.

Once the drug dealers moved into the old couple's house, the remaining law-abiding citizens feared for their futures. After the couple's deaths, the house was left to one of their children. They had rented it out for the first few years, but when the tenants destroyed it one too many times, they sold it off to a young family. The new owners took the time to renovate the house, only to put it back on the market within the year. They were good people and were prepared for the dangers ahead of them. The current homeowners are a largely properly invested company. They managed to rent it out once or twice, but at the time the dealers began squatting,

it had been empty for over two years. Although most of the old families had moved on, there were still enough left to be angered by the dealers' actions. That old couple had been loved so much the very idea of drugs being dealt out of their home was sacrilegious. It was bad enough the neighborhood had been turned into an open air drug market but turning a house, especially that one, into a crack den was a step too far. At first, a few of the men on the street asked the gang to move somewhere else. Their pleas would fall on deaf ears and be answered with curse words and certain finger gestures. They would try calling the police but by the time officers arrived, no one would be present. This strategy wouldn't do anything other than anger the squatters.

They got their revenge one night when they caught Mr. Murphy, my friend's dad, with his guard down. He had gone out to put a letter in his mailbox and the dealers pounced on him. It was initially just a beatdown, but when he tried to fight back, he was pistol whipped almost to death. This ended up being the final straw. The gang wouldn't see what was coming and after it was all over, they would cease to ever be a problem again. Me and my friends began to notice our parents acting extra strange, sneaking off to talk and going mum the second we approached them.

Things went down a few weeks later. Early one morning at around 4am, I was awakened by sirens and lights from across the street. When I rushed to the window, I got there just in time to see the roof of the dope house collapsing in flames. The fire department did their best, but the house was completely consumed by the time they arrived. I noticed my folks were already out front watching which seemed odd. I joined them and the rest of the neighborhood on our lawns to take in the festivities. I don't remember there being a single person upset to see the house go. After the attack on Mr. Murphy, the house went from being a beautiful symbol of a greater time to a den for dangerous animals.

The fire had burned itself out by dawn. That was when they began to bring out the bodies. Six in total lost their lives in the fire. The smiles on many of the men's faces struck me as a little cold, but with all the trouble they'd had, I couldn't blame them for being a bit happy. I was still shocked to see what came next. The arson investigation began within days. The suspicion among most of us was that it was electrical or the result of a lit cigarette. It eventually turned out to be a blatant arson. The evidence showed several trails of accelerant around the outside of the house. A few investigators traveled around

the neighborhood asking each owner if they had seen anything suspicious. No one had, or so they claimed. One incident still sticks with me today. I overheard my parents speaking to the investigator, and my father mentioned more than one attack upon the house by an opposing gang. The problem is, I don't recall the gang ever having trouble with anyone. Anyone but the neighbors. I have since come to form my own opinions on the fire's cause. By the end of this month, the case was closed and ruled an arson attack from a competing drug gang. A demolition company came along right before Christmas and leveled the remaining structure.

That was in 2017 and the lot has been empty since then. The neighborhood, while not as good as it supposedly once was, is a happier place without the dealers. While the drug trade continues in the surrounding area, our neighborhood has remained rather quiet. As I grow older and think on starting my own family, I am of the opinion that the fire could be seen as a sign of better things to come. Maybe the way it was done shouldn't be so important. If it's a flat or a squeal, a wobble or peel, your tread's worn down or you need a new wheel, wherever you go, you can get it from our tread experts. Until May 30th, purchase four new Michelin passenger or light truck tires

and receive up to $70 by prepaid MasterCard. Conditions apply. Details at Michelin.ca. Find a Michelin tread experts dealer near you treadexperts.ca slash locations. From tires to auto repair, we're always there. TreadExperts.ca Events from this story took place during the summer of my sophomore or junior year of college. I remember that I had just celebrated my birthday and was getting ready to head back to campus in the next week or so. For a little background, each year ever since I was little my family would spend 10 days at the state fair. We lived on a farm and would bring some of our animals with us to

stay in the buildings that fairgoers could walk through during their trips to the fairgrounds. We would bring our RV camper and would often rotate who would stay in the RV and who would stay in the buildings with the animals. Most of the time everyone returned to the RV to sleep as it wasn't the most comfortable night's sleep staying in a chair next to the animal stall all night. I have so many good memories from my time spent at the fair. I met some of my closest friends there and it turned into almost like a family reunion that I would look forward to every year. The adults would stay with the animals during the day and the kids could walk around the fair and have fun. At night we would all get together and have dinner and enjoy lots of laughs and stories around the RVs. With all that said, I have one memory from my time spent at the fair that comes across my mind far

more frequently than the positive ones. The fair was going to be ending in a few days and I would be heading back to school as previously mentioned. My friend Casey and I were having a few drinks with our parents and were getting pretty tired, probably from all the wine slushies we had during the day. We started to head back to my parents' RV to lay down and relax for the night. The walk wasn't very long and we were back at the RV in five minutes or so. Casey and I talked a little bit about school and what we were excited to go back to and what we were anxious about for the coming year. The next thing I remember was waking up thinking I heard a scratch or a scratching sound against the RV. Casey was snoring pretty loudly so I figured that maybe that was what woke me up.

I closed my eyes trying to go back to sleep and as I started dozing off I heard something again. This time it sounded like a whisper or very quiet mumbling. My eyes shot open wondering if it was our parents coming back or if I was just hearing things. The windows of the camper weren't typically open but I usually ask my dad to open them during the day in case it got extremely hot. I quieted my breathing to try and focus on what was being said outside. After a few moments of intense listening I heard someone right outside the window whispering, his eyes are open, he sees you, he sees all of you. And then just repeating his eyes are open over and over mixing in something slightly different every few seconds. The voice was wispy like it was being done to

mimic a snake or whisper in a louder fashion. I immediately lowered the brightness on my phone and texted my dad to come back right away. He arrived, slightly intoxicated, a few minutes later to ask what was wrong. I told him what had happened and he said it was probably just a bad dream or something. Casey seemed unaffected as well and went back to her camper to sleep for the rest of the night. I couldn't sleep at all for the rest of the night and made my dad close the windows to make me a little more comfortable. The next morning I got up early due to the lack of sleep and was going to head over to the cows to give them some food and set up there for the day. The day was pretty uneventful and the

memory from the previous night actually started to fade and I was able to relax for a little while. As the sunset started setting in I got a little more anxious and hoped that I wouldn't experience anything out of the ordinary for the remainder of the evening. I decided to make it an early night as the next morning we would pack everything up and get ready to leave and head home. I didn't feel very tired once I got back to the camper but quickly felt my eyes getting heavy as I strolled through Reddit on my phone. Similar to the previous night I was awoken by a sound coming from outside. It sounded like something had bounced off one of the windows. Honestly it sounded like a bird flew directly into the RV.

Fortunately, my dad seemed to hear it as well and said that if he heard anything else, he would go outside and see what was going on. About 15 minutes later, we heard the same noise and my dad threw his sweatshirt on and went outside. Me, both terrified and wanting to know what was going on, followed him to the doorway. He didn't leave the RV. Once my dad got outside, he immediately stopped in his tracks. There was a man standing directly next to our camper. He had a hood over his head and had the most yellow, crooked smile I'd ever seen. That disturbing mix of yellow teeth and a demented grin will forever be burned into my brain. As soon as my dad realized I was in the doorway he yelled for me to go back in and close the door. I did what he said and about two minutes later my dad said that he was calling the police as the guy began to ran off.

He wasn't only contacting the police because someone was seemingly trespassing at the fair but we also had damage to our RV. It had paint on it, red paint with an eyeball drawn and something written in the same red paint. He's here, he's watching is what it said. There was also deep scratches on the back side of the RV that looked a little too deep to have been done with keys. During the commotion most people were up and outside and we discovered that five other campers had similar writing on them. They were spaced out in the parking area and were seemingly done at random. We decided to pack up and leave first thing the next morning after filing a report for the damages done to the RV. We hadn't really discussed as a family since it happened, and the only time I've been to the state fair since then was to meet up with a friend for a few drinks.

Whenever this memory pops back into my head, I feel a sense of anxiety and hope that nothing this creepy happens to me again. I was never a big fan of the fair. It was always overcrowded, hot, and not really my cup of tea. However, I would still go to the New York State Fair each year to get a slice of Sicilian pizza from my favorite pizza stand. Only got the slice once a year at the fair and to visit my dad who would work the fair. My dad always took two weeks vacation from his real job to work at the fair each year. Yeah, weird, I know. This story revolves around the last time I attended the NYS fair. I was there on a Thursday night with 4-5 friends and we decided to do a few rides and do some of the smaller attractions. We started with the house of horrors that advertised the world's largest rat, clearly just another animal that they were advertising as

a rat. I honestly don't understand what else was in there, maybe the snake lady and some fake body parts and jars. Anyways, next we decided to go into the funhouse. The lady that took our tickets seemed to be way too into her job at the attraction. She was dressed the part and sure gave off the creepy vibe you would expect for a funhouse. She had a long black cloak with a large hood attached and her facial features reminded me of a witch even though she wasn't wearing any prosthetics. We moved through the house pretty fast but got a little caught up inside the mirror maze. We got separated slightly but I was staying pretty close to Alex so I wouldn't be separated from the group entirely. As we were maneuvering our way around the maze, I could have sworn that I saw the lady from the start of the funhouse behind one of the mirrors.

I pointed it out to Alex and she thought I was just trying to scare her and laughed it off. We eventually made our way to the exit and decided we wanted to go to the haunted house ride next. As we were leaving the funhouse, the same lady that was at the entrance was at the exit. She stared at all of us as we left and didn't say a word. As we were leaving the funhouse, the same lady that was at the entrance was at the exit. She stared at all of us as we left and didn't say a word. She had a scowl on her face like we had done something to make her mad. After she saw me, her expression changed to a wide grin. She slightly reached out for my arm and said,

Your aroma is intoxicating. Thoroughly freaked out and borderline angry that some random person was grabbing my arm, I just pulled away and asked my friends if they saw that. They all joked that she probably had a crush on me and said that I should go back and get her number. After a decent wait, we made it on to the haunted house ride. I asked Alex if she would sit with me and she obliged. The house was full of animatronic jump scares that probably wouldn't even scare elementary school kids. However, I always did enjoy these types of rides as they reminded me of the haunted mansion at Disney. About halfway through the ride, our car kind of started going backward and forward

and eventually came to a complete stop. There was an announcement that the ride was malfunctioning and that when the bar was raised we should safely exit the vehicle and slowly and safely make our way towards the exit. We got out of the car and started to make our way towards the exit. The animatronic figures were no longer moving or popping out so I took time to walk up to a few of them to see what they looked like up close. They were mostly what I expected. Dirty, dingy and odd looking. About 50 to 60 feet ahead there was a black cloaked figure. I told Alex I wanted to see if the figure was attached to a pole and would shoot out and expose a creepy face under the hood. When I ran up to the hooded figure I got real close to see if I could move the hood

to see what was underneath. To my absolute shock and horror, there was a person underneath the hood, just standing there. Even worse, it was the same hooded woman from the funhouse. She pushed her hood back slightly and said, I followed you. I followed the scent. Wondering if I should run or call this person out, I went with the latter and asked her, What's your problem?

in a stern tone. She just stared at me and didn't respond. Alex then caught up to me and realized what was going on and tried to pull me away to the exit. The woman then grabbed my arm for the second time, this time sinking her nails into my skin. As I pulled away, I could feel that her hand was still dug in. By the time I exited, looked at my arm, there was small slits of skin missing and blood beginning to pool where the skin used to be. My friends were now extremely scared and upset, frantically looking around for someone to help us. I asked them to stop and to just find me a bathroom so I could wash off my

arm with some soap and water. I didn't go to the police office at the fair or make any formal report. I honestly just wanted to move on and not think about that psycho that followed me around for about half that night. And I still think back on this and wonder if that was the right choice. Should I have documented some type of formal complaint? I mean, it did seem like she worked at the attractions and could she possibly have repeated this behavior to someone else? I still tend to think about this event, especially as we approach the summer months. I decided to write about it now as NYS just announced that the fair would be closed this year for the first time ever. So to the creepy, stalker, scratching witch lady,

I'm thankful I won't have to see you again. I want to preface this story with the old saying that you can never really judge a book by its cover. I still haven't fully recovered from the events that took place on this late summer evening several years ago. As time goes on, the mental scars fade away, but it's an experience that I will live with for the rest of my life. During the events of this story, I lived in a fairly large farmhouse in the middle of nowhere. It was an area with little to no traffic or commuters. That is, until the last two weeks of the summer.

Every year my town is the host for the annual fair. To be more specific, the location is just down the road from my farmhouse. I don't usually mind because I am up late most nights and I never really had any negative experiences in regards to people visiting the fair. During this two-week period, it's a lot of loud music, traffic, either by car or some local foot traffic, fireworks, and lights from the fairgrounds. Most nights, I usually just sit outside listening to music and watch the people walk to and from their cars that are parked in the lot a couple of hundred yards or so from my property. Typical of most fairs, parking fills fast and people essentially try to park in restricted areas that are close to my house or

my neighbor's properties. Unfortunately it is not uncommon every few years to have a drunk patron or two stumble towards my property. They're almost always harmless and end up walking down the street just a few minutes later. As a result of our small town in proximity to the fair from my home, I have a very good relationship with the sheriff. We've become pretty good friends over the years and his department does an excellent job of keeping everything safe and orderly for the residents who live near the fairgrounds. I've only had to call him maybe once or twice over the years and it wasn't for anything serious, basically just loitering. Fast forward to the night of the story and I was sitting outside and watching the fireworks and people leave the fair. The fair closed around 10 p.m. and the fireworks were wrapping up and you could see people leaving to get to their cars to

try and beat the traffic. I was getting ready to go inside for the night when I saw a group of people walking towards my house. They were probably in their probably 20s if I had to guess and just seemed loud and intoxicated which certainly wasn't uncommon. The group of people caused no issue and eventually made their way in the right direction and headed to where I assumed their vehicle was parked. Just as I was about to walk inside, at a little bit of a distance, maybe 30 to 40 feet or so, was another woman standing. She seemed very still, just staring from a distance in the dark. She was wearing a bright pink dress and had blonde hair about shoulder length. She broke out of her paws and started moving closer to my property. She eventually got parallel to my front door,

she stopped in the middle of the road, and turned her entire body to face my house. I was in the house at this time with the lights off, so I crept to one of the windows and stood and stared back for a moment to see if she was going to move on. After about 30 seconds, she turned back to the road and kept walking. It was a little weird as no one ever really gets that close to my house but nothing of great concern. I brushed it off as another person who maybe had too much to drink. I got ready for bed and went upstairs to my bedroom to pass out for the night. My bedroom overlooked the front of the house and I could see the road and just as I was going to lay down, out my bedroom window I saw the girl in pink standing in the middle of the road facing my home for the second time. This is where the anxiety started to kick in and I began wondering if the person was lost and maybe got separated from her group. I jumped over to my dresser and called the

sheriff to see if they had someone nearby leaving the fair to check and see if this person was alright or needed any help. He didn't answer. Luckily I had his personal cell so I sent him a text message just letting him know what was going on. If I didn't hear back in a few minutes I figured I would just go outside and ask if she was okay. When I looked back out the window she was gone out of sight. No sooner after I looked out the window I heard a loud bang downstairs. I jumped from my bedside to the top of the staircase and saw that my front door was open with nothing but the moonlight shining in. This was weird because I thought I had locked the door.

I always lock the door, just a habit. I started to get really concerned and then froze with fear when I heard giggles and the light footprints of running on your toes coming from downstairs. I couldn't believe someone could actually be in my house. Was I hearing things due to the recent adrenaline rush? I tried to sneak down the stairs quietly to make a run for the door and as I got to the bottom step I heard a loud and unnerving voice. Hey, where do you think you're going? I turned and got a quick glimpse.

It was the girl in pink. She was standing, slightly hunched over, with both hands behind her back. She had a blank stare on her face, but I could hear a low giggle barely audible through her teeth. Still not sure how someone can giggle with that look on their face. I turned immediately and ran out the front door. To my shock and horror, she was right behind me, following me with one arm waving frantically and the other still concealed behind her back. I'm coming for you, she said with her insidious and terrifying voice. I ran several yards down the road with her right on my tail, trying to gain some distance. Thankfully, by some stroke of luck, a patrol car was moving slowly down the road. This didn't seem to faze this girl at

all. We both kept running. The officer got out of the car and tackled the woman to the ground. I'm not sure if it was because I was screaming for help or if the officer had received a message from the sheriff that I asked for someone to come check out a person wandering around my property. My sheriff buddy ended up on the scene shortly thereafter and shared some of the details with me The young woman could not remember her name and said she had no idea who she was She did however keep telling the cops that she lived at my house and that I was the one that broke into her home One of the most terrifying aspects of the story is that still to this day The woman has no confirmed identity.

She had no ID when they found her. She didn't know her name, her age, where she was from. All she claimed was that she lived in my house, and from what I understand, she was detained then given further psychiatric evaluation. It scares the bejeebus out of me that there was no real motive or backstory to this intruder. I think I'm still missing a little bit of closure as to the why. She wasn't drunk, why did she choose my house? Anyway, if I can say one thing from this experience is that always be on guard and make sure you protect yourself first and foremost because you never know where danger can be lurking.

Last year was the very first and last time I'll ever go on a blind date. At the time of this story I had recently got out of a very long-term relationship and just starting to get out there and meet some new people. Meeting new people has always been difficult for me as I am on the shy side and really don't like putting myself out there. I was set up with a man named John from a co-worker and that is John not the J-O-H-N, he made that very clear from the start. We exchanged numbers through our mutual friend and started to text each other. At first, things seemed to go very well.

He seemed normal, but again, we hadn't met and hadn't really had many in-depth conversations. After about a week of texting, we decided to go on a date to our local fair. People from all over the state drive and even stay at the fair. It's a pretty big gathering with thousands of people attending every year. I figured that if this guy is a lunatic, at least I can run and scream and there will be tons of people to get away from him. I think everyone who meets someone usually does so in a public setting, right? The day finally came and he surprisingly looked exactly like his pictures that I stalked on social media. He was on the taller side,

definitely over 6 feet, muscular build, dark black hair with dark eyes. The night started out fine, other than a few weird topics he brought up in conversation but I really didn't care too much because I was socially awkward and usually couldn't find much to say when meeting new people. We got food together and I paid for my portion which I don't mind because I am an independent person. Around 9.30pm it was almost completely dark. He asked me if I wanted to ride the giant ferris wheel. It actually sounded nice and I was looking forward to it and thought hey it could be kind of romantic for a first date. This was one of those huge ferris wheels that overlooked the

entire fairgrounds and being that it was dark you could see all the lights from up above. We got in line and it was a pretty long wait but he talked almost the entire time which was fine with me because it made me seem less awkward as I just listened and got to know him a little better. The only thing that seemed a little off was that he kept exchanging this weird glance with the couple behind us in line. After doing this several times it was more than coincidence so I asked him if everything was okay. He leaned down to me and basically told me that he thought he may recognize the guy but wasn't too sure, but should probably avoid starting a thing. Seemed like a legit story so I really didn't pay any more attention to the couple.

That is until we're about to board the ferris wheel. As we got into the small shuttle John sat next to me and the attendant let the other couple on with us. I thought that was kind of weird and maybe you had to go in groups of four due to the long line. We started our ascension up the wheel and for the first time all night John was quiet. He was actually just staring down at his feet. But the worst part was the couple sitting across from us. They just sat there quietly staring daggers at me. I tried making conversation with John but he just kind of shrugged me off and stared off the side of the shuttle. We finally made it to the top of the ride and we stopped briefly up there.

My first emotion was awe because of the beautiful view but when I turned back around to John and that feeling of excitement turned quickly to fear. John was staring at me with a half-open smile and his dark eyes looking down at me. I looked across from me and the couple was doing the same thing. John started singing a strange song that I didn't recognize and the couple joined in with him. He just kept singing the same line over and over again. Coming to get you, coming to get you. And the most haunting melody you could ever imagine.

Now I realize this may sound more weird than scary, but imagine yourself being stuck in the sky with three people you don't know, all of them staring at you and singing this weird song. I was not having any of this at all, so I did the only thing I could think of doing, and that was scream. Well, this was a mistake because the three other passengers decided to scream alongside of me and followed the screaming with laughter,

so everyone around me probably figured we were goofing off at the top of the ride. Genuine panic ensued. I kept trying to just get some words out, but I was so uneasy, I couldn't even speak. Finally, I had the great idea to try and call one of my friends from the top of the Ferris wheel, and as I pulled out my phone, John snatched it right from my hands. Finally, I formed a complete sentence and said in my terrified voice, John, what are you doing? You're scaring me. He laughed and responded in a sinister voice, I'm just getting you ready for when he shows up. This strange and haunting sentence was followed by cheering and laughter

from the couple across from me. I tried yelling to the ground, but there was so much noise from the fair music that my voice was being completely drowned out. Again in unison, the group started to say in almost a chant now, he's coming to get you, he's coming to get you. Do not be afraid, for he is coming to get you. I started to cry and freak out. After only a few minutes, which seemed like forever, the ride started up again, and we made our descent to the bottom of the wheel. Once we got several feet from the bottom of the ride paused again, but I didn't care. I jumped from the shuttle and was greeted with loads of gas from the people still alive. Instead of shouting for help, I just ran. It is easy to say what you would do in a situation like that, but my brain was saying to just get out of there and run.

I ran all the way to the main entrance and alerted an officer at the door as to what had just happened. He did allow me to use a phone to call a friend to come and pick me up. Thankfully, she was there in just minutes and I ran to her car. As I got into the car, I saw John alongside the couple sitting on a bench near the main entrance. What was even more terrifying was that they were with another person. A very tall figure dressed in dark brown holding a cane. All I kept thinking about was what they kept saying on the ride about he is coming. Was this the man that they were referring to this entire time?

I got home and reported that he stole my phone and gave the cop all of John's information, but John seemed to vanish after that night. The number from his phone was deactivated. My phone was returned after it was found in the lost and found at the fair, and my friend who introduced us said that he too lost all contact with him. It was as if this John fell off the face of the earth. My friend apologized up and down for weeks that he had set me up with John and that I had that experience. He even started to question whether this was just all some sort of elaborate YouTube prank. I honestly in some many ways kind of hoped that it

was, even if it is wildly sadistic. It took months for me to get out there again and to try and go on another date and unfortunately this has given me a fear of getting to know new people thinking that something like this could happen again. To be continued... I can attest that when you hear these stories and you feel like they can never happen to you, and that the experiences are somewhat displaced from reality, they really do happen, and they do have lasting impacts on people's lives. My experience was easily the most horrifying and disturbing experience of my life. All the names in the story have been changed to keep identities and locations confidential. The night in question started like any other typical late summer evening. My hometown holds a pretty big fair to cap the end of the summertime

festivities and this year was no different. I attended the fair with my two best friends, Kevin and Jeff. Once arriving at the fairgrounds, we decided to meet up with my girlfriend Jamie and her two friends Amanda and Jill. We were all having a blast and eating food, checking out the local items for sale at the tents, listening to music, and walking around just taking in the environment. For those of you that attend your local fairs, you know that something about them brings out some unique people. And shortly after arriving, we bumped into a particular patron who was very unique. It was a middle-aged man, dressed like a clown. His dirty and rugged clothes almost made him look homeless, but

I just figured it was part of the clown getup. This peculiar looking man had a red rubber nose and a clown wig on and shoes the size of a small boat. As we were walking he came from behind us and grabbed my friend Kevin and asked for some spare change. It was harmless, honestly, but just startled our group as we didn't see him approaching. I think we gave him $5-10 and wished him a good evening and continued walking in the direction we were going. After creating a nice distance away from the clown, we decided to take a break from walking, grab a drink as it was pretty hot out. This was when I noticed a man in the distance. He was wearing a red mask, black hooded sweatshirt,

jeans and work boots and was carrying what appeared to be an axe or hatchet. It is important to note that at this point we were on the midway of the fair which contained tons of rides and games as far as you could see. So even though this man gave me pause, I was not real concerned because there were fun houses and haunted house exhibits all over this section of the fair. A few minutes later we decided to do some rides so each one of us could break off into pairs. That's when I noticed the masked man again. We were on one of those old fashioned wooden roller coasters when I noticed the man was standing behind the attraction. As soon as the ride ended I kind of made a dash towards the exit of the ride.

Kevin and Jeff were kind of annoyed and finally yelled for me to stop. Several yards away from the roller coaster I told the group about the masked man and how I wanted to tell some kind of fair security just to see if this man was in fact part of the fair or a crazy person walking around with a weapon. The group laughed and told me to calm down. They pointed to one of the haunted houses and there was a zombie standing outside scaring people in line. A few more exhibits down was a fun house where a killer clown was messing around with guests. They told me to relax and that the Axeman was just part of the fare. I agreed and went back to trying to have a good time with everyone. Toward the end of the night, we were getting ready to leave and head back to Jamie's house for some night swimming when Jeff wanted to get some ice cream. We agreed to stop on the way

out while Kevin, Jeff, Amanda, and Jill waited in line, me and Jamie set off to the side and just people watched until Jamie's face turned ghost white. Once I noticed her expression change, I turned and noticed the axe man standing in the distance. I decided no more games and I ran after the man full speed ahead. I chased him through one of the animal tents but due to the large amount of people I lost him. I figured since he ran away that he must just be someone who worked for the fair and that was messing with us, right? A couple of hours later we were at Jamie's sitting around the fire. It was just the six of us enjoying some conversation and laughs. Our bliss suddenly turned to panic when we heard shuffling through the forest that

sits behind Jamie's house. We stopped talking and stared into the thick dark trees. All we could hear was the crackling of the fire and the stillness of the night as we stared into the dark void. Then out of the darkness was the Axeman and his red mask appeared. He ran full speed out of the darkness was the axe man and his red mask appeared. He ran full speed out of the trees with the same axe in hand. The expressionless red mask and the way his head was tilted is an image I'll never be able to get out of my head. This isn't happening. This can't be real is all I could think of as the six of us sprinted away from the fire. Jamie's house was too far away so we ran to the pool house, which is a small little room filled with all the pool toys and chlorine.

And like every horror story cliche out there, Jamie truly lived in the middle of nowhere. Andy's cell phone was back inside with my clothes. I arrived at the pool house first and opened the door. I just about pushed everyone in and made my way in last and as I tried to shut the door the man threw down his axe and sliced the top of my arm Grimacing in pain

listening to screaming behind me as I was able to grab the door and shut it and lock it the man beat on the door either with his hand or the handle of the axe We screamed and cried, and by some stroke of luck, Jamie had a landline phone in the small little pool house and dialed 911. The axe man must have heard the conversation because he immediately stopped trying to break down the door. We peered out the window and noticed the figure facing the door but not moving.

His black eyes, staring out of the red mask, holding the axe with both hands, he then lifted the axe and threw it at the door. After just a couple of seconds, he removed the mask and this was when I realized he was not a he at all, but a woman. She had makeup running down her face as if she were crying all night long. She fell to her knees and began to scream and cry. The emotions we all felt at this moment were almost indescribable. This is when I noticed Jeff looked like he was about to be sick. The woman with the axe was his ex-girlfriend from college that none of us had ever met.

He was in shock and clearly at a complete loss for words. No sooner after this revelation did the cop show up and promptly arrested her. We all gave our statements and went our separate ways, me, directly to the hospital. Thankfully, I only had to have about 15 stitches, but it could have been much, much worse had it reached the bone. Jamie stayed with me that night, just to make sure that we were going to be okay. Now I know writing this story does sound ludicrous and it might be a stretch for some of you to believe, but I know the fear that I felt that night and the raw emotions that will impact my life forever. Everyone be careful out there and always be aware of your surroundings constantly. And also, be aware of people's histories and the things that might come back to haunt them.

So this story is a bit unsettling and weird. A little different than stories that are usually posted here. The events of this night I didn't really consider scary until years later when I really reflected on what truly happened. I'm 30 years old now, but was only 15 during the events of this story. The evening started fairly normal. A bunch of my friends and I just wanted to hang out, thinking we were cool because we were at the state fair without any adults. It was a group of about ten of us, if I remember correctly. We decided to post up toward the back

of the fairgrounds where all the rides were. We were all just talking, telling jokes, and trying to impress the girls that would occasionally walk by. During our time hanging out in the back, we were approached by a very strange looking person. He was an average height, a little thick in the belly, almost like a beer belly. Bald, but was sporting some hair on the sides. He approached us with great confidence and said in a stern voice, You guys waiting for the ship as well? Thinking this was more comical than scary, we kind of just laughed and responded with, the ship? What are you talking about?

The man smiled and flashed his chipped teeth and again in his confident voice said, yeah, the ship from space. You guys here to board as well? Being kids, we just thought this was a joke. We laughed hysterically and just thought that this guy had a lot to drink or something along those lines. After we had finished basically laughing in this guy's face, I finally responded to him saying, where's this ship going? He responded confidently, the Andromeda Galaxy of course. That was the last straw for us. We were just about hunched over in pain as we were laughing so hard.

Well the man finally realized we were laughing at him and he changed his tone real quick. The confidence in his voice became faint and the man said, Go ahead, laugh at me. When they come, you'll see. We responded by basically saying whatever and stepping away from this crazy guy. At this point, he started to follow us and was now irate, chasing us and was yelling about the aliens. Finally, after a few minutes of this and lots of stares from the people at the fair, I turned around and said in my blunt 15 year old voice, dude, leave us alone. We don't want any part of your ship or aliens, man. Still treating this a joke, but more annoyed and creeped out than anything else, we just kept walking. The man finally yelled, stop. We all turned and looked at the creepy UFO man and he said almost in tears now,

I've seen you in my dreams. You've been on the ship with me. And they chose us. Officially creeped out, I pushed the guy away. He surprisingly went backwards quickly like he weighed nothing. After that, he just started laughing. And with all the commotion, we noticed many fairgoers forming a circle around us to make sure there wasn't an issue escalating. The crazy man started pacing around the circle of people that formed and started to ask everyone in almost a desperate voice now. Are any of you going up? They'll be here soon. We need to get ready. The poor guy was met with tons of laughter.

I started to feel bad for him. It seemed like this person was really suffering from some sort of crazed illusion. While the man was interrogating the other fairgoers, we used the opportunity to make our way to the main entrance. Honestly, we were just done with the guy and done with the night. It was starting to get concerning and we really didn't want any trouble or to have something happen that would need our parents to get involved. Once we got to the main entrance, we took a shuttle back to the parking lot where my mom was picking me up along with three of my friends. We got to the lot. She was not there yet, so we just waited by the entrance to the lot until my mom got there. Right on cue, directly across

from the lot, which is essentially a heavily wooded area, we saw the same guy just standing there staring at us. We didn't say or do anything to provoke him this time. We just watched and waited anxiously for my mom. As we stood there, we noticed that the man just kept pointing up at the sky. He didn't look like he was saying anything, but we wouldn't have been able to hear him if he was anyways. Maybe he was at least 100 yards away. In the distance, we finally saw my mom driving in our green Windstar van. As we approached the doors of the van, we noticed the man was now somewhat rapidly approaching us. Not running, but walking briskly, I would say. We started to move fast, not really knowing if this guy was dangerous or not, and as I got into the passenger side, the man waved from the side of the road,

and I just barely heard him say, I'll see you up there, as he smiled awkwardly at the van. It was not until years later when I was telling this story that I realized just how disturbing it really was. We had no idea if this guy could have cost us harm, if he was insane, or if by some crazy chance there was some truth to his crazy delusion.

I often used to wonder what happened to that guy as I never saw him again. I still attend the fair every year and honestly I will always go back to that spot at the back of the grounds to see if the strange man ever does come back. Either way, it was a very strange and interesting story I really wanted to share, and it just makes you wonder what goes on in other people's minds and what their true intentions are. One of my job responsibilities working for the county was to work maintenance at the fairgrounds each summer before school started back up. I never had an issue with the extra assignment as it would usually lead to overtime and the extra money could always help out at home. Typically we would have a crew of five or six people who would work the fair.

All of us would work after hours and work on specific areas of the fair grounds. My assignment for this year was the animal barns. Now these weren't really barns but were buildings with stalls and pens for the animals to stay for the duration of the fair. We didn't have to worry about feeding or cleaning up after the animals for the most part. We would more do maintenance and cleaning on the building and its public areas. If there were a small issue with water flow or other facilities, we were usually able to take care of it. But our main job was making sure that everything was cleaned and sanitized overnight and in working order for the next morning. I was never a huge fan of working this section with all the animals. The buildings usually smelled and it was really creepy walking around with dozens of

animals in the middle of the night. I would much rather have been assigned to the food areas or even the midway. The midway was pretty much trash duty. Anyways, one night when I was working on the water pressure inside one of the water fountains, I heard a lot of noise coming from the building that held most of the cows. I made my way there pretty quickly to make sure it wasn't something that I had done that was disturbing the animals. When I got there, they were all mooing and moving their heads left and right like they were trying to get out or at least make an aggressive move. The sound was nothing I had ever experienced before. They were mooing over each other and sometimes in unison. It honestly sounded like wolves or huskies or akitas when they howl over one another

when they are together. I had no idea what to do so I just made my way around the building looking for anything out of the normal or something that could be disturbing the cows. I didn't notice anything and after 5-10 minutes the cows seemed to have settled down and things seemed to or be getting back to normal. I figured that probably another animal may have wandered into the building and spooked the cows or something along those lines. I have no idea, I'm not a farmer and for all I know maybe that was normal. Things were normal the next few nights with no strange occurrences. Then on Sunday night as I was getting ready to finish my shift for the night I heard noise coming from the same building once again. I headed over there to see what was going on and it was the same thing,

mooing and moving their head side to side. But this time I felt like I smelled something burning. I started to freak out because I didn't want the animals to be in any danger. I moved quickly around the building to see if I could find the cause of the smell. Eventually I made my way to the ladder that led to the second floor. This floor was only used for storage and really shouldn't have anything up there that could cause a fire. When I got up there I found the cause of the smell. There were six candles, five of which were not lit and one that was lit and slightly torching the wooden floor. There wasn't much smoke at all but the smell was very pungent. The candles must have been burning for some time because there was a good amount of wax

on the floor. I grabbed my phone to turn my flashlight on to try and see if there was any damage and to make sure the fire had been contained to just this one candle. To my bewilderment there wasn't only candles up there but there were three leather bound books. I started to freak out a little and shown my phone around to make sure no one was hiding up there. There wasn't a sign of anyone there but the window on that floor was slightly open and kind of blowing back and forth in the wind. I approached the window but didn't see anything or anyone outside. I went back to the candle area and decided to open the books to see what this stuff was.

All three books looked like a vintage book you'd find for like $500 in your local bookstore. All had blank pages. Not one single page in each book. Completely blank. I thoroughly freaked out at this point and went back downstairs and called my manager to let him know what happened and he sent everyone that was still on the premises over to the building to double check that there wasn't a sign of a trespasser and that there wasn't anything that would put the animal's safety at risk, such as another fire. Nothing else of note happened that evening and the next Monday was the last day of the fair for the year. My co-workers didn't seem concerned and honestly at that time I don't think I was either. But reflecting back on this I'm not exactly sure

what I stumbled upon that night. Was it a random person who was trying to sleep in the building? Was it someone who was up to something more sinister? And what were they doing that was making the animals so upset? If anyone has any comments or suggestions I would look forward to hear what you have to say. May 30th. Purchase four new Michelin passenger or light truck tires and receive up to $70 by prepaid MasterCard. Conditions apply. Details at Michelin.ca. Find a Michelin TreadExperts dealer near you at TreadExperts.ca slash locations. From tires to auto repair, we're always there. TreadExperts.ca. Last year, after a blissful first year of living in a new apartment, all on my own for the first time, a man moved in next door that I will never forget. The layout of the apartment is crucial to understanding this incident, so I made a

little diagram. Floor plan taken from the closest thing I could find online and edited. The most important part is that my balcony and his balcony are only partially separated by a wall and there is a solid two foot gap in which you can easily walk from one to the other. For context, I previously had a very lonely woman living next door for the entire first year I lived there who never crossed this balcony threshold without being explicitly invited. I only throw this in there so you can understand I wasn't previously concerned about someone infiltrating my space. The first time I met this new neighbor, he was unloading groceries from his massive truck into the assigned parking spot next to mine. As I was driving up, he and a girl I assumed to be his girlfriend were unloading boxes from Costco.

I noticed them speaking and as soon as I was out of the car, they went silent. I nodded to them, proceeded to the elevator and the guy ran up behind me, threw some boxes down and begged me to wait. No problem, I'm a good neighbor. While in the elevator, the girlfriend refused to make eye contact or speak to me. A little weird, but I just thought she was shy, but he quickly introduced himself and was extremely chatty. In the 45 seconds it takes to get to the floor where our apartments are, he asked how I liked the place, where I was from, and where I worked. Looking back, his enthusiasm was a little strange but

I chalked it up to him being excited to be in a new place. For the sake of the rest of the story we'll call him Sam. Sam was maybe 33, 6 foot tall with a slim muscular build and had hair buzzed extremely short as if to mask his balding, pretty average looking by all accounts. The first few weeks we run into each other often and he always makes small talk and always refers to me as miss. I assume it's because he forgot my name but wanted to be polite. I almost never see his girlfriend after the first night but occasionally I can hear him talking to a lady in his apartment as the walls are reasonably thin. One night about three months after Sam

moved in, my boyfriend is spending the night and we were watching movies on the couch. It's maybe 11.30pm. The back of the couch is against the wall I share with Sam and we hear some banging noises. My first thought is that him and his girlfriend must be getting it on. Boyfriend and I laugh and turn the volume up a bit to drown them out. Then, in addition to the banging, the neighbors begin to scream. We can hear objects being thrown, glass shattering. The words are muffled but there is distinctively anger and crying going on. My boyfriend, gem that he is, steps onto the semi-shared balcony and, in his loudest voice yells over, without crossing onto Sam's balcony,

Everything okay in there? The girl opens the sliding door on Sam's side a minute or two later and says, Sorry about that. So, we leave it alone. I'm concerned but we have no idea what actually happened and decide to go to bed. Big mistake, I know. I wake up around 3am to more screaming but my boyfriend refuses to wake up and I'm not about to take my 5 foot self to break up whatever is going on at 3am.

I considered calling the police but was so drowsy I convinced myself I dreamed it. I deeply regret that decision. The next morning I woke up to some terrible personal news. An entirely unrelated death of a friend and pretty much put the events of that night on the back burner. I didn't forget but it also wasn't on my mind. Fast forward about two weeks. It's a warm day and I'm outside reading a book in a robe, bra and shorts. I'm in a chair that in a robe, bra and shorts. I'm in a chair that faces away from Sam's apartment so I can't see his side from where I am. I'm deep in my book when suddenly I get tapped on the shoulder.

Sam is standing behind me and asks if we can talk for a second. This man has already crossed an albeit invisible line by coming on my side of the balcony, but I also can't get to my door without physically moving him aside, so I ask him what's going on. He told me it was his birthday, and asked if I knew where to get some Mary Jane because I seem like a girl who knows how to have a good time. As we live in a state where that stuff is legal, I told him that I'm sure Google would provide the best dispensary in the area, but I personally didn't have any. He proceeds to tell me how drunk he got last night and at this point I am itching for an exit. As I start to move as if to signal I'm done talking, he reaches out for my shoulder and tells me he hit and scratched my car last night because he was driving very very wasted. Remember his massive truck? He says all of this with a smile on his face almost laughing. I'm surprised but mostly want to get away from him because my creep senses

are starting to tingle and I don't want to blow up at him for hitting my car. He says he'll send me his insurance info if I give him my number and thankfully I knew that would be a bad call. I make a bad nervous joke about knowing where he lived and said if the damage was bad enough I would knock on his door to get his insurance. He counters by saying he will leave a note with his info on my door. He retreats from my balcony while also saying he'd prefer to just pay me cash and not involve insurance. I give it an hour or so and then I head down to assess the damage. I did this because I didn't want to walk down at the same time as him and risk having him

follow me. Sure enough, there are two long new scratches on the driver's door. They're not deep, just kind of superficial or worthy of a call to insurance immediately. I really just didn't want to get involved with him in any way so I decided I could deal with the scratches but this little event has kind of shaken me. At this point I knew something was off with him. Nothing unusual happens as far as I'm aware this night. The next day is Saturday and as I had to work the next day, I am home alone, watching some action-y movie and it's around 11pm. I'm on the sofa with my cat curled up on me and

the movie is relatively loud so it takes me a little while to register this banging noise coming from the hallway of my apartment building. I honestly only noticed because my cat had woken up and got all puffed up and freaked out. I turn down the volume of the film and suddenly the banging is getting louder and louder. And just as I stand up, I hear the five words no one wants to hear coming from their door. Open up! It's the police! My stomach dropped to the floor. I had lied to Sam the day before. I totally did have some ganja

on me, and I had smoked a joint outside on the balcony, the part farthest away from Sam's, maybe 20 minutes before. I'm totally panicked, high as a kite, and trying to control my breathing so I don't immediately come off as suspicious before I answered the door. I remember checking the peephole to see a close-up of a cop's face and then opening the door, coming face to face with six officers all with guns drawn. I'm about.5 seconds away from completely peeing my pants in fear, still convinced I'm somehow in trouble for smoking a joint. The officer, who seems to be in charge, consents instantly to the level of panic and he says, Ma'am, you're not in trouble. We need to speak with you about your neighbor. Can we come in? At this point I'm reeling and my whole being is tense. I let the cops in but my heart hasn't

moved from my throat. The policeman in charge asks me about any interactions with Sam. I tell them I barely know him, that he just lives next door, only moved in a few months ago. I ask why they needed to be in my apartment. I'm scared, but also I don't typically get along with cops, and I have the right to know why six of them practically wave their guns in my face. The lead officer proceeds to tell me that Sam is a bad guy. He apparently beat his girlfriend so badly the night prior that she is now in the ICU for her injuries. They also told me Sam had a gun and had barricaded himself in the apartment next to mine. They said they had spoken to my building manager and knew my place had access to his balcony and

they needed to use it. Then they asked me to go into the bedroom and lock the doors and turn the lights off. The next 30-45 minutes was complete torture. In my panic, I left my cell phone on my kitchen counter and had to sit in my room just listening to the commotion. No shots were ever fired, but there was a lot of yelling and what sounded like things being thrown. Eventually, after what felt like a lifetime, the main officer knocked on my door and told me that Sam had been arrested and thanked me for letting them use my apartment. They asked me questions for maybe 15 more minutes and left. I wish this is where the story ended, but there's a bit more. In the days following Sam's arrest,

I became even more panicked about him coming back to the apartment building, worried about retaliation. I hadn't said anything to the police to technically incriminate him. I had proof of nothing except his word that he was the one who scratched my car, but I did tell them about the night my boyfriend and I heard them fight. About five days later, Sam reappeared at the building as I was coming home from work one evening. He tried to approach me but the elevator shut just as he was running to catch it. My whole body got tense, like the feeling when you come this close to getting in a car accident but narrowly avoiding it. I stayed off my balcony entirely from this point and always kept the curtains closed. We didn't speak or really see each other at all for another few weeks

and then had our final interaction. Sam stopped me in the parking lot one night, running after me as I was about to get on the elevator. He begged me to tell him why I let the cops in that night. I told him the honest truth, that I was stoned, didn't know what to do, and had a bad history with cops. This is all true and again I was concerned about, didn't know what to do, and had a bad history with cops. This is all true,

and again, I was concerned about him trying to retaliate. He then got pretty upset and kept trying to repeat the question, obviously wanting a different answer. When I couldn't give him one, he then offered me $3,000 to testify as a character witness on his behalf because I knew him and knew how he really treated women. I was speechless and very freaked out. He told me his hearing was the next Thursday morning and he asked if I could show up. I was like a deer frozen in headlights for a moment and then somehow got out of there after mumbling a string of words that were most likely incoherent. The Wednesday night before this trial I came home from work and my cat was acting kind of weird, like something had just spooked her and her tail was all puffed out. I kind of shook it off but I noticed through the curtains that there was something taped to the outside of my sliding glass door. Apparently Sam had left a post-it with his phone number and name and

underneath, I'm counting on you. Needless to say, I never showed up. I took a photo of the post-it, grabbed my cat, locked all of my doors and stayed at my mom's house for about 5 days after that happened. I did phone the police to let them know that he had been on my balcony again but they never followed up with anything. Eventually my boyfriend came and went back to my place together. Everything was as it should have been. I never saw Sam again but a few weeks later a lady that I'd never seen before was cleaning out his apartment. Maybe a month after that new people moved in and things have been normal ever since. I tried calling the police in the county jail to see if he was in lockup again but no one was able to release information to me. I'm hoping that means he's there if he did what the police said he did.

So to Sam I will say I'm not really sure what happened but my biggest regret is not calling the police when I felt like I should have in my gut, and I hope to God I never see you when you get out. This occurred in 2017. Due to a multitude of factors including a recent death of a close friend, I was unbearably depressed at this time in my life. For that reason, my family flew across the country to visit me in LA where I live. We thought it would be nice to visit Catalina Island. When we arrived, it became apparent to us that it was the off season. It was late November, the weather was cold and as a result the island was nearly empty besides locals and a few straggling tourists such as ourselves. Our first priority was to ditch our luggage so we could explore the island so we immediately checked into our motel though that word hardly does the place justice. I call it a motel because all the doors to the rooms exited to the outside, but in actuality our room was one of 20-30 quaint guesthouse looking buildings

arranged in a sort of horseshoe shape around a walkway with rooms on either side of the path. The entrance to the motel was essentially one of the points of the horseshoe, and if you walked dead straight you'd reach the room we were given essentially on the corner before you have to go right to go further into the horseshoe. So from our room one path led back to the street the other further into the secluded maze of rooms. Stay with me. After a day of exploring and having just finished dinner it was time for the cold dark walk back to the room. Catalina Island is a decent distance from the mainland and let me just say, it gets dark. Similarly,

dark was my headspace after the dinner conversation took a left-hand turn and my overwhelming depression got the best of me. I pulled my black hoodie tighter over my freezing ears and walked ahead of my parents to the hotel room, telling them I just needed to go to sleep. And I did, immediately. Depression sometimes makes that easy. I was already losing consciousness as they entered after me, drifting off without so much as a good night. I then woke up to my mom saying my name. A harsh whisper. The room had two beds, my parents' bed closer to the door and mine further in the room. My mom's voice cut through the silence again and she sounded concerned for me. I didn't blame her, considering my mental state at the time.

Groggy, I rolled over. What? I asked. As my eyes adjusted to the dim moonlight coming in through the curtains, I saw her turn to face me. She was surprised to see me in bed. Her eyes got wide. If I'm in my bed, who was she talking to? We both looked back to where she was previously looking to see a hooded figure,

in all black, standing over their bed. Now I know this is Let's Not Meet and you are reading this knowing a creepy thing is going to happen, it is in the title, but understand how horrifically startling it is to be on an island in the middle of the ocean and wake up to see a hooded stranger looming over you. This moment seemed to last forever. Life isn't like movies where characters unleash a blood-curdling scream. Sometimes the only thing that comes out is something panicked and guttural. My mom's words became low and severe as she said my dad's name in a dire voice I'd never heard her use before. Then the hooded figure did something so bizarre and unsettling.

It didn't advance towards us, but instead, crouched in the corner near where it stood. The way it crouched was absolutely unexpected, even in regards to this already unexpected situation that had terrified me. It seemed animalistic. I knew two things. The hooded figure had been standing over us sleeping and is not acting in any sort of way that I can understand. As opposed to the infinite moment of this figure standing over us mere seconds ago, the series of events that unfolded when my hulking ex-military dad woke up happened in an instant. Suddenly we were out the door, not knowing which way the intruder went. My mom was screaming, get him, get him. My dad was running down one path of the horseshoe further

into the hotel, shouting through sheer adrenaline, I'm going to kill you. I ran down the other path towards the street. When I got there, not a sign of the intruder, but it became suspiciously quiet behind me. I ran back to the room to find my dad quietly walking back, his head low. He gets really close to me and I hear him say, It's a freaking kid. The explanation was, some young teen, tall and lanky as I'm in my twenties, wearing all black including a black hoodie, went into the wrong room, our room, the one time my parents just so happened to forget to lock the door. My mom woke up when he entered and seeing a tall person in a black hoodie thought it was me, assumedly leaving the room in a depressive episode.

And when the hooded figure crouched, that was him realizing his mistake and panicking. He was scared of us. As I got back to the room, my mom walked out and hugged this kid, who was now crying his eyes out. I would be too if a massive ex-soldier was sprinting after me with murder in his eyes. This happened to one of my best friends and I back in 2017, and I feel like it's worth sharing.

My best friend, Elise, was dating this guy, Mark, in 2016. They broke up right as New Year's was approaching. I've known Elise for over a decade but we didn't talk much while they were together. I ran into them once at a local coffee shop, hugged her and was chatting away while Mark stared at me in disgust, as if Elise wasn't allowed to talk to her friends. At the time I thought nothing of it, assuming he was just antisocial. I had no idea he would go on to ruin an entire year of my life. It's really fuzzy as to how Mark got in contact with me specifically. I believe Elise posted about her breakup and I offered my support publicly so he targeted me. It began on New Year's Eve. He started messaging me on Instagram over and over again, threatening me and I was having a get together with my then boyfriend,

two of my now ex-best friends and my now ex-best friend's boyfriend. I remember seeing my notification blowing up and ignoring it. Everyone else seemed more concerned than I was. I brushed it off until late the next day. I checked my phone and I had dozens of DMs from Mark, as well as a few public posts that he tagged Elise and I in, calling us every name in the book and claiming I was the reason they broke up. I answered his DMs asking why he was targeting me. This was the biggest mistake I'd ever made. After some angry messages from him, he blocked me and I thought it was over. I also had some missed calls from Elise so I finally contacted her and asked what was going on. She frantically told me that Mark was a dangerous man

and that he's been tormenting her since the day they became a couple. He would throw her around his apartment, leaving awful bruises that she sent me photos of. He would threaten to end his own life if she left him and he even threw a hissy fit at a tattoo shop because they wouldn't tattoo Elise's first and middle name over his eyebrow. He got Crybaby instead. Fitting. Elise also informed me that Mark had went to jail before meeting her for domestic abuse. He stabbed his ex-girlfriend in the leg and was only behind bars for a month before his dad bailed him out. With this new information, I was terrified. Elise told me where he lived and it was directly behind

the coffee shop I had mentioned earlier. I frequented that building and that part of town in general. That'll come into play later. I eventually calmed myself down and forgot about Tim, until he got my phone number. I still don't know how he got it, but I woke up to 30 plus messages from him one day and was horrified. His messages included threats to end his own life if I didn't help him and Elise get back together, threatening to kill me, cries for help, him blocking my number and then unblocking it just to start the cycle all over again. I, being very naive and not wanting to be held responsible if he actually did end his own life,

did not block him. I asked him to leave me alone and if he wanted a number to a hotline where he could get some help and he pretended to calm down for a bit. I gave him the number after many messages from him saying how much he missed Elise but also wanted to kill her. I told her immediately and pushed her to go to the police. She didn't. It conditioned her to believe that she would get in trouble if she reported him. This went on for months. I usually didn't respond and when I did he seemed to chill out for a bit. I'm skipping ahead to a particular night where Elise and I were hanging out at my house. We were chatting away when my phone started to light up. I ignored it and kept talking because I didn't want to be rude. Elise peeked at my phone and said, it's Mark, look. Sure enough Mark was bombing my phones with threats to slit his own

throat because he knew Elise was at my house, calling us both terrible names and claiming it would be our fault if he died that night. I didn't answer, but what came next is something that still haunts me to this day. He sent a video. Being curious, I clicked it, Elise watching over my shoulder. The video was of Mark's arm, a huge gash going down the middle. He was fake crying in the background saying, you made me do this. I hate you both. He clenched his fist over and over again to make more blood gush out. Elise and I were so in shock that we watched the entire 50 second clip despite how disturbing it was. I immediately called our local police station.

Elise gave them his address and an officer came to my house to view the video and take down some notes. While we waited for the police to arrive, Mark posted the gruesome video to his Instagram and unblocked Elise and I just to tag us in it, claiming we told him to do it. Being a conventionally attractive guy with an e-boy aesthetic, the girls that swooned over him commented some pretty harsh things about us and kissed his butt like crazy. He was admitted to the hospital that night, and I wish they kept him. The harassment continued the second he got out. Time traveling a little more now to a few months later, Mark hadn't let up and

Elise and I were still very close. We had a friend, Kayla, visiting from across the country. She also had a run in online with Mark and hated him but wasn't afraid of him. She was always carrying more than one weapon, some pepper spray and she knew how to fight so she suggested we go take a walk in the part of town that he lived in. She wanted to visit that coffee shop, see some of our small businesses and then grab dinner at a pizzeria. Elise and I reluctantly agreed. We parked in front of the coffee shop, grabbed some drinks and started walking down the road. Within about 5 minutes Mark drove by on his motorcycle. Elise and Kayla were immersed in conversation as I trailed behind. I looked up and made eye contact with Mark.

Elise and Kayla noticed him as he was speeding off. Kayla assured us that he wouldn't get anywhere near us with her around so he kept walking. Mark began circling the block we were walking on with his bike. As we crossed the next block, he switched that block and circled it too. On the third block was the pizza place. The walls are all glass, all see-through of course. We went in and were seated in the corner right next to the glass. We sat there for about an hour and a half, eating, talking, and sipping on soda.

Mark circled the restaurant the entire time and we did our best to ignore him. Once we were finished and got up to leave, Mark sped off and we didn't see him again that evening. Some time passed and Mark began riding by Elisa's house every night. Within a week, he started doing the same to me. I told my parents and my stepfather who kept a close eye on our street. My mom always made sure our doors and windows were locked, shades were shut before going to bed. My dad would even do a nightly patrol where he would drive around my street for a few minutes on his way home from work since he no longer lived there. He would call me and let me know that the coast was clear as he was leaving. I still woke up almost every night to the sound of his motorcycle engine revving outside my house. We had no proof of this to show to the police because he was

somehow doing this without a trace so we didn't bother reporting it. At the end of 2017, Mark took his motorcycle and sped off to California to avoid the legal trouble he'd gotten into here. Elise and I were relieved to say the least. He still harassed us from time to time but he never came back. We stopped hearing from him after a while and we thought nothing of it. Fast forward one last time to September of 2019. Elise and I were out and about enjoying the sunshine when she got a phone call. Mark was dead. He had died right after his calls and messages to us stopped. He got into it with his new drug dealer in Arizona and made them angry enough for them to shoot him

and he died instantly. He also caught two more domestic violence charges in California and Arizona and was on the run from his warrant. His father told everyone it was an accidental overdose because Mark was known for abusing Xanax and other miscellaneous drugs, but it was to cover his sociopathic son's butt. I'm not sure if Mark's death was his karma, or some higher being protecting us, and of all the girls he's hurt before and would hurt in the future, but he's gone now. We never have to worry about our safety because of him ever again.

Although seeing photos of him does still grip me the creeps and I feel terrible that he had to come to such an unfortunate demise. When I was around six, my parents divorced and my dad was soon given full custody as my mom was an alcoholic and had racked up a few DUIs and such. Anyway, we, me, my younger sister, and my dad moved to a new neighborhood and we transferred to the nearby elementary school. The school was pretty close to my new house, maybe 5 to 7 or so blocks away, close enough to walk, but my sister and I, also a girl, were too young to walk alone. Sometimes our dad would walk us to school in the morning and then walk back and less commonly he'd walk to pick us up. Most of the time he picked us up in his black Mazda. The way pickups worked at my school was pretty common. We went out with our class, stood by our teacher and classmates and when a car pulled up designated staff members would ask who the student was that they were picking up and then go find them from their class and escort them to the car. Seeing as my mom was in jail at this time,

the only person who ever picked me up was my dad. One day I was in third grade and my sister was in first. We were outside waiting to be picked up. After being outside for only a few minutes, my little sister came over to me and said someone who wasn't our dad was in a car to pick us up and said both of our names and they'd found her first. She said he'd smiled at her and told her our dad had told him to pick us up that afternoon but she said she wanted to find me first before she got in the car since she didn't recognize him and thank god she did that. Our dad had always told us not to talk to strangers so I grabbed my teacher and told her what had happened. She got really alarmed, this scared look on her face and told us to stay where we were while she told another teacher or something. Our dad arrived to pick us up a few minutes later and we got home safely. We told him about it and we all had a long talk about safety protocol.

He asked my sister to describe the man and the car and he called the police and gave them the best description he could. Although my sister was very young and wasn't very focused on important details like that. A few weeks later it happened again but this time he said my name. My dad had given the school the same info he'd given the police but presumably he had multiple vehicles because my sister said he'd been in a red car and this one was black similar to my dad's. I saw the black car and ran up to it but luckily I caught a glimpse of the face before I opened the door and hopped in. He was a middle aged man, really pale, with a really angular face. We made eye contact and his mouth was smiling but his eyes looked really wrong to me, squinty and almost angry. I turned back towards the carpool assistant who delivered me to the car to alert her but by the time I did, the car was gone and I couldn't give many details.

My dad contacted the police again but without a license plate, they weren't able to do much. The last time I saw him was until months later near the end of elementary school. I was walking home with a big group of kids that lived in my neighborhood and he drove by us and slowed the car down to try and talk to us. I recognized his face immediately and alerted the other kids to run. Luckily, we were only about three houses down from where one of my friends lived and we all piled into her house, concerning her parents significantly as we explained the situation. I never saw him again after that. My dad started dating my now stepmom and we moved to her neighborhood and switched schools shortly after. I still think about him occasionally though.

His face was actually in my dream a few nights ago which reminded me to write down my experience. To this day, I'm in my 20s now. I don't know how he knew our names. How he knew anything about us really. Very scary to think about what would have happened to my tiny little sister if she'd gotten in the car with that man, and what might have happened to me if I had. So when I was in high school, it was my senior year. I was 5'3", about 95 pounds.

I was at the park down the street from my house waiting for the school bus. Usually my boyfriend, who was already graduated, would drive me to school, but he was busy. I later found out that he was cheating. Well, there was usually a few of us girls there waiting, but this day I was the only one. So I sat at a bench and had one headphone in and one out so I could listen to my surroundings. I've always been cautious of what's going on around me. As I waited, a black Honda pulled up and I immediately noticed it. I kept an eye on it because I had a bad feeling about it.

I wasn't making it obvious that I was watching it because I didn't want to look crazy but after a few minutes two big men got out. I immediately texted my boyfriend that I was at the park and these guys were creeping me out. Of course he didn't text back so I copy pasted the same text to my cousin who was home, I live with my aunt and two guy cousins, unwinding down from the night shift. I wanted someone to know the car make and color plus it was two men and didn't get any responses. When they got out of the car they started to walk towards me, so I got up from the bench and

walked towards the street because the bus was supposed to be there any minute. The driver actually ended up being a little late. As I stood by the street, these men walked up to me and I could feel the bad energy. One guy said hello as the other stood there staring me down. I just did a small smile and a nod, then looked away. Then the same guy, I'll call him number one, asked how old I was. I didn't respond. I could tell the other guy number two was getting mad that I wasn't feeding into it. Then number one kept asking me yes or no questions like, do you have a boyfriend? Do you live close? Do you do drugs? We have some, do you want some? And then number two asked me if I knew what the black market was. I felt a cold rush go over my body and I got the chills.

Number two who was quiet the whole time started to tell me how they just got back from Russia but the way he said it was so scary, also intimidating. I knew they were from somewhere else because they had a strong accent but I couldn't pinpoint the place. They kept telling me to go to their car because they have drugs. I said no thank you. Trust me, I wasn't a straight edge in high school but I wasn't stupid either. I would never get into somebody's car that I didn't know. Then number one asked if I had a car. I said no and that my bus is almost here, sorry I have to go. And by some sort of miracle the bus rounded the corner and the guys backed off. They had been inching closer and closer as they asked me questions but before the bus got to me, number one handed me a card and said that he has a car shop and to call him sometime if I

ever need anything. He even stated that he'd give me a free car. The card looked shifty and I didn't want to grab it but I knew I needed that number on it to report it. So I took it and they walked off super fast. Finally the bus stopped and picked me up. As soon as I got on I started to cry. I had a complete meltdown. It was like all the adrenaline was keeping my mind and body aware and focused while the men were there but as soon as I was safe my body and mind gave out. Thankfully there weren't many people on the bus so the driver calmed me down before we took off and I explained to her what had happened. When she looked around for the car

they were gone. She said she saw them around me but thought I knew them because they were so close to my person. The driver called into her dispatch saying that there was an incident so that they could notify the school. She continued to pick all the other students up but when we got to the school she walked me into the office. I was absolutely terrified to be alone. The principal came out and so did campus security. They were so sweet and gentle with me as they brought me back to the principal's office. Both were men and they proceeded to ask me questions about the men, their car and the questions the creeps had asked me.

I cried the whole time. Then I pulled out the card that they gave me and handed it to the principal. He looked at the security and said that he was going to call it and act like my dad, so he did. It was on speaker and the number one guy actually answered. I knew his voice as if though it were burned into my brain. It took everything in me not to have a panic attack. The principal asked the guy if he could get him a card a good price and the guy played dumb. The principal said his daughter, me, gave him the card. As soon as he said that, the guy hung up. They tried calling again and the phone was shut off. They eventually disconnected. I could see a shift in the principal and security as soon as the phone clicked. The security got on his phone and called the police and

had them come to the school. It was as if they finally knew it was real, like my crazy story wasn't made up. The principal excused himself and the security guard and they talked for a minute in the hall. I could hear everything they were saying. She's lucky to be alive. This is serious. We need to call her parents to come get her. When the police got there, they came into the office that I was sitting in and asked me for the story again and in front of the principal and security guard. I feel like they wanted to see if I was being 100% honest, so I obliged. The officers were straight up with me and told me it sounded like they were

watching us girls at that park because they chose the one day that one of us were alone. He also said the card was being used as bait to get me to go where they wanted. I felt sick. I felt like I couldn't breathe. The school called my aunt but she didn't pick up. The only person that picked up first was my boyfriend. One of the officers talked to him as the other finally got a hold of my aunt. My boyfriend ended up picking me up and taking me home and I cried the whole time. When I got there, my grandma, uncle, aunt, mom, and cousins were all out front. The women were all in tears and the men were livid but worried for me. A week later, some girl at another local high school, not far from the park, was saved by other students. She

was being dragged into a black Honda by two guys. The other kids stood up and grabbed her and pulled her out of the car. The principal called me into his office and that's how I found out. They also had the same officers there and had me choose the two guys out of the picture lineup. I pointed them out fast. They were caught. It was in fact those two guys that tried grabbing the girl, a freshman girl. I felt worried for her and sad that she went through worse than I did days. I'm thankful to be alive and well, and I'm even more thankful that the girl was also saved by the courageous kids at her high school. This happened about a year ago. There were so many terrible factors working against me that night, I'm astounded I got away unscathed, at least physically. This all begins when I'm in my

friend's apartment who lives in a really rough part of town. In a series of poor decisions, that night I decided to get belligerently drunk and take a few pills of God knows what. I know, I know, safe to say, after a solid night of partying, around 4am I was not in the right state of mind. My drug-addled brain decides that instead of staying the night at my friend's apartment like I normally would, I wanted to Uber back to my own apartment. My friend's apartment had two separate entrances and exits to the building, one in the back, unlit, parking lot of the building, and one facing the street. They had two sets of keys for each door and I only had keys to the one in the back of the apartment. Since my Uber would obviously

arrive at the street and the door in the front of the building locked itself behind you, I exited this way when the driver was soon to arrive. Looking back, standing outside that apartment, I realize I look like the easiest target on the planet. I'm a small petite female in my early twenties and I can hardly stay upright. I'm using a street lamp to prop myself up and not doing a good job at either. The light was basically a beacon for any nearby predator saying, come get me I'm not paying attention to my surroundings at all in this state Despite the fact that there are literally a bullet hole in the front door I just came out of Not good

I remember checking to see what car I was getting picked up in And was only able to pick out the fact that it was a black sedan Soon after stepping outside, a black sedan pulls up to the curb and starts rolling down the window so I step forward. Before this man even spoke, I could feel something was wrong. He had an expression like he was tearing me apart with just his eyes. After seeing that look, it gave me a new meaning to the word predator to describe a criminal because I then knew what it felt like to be prey. He basically barks at me. I'm your Uber driver.

This was the second red flag that somehow made its way through my brain. Normally Uber drivers just roll down the window and say your name or any version of that but always include your name. I think I just stared at him for a second, my brain slowly piecing together the situation I was potentially in and I ask him, what's my name? He immediately is enraged and starts screaming about how he doesn't have freaking time for this and just get in the effing car etc etc. I don't think I've ever been sobered up so fast in my life. I'm completely panicking. Obviously, this wasn't my Uber. Quickly checking the license plate, I immediately see it's not a match. Meanwhile, this guy is still screaming at me and I have absolutely no idea what to do. If I bolt in either direction, this guy could easily outrun

me or even have a weapon. I'm also pretty sure at this point that if he's trying to nab a random girl off the street, he must have a weapon of some sort. I can't run back into the apartment door right behind me since it locks behind you and I don't have the keys nor the time to unlock it. Running towards the back door would do nothing as well and as he's idling right by the mouth of the driveway towards the back parking lot and again, I would have to take time to find the right keys and get in. If I screamed, I'm not exactly in the type of neighborhood where someone would try to be a vigilante and I can still hear the music radiating from my friend's third floor apartment. I knew

they wouldn't hear me. It's also 4am and absolutely no one is around. People talk a lot on the sub how they either sprint into action or freeze but I felt incapable of doing either. It was the absolute worst feeling I'd ever felt in my life. Everything in me wanted to run but I felt that if I did it would be the end of me. But if I kept standing there, staring in shock at the screaming man, the result would be the same. From when he started screaming at me to this point I'm guessing only 20 seconds had passed. Just as he's looking like he's getting ready to get out of the car, another black sedan pulls up right behind him. Checking the license plate as quickly as I can, I realize it's my actual Uber and make a full

sprint to the car, really only like 6 steps, and throw myself in, screaming at my real Uber driver, what's my name? The poor dude looks terrified but responds with my name quickly to which I reply, get me out of here, that man's trying to kidnap me. If I was in this Uber driver's position, I think I would be too shocked to react as quickly as he did, but my dude flew out of there, offered the call of the cops for me, which I declined and now regret, and then walked me to the front door of my apartment, ensuring I got inside safely. Truly an incredible human being. You can rest easy knowing he got the

fastest tip my college student bank account would allow for, although he deserved much, much more. For a bit of backstory, relevant to why I didn't freak out sooner, I live in a big city which is mostly a friendly place but like all cities, it has its rough areas. There are two main spots that are known to be particularly rough, and for the first 14 years of my life I lived in one of these areas, so though it can naturally be a bit uncomfortable, I tend to be pretty unbothered by drunks, addicts, creeps talking to me on the street. Anyway, I moved from one rough area and moved to a safer one, but it's very near to the other, arguably worse, rough area.

I know both of these areas pretty well too, which helped with what happened five months ago. So I had some stuff going on in my personal life and got through phases of bad anxiety as it is. I had to make the decision to take some time off of work but wanted to try and stay in a routine and be productive. What do productive people do? They go to the dentist way past when they should have. So I made my appointment and when it rolled around I walked there. My dentist is in the rough area that I now live close to. On my route home I have to walk past a pub on a main road which has a super bad reputation. Anything you can think of, it's happened inside or just outside of this pub. Stabbings, shootings, drug raids, the lot. How it's still allowed to run I have no idea. Anyway, I notice someone sat at the bench

outside the pub. I have my headphones in but see him saying something so I assume he's asking me for a lighter or something and I take out an earplug. He asked me if I want to join him for a drink. This was around 11.30am by the way. I just slightly laughed and said no thanks. Now as soon as I got a few steps away I had this bad feeling like something was just not right but as mentioned I was going through a phase of bad anxiety so I chalked it up to being that. After about two minutes I go to turn left and see the man walking in my direction in the corner of my eye. I told myself it was nothing but took my headphones out anyway just in case as I was about to walk through a narrow road that leads to a car park and is always very empty.

All of a sudden I hear him shouting at me, Hey miss, I want to talk to you, wait. The usual stuff. He catches up to me and tells me, I'm not a creep but you're too beautiful to let go. I try and stay polite but also make it clear I'm not interested. I have no idea why but seem to have lost the ability to lie so when he asked if I was single, I said yes. When he asked what I was doing that night, a Friday, I said I had no plans.

I 100% know I should have lied and as the truth came out, I was really annoyed with myself but hey, ho. He seemed to get the message and I say I really have to go so I carry on walking thinking that's the end of it. So I make my way across the big car park. Also worth noting here that I can only go two ways, where I'm heading or back the way I came. At the end of the car park is a cycle pedestrian lane that has a massive wall on one side with two lots of steps that lead to a car park to a retail park and bushes on the other end is super narrow. I get into the lane and hear footsteps like someone is running,

probably a jogger. I'm being paranoid and till right behind me I hear, at least give me your number. I finally start to panic and realize actually it's not my anxiety and this is incredibly shady. I give him a number but change the last digit and this guy proceeds to attempt to drop call me. Clearly my phone doesn't ring and he then starts getting annoyed saying I need to give him the right number. I apologize. He then has his hand basically on my phone, stood way too close to me and orders me to type his number in and drop call him. Awesome. Creep now has my number. Still not enough for him. I reiterate that I'm on my way somewhere and seriously need to get going.

What happened next is honestly a blur and I must have had a massive adrenaline rush. He had something but I can't remember what, I think I sort of blacked out and then he grabbed me by the elbow. Next thing I knew I was at the top of one of the sets of steps that led to a much busier and open space. I had obviously panicked, yanked my arm free and legged it. Pretty impressive how fast I got on all those steps considering I haven't been to the gym in months. Luckily, one of my friends works in one of the stores in the retail park so I walked over to it practically looking over my shoulder the whole time. I find my friend visibly shaking, can barely speak. She asks if I'm okay and I just burst into tears. I gather my thoughts and say what just happened and try to downplay it saying if I'm okay and I just burst into tears. I gather my thoughts and say

what just happened and try to downplay it saying that I'm just being dramatic. He's been calling my number this whole time. She takes my phone and notes his number and then blocks him. She takes me to the staff room and convince me to file a police report which I do. Unfortunately though I found out street harassment is not actually illegal where I live but because he made physical contact it might not be a complete lost cause. Police tell me they will be in touch. Now fast forward until around two weeks ago my mom's friend who knew about what had happened sent her an article and asked her to show me. I genuinely couldn't believe my eyes.

It was about a man who had followed a girl and then assaulted her in the same rough area. At the end of the article, it's a picture, and it's him. I haven't heard anything from the police, and since he had already been charged, I figured there wasn't any need for me to contact them again. I wish that they had taken what I said more seriously though as I specifically remember my friend saying someone younger or less used to that behavior might not have got away or ran which was what convinced me to file the report in the first place. My heart goes out to the girl and although currently in jail, I really hope neither of us have to face him again. His charge was pretty serious, so he'll be there for a long time, thankfully. That meant my first serious boyfriend when I was 15 in secondary school in 2005.

We ended up being together for about two and a half years. We were in the same area, myself being only three months older than him. We clicked with each other's friend groups so everyone tended to hang out with no issues. A few months into the relationship some small red flags started to appear. Another guy tried talking to me to which my boyfriend threatened him and this landed him in detention as it happened in school time. This was the first of many times I saw a very scary side of him. Other occurrences that were massive but in hindsight they really were was him smashing his bedroom window because I didn't want to go and get drunk one night. Him throwing drinks over me and when he started to rear his ugly side even more,

he pinned me against a wall because one of his friends sat next to me on a sofa at a party. Thankfully his friends pulled him off of me and gave him a bit of a talking to, but it was put down to just too much drink and forgotten about. So time goes by and we briefly split up because he was taking a lot of drugs, mainly ecstasy and speed. I didn't really want to be doing all of that, meaning we spent a lot less free time together so I called it a day. We were apart for about a month before getting back together, in which time I had been casually chatting with someone else which didn't really go anywhere. One morning when we were still in bed, he had a text from a local friend and went to meet them, leaving me in bed at his house. His mom, stepdad, and sister were out. So after about five minutes I got up and went to use the bathroom when I heard his car screech to a halt outside.

I could hear his front door fling open and smash the wall on him pounding up the stairs. I could hear him breathing very heavily like he was almost growling. The bathroom door was locked, it was wooden, so it didn't take him much time to smash it through. He screamed at me about how I had been talking to someone whilst we were split up and how could I, despite the fact that he was hooking up with someone else in his friend circle. I explained it was only texting and that we were split up but that fell on deaf ears. He went on to rip my vest top strap and rip my boots, hug boot type things that went up to the knee and then told me to get out and walk home which was about 5 miles. I live in the UK in a very quiet area, there tends to be a small

village, then like a mile stretch of quiet road, then another village, then a mile stretch of road, and so on. So I'm walking back on the first part of the quiet road with my top hanging off of me and my boots flapping all over the place as they've been ripped when I hear his car. He has a Saxo VTR with a telltale loud exhaust. There was no way I was dealing with him again so I jumped over a hedge and hid. I remember getting scratched up from the brambles but I didn't care. I just crouched behind this hedge hoping that he'd just disappear. I'd heard his car drive up and down that road a few times before he gave in and figured it was safe. I ignored all of his calls and luckily made it home safe running most of the way.

I received messages from him apologizing and telling me how he'd end his own life but I just didn't care at that point. After some time he finally left me alone and I just concentrated on college and spending time with my friends. I really wish that was the end of my interactions with him, but it wasn't. I was on a night out in my local town with friends. I put my ex to the back of my mind as it had been months now without hearing anything or seeing him. There I was minding my own business, dancing away when he just appears out of nowhere. He tries to talk to me which I acknowledge but really am not in the mood for it so I go to the toilet near the exit and decide how to handle this. One of my friends was working at the local Asta that night and I knew that

they'd finish in about an hour so I decided that I'd leave the club and walk to the Asta and wait for them to get off. I knew it'd only take about 15-20 minutes to get there. In hindsight, that was the stupidest idea, but I just wanted to get away from him. I peer out of the toilet and although it's busy, I can't see him. So far, so good. I quickly run to the cloakroom and hand him my ticket to get my coat back, shove it on, and get out the door. There were people outside smoking and just hovering about chatting. I glanced around as

I walked through and didn't see him so figured it was fine for me to dash off. About 10 minutes into my walk I start to feel uneasy. I don't know why, I'm just full of dread. I turn around and about 30 feet behind me is my ex. Following me, eyes locked on me not saying a word. He looks evil. He must have been waiting for me to come out of the toilets or clocked me getting my coat and kept a distance behind me the whole time. So it's past 12am. The roads are dead because of the time. There's no nearby houses.

I realize in this moment just how badly I messed up. I text my friend quickly telling her what's happening, where I am, where I'm going to. She tries to call but I cancel it as I don't want him knowing I've alerted people to whatever this situation is going to turn into. I pick up the pace and can hear that he does too. Ahead of me, like out of a horror movie, is the underground pass. It's a walkway that goes under the main road and brings you out into the Asda car park. I had to either run through this hundred yard dimly lit tunnel or turn around and face him. I decided to screw it and sprinted through the tunnel after all, Asda was open on the other side.

There would be for sure someone in the car park, they had a 24 hour petrol station and a gash point etc which many people do use. So I bolted through and this is when he starts shouting abuses at me. You effing this, you effing that, the usual. I get through the tunnel and I'm so relieved to finally see Asta all lit up, knowing that people were inside. I notice a youngish guy on a moped not too far off from the entrance. I let my guard down, figuring that I'd be left alone now someone else is visible, but I was wrong. So very wrong. The next thing I know, I'm being grabbed by my hair.

He takes my phone out of my hand and smashes it on the floor. I start shouting and the moped guy hand and smashes it on the floor. I start shouting and the moped guy sees us and legs it into the store. Great. So crazy X here starts pulling me backwards towards the underpass and I start noping and panicking real hard. If he gets me in that underpass I'm screwed. So with all my might I swing up and punch him as hard as I could in the face. It was then I remembered he still had a hold of my hair as he ripped a clump of it out. He grabs me again, picking me up by the throat only to throw me to the floor, cutting my knees in hand. He's now screaming at me, calling me all sorts of expletives for hitting him.

At this point I start to hear shouting and to my relief, it's getting closer. The guy on the moped has alerted staff to the situation outside and a variety of people were running out towards us. A security guard, staff member and even a customer. My ex started to run but was caught. The staff at ASDA had rang the police who were on their way. I saw my friend and just collapsed into her arms like a baby. The police were there in about 5 minutes. They arrested him and took me to the station to make a statement. They had to take photos of all my injuries, all inflicted by someone I once loved.

Bruises, grazes, cuts, a patch of missing hair. I felt embarrassed and ashamed. I remember the police officer trying to lighten the mood by joking about me managing to punch him at least. What happened after was just all blur. I shut myself away and developed bad anxiety and panic attacks due to everything that happened. I remember an officer visiting me telling me about a court date. I didn't attend. In hindsight I should have but I couldn't face him in those evil eyes.

I didn't want to remember the fear I felt looking at him. I just wanted it all to go away. It was in the local paper that week, details of his court date, etc. I was told that he had been in an anger management program and had started counseling. He was forced to face what he was, which I'm glad of as he was a monster. I've been doing my one hour of outdoor exercises at night because I find it most relaxing. My neighborhood is very quiet and I'm lucky to live in a nice area which I've always considered super safe. I used to walk at night even before lockdown because I live right next to a canal so there are lots of nice paths that are super pretty at night when everything is all lit up by the moon. Anyway, I was walking last night and decided to go to the shop first because I was hungry and then detour back to my usual route along the canal. When I was walking I heard two guys speaking super loudly in German. I live in

England so it was a bit unusual but not anything I thought twice about. They looked around 30, pretty tall, and they had caps on which I remember because they had matching designs which I thought was funny. They started getting really close and when I glanced back to look at them, they started jeering so I knew they were looking at me which kind of freaked me out so I sped walked towards the shop but had to stop at the road. I wasn't planning on getting hit by a car. They caught up with me but didn't stop for the lights to change, just walking across and went into the store I was headed for so I shrugged off my hunger and decided just to go to the canal for my walk.

I stopped thinking about the men soon after, chalking it up to me being a generally anxious person. I don't particularly like walking past strangers at night and I'm self-conscious enough as it is without them talking to me or about me. Anyway, I complete my walk and I'm self-conscious enough as it is without them talking to me or about me. Anyway, I complete my walk and I'm headed back home. For the story to make sense, I need to describe where I was stood. On my right, there is the water itself. I'm stood on the path and to my left, there is a big drop that goes straight onto the main road. And next to that road, there is a row of houses. There is a railway bridge in front of me. I have my earphones in and my music is pretty loud, but I think I hear someone shouting,

so I take one earphone out and listen, but it's pretty silent apart from passing cars in the road below me. That's when I see two men heading towards the bridge, and I immediately recognize them as the two guys who had jeered at me before from their caps. I stopped walking as my anxiety floods back and considered phoning somebody because I irrationally think if I'm on the phone when they walk past me they won't bother me but despite the fact that I've stood frozen for ages nobody comes out from under the bridge. I wait staring at the bridge for a while in complete confusion because there's no way that they could have just vanished. I can see through

to the other side of the bridge, so I knew they didn't turn around and walk away or anything, but they certainly hadn't walked through because no one passed me. After a few moments, I start to think I hallucinated them or something. I have no history of hallucinations, but I couldn't explain it any other way. So I started slowly walking towards the mouth of the bridge and just as I'm about to step in, I see it. The shadow of one of the men cast across the wall. My blood literally ran cold as I realized what was going on. They were waiting for me at the other side of the bridge, but they must have hidden behind the abutment so I wouldn't see them. My mind went to a million different places panicking about what they would do if I walked under that bridge. I was convinced

they'd just follow me. If I stayed where I was and phoned for help I was certain that they'd come out to see what was going on and I'd be trapped. I did the only thing I could think of. I quietly ran to the fence that separated the canal path from the drop to the main road and climbed it. It was only about thigh height and on the other side there was a small space before the wall and drop itself. I waited for a couple of moments as the cars passed but thankfully I live in a quiet area so the road was soon empty. I managed to navigate myself so I could lower myself off the drop without A making much noise or B hurting myself too much and the moment my feet hit the ground I raced to the side where the houses were and sped walked down that path as fast as I could without making noise only glancing back when I was nearing the edge of the road. The van were still next to the bridge.

I could see that they were looking through the bridge to see where I had gotten to. I felt sick and terrified, but I made it home. I don't know what they wanted. I don't know who they are or if they'll be there again tonight, but I do know I'm not going to be walking at night for a very long time. Hey friends, thanks for listening. Be sure to subscribe and click that notification bell to be alerted of all future narrations. If you got a story, be sure to submit them to my subreddit, rletreadofficial,

and give and receive feedback from the community and maybe even hear your story featured on the next video. And join my discord to interact with me and other listeners directly. If you want to support me even more, grab early access to all future narrations for just $1 a month on Patreon, and maybe even pick up some Let's Read merch on Spreadshirt. And check out the Let's Read podcast, where you can hear all these stories in long compilation form and save huge on data, located anywhere you listen to podcasts. Links in the bio. Thanks so much, friends.

And remember, if you mess with the honk, you get bonked.