The Lets Read Podcast - 217: I BARELY SURVIVED HIGH SCHOOL | 23 True Scary Stories | EP 205

Episode Date: December 12, 2023

This episode includes narrations of true creepy encounters submitted by normal folks just like yourself. Today you'll experience horrifying stories about High School, New Jobs & Stalkers... HAVE A STORY TO SUBMIT?► www.Reddit.com/r/LetsReadOfficial FOLLOW ME ON - ►YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/letsreadofficial ► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/letsread.official/ ► Twitter - https://twitter.com/LetsRead ♫ Background Music & Audio Remastering: INEKT https://www.instagram.com/_inekt/ PATREON for EARLY ACCESS & Bonus Content!►http://patreon.com/LetsRead

Gauteng Gao Ting was born in March of 1989 in China's northern Shandong province. She was the daughter of a prominent businessman who not only ran a large-scale machinery company, but was also a representative of the local People's Congress, a combination which made him a very influential man. In September of 2004, Gao Ting enrolled in a public boarding high school. The school housed many students on campus, including Gao Ting, but since her home was within walking distance, Gao often wandered back to her parents' house to raid the pantry under the guise of a catch-up. She was a gifted young lady, both musically and intellectually, and according to friends,

she was perennially cheerful and optimistic. This sunny attitude served her well in late 2004 when Gao began suffering a series of health problems. These health problems, which had been described as having cold or flu-like symptoms, resulted in Gao Ting being excused from her school's morning exercises, and she was only obliged to attend classes before she returned home for lunch. She would usually return to school at around 12.30pm, but on January 10th of 2005, Gao Ting failed to reappear when expected. By 9.40pm, Gao Ting had still not reappeared after leaving school, yet she didn't appear to be at home either. This is where a degree of miscommunication occurred as both Gao Ting's school and her parents seemed to assume that she was in the care of the other party. The next morning, Gao Ting's father assumed his

daughter had reappeared at school, but after talking to her classmates and teachers, it became increasingly clear that she had gone missing. Gauteng's increasingly concerned parents began searching her personal belongings, but the only clue to her whereabouts was a phone number and address for a restaurant in the nearby city of Zibo. The owner of the business had a child who shared a class with Gao Ting, but the two weren't friends and there was no apparent reason why she might visit the restaurant. It took until January 14th for Gao Ting's parents to finally accept that their daughter was in serious danger and her father telephoned the local police to file a missing persons report.

At the time of her disappearance, Gao was said to be wearing a yellow down jacket, white casual jeans, and brown sneakers. She was also carrying copies of two distinct English language university textbooks, along with a blue leather wallet and three keys. Local law enforcement began by questioning Gao Ting's teachers and classmates, in particular a group of boys who had been exempt from morning exercises that she had been excused from. They also conducted intensive searches of the school buildings, as well as the wider campus, before concluding that Gao Ting had simply run away from home. Gao Ting's parents vehemently rejected the idea,

citing the numerous personal possessions that she had left behind. If she was going to run away for any extended period of time, she'd have taken a lot more than just some school books in her purse. Anticipating the incompetence and apathy of local police, Ting's influential father poured over $40,000 worth of his own money into various publicity campaigns, and while they succeeded in raising awareness of Gao Ting's disappearance, weeks went by without any significant progress. By mid-February, the students of Gao Ting's boarding school had all gone home for winter break, a time when the school's staff took the

opportunity to deep clean the site. Two of the school's janitors were in the process of cleaning an old restroom, one that had been locked and disused and abandoned during the winter of 2004. In order to accommodate the large number of students, the bathroom was designed to be very large with two separate sections divided by a lockable door. But when the janitors tried to open this door, they found that something had been stuffed inside the lock. They were forced to return with a wrench and pliers to pry off the padlock and, after considerable effort, they were finally able to access the second area of the restroom.

And when they did so, they were greeted by a stomach-churning stench and a scene of absolute horror. Lying face up on the ground, partially decomposed, was the body of the missing 15-year-old girl, Gao Ting. Her torso had been partially covered by a white plastic bag and her killer appeared to have laid her body down on a red puffer jacket. These were not the same clothes Gao Ting had been wearing on the day of her disappearance, and while her other belongings had been scattered around her body, her blue leather wallet was never recovered. Blood and hair belonging to Gao Ting was discovered on another part of the tiled floor, indicating either some kind of violent struggle or that her body had been dragged along the floor following her death. Following another intensive search of the

school buildings, with a particular focus on the dormitories, minute amounts of blood were found splattered on a wall in one of the boys' dorms. Someone had attempted to hide these bloodstains by positioning a bunk bed in front of them, and if it wasn't for a maintenance worker recognizing the odd positioning, the blood might never have been discovered. An autopsy placed Gauteng's time of death as being on the afternoon of January 10th, the same day she went missing and that the cause of death appeared to be suffocation. Gauteng's killer had apparently used her own scarf as the murder weapon, and had three distinct fingerprints on her cheek in the process. These fingerprints didn't appear in any of the Chinese police's database, and since

no one with any criminal convictions was employed at the school, law enforcement deduced that the killer must have been another student. Gao Ting had four separate wounds to her head, some of which indicated blunt force trauma, while others suggested that they had resulted from a fall. Police noted that Gao Ting had also suffered dozens of small cuts to her limbs and torso, cuts which appeared to have been inflicted after death. There was also a large, 17-centimeter vertical cut from the middle of her breast to her navel, as if her killer had hesitated on disemboweling her,

and sadly, there were some rather obvious indications that Gao Ting had been violated following her death. With these details in mind, the police began questioning four male students who had skipped morning exercises the day of Gao Ting's disappearance. Wang Pang Ming, Yang Xiang Ling, Li Debing, and Song Wen Si, who were all questioned intensively by both police officers and school officials. But a particular focus was shown to Song Wen Si, who had slept in the bed nearest to the concealed bloodstains. Song claimed that the bed had been moved during a parent-teacher meeting that had occurred during the winter vacation, and insisted he had no idea the bloodstain was there.

This was later corroborated following the return of DNA analysis results, which conclusively proved that the blood did not belong to either Gao Ting or Song Wenxi. It was a frustrating development, but police were forced to look elsewhere for Gao Ting's killer. The police then turned to Yang Zhangling, and during his round of questioning, he told the police that the reason why he didn't partake in morning exercises was due to frostbite on his feet. Instead, he had been folding bedsheets in the dorm when, around 6.20am, he suddenly heard screams coming from somewhere else close by. All four of the accused then assembled in their rush to discover the source of the screams, each claiming to see two men standing near the abandoned bathroom where

Gao Ting's body was found. Yang claimed he tried to talk to the men but they departed in a hurry. He later described one as being tall while the other was short but because they were in a poorly lit corridor, he couldn't catch exactly who they were. Li Deping explained his absence from morning exercises by claiming he has a stomach ache but confirmed that Wang and Yang were in the dorms at the time of Gao Ting's murder. However, Li claimed that he hadn't heard any screaming like the kind Yang and Wang had described, and insisted the boys must have been mistaken. Yet Li's testimony was later omitted from reports as his apparent mundane testimony did not provide any new information. Sometime later,

the police announced that based on the testimonies of two of the schoolboys, a man named Zhang Zichao was being considered their number one suspect. Zhang Zichao was born on May 28th of 1989 and had just entered the high school that year. He had first drawn suspicion to himself when he told police that he had no idea Gao Ting was even missing, something which didn't correlate with the fact that her disappearance was the talk of the school. The four boys, also named Zhang, is the fifth male student to have been hanging around the dorms that day, and combined with the inconsistency, the police saw fit to bring him in for questioning.

After an interrogation which lasted 30 consecutive hours, Zhang Zichao confessed to the brutal murder and mutilation of Gao Ting. It all was not as it seemed. Zhang was said to have been brutally tortured during his time in custody, and he claimed he could barely stand during a visit with them following his supposed confession. Human rights lawyers have claimed that in one incident, the police asked him what color Gao Ting's clothing was, and every time he gave them the wrong color, they would slap him across the face with his own shoes until he blindly guessed the correct color of clothing. After that, he was forced to sign a statement which implicated himself as follow-us. On the morning of January 10th, 2005, Zhang woke up before sunrise

and began reading a book of short horror stories. The gruesome tales then supposedly inspired him to commit his own grisly crime, and after heading out into the dorm halls to look for a victim, he found Gao Ting. After holding a small blade to the girl's throat, Zhang apparently dragged her into the men's bathroom and held her onto the ground. When Gao started screaming for help, he wrapped her scarf around her neck, strangling her before the mutilation began in earnest. Once he had re-emerged from his haze of bloodlust, Zhang then hid the body in the corner

of the abandoned bathroom before enlisting the help of Wang Pangming and sealing the bathroom shut. When they had finished, the two quickly resumed their morning studies as if nothing had happened, but according to the police, Zhang wasn't finished with this victim. They claimed he returned on several occasions to toy with Gao Ting's lifeless corpse. Zhang's trial took place on March 6th of 2006, but was closed to the public due to him being under the age of 18. Despite a complete lack of physical evidence, Zhang was found guilty and only received a life sentence

as opposed to the death penalty because of his young age. It took until 2011 for Zhang to speak out regarding the torture he had undergone, and he began to profess his innocence to anyone who would listen. He filed an appeal, but it failed, and he was forced to turn to his family who in turn found two lawyers who agreed to take on the case. The two lawyers managed to convince the court to hold a hearing, and in 2017, the Chinese Supreme Court reviewed the case. The two lawyers managed to convince the court to hold a hearing and in 2017, the Chinese Supreme Court reviewed the case. They found that no forensic material implicating Zhang

was ever extracted, and they seemed to acknowledge and accept his claim on being tortured into confessing. Finally, on November 16th of 2017, the Chinese Supreme Court ordered a retrial. The Zhibo City Intermediate People's Court finally held the retrial two years later, and the court was shocked to hear the state's prosecutor personally recommending that Zhang be acquitted. His family and friends were finally able to celebrate in January of 2020, when the court deemed that his confession was coerced and Zhang Ziqiao was finally formally acquitted. Gao Ting's family agreed with the verdict and acknowledged that Zhang was innocent and in January of 2021, Zhang was rewarded with 3.32 million yuan in compensation. Twelve different members of the Chinese authorities, from police officers to prosecutors, were all held accountable and punished for their mistakes. But even so,

the case had drawn such widespread attention that Zhang was forced to change his name from Zhang Zichao to Zhang Chou, and he now lives in Jiangsu province where he works in the catering industry. Sadly, the real killer of Gao Ting remains unknown to this day, meaning that a young man took the life of a fellow student and not only got away with it, but stayed silent while another spent several long years in prison. I'm a big fan of the channel and I think I have a story you might be interested in. It's kind of a creepy slash sad kind of story but it's one that sticks with me all these years later so I guess it's worth sharing with you. So at the start of 10th grade this new kid called Caleb joined our school and I had homeroom with

him. You could tell right away that he was really weird, just super socially awkward and stuff, but he mostly kept to himself and he was built like a defensive tackle, so no one really messed with him. Plus, he just sort of blended in too. He didn't dress weird, didn't smell, like he didn't notice there was anything off about him until you actually spent time around him. If you did, you noticed that he had this really creepy habit and I saw it up close on more than one occasion. My homeroom seat was about to the front right of Caleb, meaning I could look over my left shoulder and see him right there. So this one time we're in homeroom, but it's kind of like a free period,

so everyone is talking and being super loud. Everyone except Caleb. Caleb was just sitting there, reading some old book he always carried around with him, and it looked like he was whispering to himself. You know the way kids kind of silently mouth the words they're reading, I guess out of habit or whatever? Well, that's what it looked like. I figured he just couldn't read very well or that he was having trouble concentrating because of the noise. Unusual behavior but nothing to freak out about.

But as it turns out, that's not what was happening at all. Caleb kept whispering to himself, even when he wasn't reading. I caught him doing it in the hallway a few times, but I didn't want to confront him about it or anything, so I just sort of let him be. But then it got to the point where he did it a few times during the quiet parts of homeroom, like while the teacher was talking, and slowly but surely, everyone caught on to the fact that Caleb whispered to himself. The first time, the teacher asked in that really cliched way if he wanted to share with the class. He just went quiet and shook his head. The second time, it was totally quiet and it got to the point where everyone around Caleb could hear him whispering. We were trying to work on something, I can't remember what it was, but the whispering was

definitely all annoying and off-putting, so in the end, someone just said, dude, shut up. Everyone stifled laughter. The teacher told us to be quiet and work, so that one just ended right there. This went on for weeks. Every so often, Caleb wouldn't be able to contain himself himself and he'd start whispering at some awkward moment. The third time he did it in homeroom, or at least the third time I saw it anyway, someone actually snapped and asked him who he was even whispering to. Our homeroom teacher was aware of this little issue by that time so she tried to interject to stop the confrontation from escalating. She basically tells the kid to back off and for Caleb to stop whispering but then Caleb kind of just pauses, turns to the kid who asked him, and just said, my mom. The kid's reply causes a ripple of laughter because he was all like,

you talking to your mommy? Making fun of him and our teacher quickly jumps in and tells everyone to shut up again. Only Caleb doesn't shut up. After weeks and weeks of not saying a single word above a whisper, he suddenly finds himself all conversational. She talks, he said, referring to his mom. So I answer. The class didn't laugh that time and no one had a single smart word to say in response. That was on a Friday, and then when we got back to school on Monday, Creepy Caleb was gone. They pulled him out of class so fast that you could still see his shadow that Monday morning, but since we didn't know the context surrounding it, we just kind of

went on as normal and we got over it. And I just said, creepy Caleb, easy come, easy go. About a week or so later, me and my family end up driving over to my older sister's place. She and her husband had been married for a few years and he was a psychiatrist at this big hospital on the other side of town, so they lived in this super awesome house that we enjoyed visiting as often as we could. My brother-in-law was a cool guy and would sometimes discuss certain details of certain cases with us over dinner. He wasn't too detailed, he didn't name names. It was all just shop talk and I barely understood any of it anyway, so I normally just tuned out and did my own thing.

But then, like I said, we're over one Sunday, not long after creepy Caleb got pulled out of class and one of the patients he mentions suddenly started sounding very familiar. My brother-in-law was talking about how hard his job is sometimes and how sometimes he has to take time to decompress on his days off. I think my dad asked him what it was that got him so stressed as I assumed it was all a bunch of rich folks telling him their problems for huge dollar amounts but then my brother-in-law starts talking about it being the younger people whose stories can really get to him. We're all listening intently while my brother-in-law starts telling this really sad story about a kid who'd walked in on his mom, taking her own life.

Not like found her body or anything like that. I mean, he walked in, and she had the gun to her head, and they were locked eyes when she pulled the trigger, and it screwed the kid up for life. We're all obviously hooked into my brother-in-law's story, but when he mentioned how they'd just had to pull the kid out of school because of a serious setback in his progress, my ears started burning. My dad asked what kind of setback, and that's when my brother-in-law mentioned something about schizophrenia, and more specifically, something about the kid whispering to himself. Mom says that I was white as a sheet by the time the whispering thing came up and that

not long after, I blurted out, what was the kid's name? Was it Caleb? My brother-in-law freezes, gives me this stunned, wide-eyed look look then clearly lies when he says no it wasn't Caleb. It was a blatant lie and he never admitted to me that it was actually Caleb he was talking about but the fact that he took me aside after dinner to give me a talking to was all I needed to know. He gave me some speech about doctor patient confidentiality and how it would reflect really bad on him if it got out that he was talking about his work. I promised to keep my mouth shut, but the news about the kid got out in other ways. I promised my brother-in-law that I didn't say anything, but he said it was

cool. Half the town had been involved in the kid's treatment in some way and rumors spreads faster than wildfire in towns like ours. Hearing the truth about Caleb was so bad that no one in our homeroom class talked about it after we found out. It was just too raw, knowing we laughed and joked about something so utterly terrible. This kid was broken, completely shattered by life and we'd been too ignorant and self-absorbed to really notice. I don't know how true the version of events are when it comes to Caleb's mom, but if that is true, if she blew her own head off right as her middle schooler came through the door, what was she thinking? And what system placed her kid back in school when he clearly wasn't ready for it?

I guess you see a lot of horror and creepypasta podcasts out there, but most of it's all skinwalkers and black-eyed children and stuff like that. And yours is one of the only ones that talks about stuff that actually haunts people. I know plenty of sad stories. People's parents passing away out of the blue, people missing out on their preferred colleges, etc. These are sad stories. The one about Caleb and his mom is something way different, and way worse. I can't even imagine what it must have been like for a kid at whatever age he was to see their own mother die a violent, self-inflicted death. And that's what it means to be haunted by something. Caleb was talking to his mom like he could see her ghost, and that's not some dumb story. That was real. I don't think Caleb could

really see a ghost, but I do think she still existed in his mind. His brain must have been echoing her voice around his skull, and talking back must have helped in some way. Hell, if it was me, I'd do just about anything to hear my mom's voice, even if it did make me look crazy. Back in 2013, 52-year-old Patrick Lee Mullins was living in quiet contentment in Florida's Manatee County. He and his wife Jill were looking forward to celebrating their 30th wedding anniversary and were the proud parents of an army combat veteran and civil engineering student. The men in the family were close and often spent time fixing up off-roaders and taking them for test spins, but without a doubt, Patrick's passion in life was his job. For Patrick, being a librarian wasn't so much a career as it was a vocation,

and he relished the opportunity to encourage students of all ages to enrich themselves with the written word. He was very successful in his endeavors too, as with his dry sense of humor and cool uncle charisma, Patrick was popular with teachers and students alike. But Patrick had another passion, sailing. Having grown up in Florida's Anna Maria Island, boating and fishing ran deep in Patrick's veins, and he often spent time fixing up old Evinrude boat motors when not working on his off-roaders. Pat owned a 16-foot stump knocker skiff that he regularly took out onto the Braden River, testing the engines that he had recently tinkered with.

And on January 27th of 2013, he sailed his boat out for a late afternoon sailing. Pat's wife didn't think anything unusual when she returned to an empty home after visiting family. But as the evening drew on and her husband failed to reappear, she became concerned and called their sons. Upon learning that their father was missing, their engineering student son rushed home from the University of South Florida in order to aid his mother in the search effort. As Jill called 911 to officially report her husband missing,

Patrick's family and friends began searching the neighboring streets and waterways and were joined the following day by detectives from the Manatee County Sheriff's Office and other law enforcement agencies. The same day as the investigation began in earnest, a member of the Tampa Bay Pilots Association spotted an abandoned boat with its engine still running, found near a place called Egmont Key. The boat's captain reported the boat adrift at around 10am and shortly afterwards, it was confirmed as having belonged to the beloved high school librarian. Detectives noted with interest that the boat was found a considerable distance from where Pat would have launched on the river,

at least a two to three hour trip from his home. If he was simply testing the engine as he so often did, there was no reason for him to sail out so far, so police were forced to conclude that whatever caused Patrick to vanish had occurred much closer to home, and that the currents took the boat downstream. But what exactly happened to Pat whilst out on the river that made him disappear into thin air? To answer that question, the authorities quickly organized a wide search of the surrounding area, one which covered more than 2,200 square miles and lasted almost three days straight. The search effort included six boats from the Florida Fish

and Wildlife Commission, a search and rescue team from Eckerd College, and even a C-130 military airplane equipped with cutting-edge sensory equipment. It was one of the most impressive search efforts in Florida's history, but sadly, it was one that had to be called off just a week after Patrick went missing, when a charter boat fisherman made a horrifying discovery. While fishing off Emerson Point near the mount of the Manatee River, the fisherman spotted what appeared to be a mannequin in the shallow waters under his boat. Yet when the seas calmed a little and the fisherman was able to get a better look, he recoiled in horror.

What he had been staring at was no mere mannequin. It was the body of Patrick Lee Mullins. Upon receiving the news that his body had been found, Patrick's loved ones were understandably heartbroken. But there was still an overwhelming consensus among family, friends, and law enforcement that whatever had occurred was nothing but a tragic and untimely accident. Yet this only made it all the more terrifying when the coroner's report made it evident that Patrick's death was no mere accident. The cause of death had been a single shotgun blast to the head, and a 25-pound anchor had been tied to his legs.

Naturally, Patrick's loved ones were devastated as the circumstances of his death suggested foul play was to blame. So when the Manatee County Sheriff's Office returned with a verdict that he took his own life, there was an outpouring of outrage from Patrick's family and friends. According to them, Pat had no history of depression and didn't own a shotgun. They also pointed out that no blood, brain matter, bits of skull, or bodily fluids were found on Patrick's boat, meaning he had been snatched, taken to another location, and then executed before being dumped. It seems like an obvious conclusion and it made law enforcement rebuttals

sound even more unhinged. According to the police, Pat had wrapped himself in the rope attached to the anchor, perched on the edge of the craft, and then shot himself in the jaw with a shotgun angled upwards. They didn't bother to try and explain how he would have been able to reach the trigger nor could they account for the fact that not a speck of forensic evidence was found in the boat. What's more, the lack of any powder burns near the entrance wound would indicate that Pat had been shot from a few feet away, which effectively rolled out the possibility of him taking his own life. Eventually, the doctor who had once ruled Patrick's death him taking his own life completely reversed his decision and admitted that he's never seen a self-inflicted gunshot wound before. It also emerged that the sole reason police refused to entertain the possibility of murder was that Patrick, quote-unquote,

didn't fit the profile of a murder victim. With it all but confirmed that Patrick had been murdered, friends and family began to speculate on the identity of his killer. It was suggested that Patrick ran into a group of armed drug smugglers while sailing and had inadvertently witnessed something they didn't want him to see. Citing what a neighborly individual Patrick was known to be, many suggested that he could have pulled up alongside someone's boat, believing them to be in distress, only to stumble across something very unexpected and very illegal. Given the amount of money involved in international drug smuggling, it's entirely feasible that a trafficker might order Patrick's execution in order to secure their multi-million dollar shipment. Bizarrely,

there was also an indication that a close family friend had been involved in Patrick's death somehow. Damon Crestwood's alibi for that night changed on more than one occasion, and in stark contrast with Patrick's other family and friends, he seemed unusually reluctant to talk to law enforcement. This naturally made him a person of interest in the case, but before Cresswood could come clean with what he knew, he died of a crystal meth overdose in April of 2017. The investigation was also hampered by chronic incompetence and inexperience. The lead detective on the case had never conducted a murder investigation prior to Patrick's, and there were accusations that several pieces of evidence had been seriously mishandled. Despite the vehement protests of Patrick's friends and family, the prevailing theory among law enforcement remained that Patrick took his own life, yet Jill had not given up hope that her husband's murder will one day be solved.

As recently as 2020, Jill was still canvassing the fairgrounds at the annual Manatee County Fair in the hopes that she could glean some new information regarding her husband's death. That same year, Jill and her attorney finally succeeded in getting the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to officially reclassify her husband's death as a homicide, as opposed to the undetermined label it held for years. I went to a fairly small K-12 in a very affluent suburb of Chicago, maybe only 200 students at the most. We all came from the same two or three neighborhoods and we all went to the same churches. Everyone knew everyone, even the teachers were some of our neighbors. And that's what made it all the more disturbing when something was found in the school's computer lab, something that affected

almost every single kid in school. One day, we went into school first thing in the morning only to find that a special presentation had been called. That meant we all had to file into the gymnasium and listen to whatever announcement the principal had to tell us. It was usually something completely inconsequential that could have easily just been announced by our homeroom teachers, but what is high school if not a series of minor inconveniences? Anyway, we file into the gym, get sat down on the bleachers, and then we're just sitting around, murmuring to each other in exhaustion, waiting for the principal to arrive so he can get it over with.

Finally, he shows up and apologizes for being late as he walks through the door, swiftly followed by an older looking police officer. You could feel this wave of equal parts curiosity and dread wash over the gym, as the presence of the police officer probably meant some kind of heavy announcement was about to be made. We all hung on to the principal's every word when he said the officer had come to talk to us about something that had been found in the computer lab. The police officer then took over and told us that the school had alerted him to something very illegal and very unsettling that either a student or a teacher had left behind.

They didn't give any specifics on what it was, but curiosity was inflamed by the use of the term obscenity laws and how breaking them was an arrestable offense. I don't know about you, but I definitely didn't know what obscenity laws were in 11th grade, but our curiosity meant we looked them up as soon as we were able, because we basically had no idea what the cop had said other than someone was in a whole bunch of trouble. As far as we could tell, obscenity laws mostly involved, like, lewd stuff. But the legalese which broke down the laws were peppered with words like abnormal, unhealthy, degrading, shameful, or morbid interest. So lewd, but something a little

messed up in there too. That was creepy all in its own. Not knowing exactly what had been found, but knowing it involved something pretty freaking gross. And also knowing that whoever was responsible for that stuff was just walking among us at school. This was before we even knew what had been found and the whole school felt like that too. There was this really creepy and nervous atmosphere at school for a while. Over the next week or so, the principal and vice principal went about questioning every single kid in the school and, as far as I know, we all got the same speech. If we were involved in any way and knew the owner of what had been found in the lab, we needed to be honest because the truth was going to come out eventually. It was a total bluff. They didn't know squat and, over time, the details of the incident filtered through the student body.

The offending object had been a USB stick, one that contained some very, very bad stuff. There had been a security camera in the computer lab, but the USB stick had been found on the floor in the middle of the room, so the camera quality and positioning meant it was impossible to determine who the USB stick actually belonged to. Word was that the computer science teacher had done his best to reverse engineer the info on the USB, I guess, or whatever he did to find out where the drive had come from, but again, no such luck. The whole investigation basically came to a screeching halt and we had to just go on living and studying in the knowledge that someone had done something very messed up involving computers. It took maybe a month for the truth to actually come out and although I didn't believe it at first,

but as the rumors grew louder and louder the lack of denial from the school authorities spoke volumes. I was literally waiting for that special assembly to dismiss all the rumors at the very minimum, but it didn't happen. The rumors grew and grew, and our teachers couldn't or wouldn't bring themselves to deny them, which in my mind means they were accurate. And in turn, I found that nothing short of horrifying. To put it in as sensitive a way as possible, the rumors obviously involved what was on the USB stick that had been found. For weeks we'd assumed it was pictures of some kind, but when I heard it was actually written literature that had been so obscene and offensive,

I was very confused. If it was just writing, what could have possibly been so bad about it? It didn't take too long to find out. Someone had written a bunch of, well, we'll call it fan fiction. That was the euphemism that was going around our school, and I'll be honest, I didn't quite know what the term referred to. But when I found out the details, I discovered it was anything but fan fiction. Someone had written stories involving almost everyone in school, almost like they were systematically taking

people off as they went. While the inclusion of the real people wasn't a disturbing thing, what the author had written about them doing was deeply unsettling. From what I heard, the contents of that flash drive were some of the most violent and viscerally disturbing literature you can imagine. And whoever had actually read it obviously couldn't keep it to themselves, hence why the rumors came tumbling through the grapevine at us. Accurate rumors too by the looks of things. The writer had students doing things to each other. Awful, terrible things. Teachers too in some parts. The whole thing was a bigger deal than when one of the freshmen was caught with some super violent

Japanese movie, and I know that was bad, so whatever was on the USB must have been way, way worse to bring in the cops. I guess it was because the principal figured that whoever wrote that stuff was actually thinking about some real life violence at some point and that IDing them might stop a future incident or something. But they were never ID'd, so the whole thing just sort of died after a while. Officially speaking it died, but the students never forgot. It's been almost 20 years since I graduated high school and the stories about the flash drives still run rampant around my alma mater. I spent the rest of my time there wondering who would be so sick as to write a bunch of stuff like that. And the worst thing, there was no obvious culprit. There was no one we

could single out to be like, it was definitely him or her who wrote it so we could avoid them and it could have been anyone. So unless it was one of the students who transferred out for senior year, we were forced to rub shoulders with someone who fantasized about some frankly unspeakable things, never knowing for sure who that person was. Needless to say, I was glad to get out of that school and even gladder when I moved out of state for college, and I hope I moved very far from whoever wrote that sick fanfiction. I went to Canton High School in Michigan and graduated in 2009. It was an okay school, not great, not terrible, just average. But then in my junior year, Canton High became infamous for something one of the students did, and that kid's

name was JP. JP was in the grade above me and was this all-around unremarkable character. I was only vaguely aware of him to begin with, as the only time I ever paid him any attention was to be like, this kid's name is Jean-Pierre? No wonder he calls himself JP. No offense to any Jean-Pierres out there, it's just not the name I'd pick for myself if I wanted to make it through high school without getting the snot bullied out of me. But after that, nothing. He was just another anxious, pale white kid who seemed to have mastered the art of not drawing attention to himself. Then one day, boom. The name Jean-Pierre Orlowitz was all anyone talked about,

and for a good reason too. It was sometime in November, I remember that much, and the first I heard was my mom asking me, didn't this kid go to your school? She showed me the newspaper and there was JP's mugshot staring back at me. He'd been arrested for murder, which seems crazy all on its own because he'd be one of the last kids I thought would be capable of killing someone. But as time went on and the details of what he did came out to the public, I couldn't believe some of the twisted stuff he'd done to the poor guy he'd offed. So, JP and his buddy heard about some random kid inheriting 40 grand from a dead grandpa or something, and they told this older guy, Danny Sorensen, to come in and join their plan to rob

him. According to JP, the three had met up to actually go through with some kidnapping and robbery plan when JP had a change of heart and decided to back out. Danny then loses his temper, starts yelling and pointing his gun at him, so in self-defense, JP stabs Danny in the back. Stabbed in the back? In self-defense? It seems kinda sus, right? Well, if you think of that, you'd be right, because that's not what happened at all. According to the other kid involved, I forget his name, JP hadn't intended to rob the random guy's inheritance money at all, and that was all just a trick to get Danny Sorensen to meet them at some secluded location. Danny didn't have his gun out. He wasn't threatening

JP. He literally just showed up for a robbery and got stabbed in the back. JP had always intended to kill this guy and all because he just didn't like him. There was also a rumor that JP owed Danny a bunch of money too, and since he didn't want to pay it back, he figured that he'd just kill him instead. I don't know if that's true or not, but it doesn't really matter. Either way, he decided that the solution was to commit murder, which is all just kinds of crazy to me. I don't think JP's friend actually knew what was going to happen until the night of the murder because both he and JP said the guy just stood back, watched, and did nothing as he started

stabbing Danny Sorensen. Some people say that he was to be the lookout, but I know the defense team said it was because he was so horrified by what was happening that he was frozen to the spot. I don't know how true that is, but it's definitely true that JP started doing some messed up stuff to Danny's body after he stabbed him. I heard that what JP wanted to do was to bag Danny up in a tarp, hang him upside down from a tree, and then set him on fire. Then he wanted to chop Danny's head off while he was hanging there burning like some sick parody of a pinata or something. In reality, JP didn't get up to anything quite so fancy.

Instead, he used a hacksaw to cut Danny Sorensen's head off, then used a blowtorch to burn his fingerprints off so it'd be harder to ID his body. After that, JP drove the guy's body out to some random field and set his headless torso on fire. One of the things that shocked everyone was how JP had apparently played with the guy's head after cutting it off. I think his buddy told either a cop or the actual courtroom that JP had tried to make it talk like a puppet or something. It also really didn't help that JP was cold and dead-eyed during the trial. I heard people were describing all this horrific stuff that he actually did and just sat there, totally unemotional. Like for the judge, it was a

murder trial, but for JP, he acted like it was just a Tuesday. I don't know how long JP got in prison, but I know it was a pretty long time, and I know he got even more than a usual murder on account of how he did all that evil stuff to the guy's body afterward. And I swear though, of all the people I knew in high school, if you asked me to rank them in order of likeliness to murder someone, JP would have been way down near the bottom. I just can't picture him cutting a dude's head off with a hacksaw, but he did it. I suppose it really is the quiet ones who turn out to be the biggest psychopaths. Of all the guys and girls I went to high school with,

the creepiest was by far this guy called William. I used to sit near him in chemistry class during my junior year and he had this habit of mumbling stuff to himself before laughing in this really creepy way. It was like he was trying to stop himself but couldn't and it always seemed like whatever he was laughing at was either real mean or real dirty. He used to get picked on by the football players and pretty bad sometimes too and sometimes he'd lash out in ways that meant that he'd be the only one who got into trouble. I think these days he might have been diagnosed with Asperger's and put into a special class or something but back then he was just the weird kid. At the end of junior year I learned that he and his family lived just a few houses down from me.

I didn't hang out with them or anything but I would see him around every once in a while and sometimes I'd say hi. I kind of felt sorry for him and I figured that he'd appreciate someone just being cool with him but he just always seemed very angry and socially awkward. So on the rare occasion that I did try and talk to him, he always just brushed me off like it was me who was the lame one. I didn't feel sorry for him after that, let me tell you, and over the course of senior year, William just got angrier and weirder and more socially awkward. No one tried to help him or intervene because we all just thought that he was a jerk. If he'd have been cool with just about anyone, he'd probably have found people to hang out with, but he wasn't, so he stayed lonely.

But then the longer he remained alone, the weirder he got. In retrospect, he was a ticking time bomb, and it was only a matter of time before he blew up, and when he did, it was really, really bad. I remember packing up my guitar and a few tabs books with the intention of going to band practice. Then when I walked out into the street, I looked right to see a whole bunch of cop cars, ambulances, and fire trucks parked all over the place. I'd never seen so many emergency vehicles in one place in my whole life before, so I knew right away that something bad was going on. I wanted to know what was happening, but I also didn't want to be late for band practice, so I figured I'd just find out later from mom and dad when I got home again. Finding out was a weird experience because I didn't expect it, but it also made all the sense in the world, the kind of thing you felt stupid

for not seeing coming. For some reason, Will had put on a trench coat and a paintball mask, then went around the neighborhood with a loaded shotgun, shooting at people. First, he walked just a few doors down, opposite direction he lived from us, then walked up to the person's driveway. He then just knocks on the door, shoots the person who answers, then walks inside to kill the other neighbor. Our direct neighbor heard the shots and walked out into the street, then had to watch as this masked kid aims a shotgun at them and pulls the trigger. By some sheer miracle, the gun didn't fire, so he panicked and ran back inside

his house to reload or grab a different gun or whatever. But then by that time, the cops had already been called. They surrounded his house and instead of going out shooting, William checked out early. I later heard that he was very active on some internet forum. I'm not sure if it was Reddit or Tumblr or what, but he'd already talked a bunch about going on some kind of killing spree before taking his own life. The comments on his posts mostly consisted of people calling his bluff, telling him he was chicken and that he didn't have the balls. I heard the rare few

comments where people urged him to get help were downvoted or trolled, and there wasn't a single thread of compassion shown to him. I guess that makes them no different from us in a way. We didn't show him much compassion either. We should have looked past whatever mental issues he had and gotten him the help he needed and by we I mean the community as a whole. Another horrifying little detail is that the widow of one of the two people who were killed actually worked with my brother. He saw her take the phone call from the police telling her that both her husband and daughter had been murdered in their own home. I know I sound like some kind of bleeding heart hippie with this take, but

remembering William and what he did just makes me sad, and as dumb as it may seem, I think I actually feel kind of guilty over it. I tried, but I don't feel like I tried hard enough. No one did, and because we all let him get worse and worse, he ended up killing two innocent people that I had known since moving to that neighborhood. Two people lost their lives, but it could have been way, way worse, and even then, the whole thing ended up haunting our neighborhood for years and years to come. Since the events of this story only happened several weeks ago, I won't disclose any real names or locations to protect me, my family, and anybody involved within this story. I've recently become a state health inspector, and it didn't take me very long to make enemies,

for lack of a better word. My job is exactly how it sounds. I inspect food locations for the state. This includes restaurants, grocery stores, gas stations, and pretty much anywhere that deals with food and sanitation. Being young, I'm often referred to as unknowledgeable or that I'm trying to make a name for myself. But the reality of the matter is that I'm just trying to do my job and keep people from getting sick or worse. My first time being out in the field by myself didn't go very well, and I fully expected that. My story starts about 40 minutes or so from my hometown, in a small little town surrounded by a beautiful lake. The town has one local independent supermarket that has a great reputation among the locals,

and even those throughout the surrounding areas. The store was my next location for inspection. The first half of my inspection went completely fine. Some little asterisks, but nothing that would be detrimental or harmful to the consumers of the store. But after those first few departments came the butcher shop at the store, and believe me when I tell you, I cannot believe nobody has gotten sick from eating from the shop. The tables that the butchers cut on were filthy, and not just with the residue from that day of cutting meat, but the underside of the table had caked on meat that was clearly very old. The walls looked like they had never been cleaned. The knives that were not being used were covered in dried blood and old meat. All the machines used in the department were

covered in grime and years worth of buildup. That alone is enough of a scary story, but unfortunately, my rant of this disgusting department is not where my story ends. As I walked with the manager of this department, I tried to explain to him the issues and why this is a problem. With everything that the world has endured in the last several years, sanitation is obviously incredibly important. This man didn't care at all what I had to say. The butcher was well over six foot tall, and I'm not an expert, but I would guess about six-fives since I'm only about five foot five and he seemed like he was a foot taller than me. And the man leaned over with his massive frame and billowing loud voice

and started to verbally attack me. Now, I have thick skin, and a family that knows how to throw around some curse words, but this man just laid into me like I've never heard before. I couldn't even get a word in if I wanted to. In the middle of the man's rants, I turned around and walked out of the department to continue my inspection of the rest of the store and, during this time, I could still hear the butcher from all the way in the back of the store still attacking me with his words. I would be lying if I didn't say that I started to feel like I was going to shed a tear or two when I got into my car that evening. And needless to say, the store had failed the inspection due to the critical condition of the butcher department. When a store fails an inspection, they have a small grace

period to correct the issues. After said grace period, I show up to the small store once again and to my dismay, my butcher friend was there and as soon as I walked in the door, he just stared at me with a look of disgust. It was intimidating and honestly a little scary the way he stared me down. When I eventually made my way to the butcher shop, I was surprised and not because they cleaned but because it was somehow worse and written in the meat blood on the cutting table was a certain expletive about me. I tried to be stern and tell the butcher that he was not going to pass again, and that this department was a major sanitation risk, and this is where my story gets truly scary. The man went off the deep end again, but this time his eyes were filled with

legitimate rage, and his skin turned red. He hollered at the top of his lungs and I swear if the store manager was not right between us, this butcher would have hit me. As I tried to leave the department like I did on the previous visit to the store, the butcher followed me and kept going on his verbal assault. Nobody could calm this man down and before things got out of hand even more I told the store manager that I would have to come back because I didn't feel safe in that store anymore. As I turned and walked away the butcher said in a menacing and almost maniacal voice, goodbye sweetie. And when I turned around he was now smiling at me in an extremely creepy fashion, and then he said my name, which really freaked me out,

because he either saw it on my name tag, but just the fact that he knew it really gave me the heebie-jeebies. The drive home that night was miserable. It was a long and tiresome day. I still live with my parents as this is my first real job post-college, and I couldn't wait just to sit down, unwind and get that lunatic out of my head. In the middle of the night sometime, I'm not sure of the exact time, I was awoken by some chatter between my parents in the hallway. I walked out of my room to ask my parents what was going on and why they were awake. My father said that some tall guy was walking around the house, and I immediately asked why he didn't call the authorities and my father basically just shrugged it off as some wandering fellow walking through the yard. I know that may seem jarring to some

people, but in the small town I live in, people walk home late at night from the bars and cut through yards all the time as we all know each other in the small community. But something about this didn't feel right. The next night it happened again. This time I heard my father calling to the tall man who was just standing in the backyard. The man didn't move or flinch. He just stood there for several moments. When my father asked if the man needed any help, he turned and walked out of the yard. But as he turned, I could see that he was holding something, something that seemed to

shimmer in the light. I don't think I need to remind you what instruments butchers use and what I was thinking in my head right at that moment. I slept with one eye open that night, jumping at every sound I heard outside. It was now Saturday and I was ready to just stay home and relax. My parents left for some errands and I ended up taking a quick nap in the living room. When I woke up, I was filled with an overabundance of fear. My front door was wide open in the middle of the day and a note sat on my kitchen counter that read, I missed you, but I'll be back tonight.

Immediately, and I know I should have did it last night, I just called the cops, who really didn't know what to do at that moment in time but said that they would keep an extra patrol in that area that night. And my father was clearly more than livid that I called the police without calling him first and everybody seemed blown away that I didn't wake up to someone breaking inside, leaving a note, and leaving. That night, I clearly didn't sleep a wink, and when I saw the hall light go on from underneath my doorway, I figured my father had woken up again to the noise of the mysterious man. When I opened the door, what I saw at the end of the hallway was not my father, but it was the tall man. The tall man from the backyard, and they were none other than the butcher from the store. He stood about 15 feet away from me at the end of the hallway. I was frozen in fear and before the man could run at me or do whatever he had intended, a cop was there and tackled the intruder to the ground.

My heart was racing. The cop was parked at the end of my street patrolling the area and he actually saw the tall man walking down the street. He pursued him slowly and saw him walk to my family home and jostle the door until he broke it in. Being that we live in a small town, the cop knew that this man did not live here, and that is when the cop acted fast. The now former butcher was arrested right then, and as far as I know, is still in jail at this moment. I realize when people talk about dangerous jobs, they don't often bring up health inspectors, but in my situation, it truly was life and death. The butcher did in fact have a knife on his person, but he stayed quiet and didn't say what he intended to do to me or my family, and this event has left me mentally wounded and scared to do my job. I basically live off of Instacart and Grubhub now, and I triple checked that my doors and

windows are now locked. Nothing of note has happened yet since the initial arrest but I'm sure this story isn't over yet. Any updates or new information and I will share with the world when the time comes but for the moment I just want to try and move on from this and be happy that I'm still alive and that my family is safe. After years of college, I finally scored the first step on my dream job journey. I was at the bottom of the totem pole at a government facility, but I was in the door, and that was a step in the right direction. Unfortunately, due to the nature of this job, I must be somewhat vague about

exactly what I did. Don't worry though, it's nothing super exciting like aliens or anything, just sensitive information that I can't make public even if I am writing this anonymously. The people of this office were, well, let's just say, wound tight. Not mean or rude, but certainly not nice. And that was until I met Sue, or Susie as she liked to be called because according to her, Sue is an old person name. Her words, not mine. I really vibed with Susie. She was smart, funny, showed me some stuff at the job, and I was kind of into her. Everybody at this new job of mine was cold but Susie was on fire all the time. Her lively and bubbly personality was contagious, at least for me.

The first few weeks of this job were amazing and I hate to say it but it was solely because of her. I forgot about my focus and my yearning to grind to the top because all I cared about was going to work to see Susie. I admit this was a pretty toxic mindset on my part but I'm only human and at least I can admit this fault. My only regret is that I couldn't see between the lines back then. Several weeks into this job I finally worked up the courage to actually ask Susie out and to my surprise she actually said yes. It was a great evening from start to finish and if I wasn't head over heels into Susie by this point, I definitely was after our date. Fast forward to the following weekend and Susie asked if I wanted to do something again and of course I agreed with no need to talk me into the plan. She said that she was going to pick me up which I found kind of weird but

I'm not big into gender norms so if she wanted to drive go right ahead I thought. When she arrived to pick me up she was in the back seat and some other guy was driving. I was not a huge fan of this development but I was blinded by the supernova that was Susie. As I approached the car it dawned on me that I never asked her what we were going to do that evening and it was the first time I felt any type of way besides love for Susie. Maybe it was weird jealousy or something but honestly it wasn't enough of a flag for me to run away yet. I got into the car and the guy driving said nothing. Susie greeted me with a huge hug and asked if I was excited about an amazing evening. I smiled of course, I was like heck yeah, but was still a little freaked out that nobody has

acknowledged the guy in the car yet. Finally I introduced myself to the driver who just gave me a what up nod, but audibly said nothing out loud. As I stared with a bit of confusion, Susie spoke up and said, oh that's Sebastian, He doesn't say much. He's just an old friend who agreed to drive us around tonight. Now, don't get me wrong. I know how weird this sounds and writing it now I keep smacking myself in the face, but in the moment, I just shrugged it off and went along with the ride because of Susie. Before long, I knew where we were and I was definitely a bit sketched out now. Not to mention the entire ride, Sebastian kept looking at me in the rearview mirror which I didn't enjoy. Behind the giant building I work at is a heavily forested area and this man parked the car and

shut it off in the forested location behind my work. This was the moment I finally spoke up and said, Susie, what are we doing here? We can get in. And she cut me off before I could finish my sentence. Listen, I need you. Sebastian's not an old friend. He's one of the security guards and he told me that the camera in the back is faulty and he gave me the code to get in through the back door. I couldn't tell if she was serious or if this was a funny joke to play on the new guy. I looked her in the eyes and said, Susie, I'm not comfortable with this. What could you possibly need in this building at this hour? Susie looked down and then back at Sebastian and then back at me.

Please. She said with those eyes that I was a sucker for. I shook my head knowing all too well that this was not going to end well for me, but I got out of the car anyway. We made our way to the door, and the camera above the back door did look a little crooked but looked operational, and she entered the code and it worked. I couldn't believe it. Once inside the building is where my heart stopped and I truly grasped the gravity of what we were doing. We're not talking about a slap on the wrist, but legitimate trouble if we got caught breaking into a government facility.

We traveled through several corridors and tight hallways and made our way to parts of the building I had never seen. At the end of a long, dark hall was a room filled with all sorts of files and papers that quite honestly looked like nonsense to me. She briskly ran to the back corner of the room and started rummaging through a file cabinet, and she knew exactly what she was looking for. I got it, she exclaimed, and she turned to me and said, okay, this is where I need you. She got close to me, as if she were going to kiss me, but instead, struck me on the head with

something. I don't even remember what it was, it happened so fast. I saw her running away as my vision blurred, trying to stand up. I tried to make my way through the halls, remembering just how we got there, and now I was thinking that Susie purposely took me on a confused route so I wouldn't remember my way out. And using only a cell phone flashlight I finally could see the back door in the distance and my night was just getting worse at this point because about 10 feet away from the door I saw that the alarm started to go off. And this is why Susie needed me.

She needed someone to take the fall for her theft. And I figured my time was up, but I kept going anyways. I made it out the door and into the woods before any security were able to get there, but of course, Sebastian and Susie were gone. I traveled in the shadows until I got home that evening and I sat up and waited for the cops or Susie to show up all night and all weekend, but nobody ever came. On Monday morning I got to work and I instantly noticed two things. There was an outrageous amount of security there and Susie was not there.

I thought about this all weekend and I figured my best course of action would be to come clean so I went into the main office and sat with my supervisor and just told her everything. And it turns out the cameras weren't faulty at all, as they had clear video of us entering the building. There were also dozens of cameras that picked us up in the building and I explained to them why I was there and I tried to justify it, even though there really was no justifying it. Without getting into a lot of legal babble, I pretty much was free to go if I would cooperate with the investigation of Sebastian and Susie, among a few other things. First off, Sebastian did not work for the company and most likely was not his real name.

He was some sort of computer hacker or something along those lines, and that is how he was able to get the backdoor code. Susie, on the other hand, was her real name, and they had all her personal information and she was a legitimate government employee. Where she lost her way is what everyone is trying to figure out. After the incident, she essentially went AWOL, and to this day as far as I know, nobody's heard from her. They asked me a million times what file she took and why she took it, and I only caught a quick glimpse of it, and all I could see was the words project on it. And I've tried wrestling my mind around what it could be, but I have no idea. But it seems that my supervisors get super uneasy when I talk about it.

I've gone crazy trying to dissect everything Susie has ever said to me. Did she ever give me any inclination that she was like this, or what she may have wanted? I was blinded by fake love, and I can't tell to the best of my knowledge if she hinted at some sort of greater plan and I clearly lost that job and I'm under a pretty short leash these days. I'm kind of writing this in hopes that maybe somebody's heard or seen this Susie character. She's a blonde woman with bright green eyes, maybe five foot four. Very intelligent and very quick-witted and funny. Anybody out there know anything related to this project, even though I know how vague that sounds?

It's been about 10 years since this incident and I'm still thinking about it today. I know this story seems a little far-fetched and out there and I wish I could give more details, but unfortunately this is all I can recall from the event and all I'm able to disclose about this incident. The End Anybody who has ever moved to a new town knows how hard it can be to get adjusted to the new everything of life. In my case, I moved from just outside of New York City to a small little town in Nebraska. This change of pace was hard, but it was much needed for me during this point of life. After graduating from college and receiving my dream job in New York City, I thought my life was perfect and heading in an upward trajectory. Unfortunately

for me, I could not be more wrong. Not even a year after getting my job, I was fired. The result of this firing is a combination of many things, but at the end of the day, it was my own doing. Struggling and depressed, I decided that I was going to leave the city, and that is how I ended up moving to Nebraska. It's also worth noting that I didn't choose Nebraska out of a hat or anything, but I in fact have an aunt who lives in Nebraska, so it all just made sense for me. I wanted to be in a small town, as far away from the city as I could. My first several weeks in Nebraska were somewhat uneventful.

I spent some time with my aunt, learned about the area, and got familiar with where all the stores and everything like that were located. While out and about I noticed this great little bar right in the center of town. Quick side note, in order to keep myself, my aunt, and the town I lived in safe and quiet I am refraining from using the name of the town and the name of the bar. Alright, back to the story. This bar is what you may consider a dive bar but it was bumping when I poked my head in there. Come to find out, this is where all the locals came to drink.

Not too far from the town is a massive contracting company and when the employees leave the job for the day, they all come to this bar to drink. I loved the energy and everything about this bar. All the locals who were drinking in this bar were friendly and really nice. I introduced myself right away to the bartender who, oddly enough, was the owner of the establishment. She was an older woman, rugged and tough for the two descriptors I would use to describe this woman. A room full of men and this woman took no nonsense from anybody in there but in return, all the patrons of the bar seemed to treat her with a massive amount of respect. After chatting with her for

a little while, I brought up the fact that I bartended in this city when I was in college and without hesitation, she asked me if I wanted a job as a bartender. I was flattered and of course, I accepted. I needed a job and with all the customers drinking in this bar on a Wednesday night, I figured that I could do quite well with my tips. I started that Monday, and within no time at all I was being treated as a local. I learned most of the regulars' names and their drinks fairly quickly, but anybody who has been a bartender or any kind of server really knows that it's not all sunshine all the time. You will, without a doubt, get unwanted attention and just horrible or rude customers. But this one specific customer was neither horrible nor rude. Actually, he was quite charming and handsome. He didn't look like any of the other

men in this town, and that's not an insult on Nebraska, it's just that this town was really small and kind of poor. He didn't see a very many men who looked like this guy and he said his name was Peter and that he was in finances for this job. Giving me a little job title so broad should have been a red flag but his beautiful smile was more important to me at the time. He was tall and muscular, very tan and had jet black hair, a little bit of scruff and he was wearing a suit. Did I mention how beautiful his smile was? I know I'm overhyping this guy a little bit but I swear he looked like a movie star. So this handsome man came in two nights in a row and stayed at the bar and talked to me most of the time. Before he left that second night he asked if I would be interested in

grabbing a late bite to eat tomorrow evening. I'm not sure if I was lonely or just that hypnotized, but I accepted right away. When he left the bar that night, I spoke with the owner of the bar for a few minutes, and this is where I should have noticed two glaring red flags that I blatantly ignored in the moment. She told me in that grisly smoker's voice of hers, I don't like that man, honey. Just please be careful. She literally liked everyone, so for her to not have a good feeling about this man should have made me run for the hills, but I didn't even pay any attention to her words. The second alarm bell I chose to ignore was how the customers of the bar were looking at and treating this man.

As I stated previously, these guys were super nice and to this man they were as cold as ice. Looking back in hindsight, most of the men there just stared at this guy with a strong look of worry. Maybe at the moment I took it as some kind of jealousy or something, but realistically, I didn't notice any of the looks or attitudes. The night came and the handsome man picked me up from the bar at 11pm in a massive blue Chevy Silverado. I was kind of excited to hit up one of the late night diners or something along those lines, but instead, he took me to a house about 10 minutes away from the bar. Believe it or not, I was a bit apprehensive getting out of the car, but he charmed me inside in no time at all.

The house was strange and very dark. All the lights were dim and gave off a very low hue. It smelled bad but wasn't unbearable, and I finally started to feel a little uneasy after being blind for so long. When I finally started to think, I started to freak out that I didn't have my car and that he was already drinking pretty heavily. How was I going to get home? I was reminded of that feeling I felt when we arrived at the house and that I wasn't ready for a house call just yet. He was certainly charming and handsome, but I also didn't know him at all.

The worst part about this though was when he actually started to cook. That bad smell was now horrible. He kept raving about this delicious meat that he had hunted but he couldn't tell me what it was because it was a surprise and I probably wouldn't eat it if I knew what it was. Those were his words. As he cooked, the smell was making me dizzy. I could barely focus on anything other than breathing. He was talking to me from the kitchen as I sat on the living room couch. Other than the dark interior, the actual house was not that bad.

It was a wide open living room and he had a lot of books lying around everywhere. I eventually approached the kitchen to tell him that I was going to sit outside and get some fresh air, but as I approached the doorway to the kitchen, he stepped right in front of the door and stood over me. What do you want? I told you not to go into the kitchen. I froze only for a second, mainly due to the intimidating nature of this confrontation. I was able to spit out the words, I'm just going to sit outside for a minute, get some air. He smiled and responded, oh yeah, I know the smell can be bad, but once it's cooked, you're going to be in paradise. Go get some air, and I'll come outside in a minute, I'm just cleaning up my mess. I sat on the front steps and contemplated what I should do. Should I just suck it up and eat the food and ask him to take me home?

He has been super nice to me and I have no reason to believe he wouldn't if I asked. Should I just run and cut my losses and say no way to this whole ordeal? This guy is just too weird for me. Should I go inside and just be blunt as to what we're eating? These were all thoughts that crossed my mind but before I could act on any of them, he opened the door and sat next to me. He then proceeded to carry on with one of the weirdest little rants I'd ever heard with my own ears. He said,

I really hope you like this dish. I can't get this meat all the time. It's, well, it's hard to get this meat. Actually, it's illegal to get this meat. You have no idea how hard it was for me to get it. I want to go hunt some more, but I know it's probably not a good idea. The look in his eyes at this point was terrifying, and the man from the bar who got me to come to his residence was not the same man anymore. Thinking quickly on my feet, I asked him to give me just one minute alone. I told him I had to call my sister for something private and I used the phrase women's stuff. I don't even have a

sister, so I don't know why this was the first excuse that came to my mind. In a split second, the eyes sparkled again and he said, of course, as he flashed that big smile. As soon as he shut the door behind him, I turned and ran as fast as I could. I realized that I was far away, but not far enough that I didn't recognize some of the area on the way to his house. Once I got about a hundred yards away, I dipped into the tree line of the main road so I couldn't be seen in case he had chased me. To my absolute horror, no sooner than I jumped into the tree line of the main road so I couldn't be seen in case he had chased me. To my absolute horror, no sooner than I jumped into the trees, I saw that Chevy Silverado drive by. I called the owner of the bar, and she came and picked me up at a gas station about another mile up the road. I just told her that she was right, but there was something off about him.

I didn't go into any details and she didn't ask. I never saw the man after that night, and it wasn't until a few weeks later that I finally told my story to a few of the customers and my boss. They were outraged and horrified. I described the smell of the meat to them and a few of them turned as white as a ghost. They told me that I didn't want to know what kind of meat that was and that I needed to give them the address right away. They came back the next night and told me that the house that I had given them had been abandoned. There was nothing inside when they looked through the windows. No truck and certainly no man. I have absolutely no idea what this man intended on having me eat.

I have no idea where his intentions lied that evening, and I have no idea where this man went. Please, anybody out there who meets someone new, always have a plan and know where you're going, and tell someone where you are. I'm so lucky that my boss of my new job of only several weeks cared enough about me to come out late at night to pick me up from potential harm. My life has finally calmed down a little bit, and I'm happy to report that there have been no more dinner dates with what I can only assume was a cannibal. The Last Few Years The last few years have been tough on everybody and it's been a strange adjustment for a lot of people. Many jobs have changed on how they operate and this is both a blessing and a curse. Unfortunately for me, this change was a curse. Something that seemed like it was going to be the greatest news I'd received in a long time ended up being a horrific nightmare that I'm lucky to be able to walk away and tell the tale of.

When the world was going through its struggle, I made the choice to go back to school at 30 years old to study video game design. I figured since life was morphing into a more online setting, this would be the perfect chance for me to get back and get my degree. In almost no time at all, I realized how much I loved this program and how much of a knack I had for game design. I fell in love with programming, designing, and all the boring stuff that game design entails like game documentation. And I got my bachelor's degree in an accelerated program in just a little over two years, and then the job hunt started. By this point, the workforce was back in action, but the online workforce was still very strong and growing, as remote work seemed to be more popular than ever. I applied for dozens of jobs, but the competition in this

industry is fierce, and I didn't even get a call or email back on any of my applications. And this is until about three months or so after my graduation when I got an email from a game studio called Eye of the Rose Studios. They were a smaller startup company looking for fresh graduates to bring their unique vision to the company. I didn't care that they had no titles launched at this point and I was kind of attracted to the fact that they were this new company and they wanted me. One of the other things that seemed really sweet about this gig was the fact that I could work remotely until the company was a bit more known. This was the perfect situation for me at the time. I could work from home, on my own, get paid by this company, and make a name

for myself all at once, and life was finally looking up for me. I had a professional Zoom interview with a man whose name was Luke Delphine and Mr. Delphine was blown away by my portfolio and he seemed fascinated in my ideas and everything I had to say. Now it's important to note at this point there were literally no alarm bells going off whatsoever. The man in the Zoom call was clean cut, wearing a suit and was sitting in a room where the background was filled with gaming PCs. He seemed knowledgeable about the business and presented himself as a real player within the gaming industry.

After the Zoom interview, we chatted casually for a while about our favorite games and gaming mechanics. Part of me thought this may have still been part of the interview, so I kept my professional attitude and demeanor on full display. After the long call, Luke finally said that he would be in touch with all the job information, including payment, start dates, hours, and all that fun stuff very soon, so keep checking my emails. I was over the moon about this job. I got along so well with this Luke guy and it seemed like someone I would love to work with. I told my parents and my friends about the job and I couldn't wait to start.

But unfortunately, waiting was my life for the next two weeks. I was anxious and after the first week I sent Luke some messages and never heard back. It was discouraging and frustrating and I didn't know what to do. And just as I was about to lose hope I finally got an email from someone who wasn't Luke but said they worked for Eye of the Rose so I opened the email. The message looked kinda fake, like spam but I wanted so much for this job and everything to be real so I read the entire email. It wanted all my personal information, like my address, phone number, bank information for direct deposit, and then just some random questions like do I live alone, do I have children or pets, just questions that didn't seem like they belonged.

After I sent the messages back, which I know was a huge mistake, but this working online stuff was all new to me, and I didn't receive an email back until the next day and the response to the email was just, great, thanks. It was not signed by anybody and didn't even have a company name attached. And this is where I finally started to get that pit in my stomach, that, oh god, what did I just do feeling. Another five days go by and I hear nothing. I was messaging that email and Luke's email and still heard nothing. And I started to panic and was constantly checking my bank account but the low dollar amount that was in there was left alone. That night, outside of my apartment, I heard a loud bang. It would have woken me up but I was already awake gaming on my PC.

I heard the bang again and again. I had all the lights off and my room was only illuminated by my computer screen. I left the spare bedroom where my computer is located and made my way to the dark living room and the loud banging had now turned to the sound of shuffling. I stared at the sliding glass door which was concealed by the hanging blind so I couldn't see what was on the other side. It sounded like there was someone on my balcony. I lived on the second floor so it wouldn't be impossible for someone to climb up there but it also wouldn't be easy. I heard the movements of big birds or giant raccoons but this was bigger whatever it was.

After a brief pause which felt like an eternity, the sound was now unmistakable. Someone was trying to break into my sliding door, and I was frozen in fear. My phone was in my pocket and all I had to do was call the authorities, but at that moment, all I could think was I need to hide. I tried to tiptoe away from the door to the hallway and that's where the second nightmare hit me. There was someone turning my doorknob to my front door as well, not just the sliding door. In the bedroom there was a bathroom and I was able to fit inside the small closet inside the bathroom. And finally, logic kicked in and I remembered my phone in my pocket and I called the police. I whispered the situation to

them and in my mind I felt like I was screaming even though the dispatch operator could barely hear me. Moments after I gave the address I heard the front door squeak open. I had the operator on the phone the entire time and I just clenched my phone hoping that the police would show up soon. The footsteps were soft and slow. I could feel his footsteps through the vibrations on the floor as he made his way to the sliding door. The intruder opened the sliding door and it sounded like more than one person came in through the slider. I could hear some muffled whispers but couldn't make out what they were saying. The slow footprints continued as the intruder searched the room. They got to the

bedroom and once they realized that I wasn't in there, they turned the light on. I could literally not breathe at this point and I was terrified that my shaking would give away my location. One of the intruders entered the bathroom and turned the light on. I was crippled in fear at this point. There was no movement for several seconds and I began to fear the worst. I almost screamed when the intruder drew back the shower curtain. The loud noise of the curtain rod sounded like a blast from a trumpet. The intruder sighed and then grabbed the doorknob of the small closet I was hiding in, but he didn't open it for some reason. The only reason I can think of is he must have thought that the closet was

too small for any adult to fit in and this was the first time in my life I was happy to be a very below average sized man. As the tension was at an all time high I heard a knock at the apartment door. Police, is everything okay in here? The intruder that was in the bathroom spoke up calmly and said, yes sir, is there a problem? And I heard the conversation that transpired next, and I was in disbelief at the calmness of this man. There was a call about an intruder, is this your apartment sir? The man responded,

Yeah, sorry about that officer, I really spooked myself out, I thought I heard someone on the balcony, but it but just a possum. Sorry I wasted your time. There was a brief pause and one of the cops must have thought something wasn't right because he asked if he could look around. The intruder seemed a bit nervous now but responded with an uneasy okay. As soon as I heard the cop enter the bathroom, I crack open the door and made myself known. The cop motioned for me to go back inside the closet and then quickly went back out in the living room and instantly arrested the man. I came out and told the officer that there were two more guys at least and as I said that, two guys burst out of the coat closet and ran out of the door. One of the cops ran after him out of the door. One of the

cops ran after him as the other radioed for backup. After undoubtedly the worst night I'd ever had, it was finally starting to feel a bit safer, for a little while anyway. They were about to catch one of the intruders that fled, but the other escaped and his two accomplices have yet to turn him in. The main intruder that pretended to be the apartment renter was none other than Luke, and I didn't recognize the other intruder that the cops arrested. This same night I went home and lived with my parents, and I've never stayed another night in that apartment. I have no idea what these men intended to do to me, attack me, rob me, or worse.

One very ironic detail and one that I found humorous after all this was said and done was the fact that I typed my account number from my bank account wrong so they couldn't access my account and that's why my account remained untouched. I apologize for the long story but I believe it's important to really do your research when you're applying for a new job, especially online, and never, ever give out your personal information until you know for sure that the job is legitimate. People are sick and twisted, and you never know what kind of evil and atrocities they're capable of until you find out for yourself on the other side. Let me first say that this story happened several years ago and is still to this day the weirdest thing that's ever happened to me. At the time I didn't really view it as scary,

just weird. Years removed from the incident however, I can reflect just how potentially dangerous and unnerving the situation actually was. Almost five years to the date of me writing this, I met Joey. At that time, I had just started with the new company as the head of human resources. After my training, my main duty at this job was to perform all the interviews and do the hiring and placement for most of the new entry-level positions of the company. At first, it seemed like an easy job, and for the most part it was easy. It was a lot of paperwork and a lot of unpleasant conversation with folks that were horribly unprepared for interviews. The first week of the job I had performed nearly 50 interviews and nearly nothing of note had occurred. It was not

until that Friday of my first week that I had a story to tell my wife at home. A story so strange that I still tell it to this day. As that Friday, I met Joey. The interview started like every other interview. It was friendly and cordial. Joey was a shorter man in his 40s. I didn't remember the exact age, I just remember he was close to my dad's age at the time. His resume was alright, nothing that jumped off the page, but nothing that was awful. He talked for a while about his work history, school history, and his personal interests. Again, nothing that was crazy or noteworthy, just a normal man up to this point. I remember jotting some notes down in my pad that Joey would not be getting a call back, but I wanted to continue the interview just to make sure that I was making the right call.

Little did I know, within just a few minutes, I would know for sure that I was making the right call. Just as we were about to wrap up, Joey said, You know, I have also done other work that isn't on my resume. I sat back in my chair and clicked my pen a couple times. I gave him a nod and told him to continue. He looked down on the ground while he was sitting in his chair and started to twiddle his thumbs, I guess, much like you would do if you were in trouble in the principal's office in school. His voice got a little rocky and he started to speak through this weird stutter and said, I don't like to put this on my resume because people don't understand but you look like you would understand me. I can see it in your eyes. This strange sentence freaked me out a little bit, but in a more of

creeped out kind of way and not in a real scary way, I suppose. He continued, I used to repossess objects from people and I really liked it and I was good at it. Joey piqued my interest, so I fished for some more information. I asked him to elaborate and tell me what company he worked for. No company, I was a bit business for myself. His tone was now way off and he was talking slowly and almost with an ominous tone. I asked Joey to elaborate because at this point I was lost, and the guy said that he would repossess things but didn't work for a repossession company.

You know, some people are just ungrateful for the stuff they own. I would take one look at someone and say to myself that there's no way they pay their bills. So I would save everyone the trouble and repossess the car or whatever item may be, not just cars. At this point, this guy showed me everything and more than I needed. It sounded like he was some type of thief and I just wanted to wash my hands of this nonsense. I looked at Joey and said, uh, thanks for coming in. If we're interested, we'll give you a call, okay? I stood up from my chair and extended my hand for a handshake and

instead of standing and doing the same, he stayed in his chair and started to stare at the pictures on my desk. As I stood there with my hand extended like a statue at this point, he goes on to say, is that your wife? I lowered my hand and now gave the man a bit of a disgruntled look. Yeah, that's my wife. I said in a dismissive voice and then I started to tell him he needed to leave, but he cut me off mid-sentence to say, I bet she doesn't pay her bills. She would be someone I would repossess. In the moment, I didn't even try to dissect what that meant and what delusions this guy was talking about. Alright man, you need to leave. I started to get angry and a bit short with him. And then this lunatic goes on to actually lounge in the chair, extending his legs out.

This guy was literally not leaving. His voice then changed again and he started to laugh and sounded upbeat. You know, I don't even think I want this job anymore. I think I want to get back into repossession business. I kid you not, after he said this he pulled out a cigar and started to light the thing right there in my office. I just stood there in shock for a moment and started to shout to him that he needed to leave right now. Joey stood up and stepped right in front of me. I'm not gonna lie, I I felt a little terrified, but I wasn't going to do anything because

that might be my job on the line. My company had security in place, but being that I was so new, I didn't really know the protocol. He grinned and this was the first time I was able to see his yellow teeth and he said, I know your name and I'll find out where you live and I hope, I hope you pay your bills. He put the cigar out on his suit jacket arm and walked out of the room. I must admit I felt a wave of relief when he left, but I definitely felt freaked out by the entire ordeal. I didn't mention this guy to my supervisors and I didn't save his resume. In hindsight, I should have reached out

to the authorities or just grabbed him and slugged him but instead I just chalked it up to this guy being just some sort of freak weirdo. When I went home that evening, my wife was freaked out and told me that I should have done or said something, but I just shrugged it off again. I remember that evening not being able to sleep and noticing a lot of automotive lights in the windows. The thoughts had crossed my mind, did this insane man actually find my home? But when I woke up in the morning, thankfully nothing had been repossessed as he would say. I never heard or saw this man again but thought about that day for

years. To this day I still have not had an interview quite like that interview I had with Joey. I realize nothing insane or terrifying happened here but the body language and implications of Joey was so unnerving that it gives me nightmares all these years later. It actually freaks me out more now than it did five years ago. I've had co-workers, friends and family all tell me I'm an idiot for not doing anything or reporting this man and I realize now that I am. I was young and inexperienced then and I didn't know what I was doing yet. I hope you enjoyed my weird stories about my interview with Joey.

What do you think he was talking about? Was this guy just some thief or just a strange human being? When I was in my late 20s, I had hit a bit of a rough patch. Most of my friends after high school went to college and either moved away or got a job and started to settle down and start a family. Myself, however, I kind of got lost in the shuffle after high school. I did the whole community college thing but had no direction in life. After I dropped out of college, I worked several mundane jobs just to keep my head afloat. None of these jobs lasted or amounted to anything. One night, things got out of hand and I got into some legal trouble. In the moment, this was the worst night of my life but it was also the night

that gave me the reality check that I needed. After the legal mess was sorted out, I decided it was time to make some changes and make something out of my life. I applied to school and was thrilled to be starting in the fall. In the meantime, I needed a job because my mom was done bailing me out, and I mean that literally and as an expression. Bless that woman, but I needed to become my own man now. My mom is retired now, but when she worked, she was a real estate agent and a very good one too. Through her years in the business, she met hundreds of people, and one of those people was Mr. Alvarez. Now Mr. Alvarez was 89 years old at the time and was just too old to keep up on the maintenance of his home. He still owned his home and lived in it alone,

and this is where I come in. My mom told me that Mr. Alvarez was looking for someone to clean and organize his house because he was too old to do it himself. The reason why my mom thought of me was because she used to clean his home when she was a little younger to make some extra side cash for the holidays or vacations. Unfortunately, my mom's back isn't what it used to be and she didn't feel as if she could do it anymore. She asked me because she knew that I was looking for a job and Mr. Alvarez pays very, very well. A few days after he contacted my mother, she drove me over and I met Mr. Alvarez. He was one of the nicest men I'd ever met in my life. For someone who was 89 years old, he certainly had some pep in his step.

He was a peculiar looking man for sure. He looked a little bit like a hobbit, I suppose. Short and somewhat stocky. He had messy silver hair, but still was rocking a full head of it at 89 years old. His most noteworthy feature to me though was his massive forearms and hands. This guy almost looked like a cartoon character or something. Old or not, this guy looked like he could crush a coconut with his hands. And needless to say, the meeting went great and we agreed on an arrangement. I would come every Tuesday and Thursday to clean and basically do

whatever Mr. Alvarez needed and he would pay me a staggering $500 per day. That may not be a lot to some people but for me that was a literal fortune at the time. Tuesday comes and I get to ride over to the house for my first day on the job. He greets me and it's the same jolly little man I met a few days ago. I work for several hours and clean this mansion of a house and organized a lot of his stuff. Probably an unrelated note here, but this guy had some wild stuff in his house, like full taxidermy animals, crazy antiques, coins that looked ancient, outrageously rare sports memorabilia, and even some stuff from World War II, like uniforms,

guns, badges, and an insane number of photos. Mr. Alvarez was one of the most fascinating humans I'd ever met. I left that night and I honestly couldn't wait to go back on Thursday. Thursday comes and the same Mr. Alvarez doesn't greet me at the door. I mean, it was him, but something was wrong. He opened the door and didn't say anything. Left it open and walked away so I walked inside. I closed the door behind me and all the lights were off inside.

I walked over to the switch on the wall which controlled the overhead light and when I flipped it on he shouted from the other side of the room. What do you think you're doing? I froze at that moment because I didn't have an answer. And then I saw the floor on the front room and it was covered in bones. Hundreds of bones. Like skeleton bones. I stared in bewilderment because I was at a loss for words. I tried to process this and it was kind of making sense in my head. This guy had a lot of taxidermy around the house and a lot of other random and cool stuff. He probably had some kind of bone collection. What are all these bones from? I asked as I was trying to keep my composure. Without hesitation or remorse, he simply responded,

my victims. I felt my heart fall into my stomach. I didn't know what that meant, and I didn't know what to say next, so I just stuttered and began to try and speak. Mr. Alvarez, I don't really... He cut me off mid-sentence and said, Mr. Alvarez, he looked confused as if he had never heard this name before. Why did you call me that?

My name is Captain. I tried to calmly approach the situation, but I've never dealt with anybody this old. I didn't know if this man was losing his mind or if this was just normal old people behavior. Okay, Captain, why don't we just sit down and we'll talk? It seemed like a rational and calm response. I approached the couch and he jumped on me. He started to repeatedly hit me with his cane and he just kept saying, You'll never find them! You'll never find them! I have to admit that I was right about those forearms.

This man was powerful and not a frail old man. I'm a decent sized guy and I had to actually use all my strength to push this man off of me. And he hit the ground and instantly got back up and started to charge at me while still screaming, You'll never find them! I was able to run out of the house and run to my mom's house which was only a few miles. I told her what happened and she immediately drove over to check on him. We walked inside and Mr. Alvarez was sitting in the living room

and he was his happy and chipper self. Captain was no longer here. We asked if he was okay several times and he just kept saying that he was and was confused at what we were talking about. He says he was sitting on the couch waiting for me to show up and I never came. All the bones were gone too and when my mom asked about the bones he laughed and told my mom that she had a wild imagination. After some small talk we decided this job just wasn't for me and we left. My mom cried a little on the way home because of just how sad the situation really was. Clearly Mr. Alvarez was starting to slip in his brain and she didn't know if she could call

someone or just leave the man alone in his old age. He had no kids and his wife had been dead for almost 50 years I guess. Only a few days later, he had literally unfortunately passed away from some type of heart attack or some event like that. It was surreal and almost hard to believe because just days ago he was dancing around like that. It was surreal and almost hard to believe because just days ago he was dancing around like that hobbit I mentioned earlier and attacking me. So the fact that he was dead really hit hard for me. As far as I know, I assume all those bones were related to taxidermy. He did have a will and everything was left to a great niece that we didn't know we ever had I think about that day all the time

And I wonder to myself Was there anything else related to those bones? And what the hell was that captain persona? And what is it that I might never learn about him, or ever find. In late 2019, I was on the hunt for a new job. I am what you call a jack-of-all-trades. I've never had an issue finding a job or making money. My issues come from the fact that most of my jobs don't really last. I'm the person people call when they need something fixed, whether that be something electrical, plumbing, painting,

even cars. I never worked for a specific company and just got most of my work through word of mouth. One night at the bar I ended up meeting a nice guy named Jonathan. We got talking about maintenance and contracting work and I could see his eyes light up. Hey, if you're looking for a job you could come down in the condo complex down the road. I smiled but didn't really know how to respond. I didn't know what working for a condo meant. I'm the head of all the maintenance and tech at the condos. I got a small crew and I could use someone like your talents. I shrugged and said, okay. That's the type of guy I've always been.

I don't really think things through enough. I don't really take my time with it. I make rash decisions like I made that night, which would end up being a massive mistake. The next afternoon, I showed up at the condo and met Jonathan. He introduced me to his crew and basically gave me a tour of the complex. The place was beautiful. I didn't think condos could look that nice but then again, I really didn't know what a condo even looked like on the inside.

This complex had its own 24-hour gym, a game room, a theater, a sports complex, a spa, and a massive garage to keep your vehicle safe. This place was really cool. Jonathan then took me to the basement which is where our offices were located. The basement was the first part of this entire complex that didn't look amazing and it looked like a regular dark and depressing basement. Once down there we walked by a massive steel door that was slightly ajar, and I stole a quick glance, and I swear it looked like a dead animal in there, but we were walking so fast, I didn't really have a chance to be sure. Once Jonathan stopped talking, I asked him,

hey man, what's in that metal door over there? And his expression changed instantly. Oh, that door, it's not supposed to be open. It's the owner's storage room. I'll just go close it quick. He ran over quickly and used his entire side of his body to push the door shut, and then checked it to make sure it was locked after shutting. He then walked back over, smiling, and said, That was weird, but I better just ignore that room.

I nodded, but was not feeling super okay about this. After the weird door incident, Jonathan gave me a task list to accomplish, and I did everything on the list. When I left that day, he gave me my keys, which granted me access to the building in case I was called after hours from some maintenance emergency. Anybody who knows me knows that when I get my mind fixated on something, I need to have an answer. I went home that night and I couldn't stop thinking about that room. Around 1 am I got out of bed and decided to drive to the condos. I have a key now so I can get in and not worry about breaking in or doing anything illegal. And the first thing I noticed when I pulled into the lot was that Jonathan's car was there. I know it was his car because he carried on at the bar about how great his yellow Jeep Wrangler with the black

rims is and I know he doesn't live in the complex and he was there before me today so I know he still wasn't working. Something felt weird and I instantly felt uncomfortable. I started to try and rationalize it and came up with two very plausible solutions. He could have been on a late call which I figured was not likely because he told me he usually sends one of his crew or two maybe he was seeing someone who lives there. He works there so it's possible that he is dating someone there as well. I walked into the main lobby and used my key to open the basement door. I started to make my way into the basement and I heard laughing. Uncontrollable laughter and not just from one

person. I paused on the stairs and tried to listen to what this commotion was, and it was hard to hear so I kept trying to creep my way closer to the noise. When I got to the base of the stairs I could see the glow of the candlelight reflecting off the walls and floors, and now I could clearly make out Jonathan's voice, and he wasn't saying anything specifically, just laughing and screaming nonsense noises. I turned the corner and saw that the metal door was now wide open and a bright glow of candlelight shined out from the door. There was definitely an animal carcass of some kind, I think a deer lying on the floor of this room. I then saw Jonathan and three of his crew dancing around this animal like children on Christmas morning. I stood watching

like a deer in the headlights, pardon the pun, until Jonathan noticed me. He stopped and then expression on his face changed again. When he stopped, his crew stopped as well and all four men stood there staring at me. It was the tensest few seconds of my life and we all just stood still and stared and nobody said anything. Finally, Jonathan just screamed at the top of his lungs, like a drawn out cackle of some kind. The other three men started right after Jonathan. I started to back up because I finally realized what was happening and I wanted out. As I backed up, all four men charged at me and I turned and ran. They didn't chase me outside

of the basement, at least not that I could tell. I called the condo management the next day to report what I saw and I was shocked by the conversation we had. Not that I was going to ever go back there but the manager fired me and said that I had broken in. He told me that Jonathan had the basement on surveillance and he had caught me trying to do some kind of animal ritual. I tried to argue my case and claim that it was Jonathan and not me, but the management team instantly took his side. He said that I'm lucky that he won't press charges and if I wanted to stay that way, I should stay away permanently. I said fine by me and hung up the phone. And for years I've been wondering about several things.

I've always wondered if I should have tried to reach out to authorities myself. Maybe I could have got somewhere. At the time I was broke and scared that this would cost me a lot of legal fees and I didn't have those. And if these people were financially powerful, I would have ruined my life. I also wonder often what the heck was going on down there. I know nothing about that kind of stuff. I'm good at fixing things, but not very good at knowing whatever that was. Does anybody out there have any idea what that was? And was it harmless? In the moment it was horrifying, but was I truly in real danger? I'm hoping someone could give some suggestions or something on here.

So a few strange things have happened to me lately. For context, my husband is a truck driver and has gone two to three weeks at a time. We live way out in the woods, nearest neighbors are about two miles away, and it's not a place to find easily unless you know exactly where you are looking for. I work at home and am very private about my life on social media and do not do anything unnecessary that would be easy to find me. I'm just a very private person. I barely use Facebook except to keep in contact with a few family members. So I found it odd that around a week ago, a clearly made up name for a Facebook

user messages me and they know my real name. I use a pen name for my Facebook where I post memes and my artwork. He gives details on what my home looks like, my town, and where I work. Odd, but I ignored it. The next day, the same user messages and asks me very personal questions and stating disturbing things that they would like to do and how easy it would be to get inside my home. I show my husband who replies with the same user messaging disturbing odd things to him as well, asking very private things about me. Long story short, we find it weird but decide to block this account. As last week passes, I receive calls and text messages,

assumingly from the same account. Every time I answered the phone, it was just deep breathing and then hanging up. Eventually, it freaked me out to the point that I put up trail cams and security cameras on my porch and around the property. Well, this morning I went to town for some errands and my ring doorbell goes off and there's a man wearing a black hoodie hiding most of his face standing on my back porch and then banging on the door increasingly louder and yelling my name. This went on at least 15 minutes until we just stopped and walked off into the woods. I called the police who checked the house and around the property and haven't found anyone.

I even gave them the picture caught on my trail cams and basically nothing can be done unless I'm in immediate danger or he gets inside and they suggested that I get a guard dog. Basically nothing can be done unless I am in immediate danger or he gets inside and they suggested that I get a guard dog. My husband believes it's just a neighbor or friend pulling a prank but this isn't like anything anyone I know would pull. The questions and statements made about what this person wanted to do is incredibly creepy. My husband and family think I'm overreacting but to see someone just standing in my backyard super late at night when I live this far out isn't normal. I'm freaking out, and I don't know what to do.

So, update on the strange goings-ons. I woke up this morning, checked the cameras, no weirdos on the porch this time, but an eerie feeling all around and a dead bird right off my porch. There was blood so I'm really hoping this was just an animal attack. I'm clearly paranoid at this point. I spoke on the phone with the husband and he sent screenshots of the messages he received. I unblocked and tried to call the number to see what would happen and it says it's inactive. Reverse search for the number says it's a texting

app number randomly given to the person, which is even more creepy. Now a few things. One, I'm having my younger brother come and stay with me for about a week. He'll be doing his college classes at home here. I know that sounds silly, but I can't afford to stay at a hotel or something at the moment. He's the only family member I keep in touch with on a regular basis. My relationship with the rest of the family is strained due to childhood trauma issues. And lastly, he is ridiculously big and strong for a 20 year old kid and is fearless and I just feel better having someone here since I can't exactly stay somewhere else. Two, I plan on getting a dog later in the week, hopefully to just have a big

one as an alarm and guard. I also have ordered some better cameras to set up. 3. As someone has mentioned, yes, my brake lights were cut about a month ago. I'm really suspicious now as my cameras didn't pick up anyone. Neighbors live on the main road just before you turn down the back road all the way to get out here and said they haven't seen anything weird but they will keep an eye out now. And four, finally I've read all the comments and a lot were suspicious of my husband. I want to let all of you know that I hear you, I'm not ignoring the signs and to be frank with strangers on the internet I worried myself. I love him to death and I'm not about to go on a crazy train of accusing my husband of attempting to murder me or

even anything harmless or as a prank. However, I am a very suspicious person who doesn't trust anyone 100%. There haven't really been any signs of anything weird on his end that I've noticed yet and I have confirmed that he's been over the road like he said but I'm just keeping the idea in my head just in case. And I'm trying to figure out how to post photos on this app so others can see proof. If I manage to do so, you all can see for yourselves. I have mace and I'm about to check the cameras again and leave to pick up my brother. But one last thing. I'm in America, so I've been considering buying a gun and concealed carry permit. I grew up on a farm, I know how to shoot, I just prefer not to mess with them due to extremely traumatic events

before in my life. And if anything more happens, I think I'm going to do it. I'm still alive, and I have a bit of an update. I just want to preface this with something real quick. First, I've seen all the comments and I've gotten numerous messages and while I appreciate the concerns and tips, I'd like to say something. I'm not a young person or someone looking for attention. I can assure all of you that I am of sound body and mind and I am not imagining things. I don't struggle with mental illness, although I understand and hope the best for anyone who does. Second, I am not in tune with the internet, nor this app as well as many others, so I apologize for still trying to learn how to post pictures and such and I hope to figure out too soon. So as for the update, well, the police took my cameras

and have been holding them as evidence and that's all I've been told. Yes, there were more pictures caught. My younger brother in college stayed with me for about a week and we had thought things would calm down having a large male in the house but a few nights into him staying we both woke up in the middle of the night to banging on the front door. I checked the security cameras through an app on my phone. Same creepy guy standing there, hood pulled down and unable to see his face. My brother yelled that he was calling the police and the man just said, okay, and laughed and walked off. I have no idea where to, just into the woods.

I called the police and we explained everything again. He didn't seem to take it seriously and needless to say neither of us slept well after that. The rest of that week was quiet and I was terrified for him to go back to school but my husband was coming home for about two weeks so I felt a bit better. Things seemed to calm down the first week that he was home and I thought whoever was playing the sick joke was finished but this past weekend we had some of his friends over, celebrating a birthday and we all had drinks so friends were invited to stay to the night. Sunday morning we all woke up hungover and planned to go to town for breakfast. When we stepped on the front porch there was a roll of duct tape and a screwdriver that we don't own just laying on the ground. Cameras checked again and there were a few times you could make out this guy's face, pacing the porch or peeking in the

front windows so we all drove straight into town and showed the police. This time they came, checked all over the property and the property line in the woods and haven't found anything but are hopefully able to find out who this creep is through what the cameras caught. My husband has tried to console me through pointing out the possibility that he may be someone mentally ill or something and not with bad intentions, but it's frightening regardless. On top of all of this, my friend who lives in town and my neighbor at the beginning of the road have both apparently reported seeing someone matching the description of our troublemaker outside a large white windowless van at my friend's place of work, driving past her house late at night and apparently following her home several times recently. My neighbor has said along the same lines that said man has stopped at her house to

ask about the neighbor up there, my house being the only one. There's been a lot of reports and sights of a van similar in the area surrounding my small town about trafficking schemes and it just very much puts me on edge. I'm not sure if this is someone with a mental illness, someone involved in human trafficking, or someone just pulling a sick joke or what, but I'm terrified and sick at the thought of being home any longer. My husband had to be on the road again this week and I've decided to stay somewhere away from my town and I've not told anyone. I don't have family or many friends and at this rate, I don't know that I trust anyone to know anything right now anyway, but with no

one possibly knowing my location to tell friends, husband or the like, we'll see what happens. I know I may sound crazy to some. Some have and continue to say that I'm making things up, but at what cost? I have a private happy life and I gain nothing from this. I'm just living in fear anymore and hope it'll all go back to normal one day, as I'm beginning to regret moving to a small town. Back when I was in elementary school, I used to wake up super early on the weekends. I'd get up way before my mom, dad, or older brother, and I'd go downstairs to watch cartoons and make myself some cereal. I always appreciated that hour or so I had by myself.

We weren't a rich family, so there was only one TV in the house, and getting a chance to watch whatever I wanted was a huge luxury for me. It might seem weird, but I remember those mornings being a really happy portion of my childhood, and I suppose that makes it all the more ironic that one of those mornings brought arguably the most disturbing event of my entire life. I think it must have been at least six or seven, because it happened in the first house I grew up in as a kid, and it happened on a Saturday morning like any other. I got up, went downstairs, made myself some cereal, then sat watching cartoons and playing Mega Drive until I heard the phone ring. Now I really didn't want the rest of my

family to wake up because that would obviously ruin my private time, so I rushed to the phone as quickly as I could with the plan of just telling the person to call back later. But then as soon as I picked it up, put the receiver to my ear and started talking, I heard a voice on the other end of the phone say my name. That wasn't the first time someone had done that. People who knew our family that called our house would generally know if they'd heard a younger voice on the other end of the phone and that it was me. I'd even learned to recognize a few voices, mainly for the way they greeted me, but I didn't recognize the man's voice from that morning, even though they seemed to know me very, very well.

They said hi and stuff, asked if I was okay, then asked if I was watching cartoons like I normally did on a Saturday morning. I said yes, then told the guy that my mommy and daddy were sleeping, and that I'd ask him to call him back later if he told me his name. And that's when he said something like, that's okay, I don't want to talk to them anyway. I want to talk to you. I remember thinking that that was pretty unusual and I also remember just wanting to go back to playing Sonic or Streets of Rage or whatever it is I was playing. But saying that I also knew not to be rude to friends and my parents so I stayed there on the phone just answering the guy's questions.

It was all run of the mill stuff at first, asking me how school was, if I liked the teachers and the other kids. I was giving him mostly uh huh and I guess answers, just wanting the guy to be done so I could go back to playing Mega Drive but he just wouldn't seem to shut up. Finally, there was a pause in the conversation, a few moments of dead air, and I figured that he'd run out of things to say and was about to hang up. I had no idea who the guy was, nor did I care, I just wanted the call to be over. But then, like I said, he started saying stuff that made me think the guy was really close to our family. Without having to type out the whole

conversation, he seemed to know what cartoons I liked, what my favorite kind of cereal was, what pajamas I was wearing, all kinds of stuff. It didn't set alarm bells ringing or anything, even though it really should have. I just figured that he was one of my many uncles as both my mom and dad came from families with lots of siblings. But then the guy started talking to me in a way in which no uncle would ever talk to their nephew. I don't really want to get into exactly what he said. A lot of it was just beyond disturbing, but at the time, I didn't really know what he was talking about. There were a lot of words and phrases used that meant nothing to me until years later. So although I kind of knew some of it was bad, it didn't really affect me until years later when the

implications of the call became clear. So the guy said all this weird stuff that he wanted to do with me. Then he made some weird noises but thankfully right as I got to being so uncomfortable that I wanted to drop the phone and run away, he just thanked me and hung up. As you can imagine, the whole thing was on my mind all day but I think I stayed quiet because of how uncomfortable I was. Then with the classically awkward timing that only kids seem to have, I brought the issue up at dinner the following evening. I remember mentioning the call, then showing some curiosity about it. Then the next thing I mentioned was one of the phrases the guy had said to me.

It was one of the ones I didn't understand when he said it to me, and he said it during the part of the call that made me feel really uncomfortable, and when I said it, my dad actually spat a mouthful of food onto the table. The way I phrased it was like, what does it mean, blah blah blah and just hearing the phrase seemed to send my parents into orbit. They immediately sent me up to my room. I threw a tantrum because I had no idea what I'd done and I was still severely shaken from the call. It basically took a whole thing before my mom finally came to talk it out with me. I was still very ignorant of what had actually happened at the time, the overall significance of it anyway. I knew what the guy had said was wrong in some way, I just didn't know how to

express it. I also didn't understand why mom and dad were so utterly distraught when I told them as much of the stuff as I could remember. As far as I knew, someone had just said some mean stuff to me and as mom and dad always told me, words couldn't hurt me. But then if that was true, why were they so angry and why were they so scared? I didn't really find out until years later and my journey of unwilling discovery took place over a long period of time. I'd hear the odd word here and there throughout middle school and high school, then when I found out what it meant and I'd have this moment of, oh god, so that's what that guy wanted to do to me. I think that's why stuff messes you up as a kid so bad. You have all this time to dwell on it when you're still really confused and weak and vulnerable. I've clocked a fair few hours in

therapy because of it and I don't think there will ever be a time when I don't need to have that option on hand. As for the actual end of the story, as in what happened with the guy who called, I'm sorry to say that nothing came of it. Again, this isn't something that I found out until years later when mom and dad really broke the whole thing down for me, but yeah, they never caught the guy. The call came from a payphone I guess, one not covered by cameras and it came after the caller had obviously been watching me for quite some time. No incidental stuff either. The cops thought the guy might have actually watched me from the yard on a few Saturday mornings, just taking note of all the stuff

that I did or appeared to enjoy. I guess all his prep for taking it a step further. Thankfully, he didn't, but it's always creeped me out how that guy might still be out there, still harboring all kinds of messed up urges that drive him to terrify innocent young children, just ago I was staying in my partner's apartment for a few weeks by myself. I don't quite remember why I was out that late, but it was around 1am and I just got off transit. Only one other guy got off with me and he was rather tall and walked briskly. I was ahead of him at first, but he quickly passed me because even though I have a quick stride, I'm pretty short for a guy. I don't normally live in that city, so I'm not sure sure why but the streets were incredibly empty.

I remember thinking that because there wasn't even a single car on the road. We were literally a five minute walk away from a major university so it was very odd not to see a single person or car. The only lights were street lights. I spent nights at my partner's place before and I've never remembered ever being this dead. But anyway, I had walked down the street and was coming up to an intersection where I had to turn left. I noticed this guy standing around in front of the bank that was on that corner. The guy ahead of me walked by him with no problem and went straight. I was a bit wary but didn't think much of it until I was about maybe a meter away and he had sidestepped to be in front of me and held his arms wide open, grinning at me.

I glanced in the direction of the guy who left the train with me but he was across the street already. My heart was already pounding at this point and I think I may have started to disassociate from the stress because I can't remember what he looked like even though I remember looking directly at him. If this sounds like an overreaction, I have a history of multiple cases of CSA by different people and have PTSD among other mental illnesses that I still struggle with. At the time I was falling back into my disordered eating again and was also underweight in addition to being short so definitely not the person you'd expect to win in a fight and I knew it. I remember being frozen for a moment and then on instinct I very politely said, no thank you and took a step to the right towards the street and tried to keep walking forward. He moved in front of me again, still with his arms wide open, expecting me to hug him, still grinning.

For some reason, I repeated my polite refusal and sidestepped again instead of running the opposite direction. Luckily, he let me pass, but I could hear him following me from a short distance. I was wondering what I could do in that moment. I couldn't fight him. There was no one around. If I tried to call someone, he was close enough to grab me and I wasn't able to run very fast. I suddenly hear his steps speed up into a sprint and before I could react, he slowed down again. I walked a bit faster. He repeated the same thing over and over. I wondered if I should go a different path so he doesn't know where I live. It wasn't the

best idea since I didn't know the city well and he probably knew it better than I did. I decided I knew that I could find help in the lobby at least compared to if I went somewhere else. He sprinted at me again and I turned around and loudly asked him, do you need help? I remember not feeling my body and feeling lightheaded from the anxiety. Despite how panicked I felt, my voice came out clearly and I sounded disdainful. I don't think I meant to sound like he was annoying and inconveniencing me, but that's how it came out. Then he spoke for the first time and responded, no, do you need help? I didn't say anything to that and just turned back around and kept speedwalking towards my partner's apartment building.

He was still following, but now he was talking. I can't remember much of what he said. I was just focused on getting back without being assaulted. Eventually, I heard him stop walking. I know I'm scary. I don't know why he said that. I took the opportunity to put more distance between us and kept speedwalking. He didn't keep following though. He just kept saying, I know I'm scary. He got louder and louder the further I got. I got to the door of the apartment building and looked back again, and he was no longer in sight.

I unlocked the door to the building and then ran up the stairs instead of taking the elevator. When I got into the apartment I went straight to the window because the unit had a large window facing the street and I wanted to see if I could see him. Nothing. The streets were empty again. I texted my partner about the experience but he was already asleep and wouldn't see it. Luckily I haven't seen that man again and I hope I never will. So this story takes place back in the late summer of 2007. I was 18 years old, had graduated high school and was looking forward to starting college in just a couple of weeks. I'm a tall guy, a bit over 6 foot and was lanky and billed back then.

My dad and I had a yearly tradition of going on a trip to Reading where we'd stay at a hotel for the weekend and go to the water slides, see a movie, grab dinner from a fancy restaurant or two and just generally have a good time away from home. It was Saturday and we'd gone to the water slides all day. Once the sun was setting we decided to go to an In-N-Out for dinner and then had planned to go to the movies later in the evening. We were going to see Rush Hour 3 but on this particular occasion my dad had gotten pretty wiped out and decided that he would just relax at the hotel. I still wanted to go to the movies and said it was okay. He dropped me off at the movie theater, which was only a couple of miles from the hotel we were staying at, and I told him he didn't have to wait up for me. I just walked back after the movie. While I was waiting in line, I noted that there was a surprising amount of people around my age all going to see a movie called Superbad. It was starting 10 minutes

later than Rush Hour 3 and I was so curious to see what it was about that I changed that movie. It was a great time. The movie let out close to midnight and I was full of energy. The moon was full and it was warm at night in Reading, low 70s, so I was in good spirits as I started to leisurely walk back to the hotel. On my way back I noticed a silver car pulling out from a nearby street. It was late and on a quieter part of the city so there wasn't a whole lot of traffic at the time so it was notable. It slow rolled up to me and the passenger window rolled down. Inside was a guy who might have been in his late 20s or early 30s. He was clean shaven with dark hair and decently dressed and he asked me if I needed a ride. I thought it was a little odd but

he was smiling and seemed friendly enough. I'd had such a good day and was still full of energy though so I said no thanks and told him I was just going to walk back to my hotel. His smile faltered for a moment and he asked if I was sure. I nodded, assuring him that I'd be alright. He shrugged his shoulders and asked one last time if I was certain. I said yeah, then I began to walk. He drove off and I thought that was the end of it, but it wasn't. About two minutes later I was still walking along the street and I saw a car coming on the opposite side of the road. There was a cement divider on the center of the road and it only has a couple of areas where cars could turn around. I had been distracted with my own thoughts and wasn't looking for it but

I thought it might have been the same car. I glanced back and I could just barely see where the road curved and the car turned around at the same intersection. It turned around and came driving back my way and now I knew it was the same car with the guy I'd talked to earlier. I saw him looking at me as he passed by me again and chills went down my spine. I began to walk faster but not too much as I was giving him the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he thought that he'd forgotten something, but then realized he hadn't. Either way, I was paying attention now, and sure enough, as I walked forward, I saw him drive by on the opposite side of the road again. Any doubts I had disappeared,

and now I was on edge, ready to bolt if I saw his car slow down next to me. I saw him drive by again but also some other truck drove by on the opposite side of the street and his car passed me by. At this point I could see where he could turn around but I knew the street lights that he could use weren't too far ahead either. I looked around and across the street from me were some businesses and they had bushes in front of them. I waited until I couldn't see the silver car anymore and I ran across the street and hid behind the bushes, using them for cover. I watched and waited. I tied my shoes tight as my heart was pounding, hoping he wouldn't come by again.

But he did. I saw his silver car drive by my hiding spot and let out a sigh of relief as he didn't suddenly decide to drive into the parking lot where I was. But I didn't move either. I knew he could turn around again so I kept waiting. He drove by again on the opposite side of the street. I then started counting for 10 minutes, 600 seconds. I decided that if I saw his car drive by I would start again and I would still be ready to run just in case. The 10 minutes went by and I didn't see his car again. I got up and shakily made my way back to the hotel, keeping my eye out for any new cars coming my way. None did.

My dad woke up when I got back to our hotel room and I told him what happened. He got up and took a look around the hotel parking lot before saying that we should lock the door, draw the curtains and get some sleep, and we left early the next day. I'm really glad that I didn't get into that guy's car that night, because I just recently heard that there have been a number of kidnappings in that area around that time, with people getting taken after getting into seemingly friendly strangers' cars at night. To be continued... a movie on a little bed which was just layers of blankets with pillows in front of the tv in the living room by the front door i remember we were watching kung pao so we were all giggling and having fun my parents had gone to sleep a while ago so we were trying to be quiet only the light above us was on in the house at the time we were talking and joking when suddenly the doorknob

started shaking i knew all my family was asleep and in the house. Me and my friend looked at each other knowing that things are not right so we quickly lay down and pretended we were asleep. The door opened and a man walked in. I realized the light still being on would make it easy to tell that we were pretending to sleep. After a half a minute of silence it was too much for me. I sat up rubbing my eyes and said, hello? Looking at him, the man in the doorway had a small bag and stared back at me for a bit. He looked middle-aged with long blonde hair. He looked surprised like he didn't think that there was anyone up still. My friend continued pretending to sleep but I was horrified.

He said, Is this 48th street? I continued to act sleepy and said, 48th street is a block that way. And I pointed back behind the house. He just stared at me and stood silently. He said thanks and walked out. The weird bit is my house was on 48th,

but instead of street it was terrace. There wasn't any 48th street near. I told my parents when they got up and they were livid that I didn't get them. Before I begin, this encounter happened about 10 years ago. I was 22 years old and I am well aware that this was a very poor judgment call on my part. My parents always taught me to help someone in need, just not necessarily to the extent that I allowed. Up until this point, I didn't have much of a reason not to trust people or find out that some may not always have good intentions. I have also had an unreasonably difficult time saying no to people my whole life and have since had the help of a therapist to be better about that. I have only told this story to a handful of people because I truly am ashamed of my actions

and potentially putting my daughter's life in danger. I was on my way to an event of some kind with my three-year-old daughter when I realized that I had left something behind in my apartment. I was close enough to home that I decided to turn around and head home. As I was pulling into the parking lot of my apartment complex, a woman was walking kind of in the middle of a driving area and began waving me down. I pulled up next to the woman and rolled down my window about one third of the way. She gave me this story about how she works at the nearby nursing home and that she had run out of gas on her way to the gas station and was asking for directions to the gas station. I didn't think much of the fact that she was roaming around in my apartment complex because it was pretty common for people to cut through as it sat between two main roads and avoids traffic lights. I gave her directions

for a five minute walk to the gas station but she mentioned that she was pregnant and that she wasn't feeling well. I tried telling her that I was in a hurry and assured her that it was a very quick walk but she started to beg. At this time she noticed my daughter was in the back seat. She had a look of surprise that I didn't think much of at the time and she began talking to my daughter and made her laugh. She turned back to me and asked me one last time if I could just drive her to the gas station. At this point I rolled my eyes and just gave in. I let her in my car and she almost immediately asked if I have any money that she can use. My heart sank at that point, realizing that she was probably lying and just

wanted to lie her way into some cash. I was honest with her and told her that I was broke and also didn't carry cash on me. She pointed out another resident in the complex and asked me to drive her to them. In my mind there was still a slight possibility that she needed gas but didn't have the funds for it. So I drove her to the other person and she rolled down my window and started asking them for money. They said no and she pointed out to another person. At this time I told her that I really had to be somewhere and couldn't keep helping her. I drove her closer to the other person but far enough that she would have to get out of my car to talk to them which thankfully she did. When she got out of my car I just sped off and drove to my destination.

I told my mother about this story and a week later she sent me a clip from the local news. The news mentioned a woman who would approach people asking for a simple favor, which led her to asking them for money. If these people said no, she pulled out a syringe or a needle of some kind and would threaten to stab them with it, and did end up stabbing them on one occasion. I look at the image of the person and instantly recognize that it's the woman that was in my car. I know these types of people don't have much of a conscience, but I truly believe the fact that my daughter was in the car that day is what kept that woman from stabbing me. A few years ago, I moved back to my hometown after divorcing my ex-husband.

About a year after I moved back, I got a job at a local boutique. My workspace was in the back where the girls took deliveries and the clothes were stored before being put out in the front to sell. Soon after I started working there, I realized all the girls were creeped out by our local FedEx driver. When the girls saw the truck pull up outside they'd usually yell, he's here. And my boss would literally hide in her office so she didn't have to talk to this guy and it didn't take me long to figure out why. I'm a very friendly person usually and I like to treat everyone the way I'd want to be treated. This driver, Jeff, would come in to drop the boxes off and he'd always linger. He would make conversation and his conversations always

got progressively weirder. The first time I met him and introduced myself he said, oh did you used to work at the funeral home? It was a little strange to me but it's a small town so I just said yes and that was it. I hadn't given him my last name so I just figured that he remembered my face. One of the next times he came he told me that he had just dropped some packages off at my house. When I looked at him and asked how he knew where my house was he just laughed and said it's not a big city. I remember names and it doesn't take long to realize who's who. It made me feel weird and when I told my boss about it after he left,

she agreed that it was weird but I just kind of let it go. When my girls told me that the FedEx guy was weird and that he always tried to talk to them when he came in, my warning bells went off. One of the next times he came in, he made a remark about a big box he delivered to my house and gave me a couple of small packages that were addressed to my house and said, With it being close to Christmas, I didn't want to leave these. I know you don't have a big man to get that box inside. Do you want me to come help you and get in the house when I get off of work? I immediately replied no.

I got it, but thanks. And that remark creeped me out bad. That told me that he was either watching my house or paying attention to the names on the mail. Either way, it was enough for me to warn my girls not to answer if he came to the house and start trying to hide when he came in. One day I even heard him ask one of the girls up front where I was. I started to take my lunch break around the time that he made his delivery and I did everything I could to avoid him. One evening I heard a knock at the door of my house and then the sound of packages being left on the porch. I waited a minute or so and then went to get the boxes.

Jeff was parked in the church parking lot across my house, watching. As soon as I came out, he grinned and waved and then started to get out of the truck. I quickly backed into my house and shut the door. He didn't come knock, but his truck was in the parking lot for another 15 minutes or so. My daughter watched him from her bedroom window and told me he kept looking at the house and I figured that he was waiting to see if I'd come back out. I called the local FedEx facility to report it. I explained the whole story and the manager told me that they would look into it and thanked me

for letting them know. I figured nothing would be done. A couple of days went by and I got a call from a manager at the FedEx facility. He told me that Jeff would no longer be a problem and apologize for everything. I assumed maybe they changed his route or something, but the next driver happened to be a high school friend and when I jokingly told him, I'm glad you're our FedEx guy now, the last dude was a creeper. He said, Yeah, he got fired. Dude was stalking folks, apparently.

And it made my blood run cold. I watched for him for months afterwards. It's possible he was just overly friendly, but I don't think so. I used to feel bad that he lost his job, but he just crossed too many lines. To be continued... there on a wife retreat with each other. All was well for the first six days, then I find that the back gate is wide open. Well, that would not worry me for one, but to access that gate in particular,

you have to get past a six foot tall sliding gate. The house is right off the road downtown, so the driveway is on the side of the house and the garage is basically in the backyard. Once you go into the big sliding gate, you can pull right into the front of the house and the garage is basically in the backyard. Once you go into the big sliding gate you can pull right into the front of the garage and next to the house. To get to the back door and go inside there are two side gates that fence off the back area. One gate leads to the backyard and the other leads to the back door. I have not touched the one that leads to the backyard the whole time that I've been here. Well I work the night shift and I arrive home at about 11.30. I get home and I know for a fact the gate was not open when I left because my dog was trying to get out that gate and I told her no and to come to the gate that I was using. I got home and I know the gate was closed.

Well it was about 2am when the dog started fussing and and I was like, I guess they might have to go potty. So I walked outside, and the dogs started barking like crazy. No big deal, they do it every time they go out. Though then I looked to my left and see that the second gate was wide open. My heart sank because I knew I didn't leave that gate open and it was closed when I returned home not even three hours ago. I've called my parents and told them the situation and they're not concerned at all. I check the entire house, all the closets under the bed and no one's in the house and

nothing looks a ray. Though I am jumping at every sound their cat and two dogs make and I'm scared and want to leave but also scared to return outside of my car. I have very high anxiety and panic attacks and I'm feeling one coming. I know all the doors are locked, though none of their windows have curtains, so anyone outside can easily see in. I need some reassurance. Sitting in a back room with all the dogs with me typing this. Long story short, I'm house slash dog sitting my aunt's house and I come home to the back gate that is only

accessible after passing a six foot gate open. I know it was closed when I left and I hope to god that someone's not here. Update. I packed all my stuff up and I was just sitting on the couch with the dogs. I noticed police lights outside of the house in front of the next door neighbor's house. I walked outside with all of my stuff locking the front doors of the house. I went over to the cops and asked them to escort me to my car because I felt unsafe. Turns out, the cops are at the neighbor's house due to reported suspicious activity. Three men escorted me to my car and I got the heck out of Dodge. My gut was telling me that something wasn't right and obviously something wasn't right because

cops were at the next door neighbor's house. I'm now safe and I got off the phone with my brother and finally I'm almost home. She told me not too long ago that she was sitting in her car at night in the parking lot of her friend's apartment complex and a car that was parked nearby pulled in front of her and stopped the car, turned the lights off, and a guy got out and had something in his hands and was walking towards her door. Luckily, it was an open parking lot, and no one was behind her, and she was able to pull off. Now, this is my sister I'm talking about, and another time, she was getting gas in a nearby gas station like 10 minutes from her house late at night. She was the only one out there at the time, and she had to go into into the store and there was only one cashier. She said a couple of guys came into the store and walked close to her and said to her,

Hey sweetheart, and mind you this is late at night but that's still creepy anytime it's unwanted. She was at the self-checkout and purposefully rang the barcode on a banana since they don't scan so it would alert the cashier and they came over. She left and went back to her car but unfortunately this wasn't where it ends. The two guys came out, one of them went to their car which was parked right behind my sister's at the pump, opened her trunk which was completely empty according to my sister and the other guy circled her car, gestured to the other guy and tried to open her door. Thank god it was locked and when he saw that she was on the phone, he backed away and she took off. Then a couple of days ago in our neighborhood while she was walking her son home from the bus

stop, a lady who was walking her dog and had a stroller stopped her and informed her that a guy had been following them and taking pictures. What the hell is wrong with people in this world? I've never had any experience such as this, but I take for granted that I'm 6'6", a grown man who's just not vulnerable and I can defend myself. She's like a foot shorter and not able to defend herself. Just makes me want to get cameras even more now. More than anything I feel like I wish I could do something. I wish I could catch these sick monsters and let them know that they're in for a rude awakening. Anyways, I just needed to share this because she just laid this information on me and it really disturbed me.

And I hope that my sister is able to find peace. A little over a month ago, I had gone to pick up an item from a Kijiji seller who, for the sake of anonymity, we'll call Mike, who lives in Canada. We exchanged a few messages regarding pickup and he was dead set on meeting just outside his house. He wouldn't budge on it and said word for word, quote, if not specific place here, then I'm done here. He seemed to have quite a stubborn and aggressive temper right off the bat, so I was hesitant to even meet him, but the item I was looking for was something that was sold out online everywhere, so the fact that I found one for sale much cheaper than its original price won me over. It turns out my gut instinct was right from the start, because when I went to do the pickup,

it just got worse. He told me he liked to kill and skin animals for fun. He tried to bribe me into his apartment, or to walk me back to where I was headed. He was asking where I lived in high detail and at one point he even tried to put his hands on me but I took a step back and stood my ground. He was asking a lot of really personal and quite frankly creepy questions and though I didn't answer them in ways he probably expected me to, I just tried to act polite and not upset him any further as in his messages he was saying that he was angry and had a horrible day. Once we went our separate ways he acted all giddy about the fact that Kijiji supposedly

links your phone number to your account and that would be his way of keeping in touch with me. Needless to say I blocked his account on Kijiji as he seems to be a really dodgy and sketchy character. He looked miserable and upset when I said that I didn't use social media, which I truthfully don't, but he was desperate to stay in contact with me somehow. Keep in mind, this man looked to be bald and in his later 30s and 40s, slim-billed white dude who claimed to have some super attractive wife he met on plentyoffish.com. Yeah, I don't know. Creepy. I was tempted to file a report against him to police, but because he technically didn't do anything, I found that it would be pointless

to do so, and instead, I'm posting a warning about it here on Reddit. Please stay safe out there. Have someone tough with you, or really really anyone with you even if it's a group of people. I legitimately feel like this cellar is capable of harming another human being and it's only a matter of time. To be continued... bell to be alerted of all future narrations. I release new videos every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at 7pm Eastern Standard Time. If you get a story, be sure to submit them to my subreddit r slash let's read official and maybe even hear your story featured on the next video. And 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 of these stories in big

compilations and save huge on data. Located anywhere you listen to podcasts. Links in the description below. Thanks so much, friends, and I'll see you again soon.