The Lets Read Podcast - 241: DON'T GO OUT AFTER DARK | 20 True Scary Stories | EP 229

Episode Date: May 28, 2024

This episode includes narrations of true creepy encounters submitted by normal folks just like yourself. Today you'll experience horrifying stories about Sheriff Grandpas, Strangers, & Things That Happen After Dark... HAVE A STORY TO SUBMIT? www.Reddit.com/r/LetsReadOfficial Or over email: [e-mail] 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/

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Valid email address required. Terms apply. See pennzoil.ca slash offer for details. MasterCard is a trademark of MasterCard International Incorporated. A A little over a year ago I was living in an apartment, trying to save money. It was a small one-bedroom apartment and the rent was somewhat manageable. At the time I wasn't dating and I surely wasn't looking to date. I was happy going to my 9-to-5 job and then coming home to relax with some video games. The apartment building itself was alright, it was nothing to write home about. Everything on the inside worked and for the most part the tenants were quiet and kept to themselves.

The one downfall for me was the view from my balcony. I don't know if this is an unpopular opinion, but I wanted the third floor apartment so I could sit outside and read or just simply take in the fresh air. So the fact that I had another apartment building in my direct line of sight was kind of a buzzkill for me. I ended up making peace with it after a while and learned how to ignore it. It's strange how the separation of a building makes a huge difference. For example, my apartment building was just a little nicer and had very little, if any, type of crime. The apartment building behind me always seemed to have a police car outside, and the area itself spanned multiple blocks and I think six or seven different apartment buildings.

When I say buildings, I mean different apartments altogether. Like each block of apartments was a different leasing company. The first few were really nice, and the more you progressed through the blocks of apartments, the less nice they became. I was in the last building before they started to go downhill. But like I said, I got used to my view and every once in a while I would get to see a show better than you could watch on cops. At some point during the lease of my apartment, I had come home from a hard day's work and just wanted to sit outside and relax. It was one of those beautiful nights in the early summer and I didn't want to go outside. I grabbed my laptop and started watching stuff on there with my headphones. Before I knew it, it was after midnight and I was still sitting outside.

I finished what I was watching and I decided to just sit outside and enjoy the air for a while until I went inside to sleep. Immediately after taking my headphones out, I noticed something strange from my balcony vantage point. I saw a sort of figure pacing back and forth outside of the apartment building behind me. I felt comfortable practically spying on this person since there was no way he could see me. I was dressed in all black on a third floor balcony slouched in a chair. I watched this pacing continue for roughly five minutes. I was trying to theorize what the person was doing. My first thought was that maybe they got locked out and they were pacing waiting for someone to let them in. But that theory faded away quickly

when I noticed how suspicious he looked when he stopped pacing. He started to look all around, like he was trying to be secretive. I could clearly make out some of his features once he started to look around too. He had a thick beard and was wearing an Atlanta Braves baseball cap. He had a hood on top of the hat and I could see long hair protruding from the sides of the hood and hat. He slowly approached a sliding door and it must have been locked because after a couple of attempts of trying to open it, he stopped and walked to another apartment. When he reached the next apartment, he went to grab the door and a car drove by. He jumped away from the door and pretended like he was walking down the road.

Once the car was out of sight, he went back to the door and tried to open it again. And again, no luck. I felt a sense of relief when he started to walk away from the apartments. Whatever intentions he had, it seemed like he was abandoning them. I also felt relief lift off my shoulders because I was having an eternal battle on the inside on whether or not I should call the cops. I mean, of course I should have, but for some reason calling the cops was giving me crippling anxiety. I can't explain why, but the police terrify me, so I avoid that confrontation at all costs. Just as the relief was sitting in completely, the man turned back around and went back to the apartment

that he was just at seconds ago. He didn't look around this time. He grabbed onto the sliding door and started to yank on it hard. Thankfully, his failure continued and he gave up and went to the last apartment on the ground floor that was in my vision. He grabbed the door and, to my horror, it opened. He slowly opened it as if though he was trying to be quiet. I wanted to grab my phone and call the police, but I also didn't want to lose my focus on this guy. The lights were in the apartment, so I couldn't tell where he went once he went inside. And once he was inside, I lost sight and I ran and grabbed my phone.

I took everything I had, but I called the police and told them my suspicion. They said that they were going to send a car over right away and I sat on the balcony and continued to watch the sliding door that he left slightly open. I saw a light turn into one of the windows of the apartment and within seconds I saw the man run out of the apartment at full speed toward my building. Even though I knew this man couldn't see me, I still slid down in my chair even more just because I was so tense. Before the man was even out of sight, a large shirtless man ran out of the sliding door with a baseball bat in hand to chase him. He only took a few steps before retreating into his apartment, closing the sliding door and standing in the window of the door with a bat in hand. I couldn't believe what I had just seen.

I instantly felt guilty for not calling earlier, but then reassured myself that it could have potentially been much worse if I didn't call when I did. The cops finally showed up a few minutes later and were talking to the man. I was still watching from my balcony and I saw a woman joining the big man as well as two teenage children. Within just a couple of minutes, several more cops showed up. After a lot of conversations with the family, the cops finally left and eventually, the night was quiet again. I went to bed that night, terrified that someone was going to open my sliding door even though I was on the third floor. I feared that my apartment was going to get broken into every night until I eventually just moved out. I still think about that night all

the time. Even though it didn't directly involve me, sometimes being a fly on the wall and witnessing something horrible can be just as traumatic in other ways. At the end of the day, I was just happy I don't live anywhere near those apartments anymore, and that the family from the apartment was physically unharmed that night, although I can't imagine the psychological damage that that family is still enduring today. About four years ago, one of my work colleagues asked me to dog sit and watch over their house while they were out of town for a few nights. I was decently close with this co-worker so I told them that it wouldn't be a problem and I'd love to do it. I had met their dog Candy on a few occasions and knew that I wouldn't have a problem being with her for a few days. She was hyper but usually pretty low maintenance. I figured if I brought her a new toy that it would distract her for most of the time.

I packed a small bag and went over a little early so I could get all of the details before they left. Where the dog food was, how often she was fed, where her harness and leash were, etc, etc. They had a security system, but we decided that they would leave it off while they were gone, so I didn't have to worry about it when I left and came back during the next day. They lived in a nice neighborhood obviously so I would still lock the doors and there was a dog there so I really had no need for the security system to actually be on. She did let me know that even when the system wasn't armed if the doors opened you would hear a faint chime that the security box would let you know what door was open. After getting the rundown, they were off on their trip and I was inside hanging out with Candy. The first night was

uneventful. Outside of Candy trying to eat grass and dirt, she was perfectly well behaved and even came and laid with me on the couch when she got tired. I was a little annoyed with myself that I brought her a toy with a squeaker because after two hours I thought that I was going to go insane. I didn't sleep well. Something about being in someone else's house alone I just couldn't relax my mind. Also Candy couldn't figure out where she wanted to sleep so she was up and down on the guest bed with me which wasn't really allowing me to get comfortable. The first night came and went and it was already my last evening staying at the house. I remember it was getting kind of late and I wanted to get pizza. I ordered it on my phone, ran out to pick it up,

and came back to put the TV on and enjoy some pizza and breadsticks. Before I knew it, the sun was down and I was starting to doze off on the couch. Candy seemed very restless, which she hadn't at all since I had been there. I figured that maybe she needed to go out to the backyard, but when I opened the door, she just stared out into the backyard and started to whine. She wouldn't go outside, even when the motion light turned on. I didn't close the door right away, so the faint chiming from the security system was going off to let me know that the door was open. I went to the closet to get Candy off to let me know that the door was open.

I went to the closet to get Candy a treat to see if that would calm her down. I moved her harness and leash out of the way and got her a treat, which she looked very excited about and her tail was wagging like crazy. I realized that it was because she heard the jingling from her leash that she wanted to go on a walk. It was late and I wasn't sure if I should take her, but if she had to go to the bathroom and wouldn't go in the backyard, I figured I would take her on a quick walk to see if she would calm down. I almost fell down the stairs trying to lock the front door while she was pulling me in the opposite direction. I started walking down the street as I wasn't super familiar with the area.

I noticed that down the road there seemed to be a park or at least an area with some open grass. The street lights gave me a little bit of guidance in the dark and as soon as we got to the grass Candy stormed around and went to the bathroom. I was relieved and thought that this was definitely what she needed. As I was done picking up after her I noticed that her ears were raised and she started to whine again, and then the whine turned into a low growl. I asked her what was wrong and looked toward where she was looking and there was a person sitting on one of the swings in the park. The park itself wasn't lit, but some of the mulched enclosure was being lit by the streetlights. The person wasn't moving or swinging.

They were sitting as still as they could be and staring in our direction. The only thing I remember is that they had some type of striped outfit on. Both the pants and shirt were vertically striped, almost like you'd see on a clown. I pulled on Candy's leash to try to get her to move, but she was just stuck in place, and I yelled under my breath, Candy, let's go. As soon as she looked back at me, the person stood up from the swing, still just staring in our direction, and Candy started to bark, and I just started walking back towards the house. Even though I was very far away from the swings, I remember starting to jog just to try and get out of there and get back to the house as quickly as possible.

Once we got back, I gave her another treat and figured that we would sit on the couch. She got into her dog bed with her toy and laid down while I put the TV on and started scrolling on my phone. About a half hour later, I kept feeling like I was hearing something, like music or something. I couldn't put my finger on it. It was nagging at me so I walked out to the kitchen and realized that it was the security alarm unit. It was chiming and saying that the back door was open. My heart sank. Why was the door open?

I then remembered that I tried to let Candy out to the backyard before we went on a walk. Had I forgotten to close it all the way and lock it? That definitely was against my nature, even at my own house I always closed and locked the doors as soon as I got inside, out of habit. I closed and locked the door and started to walk back to the living room when Candy was already out in the kitchen whining and kind of half growling and barking as she had earlier at the park. She turned her attention to the stairs, heading down to the basement and started full on barking. As I tried to calm her down I noticed that the light switch to the basement didn't seem to be working, or at least the switch wasn't turning a light on to the

basement at all. I walked back to the living room and told Candy to lie down. I then went back to the basement stairs, turned my phone light on to try and mitigate some of the darkness, and heard only what I can describe as sort of a laugh. I don't know how else to describe it, but I remember turning around and booking it up the stairs and grabbing Candy and just going outside, not knowing what else to do. I called my friend from work and told her what happened.

She said that she would phone the police and let them know that there was an incident and that I was house sitting and that they could expect me to be there. About 20 minutes later, the police showed up and did a walkthrough of the house and property. They didn't find anything, but did say that the back door was slightly ajar and unlocked. I told them that it had 100% been locked as I remembered doing it less than an hour ago. They gave me a number and said if anything else out of the ordinary happened to give them a call. I called my friend and filled her in and also apologized for having them having to worry while they were away She said that they would be home first thing in the morning and walked me through how to set the alarm for the remainder of the night

I made it through the night with no other strange occurrences and I never did get any answers as to what exactly happened that night. It's not uncommon to go through some hard times in your early 20s. Whether that's trying to find a job, saving money, or starting a family with the right partner. You name it. And I'm sure there is a long list of people that share those struggles. I also went through some hard times in my early 20s, but I'm sure my situation is a little more unorthodox. I had every advantage in life growing up. I was funny, athletic, had a loving family and great friends, and came from a wealthy enough background that as long as I applied myself, I could have a comfortable life.

Yeah, that didn't happen. I was too obsessed with being the funny guy. And I was never going to be a pro athlete by any means, but I was good enough at football to play in college for sure, but decided in my senior year of high school that I would rather party and hang out with my friends. Sports isn't everything though, and my parents were cool with me giving football up, even if it meant giving up scholarships. I didn't have those parents that forced me into sports or hobbies, but giving up that structure of football forced me into doing some shady things in my free time. Long story short, I barely made it through my senior year and by the end of summer, I had a falling out with my parents and never went to college. I moved across to the east coast for a few years, just being useless

and offering really nothing to society looking back. I was hanging out with questionable people at best, and doing things that I'm not proud of, and have yet to come to peace with it, and I'm now in my 30s. My parents lived in Pennsylvania, and I started making my way up north when I was 22 years old in an attempt to apologize and kind of just turn my life around. I had finally reached my breaking point and decided that I couldn't be homeless anymore. I was starting to feel sick and I knew something wasn't right on the inside. I hitchhiked a massive chunk of the journey and when I reached Virginia I started walking again. I didn't call my parents because one, I didn't think that they

ever wanted to see me or talk to me again, and two, I didn't have a phone or any way to reach them. I planned on just showing up at their doorstep and just hoping for the best. One night, I think I was still in Virginia and I started walking through this nice park. This wasn't one of those playground parks. This was a massive area with forests and all types of trails. I bet during the day, under the right circumstances, this place is probably gorgeous. The dark trails were quiet and desolate and for the first time in a long time, I felt peace. It was pitch black, but I always liked the dark, especially since I had been homeless. I considered nightfall to be one of my best friends.

I figured I would find a nice quiet place to lay down and get a relaxing night's sleep before the sun rises and I can continue my walk home. I was exhausted though, so I fell asleep right away. I don't know how long I was sleeping when I woke up to the sound of whispers. One thing about being homeless is that you sleep with one eye open. I rolled to the side of whispers. One thing about being homeless is that you sleep with one eye open. I rolled to the side of the big tree that I was leaning on and tried to focus on the darkness to see where the sounds were coming from. Well, I didn't need to be a detective to find the source. About 15 feet away from me was a group of guys. I think I counted about five, but there could have been one or two more.

They had flashlights and they were shining them into the forest where I was laying. I heard one of the guys shout from the darkness, He's over there! I know I saw a person sleeping! The light danced back and forth and then the beam stopped directly on my face. The guy with the light yelled, Oh dude! He's right here! I heard them continue to whisper and laugh. I couldn't decide what these guys wanted, and as I stared back like some frightened animal, the guy with the light said in a confident voice, it's okay dude, come

on out. Why are you sleeping in the woods? For some reason, I felt safe about this and I started making my way toward the group of guys and telling them that I was homeless and trying to make my way home. As I got closer to the guys, they were all staring at me and they seemed to be smiling. It was like they were greeting an old friend. One of the guys grabbed my arm and helped me over some rocks to join them. As soon as I was face to face with the group, the guy with the flashlight shouted, oh dude, you reek. The other guy started to laugh uncontrollably as I started to feel really embarrassed. I tried to say something but before I could even get any words out, the guy with the flashlight struck me right on the top of my head

with the light. I fell to the ground holding my head. I could hear the guy laughing and joking as they all started to kick me while I was down, screaming things like get a job deadbeat and stop ruining our parks with your filth. I gave up trying to fight back after a while and just let the beatdown continue. They stopped after a few minutes and as I was laying there, I could feel the ground spinning beneath me. These guys really did a number on me, I thought. They started to talk amongst themselves about something completely unrelated, talking about a girl from class or something. I couldn't believe that they'd just beaten me so badly that

I couldn't even see straight, and they seemed completely unfazed. While they were talking about this girl, I tried to get up and just make a run for it. I got to my feet, and I felt the world spinning as I tried to take a step. I must have looked messed up because the guy started to cackle right behind me. And through their hysterical laughter one of the guys shouted, Look at him trying to run. Looks ridiculous. I'm not sure how far I made it before I felt an intense pain in the back of my head and everything went completely black.

I remember these passing moments of the guys walking by and laughing. The only thing I really remember about these guys was that they were roughly college age, were talking about people in class, and one of them had a Virginia University shirt on. The next thing I remember is waking up the next day in the woods, surrounded by a few different people. They were hikers on their phone, the paramedics I believe, and I somehow was able to form sentences and tell them my name and very little details of the prior evening. One of the women who was sitting with me while waiting for the paramedic asked if she could call anyone for me, and this is when I finally broke down and just called my parents. They wasted no time and drove down to Virginia to get me and make sure that I was alright.

After that night, my life drastically turned around. I moved home for a while until I got on my feet. I started online programs for college and eventually, I got my business degree. When I was homeless, I had seen some messed up things, but none of those things held a candle to that night. I thought my life was over in that moment. These insane adults just felt no remorse as they attacked another human being and then laughed as I lied there nearly motionless in pain. Monsters aren't always hiding under your bed or in your closet. Sometimes they can be the very normal people that we see every day of our life. I have spent the better part of the last four years taking care of my sick grandfather.

My grandma died over ten years ago and unfortunately, my dad didn't have a good relationship with his father. It wasn't easy towards the end, but he ended up passing away a few months back. I took it harder than the rest of the family since I spent a lot of time with my grandpa. I guess it should have come as no surprise to me that he left me his house in the will. The house was in bad shape though. For starters, it wasn't in a great area. My grandparents built the house almost 70 years ago when the area was nothing but forests and a few roads. Now, the house is in a busy area of the town. The neighborhood where the house sits

is one of the most crime-ridden areas in my hometown. Add that to the fact that the house hasn't had any updates or repairs in over a decade and you have a house that, quite honestly, I didn't want. I spoke to a realtor who told me that the house would sell without issue. Even though the house was rough it was big and she told me that people often will buy houses in these areas to accommodate their entire families. She gave me a small list of things that I needed to do and then we were going to list the house the following week. I tirelessly cleaned that house for days. In his older age, my grandpa became a hoarder and just had things everywhere. Not only that, but I also just felt depressed

being there. I spent so much time there as a child and even into adulthood. One night, I decided that I was going to stay overnight and bang out the rest of the cleaning. My husband didn't stay because he had to work in the morning and I was okay with that. Truthfully, I wanted to be here alone anyway to come to peace with the fact that my grandpa had moved on. I truly worked all night. When I finally looked at the clock, it was almost 3.30 in the morning. I was shocked and felt good about the work that I had done. I went into the living room, which was at the back of the house. I turned on a small desk lamp and started to read for a little while. I planned on reading until I got tired and fell asleep. I couldn't have been reading for longer than five minutes when I

started to hear a strange noise. I listened but didn't pay too much attention to the noise. Eventually it became hard to ignore. It sounded like movement. I tried to reason with my logic and tell myself that it was either old pipes or just my imagination. After all, my grandpa just died and I thought it was entirely possible that I was subconsciously trying to convince myself of some sign. I slowly made my way down the long and dark hallway though, and the noises were getting louder and at this point it was just too hard to ignore. When I got to the front door I was standing next to the basement door and whatever the

sound was, it was clearly coming from the basement. The basement of this house is sort of strange. From where I was standing in the kitchen it was a long staircase down to the basement but in the back of the basement you you can just walk out the door. And this is because my grandparents' house sits on a hill. So I opened the basement door, and now the sounds were loud and echoing through the staircase. I don't know if it was because I was sad or just plain stupid, but my mind was telling me that these noises were my grandpa giving me some sort of sign.

I slowly made my way to the basement, and as I turned the corner, I saw two men digging through my grandpa's boxes. I quickly ran behind a stack of boxes and just froze. The men had a flashlight, and I saw the beam of light fly in my direction for just a moment, but then went back to where it was before. I could hear them talking and shushing but I couldn't make out any words. The only thing I did hear was in a muffled voice and he said, be quiet, you don't want to wake that old man. Whoever these guys were, they thought my grandpa was still alive and I was praying that they would

leave and not find me hiding on the other side of the basement. I was too scared to make a run for it and I didn't dare take two people on at once. My phone was upstairs and my purse which was in the kitchen. I figured my best course of action was just to stay hidden and hope they didn't find me. A couple of minutes at least had passed and the two guys ran off out of the back door of the basement. I still waited for a while after that moment before I moved and once I decided it was safe I ran upstairs, got my purse and just drove home. At this point it was almost 4.45 in the morning and my husband would be waking up for work soon. I came back frantically and my husband woke up. I told him everything and

he called into work so he could stay with me for the day and we went over to my grandparents house in the morning so we could look and see if the back door was damaged and if anything had been stolen. Most notably the door was not broken. Whoever got into the basement just walked right in. Now admittedly I hadn't been in the basement that much so I didn't even bother to check and see if it had been locked prior. We looked at the boxes that they were going through and they didn't have too much in them that I would consider valuable. It was newspapers, pictures, and some little knickknacks. I suppose they could have stolen something valuable but I don't even know what could have been down there that was that valuable. We did end up making an official report when it was all said and done and I didn't expect

any answers. By the time I crossed my mind to call the police I was already almost home and figured by that point it was just a waste of time. We eventually finished cleaning the house during the daytime hours and then sold it in a couple of weeks. I'll never forget the memory of seeing those two guys, just standing in my grandpa's basement, rummaging through his stuff. When you want to bet on sports, play it on a field or ice or course, Bed Rivers is the place. Over, under, money, line. Same game, parlays, it's all fine.

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That's R-I-N-S-E dot com. Almost five years ago, I moved to Vermont from Maryland. Not for myself, but for my wife, who secured some type of hospital administration job. I don't really know the specifics of the job, I just know that the pay was outstanding enough that it was worth moving. Not to mention, her new company paid for us to move. Back home in Maryland, I didn't have what you may call a great job. It wasn't a bad job and was more than enough to make a living. I was a manager of one of the local supermarkets in the area. The only issue with my job was that I had already hit a ceiling for my pay and my wife was starting at a drastically higher rate than I was already making, so it was

a no-brainer. We settled into the new place in no time. My wife made friends at her new job almost right away, and life was good. I was looking for work all over, and I ended up getting a job at Target. That job lasted about two weeks because I got a call for a better-paying job. A small, independently-owned supermarket was not far from where we lived and it just so happened that they were looking for a store manager. I loved this job at first. It wasn't like working at a chain store like I had done in the past. It was low maintenance and the hours were fantastic. The store was only open from 7 in the morning until 8 at night.

Within just a couple of months I was running that store like a well-oiled machine. The owner loved me and trusted me and surprisingly I was making more at this independent store than I was at the chain market in Maryland. One afternoon the owner came in and he started ranting about how he hated how all the end displays looked and decided that he wanted to do a full remodel. I will say the average average person would never notice this, but this guy ran a good company and he wanted everything to be in top shape all the time and I can't blame him there. He started talking about hiring some extra hands to do this remodeling and I told him not to waste his money. I suggested that I come in overnight for a few days next week to knock out all the remodeling stuff that he wanted, and he agreed and we locked it into the schedule for the next week. I scheduled myself and three other employees to work overnight Tuesday through Thursday. I figured having eight hours overnight uninterrupted would be plenty of time.

Tuesday night came and went and we made good progress. I was looking forward to the rest of the shifts because we had fun that night. We blasted some music and just went to town redoing displays, cleaning, and totally revamping one section of the store. On Wednesday, the night started just like Tuesday. We were doing an awesome job, and sometime during the middle of the shift, one of the employees, a woman named Jade, came up to me. She looked like she had seen a ghost and I asked if she was okay and she shook her head and asked if we could talk in the office for a minute. When we got to the office, I asked her if she was okay again. She looked more concerned and

angrier at this point than scared and upset. In a low voice, as if though she was trying to be quiet, she said, when I was just in the bathroom, someone came in and was just standing on the outside of the door. I yelled at them, I don't remember what it was, and they still just stood there. It was like a full minute and then finally they turned around and ran out of the bathroom. I took in everything she said and I understood her concern. Jade was the only woman on my crew tonight, so whoever was in the bathroom with her obviously didn't belong there. Jade's a tough woman who doesn't take any crap from anybody. She didn't want me to tiptoe around this. She wanted to go out there, point blank, and ask who went into the women's bathroom.

And so I did. One thing about working for an independent company is that sometimes you can handle things in more unconventional ways. I don't always agree with it, but sometimes it's just easier to get to the bottom of things. So I confronted the other employees, and they all denied it, rather passionately, I might add. A minute later, Jay joined us in one of the aisles and a screaming match ensued. And then, instantly, Jay stopped yelling. We all looked at her and noticed that she was looking down at the shoes of the other employees and she said, I'm so sorry it wasn't any of you guys. The person standing there had brown shoes and blue jeans. I could see their feet in the bottom of their jeans underneath the stall.

I looked over and all the other employees were wearing sneakers. We all went into the back room and made our way near the bathrooms. Located near the bathroom door was some back stock that was knocked over and one of the boxes looked like it had a dent from a boot. I can't speak for everyone, but I felt a pit in my stomach forming. Right above the bathrooms was a storage area, almost like a loft or a crawlspace. I don't know if they were having the same thoughts, but I started to think that someone may have been hiding up there. It just made sense to me. It's right above the bathroom and they would have had to climb on the back stock to get up there.

I grabbed a ladder and went up to the storage area. It was a mess up there. All the holiday decorations, extra shelves, old promotional materials, you name it. I got to the top and took a few steps. I noticed some beer cans on the ground and empty boxes of cookies. I even saw an empty tray of ground beef up there. I was taking small steps as I moved through the area. And then I saw him.

Right there in the back corner of the loft was a man. He was just standing there, looking right back at me. And what was horrifying was that he was standing there the entire time and I had just noticed him. His eyes were so wide they looked like they were going to fall out of his head. His hair seemed to be wild and he looked angry. I stood still at first, just making eye contact, trying to decide what to do. I heard one of my co-workers yell from the bottom, hey, anything up there? I yelled back to call the police and as I finished saying that, the man ran at me.

Thankfully it was such a mess up there that he tripped over something, hitting his head. He started rolling around in pain and then I just started to scream. Two of my employees ran up there and they helped me hold the guy down as he started to recompose himself. They started to scream and squirm around but my employees were pretty big guys so this man wasn't going anywhere. The cops thankfully showed up quickly as well as the owner since I called him as soon as we held the guy down. The cops arrested the guy and we were left with one wild story. We found out after the fact that the guy actually had a knife but he never pulled it out. He also used to work at the store when he was 18 and he was in his 30s

at this time and sadly he wasn't really all there mentally anymore. I don't know whatever happened to him. This incident just happened and then it was over and nobody really talked about it. And for me, it was one of the craziest and scariest moments of my life being face to face with this dude, even if I didn't get physically hurt. I still think about this all the time, especially if I look up at the storage area. It's just scary to think about that fact sometimes when you're supposed to be alone exciting event that always proved to be an enthralling adventure. There was nothing like hanging out late with friends, talking about anything and everything.

As a kid, I would always look forward to the next sleepover. That is, until one dread-filled night from ninth grade that I'll never forget. I've told this story a few times, and some people sort of just shrug and tell me I overthink things, which might be true. But honestly, this night stuck with me long into adulthood, and I wanted to share to see what everyone else thinks about this. The night started out just like any other get-together with my friends. It was my friend Hansen's birthday and he had six of us stay overnight. We had all been

friends since the fourth grade and every year on his birthday he would have an awesome sleepover. Hansen had an awesome house. It was huge, gigantic really, and the house had those huge cathedral ceilings and tons of rooms. It was a three-story house and had a massive backyard. We would often play football in the backyard and then play basketball on the full outdoor court that he also had in the backyard. He seemed to always have an endless supply of soda, Gatorade, and snacks. Just to get to his house, you would have to turn down a long driveway and travel about a hundred yards or so down a dirt road until you finally pull up to the enormous mansion, for lack of a better word. At this point, I am sure that it goes without saying,

but Hansen's family had a lot of money. We had free reign of the house whenever we went there. We would often play hide and seek when we were younger, not so much when we got to be a little older, and the only rule from Hansen's father was to just never go in the basement. It also reminded me of that Goosebumps book every time he would remind us to stay out of the basement. And just like clockworkwork though, every time we showed up, Hansen's father would drop in on us in the living room and say in his chipper voice, hey there fellas, just a reminder to you, just stay out of the basement, okay? Then he would just giggle and walk away. Well, this year my curiosity got the better of me and

I asked Hansen what was in the basement. He responded in a normal voice, saying, I'm not sure. We're not allowed to go down there, so I just don't ask. Probably something to do with his work. At that moment, I realized that I had no idea what his father did for a job. I asked Hansen, almost as if it were turning into an interrogation, What does your dad even do? And this is when I saw the wheels start spinning in Hansen, almost as if it were turning into an interrogation, What does your dad even do? And this is when I saw the wheels start spinning in Hansen's head.

It dawned on me that Hansen had no clue what his dad did. And he finally said, Honestly, I don't really know. I know he does something with finance or something like that. He has to leave for business all the time. We just don't ask about it, you know? He told us when we were younger that we wouldn't understand, so we just stopped asking and I guess I just don't think about it anymore. That honestly left me so unsatisfied, but somehow the conversation got changed quickly by another friend and we just got started doing

something else. All night long I thought about that basement and what could possibly be down there. Around midnight we were just playing video games and eating leftover pizza in his living room. I told my friends that I'd be right back so I could go to the bathroom but I was actually going to see if I could go get into the basement. Just standing in the narrow hallway with the basement door at the end gave me the chills. My body was really tense and I tried to keep telling myself that it was just a room and nothing down there could be that bad. I got close to the door and before I even attempted to open it I noticed that there was one of those door cameras right on the door and it was sealed tight with a

padlock. What on earth could he have had down in that basement? I walked back to the living room and at that point I could feel my fascination turning into obsession. Finally, around 3am we all started to crash. I was sleeping on the floor because I honestly liked being able to spread out. I didn't care if I had the couch. I'm not sure exactly what time it was but I was awoken by a voice. I didn't care if I had the couch. I'm not sure exactly what time it was, but I was awoken by a voice. I opened my eyes and looked around the dark room as my eyes tried to adjust. It was dark, but not pitch black. The moon was still pretty bright enough that I could make out the corners of the room. At this point, I figured it was just a dream and I decided to lie back down. As I put my head on the pillow, that's when I heard it again.

Except I recognized the voice. It was the voice of Hansen's father. I rolled over and noticed that I just happened to be laying on a vent that was open. And I could hear Hansen's father talking to someone down there or on the phone, I'm pretty sure. At first, the sound was kind of faint, but but the more I focused the clearer his voice became. The chipper voice that he always greeted us with for years was not present anymore. The voice sounded almost menacing and I don't even know how to begin to interpret what he said down in the basement.

In his now foreboding voice I heard him say, No. That's unacceptable. I'll not accept failure on this. If I have to come and do this for you again, this will be the last job you ever have. Alone, that sentence sounds threatening, but not objectively scary. It's what he did next that made my blood run cold. He just started to scream, like irrationally screaming, and then I heard something slam and the sound of footsteps. It was Hansen's father coming upstairs. I heard the basement door shut and he walked slowly to the archway that looked down into the living room. I could feel him staring at us and it made me extremely uncomfortable.

Somehow I could just feel that he knew something was not right. Morning finally came and I didn't sleep at all. Hansen's parents woke up early and made us breakfast and his father looked at me and he said in his once again chipper voice, what's wrong bud? Not hungry? Stupidly I responded, I don't feel that good, I didn't sleep very well I noticed his chipper smile fade to an uneasy smirk and then a slight frown Sorry to hear that bud I hope nothing in particular kept you up Almost immediately he excused himself and walked away from the table

That morning we went outside and just shot some hoops until our parents came to pick us up. Thankfully my mom pulled over and I went inside to grab my bag. I was confronted by Hansen's father and he put his hand on my shoulder and said, I saw you were looking at the basement door last night. Got anything you want to say me or ask me? Nervously, I just said no and walked to my mom's car. As she pulled away from the enormous property, I could see Hansen's father staring at me from the middle of the driveway. I mentioned this one time to Hansen in school and he just sort of laughed and said his dad

yells all the time. Every other time I went to his house his father never greeted us anymore. And when 12th grade came Hanson left our school and moved away. He said it was for his dad's work and that was the last time I would ever see him. We're friends on Facebook but we don't talk much anymore and that story was almost 20 years ago at this point. For years I wondered if his dad was doing something shady down there, or if he really had just an important and sensitive job to deal with. After all, I didn't see anything wrong, and I really didn't even hear anything that was incriminating.

It was just that the vibe that I got and the tone of his voice that gave me those uneasy feelings for all those years. Does anybody out there have any idea what this could have been? Or what Hansen's father could have done? Anything would give me some peace of mind. The story I'm about to share with you just happened a couple of months ago, so the events are still fresh in my head. I also want to state for the record that my girlfriend doesn't know the extent of the story I'm about to tell. I realize that some people may disagree with me not telling her, but it's only to protect her peace of mind. My girlfriend and I had just moved into a beautiful new home, and I wish I could say that we bought the home, but we were just renting it. Anything was better than living in the cramped apartment that we were currently living in. We weren't looking for a new place to rent either.

It just so happens that this place fell into our lap. I wouldn't go as far as to say a friend, but an acquaintance of my girlfriend's father ran into him. This man, whom we'll call Brian, told my girlfriend's dad about this great house that he bought. He asked her dad if any of his kids would be interested in renting it, and of course, knowing our apartment situation, he recommended it to us right away. We were hesitant to see it at first. I'm not sure why we were hesitant, I guess the idea of moving into a place that we're not buying just seemed off the table, especially since we both were in school. As soon as we entered the house for the first time, we both fell in love with the place.

It was way bigger than it appeared to be on the outside. The living room, dining room, and kitchen were all in the big open floor plan, which ordinarily I don't care for, but I love this. One of the walls in the living room had a built-in bookcase, and I don't mean just a little bookcase either, it was the entire wall. The other wall had a fireplace which I loved even more than my girlfriend. Along with this beautiful open floor plan, we were getting two huge bedrooms, two and a half bathrooms, and a massive two-car garage and all brand new appliances including a washer and a dryer. But the coolest feature was the basement. The house had a fully finished basement with a built-in theater. All the wires were already hardwired into the wall and all I had to do was just press play.

So now you're probably asking yourself, what's the issue? This all seems amazing. Well yes, all of that is amazing, but Brian, the landlord, is not so great. As I said, we fell in love with the house and told Brian that we wanted to rent it. Conveniently, our lease was up a month after meeting Brian, so it all worked out perfectly. This guy was weird though. He was single, a middle-aged man that just liked to spend money. He had more money than he knew what to do with, hence buying property just because he could. He was short, bald, and slightly overweight,

but what made him weird was his personality. He would just stare at you with this strange and uncomfortable look. He would go from extremely erratic and excited to not making a sound and just kind of staring. That may sound like nothing weird to you, but that look in his eyes was really unnerving. It was as if though he was always contemplating something. Fast forward to the end of our lease and we moved in. Every landlord I had ever had has been kind of weird and I didn't really let this weird presence bother me and besides, we absolutely love this house.

I didn't find out until we moved in though that Brian lived next door so that was exciting for me. We moved all of our stuff in one weekend and by Monday we were all set up in our new home. It didn't take long to feel at home and that is thanks to my girlfriend. The first week we were there was when I had my first encounter with Brian. My girlfriend is currently well underway with her nursing degree so to make ends meet she bartends on the weekends. Some nights, she doesn't get home

until about 3am. The first Saturday night of being in the new home, I was just lying on the couch in the living room relaxing with the dog. It was probably about 11.30pm and so she was still at the bar and I heard the front door open. I jumped off the couch, trying to think why she would be home so soon and to my surprise, there was Brian, just kind of standing there, looking at me. I asked if he needed anything and what the hell he was doing. I was trying to show that I was angry, but for some reason I was still trying to be somewhat respectful since my girlfriend's dad is kind of friends with the guy.

A few seconds passed and he said in a low, drawn out voice, um, I was just stopping in to see if you're settling in okay. I nodded and then he slowly turned around and left. I made sure I locked the door behind him. I thought that I had locked it earlier, but it's possible I didn't. That night when she got home, I told her about the encounter and she kind of just laughed. She said that Brian sometimes has a few too many to drink and he probably just walked into the wrong house. I was happy she was able to laugh it off, but I still felt uncomfortable about all of this. A week passed and I almost forgot about Brian's entrance. Around nine that

night I heard a car door shut. I looked out the window and I saw Brian walking into his house. I figured my girlfriend was right and Brian probably just mistakenly walked into the wrong house last weekend. That night I ended up dozing off on the couch watching a movie while I was waiting for my girlfriend to get home from the bar. I was jolted awake a little after one to the door slamming. It was Brian again and he looked angry and a little disoriented. He was wearing jeans and a torn up tank top. He was several steps into my living room just standing there by the time I got to my feet. This time I gave him attitude as I grilled him as to why he was inside my house. He looked around as if though I wasn't even there and then said,

I just want to see the place. Before I could lose it on this guy, he turned around and ran out of the house, slamming the door. I was freaked out and concerned. Was this going to be a common occurrence with this guy? My girlfriend was surprised to see me awake when she got home. I told her that I couldn't sleep and that that's why I was awake, and decided not to tell her about Brian visiting though.

I could tell that she was under extreme stress from school and work and I didn't want to ruin the only place that she felt comfortable. The next few nights I barely slept. I would toss and turn in bed, constantly getting up and checking the locks. A few nights after the last encounter I got out of bed at around 2am. I went into the kitchen to grab some water and in the kitchen, just standing there, was Brian. He was facing me, not moving. I can't even begin to explain to you the terror that I felt as I looked at this man being illuminated by nothing more than the lights outside. Trying not to alert my girlfriend, I slowly put my hands up in a defensive position, and then, without notice, he just calmly walked out of the house and shut the door quietly.

I stayed in the living room for the rest of the night just staring at the front door. The next day I went over to confront Brian while my girlfriend was at school, but he was gone. I waited all afternoon and he never came home. And after a few days, he still wasn't home, so I casually mentioned to my girlfriend that Brian doesn't appear to be home. And she told me that he went on a trip to Japan for two months. And if we needed him for anything, he gave us the phone number of a friend. Brian has now been home for about a week and I've yet to see him.

I've been up most nights just watching and waiting for him to come inside. I will eventually tell my girlfriend when school calms down for her and I know that we're safe. I still plan on confronting Brian one of these days just trying to figure out what to say. If anything else ever happens or there are any other developments, I'll surely update you. Does anybody out there have any thoughts to explain this guy's behavior? Does he have some type of disorder or is he just flat out dangerous? Any advice would be greatly appreciated because I can't live like this for much longer. My father, God rest his soul, used to be a sheriff's deputy over in Culberson County, Texas. Whoever said everything is bigger in Texas didn't get around to letting the Culberson Sheriff's Department know that.

I've seen public bathrooms bigger than their office, but I suppose that's on account of how little crime there is out there. They're based in the place that I grew up, a small town about a hundred miles east of El Paso called Van Horn. Van Horn is the kind of place where a seven-course meal consists of a possum and a six-pack. I'm only joking, but really, it's got two trailer parks, one Wendy's, and a golf course once voted the worst in the country. I still have a little misplaced affection for the place, but it's safe to say that not much happens in Culberson County. When I was a kid, I'd ask my pa about all the bad guys that he caught. He'd sit me on his knee,

tell me about the bank robbery he stopped or the high speed chase he'd been on that day. But really it was all nonsense. Most things he did would absolutely bore you to tears and the other stuff wasn't fit for a child's ears. They only told me that years later at a family barbecue, playfully embarrassing me in front of the girlfriend that eventually became my wife. I didn't mind. It made sense that he protected me from all the darker things that he dealt with, and that's what a good father does. But then later on, just after sundown, we were having some cold ones around the fire pit when we revisited my dad's time as a deputy. He was retired by that time. All the guys he'd been active with were either dead or fishing themselves to death down on South Padre Island. And then

combined with the fact that I was no longer a kid and I figured I could ask him about some of the more intense moments of his career. Now I already knew that during his time in the department, one of dad's fellow deputies had made the ultimate sacrifice, but what I didn't know is that my dad had been there to witness it. But to explain how he ended up in a situation where two sworn peace officers were murdered in cold blood, Dad had to go back and tell me another man's story, and that man's name was Henry Crow. Henry lived with his father on a small piece of land a few miles out of town and went to the same high school as my dad and uncle. They were both full-blood Comanche and the black eyes that he came to school with spoke volumes about the conditions at home.

His father, Harlan, did okay as an auto mechanic for a while, but fell apart after the death of Henry's mother. After that, all he did was drink, and caused trouble whenever he ventured into town for more liquor. Henry was a quiet kid, who rarely socialized with other boys. He preferred the solitude of shooting jackrabbits at sundown after school, and scrapped all the way to the 11th grade before the accident that killed his father. Harlan Crowe was known to drive drunk on occasion, and whenever he did, deputies would pull him over, arrest him, and then throw him in the drunk tank for a night to sober up.

These days, they'd have carted him off to jail on his third strike, but I guess the sheriff decided that there was no need for any higher involvement. Harlan had suffered enough. But then one day, Harlan was as drunk as Cooter Brow, didn't pull over, and took the cops on a high-speed highway pursuit that ended up somewhere near Pine Springs, I guess. Harlan ended up driving off the road, then dying in the wreckage. But whether it was his own sloppy driving or a pit maneuver gone wrong remains hotly debated to this day. Aside from his son, Harlan Crowe had no known relatives to claim his body, and when asked, Henry declined to receive it.

Harlan was cremated at the Culberson County Coroner's Office and then interred in a small undignified mausoleum in Van Horn Cemetery. Henry dropped out of high school shortly afterward and then disappeared from town. The only clue to his destination was a remark that he'd made to the vice principal, one about hitching a ride to El Paso to talk to an army recruiter. By the time Henry left town, my father was on his way to being a newly minted deputy sheriff. Not long after he earned his badge, he met my mother and they started dating. That must have been around 61 or 62 and my dad recalled a more innocent and peaceful time then.

But then in November of 63, as you know, the president was assassinated and according to my dad, a black cloud hung over all of America. Vietnam, Charles Whitman, Detroit, Manson, Kent State, all part of the same nightmare we've never really woken up from. By the summer of 1970, my dad had gotten married, bought a house, and had just gotten around to

talking kids with my mom, when who should walk back into town for almost ten years of being away but Henry Crow. He'd been walking around a grocery store on West Broadway for around twenty minutes before someone realized who he was. He paid for a bunch of canned food and cash and then walked the three miles out of town to the old derelict house that he grew up in. A deputy paid him a visit the next day just to confirm the rumors. Henry told him that he had some business to attend to in town, and would be moving on once it concluded. He refused to say any more, and then politely asked the deputy to leave the property. And needless to say, such an ominous suggestion caused the people of Van Horn a great deal of concern, as you might expect. Some believed Henry had returned to resume the same role his father had played as the town's chief troublemaker,

while others said he'd returned for revenge. Henry had always been cold and withdrawn, but upon his return, he was like a walking AC unit and had people shaking in their boots wherever he went. He had an air about him, I guess is what I'm trying to say. My dad said that much was true. He personally asked Henry how he'd been all those years, and more importantly, where he'd been all those years. Henry just told him that he'd been around, and while my dad was satisfied with him maintaining his privacy, the county sheriff was not. He was aware of the rumor

that Henry had visited an army recruiter before leaving town, and being a former soldier himself, he was able to make a few calls to confirm if Henry had served or not. The sheriff discovered that not only had he served, but after a few years with the Rangers of the 75th Infantry, his service record went completely dark. After his first tour of Vietnam, it was all classified operations, redacted after action reports and references to top-secret CIA intelligence reports, believe it or not, and there was a hint of where Crowe had been, or what he'd been doing, but his medals and citations spoke volumes, two silver stars, and three purple hearts. For those unsure of what that means,

it means Henry Crowe almost died a total of five times during his tours of wherever they sent him, and two of those times had been while killing a whole lot of enemy soldiers. Henry wasn't some drifter who wandered back into town to sell his daddy's old house. He was a highly trained killing machine, who no doubt had taken scores of lives in the time that he'd been away. As you can imagine, this made everyone in town very nervous, and law enforcement in particular. If Henry had indeed returned to Van Hoard to seek revenge, there was no telling how much destruction he could sow before they stopped him,

if they could even stop him at all, that is. Every couple of days, Henry would walk the three miles into town to visit a real estate attorney, and folks assumed that he was waiting to sell the house before he unleashed his wrath on them, but somehow, finding out that he was sticking around was even more ominous. He didn't visit the gun store or pick up a few fifty-pound bags of fertilizer. Hell, he didn't even have a car and walked everywhere he needed to be. All he ever bought were groceries and hardware supplies, carrying them back to the old crow house when he needed them. All the sheriff and his deputies could do, my pa included, was watch, wait, and hope that when the time came, there'd be a minimal amount of bloodshed. And then finally, in early September of 1970, it started.

Early one morning, the gravedigger at the Van Horn Cemetery stopped by the sheriff's office to report several acts of vandalism, destruction of property, and grave robbing. In the middle of the night, someone had carved obscenities into a great many of the gravestones. Terrible things too, wishing inferno on the dead while hailing Satan and all of his minions. On top of that, several recently interred corpses had been exhumed and desecrated. Remains had been fashioned into obscene poses while some body parts had been removed from the cemetery. But perhaps the most concerning and most damning of all details was the fact that the cemetery's small mausoleum had been raided. The place had been almost completely trashed

with an inch-thick layer of ash and broken ceramics on the cold stone floor. And only one had been stolen, that of Henry's long-dead father, Harlan Crowe. When half a dozen deputies paid Henry a visit, he denied any involvement, but although he was never accused, arrested, or charged, the court of public opinion had already passed a verdict. The way the townsfolk saw it, Henry Crowe was obviously to blame. He'd gone to reclaim his father's remains and had desecrated the other graves as a sort of appetizer before a dish of ice-cold revenge in his eyes. They didn't care

if the sheriff told them Henry wasn't a suspect and that all he wanted was to be left alone. To them, it was clear. Henry was out to get them, and if the sheriff and his deputies weren't good for stopping him, then what good were they in the first place? Pa says that was the first sign that folks were losing their trust in the law. They wanted Henry gone, and if the sheriff wouldn't do it, someone was going to step up and do it for him. Tensions increased even more after the owner of a local construction company, Holt Williger, confronted Henry on one of his grocery runs. Holt was a contractor whose bills would balloon with all kinds of unexpected expenses before a job was done. Pa said that he was so crooked that you couldn't tell from his tracks if he was coming or going. Henry just ignored him, but angered Holt even more. Henry tried to walk away. Holt raised

a fist in anger, but he was all hat and no cattle, as they say, and was lying in the dirt before he could even swing. It wouldn't have been so bad if half the town hadn't been watching, but they were. Holt walked away with nothing but wounded pride, but as my pa told me, those kinds of wounds are fast festering in a man like Holt Williger. Things carried on that way for a while, with tensions increasing by the day, or rather by the night. Someone was sneaking around the residential neighborhoods at night,

climbing into their backyards, peering through their windows, someone who looked a lot like Henry Crow. This went on for a few nights, until finally a little girl doesn't return home after playing outside with her friends. The family contact the sheriff's office, but they also alert their friends and neighbors and soon half the town were running around like a bunch of one-eyed dogs in a smokehouse. They didn't mean anything bad by it and they certainly didn't implicate a certain newly returned veteran, but when the news reached Holt Williger and his friends, they decided to take

the law into their own hands and use the panic and the chaos to settle their score. They piled into their trucks with their rifles and their shotguns and then gunned it over to the old Crow place to move Henry on for good. But then it just so happened that they were spotted by a patrolling deputy who immediately radioed it into the sheriff, and seconds later, a handful of the deputies were diverted away from the search and sent to apprehend the lynch mob on their way to the Crow Place, and my father was one of those deputies. They rolled up behind the lynch mob, cherries and berries flashing, but they couldn't stop until they were right outside the Crow Place. The deputies were thinking that they could keep the peace with just a few polite words,

but the situation was way beyond reasoning. Between the incidents at the cemetery, the confrontation between Holt and Henry, and now this missing girl, it was like folks had temporarily lost their minds. Instead of throwing down their weapons, the seven or eight members of the lynch mob realized that they had three deputies completely outgunned, and the way they saw it, how dare these cops prevent them from saving a little girl's life. Henry could have been doing God knows what to her in there, and they needed to find him and he needed to die,

and if a few deputies had to die along the way, their deaths could quite easily be blamed on Henry. Paul said that he saw it in one man's eye before a shot was even fired. The situation was out of control and he was already backing up behind his patrol car when the first bullets came at them. One deputy was dead before he even hit the dirt, another was wounded, but managed to return fire. My pa, on the other hand, he thought that he could hear the fat lady singing, as he said. Bullets are hitting all around him, closer and closer with every shot fired, and his buddy is bleeding real bad a few feet away, and if he doesn't go get help soon, he's going to die.

Then just when he's considering just surrendering and hoping for the best, he hears a bunch of more shots coming from someplace else and the lynch mob began to scream. More shots rang out, careful ones this time, not just spraying and praying, and with each shot, one by one, the screams went silent. Pa stayed behind the wheel of his patrol car, terrified that if he stood up, the shooter would get him too.

Minutes go by. He hears footsteps and when he stood up, the shooter would get him too. Minutes go by. He hears footsteps, and when he looks up, he sees Henry Crowe with an old bold action in his hands. He takes one look at Pa, who's too terrified to do anything but stare back at him, and takes a look at the wounded and dead deputies. All he says to Pa is, you need to get him to a hospital,

and then starts on dragging the bodies of the lynch mob back towards his house. Pa knew he was right, so that's what he focused on, and praise be, the wounded deputy survived his injuries. It also turned out the little girl who went missing, she didn't actually go missing at all. Get this, she was hiding in her closet after an argument with her sister over whose turn it was to play Barbie dolls. All she had was hurt feelings, and when all was said and done, she was fine. But who wasn't fine was old Williger and his gun-toting buddies, who were all still up at the old Crow place. Some heavily armed state troopers drove over to the place, aiming to arrest

Henry on suspicion of murder. Pa said it would have been an open and shut case of self-defense had it come to any court proceedings, but the state of Texas can hardly let a massacre occur without at least looking into it. At least, not back then, anyway. But when they got there, Henry was gone. They never did find him either, but what they did find were the mutilated remains of Holt Williger and his buddies. Each had been scalped, beheaded, and their limbs ripped off. Their heads were resting atop their limbless bodies while their arms and legs had been burned in a large fire pit. The troopers fanned out looking for Henry, but a lean dog runs fast, as they say. And lengthy inquiry concluded that while Henry's actions had been

indisputably barbaric, he had every right to defend himself from an armed incursion onto his own land, especially if that armed incursion had involved the death of a deputy sheriff. And as a result, he was never declared wanted, and the brutal deaths of Holt and his buddies were ruled as justifiable homicides. Which, as the saying goes, is close enough for government work. As you can rightly figure, me and my brother hung on to every word that came out of our paused mouth telling that story. We knew that he'd seen some stuff, but we had no idea that he'd been involved in something so god-awful as that. I can understand why he hadn't

told us anything like that growing up either. I know I wouldn't have been equipped to deal with it, you know, and knowing my pa was in that kind of danger on a daily basis, I don't think that I'd ever have slept again. I sometimes wonder about Henry Crow and how the end of his story went. I hope he found a measure of peace in this world, but I bet the farm that he spent his final days far away from any other person. These days, I can do anything from my phone. Book a vacation, order a meal from a five-star

restaurant, buy and trade stocks. But maybe the most amazing thing I can do is make my dirty laundry disappear and then reappear perfectly washed and folded. I have Rinse to thank for that. I just schedule a pickup in the Rinse app or at Rinse.com. A Rinse valet comes to get my clothes, and before I know it, they're back crisply folded and ready to wear. They even do dry cleaning, which is returned hanging in a nice Rinse garment bag. And with Rinse, my satisfaction is guaranteed. If for any reason I'm not happy, they'll re-clean my clothes for free. Best of all, Rinse saves me tons of time each week. That's time I get to do something I love versus something I have to do.

So if you want to save loads of time by not doing loads of laundry, remember, there's an app for that. Rinse. Sign up now and get $20 off your first order at rinse.com. That's R-I-N-S-E dot com. Before I started my own business, I spent two years working as a lathe machinist for various manufacturing plants in Pennsylvania and Ohio. And for those of you that don't know, a lathe is a kind of machining tool primarily used for shaping metal or wood. It works by rotating whatever you're making around a stationary cutting tool, mainly to remove unwanted pieces of metal, and there are all kinds of different lathes for

different purposes. Smaller ones for smaller parts than huge ones for making automobile parts, but whatever the type and function, they all operate using this basic holding and rotating mechanism. You might call it the mother of machining tools, and they've been in use in some form or another for hundreds of years, really, which is kind of ironic considering just how freaking dangerous they can be. In a vocation where almost all manufacturing machines have evolved to be as safety conscious as possible, there's just no replacing the lathe with something 100% foolproof. Because of how fast the moving parts are, especially those designed for metal cutting, there's always a risk of being hit by loose objects or by poorly secured or oversized work pieces. But the

real risk when it comes to working with lathes is getting clothing entangled in the moving parts. Those kinds of accidents are extremely rare but as any risk assessor will tell you that actually increases the chances of them occurring. Sometimes if a person gets too comfortable working with a machine, they get complacent, and when they get complacent, they get killed. So towards the end of my career as a machinist, I was working with this huge lathe that made hinges for shipping container doors. It was massive, twice the size of even the biggest lathes I've worked with previously, but after working with it for nine hours a day, week in and week out, it became just another familiar piece of equipment.

I was almost done with this one particular workpiece, and the last step was to polish it a little. So I took a long piece of what we'll call emery cloth, and threaded it around the workpiece while it was still held in place by the lathe. The idea was then to hold on to each end of the cloth really tight while the lathe spins the piece around really fast to polish the metal. Only in my case, the lathe finished up a previous cycle that I'd paused, not cancelled, and spins my cloth so that the left side pulled all the way into the lathe, where it bites down on the tips of the first two fingers of my left glove. Now, I shouldn't have been even wearing

gloves in the first place, especially not one's two sizes too big for me, but as I said, comfort breeds complacency. And the second the lathe bit down on the loose fabric was probably one of the most terrifying moments of my life. I've been through a ton of safety briefs and was warned over and over that accidents with lathes meant amputation or death. One guy just never got tired of telling us, you will lose an arm if you do X, Y, or Z. So obviously this is in the forefront of my mind when I feel the tips of those glove fingers pinch. But by some miracle, I jerked my hand back just at the right moment and it slipped out of the loose glove before the lathe could burn my hand into a slice of pastrami. If my boss hadn't been too cheap to buy me a pair of gloves that actually fit, or I'd been a sucker enough to buy some out

of my own money, that lathe might have completely crushed my arm, and I might be pushing daisies right now. I was embarrassingly shaken up afterwards, and my boss was nice enough to send me home for the rest of the day on full pay. I accepted his offer, and I figured that I was fine a few hours later, but in the days that followed, I started actually reflecting on just how lucky I'd been. A big part of that was, as bizarre as it sounds, searching Google for footage of lathe accidents. Now, I know it might be tempting to go search for the kind of

videos I'm talking about because they are out there, but I'm telling you guys, don't do it. They have to be some of the most horrific injuries you've ever seen, not because of how gory or gruesome they are, but how fast they happen. What's worse is there's always this moment when the person realizes that they're about to lose their finger or hand or arm or whatever and they're doing everything they can to stop it happening, but it's just hopeless. Some bleed to death before the EMTs even get there, barely able to get out a cry for help before they go into shock and just collapse. I know it sounds crazy to do that to myself over and over again, but every time I watched a person get hurt and thought,

that could have been me. And then surprise, surprise, I completely psyched myself out of working with machines and quit the machine shop just with zero notice. My boss would have been angry if I hadn't spoken with him the weeks before I quit, mentioning that I might not be able to go on anymore. Those were my exact words too. I don't have to elaborate anymore on that, so I think he took that as a verbal notice period because he was cool with me leaving to find some other means of putting food on my table. I work in phone and laptop repair now. It makes me money, but I don't love it like I used to love shop work. It's a different environment in more ways than one, but as much as I miss the kind of shop banter that you have with the guys,

there's no chance of a laptop ripping my arm off anytime soon. So let me tell you about the incident that made me want to get sober. So it was 1999 and I had just dropped out of college. I was living with an old high school buddy of mine in this Fresno trailer. A big part of the reason that I dropped out and the big reason he never made it to college in the first place was that we were both dedicated psychonauts, quote unquote. A big part of the reason that I dropped out, and the big reason he never made it to college in the first place, was that we were both dedicated psychonauts, quote unquote. We were adventurers, committed to the exploration not of outer space, but inner space. Now I get how cringeworthy that sounds today, but back then, we thought we were it, man.

Some people just dipped their toe into the psychedelic waters, but we went deep. Really deep. We sampled a whole bunch of tryptamines, from psilocybin to dimethyltryptamine. We even got our hands in a little foxy-meloxy one time, which had been known to put inexperienced users in the hospital. Then came the ergolins, like LSD and its more natural cousin LSA, which we derived from importing Hawaiian baby wood rose seeds. We had particular fun experimenting with phenolthiamines too, which is your mescaline, 2C-B, and other less aggressive compounds. But our holy grail, the thing we always wanted to get our hands on, is a compound known as Dragonfly.

It might sound like something from a novel, but I can assure you that there really is a hallucinogenic drug called Dragonfly. You might have to look it up to get a proper description of it, but just to summarize, it's a chemical compound that was first synthesized in 1998, just a year before me and my buddy Aaron got our hands on some. It might have a scary sounding name, but Dragonfly is called so because its chemical structure resembles a dragonfly, or at least the tripping chemist who invented it thought so, and so here we are. Anyway, Dragonfly is only about 30% as strong as LSD, but you're steadily tripping for a couple of days at a time. You're tripping when you dream, you trip when you you're steadily tripping for a couple of days at a time. You're tripping when you dream. You trip when you wake up. Tripping when you cook and eat and go to

the bathroom, and slowly but surely, the trip wears you down. To put it simply, when you ingest a chemical compound like LSD or Dragonfly, your body works overtime to try and cycle it out of your system. It's this new, icky thing, so better safe than sorry, your body might think, but with Dragonfly, the slow release forces your body to be like, okay, this isn't going to kill me, and there's too much to get rid of, so I just better conserve energy and just stop fighting it. And that's when things get weird, especially around the 48 hour mark. To prep for our multi-day trip, we hit up the local Walmart with the money that we had left over and picked up a whole load of essentials. We had a whole bunch of food, bottled water, some feel-good kids movies just in case the trip started to go bad at any time.

We also decided to set up a shop in Aaron's aunt's trailer, which was safely sequestered from the rest of civilized society. We didn't want anyone catching on to the fact of what we were doing, as that always brought bad vibes, and what brought even worse vibes was having to talk to the cops while tripping, so we had to be almost totally alone and unbothered during the whole thing. The trailer was perfect for that. Isolated, but not too isolated. We'd have the woods to explore, a babbling brook nearby, and it was perfect for that purpose. And when the time came to drive out there with our trunk full of supplies, I was the most excited I'd ever been to trip. Excited, but also a little apprehensive, you know. Unlike a lot of other

hallucinogens, Dragonfly has a relatively high toxicity, and by the time we took it, it had already killed someone over in Europe after they mistook it for something else, I guess. Overdoses were shown to cause tissue necrosis in the arms and legs, meaning your limbs rot and have to be amputated to save your life. Other overdoses had people almost choking on their own vomit or having near fatal seizures, and it should be noted that vomit was bright red with blood. I read one account years after I tried it that said a bad dragonfly trip was like being dragged to hell and back again many times. It's the most evil thing I've ever tried and it lasted an eternity. At this point, you might be asking

yourself, why the hell would anyone want to risk losing their mind, or even your life, just to feel something so arguably terrifying? Well, it's because we were very confident that we could keep our dosages correct, and not do anything too stupid. We were experienced psychonauts by that time, so the idea of overdosing or jumping off a building was totally out of the realms of possibility. In fact, just in case it isn't obvious, this story isn't about us suffering any of those negative OD-related side effects. So sorry to disappoint you if you're hoping to hear about us dying. Instead, this story is about something else which happened during our trip, and this is the thing that made me want to get sober, completely straight edge kind of sober too. So like I'd already talked about, Dragonfly doesn't

quite hit you as hard as LSD, not at first anyway, so we spent our first day kind of mellow, smoking a little grass and otherwise keeping a chill. We dosed around 5pm, went to bed at around 5 in the morning and pretty much did the same thing the whole next day. But that day is when the effects really started to take hold. There'd be times when I'd be cruising alone, steady tripping, but nothing major, and then boom. Everything started to feel a little more fluid, and I kind of felt like I was walking in mud, if that makes sense. The feeling would stay for maybe 30 minutes at a time, then I'd start to level off again. Other than that, it was another day of snacking, giggling,

and generally trying to stay in a happy, positive place. I didn't remember any of my dreams from the first night, but the second night, well, they were on another level. It was pure lucid dreaming, but the scope and scale of everything was just phenomenal. Gargantuan, vine-infested red rock structures inhabited by these huge behemoths. I wrote all my dreams down when I woke up, and up until that point, I think it was one of the best trips I'd ever experienced. I mean, I can get why people freak out after tripping steadily for so long, because waking up was like the dream hadn't actually ended. I was just in a different place and time. A less experienced psychonaut might have really wanted to tap out at that point, but for me, it was the kind of trip I'd been looking for.

They say the longer you meditate for, the more you feel the benefits, and I feel the same way about tripping. So yeah, on the second day, I woke up and wrote down my dreams, had a little breakfast, took a shower, and I'm still enjoying the whole thing. Aaron, on the other hand, his dreams were considerably harsher than mine and he was worried about his trip taking a bad turn. Now with that in mind, we stuck to those feel-good kids movies, broke into our snack stash, and tried to avoid any negative vibes. But no matter how hard we tried, Aaron just couldn't get out of his funk, and fearing that a bad trip might last for literally days, he pulled the equivalent of smashing the

emergency glass and went off into the trailer's bedroom to chill in the dark with some music. I didn't mind being alone. I was still enjoying myself, but after a few hours of my own gorging on candy and sodas, I went on a major sugar crash and decided to just take a nap. And that is where the trip got pretty intense. I was having the wildest dreams, stuff that centered around interacting with beings from another dimension. I remember finding their appearance very frightening at first, but they seemed friendly, although we never found a way to properly communicate. They used a very intricate language, and all their frames of reference were different to mine, so it was friendly, but just tough. I don't know how long I napped for,

but when I woke up, it was dark outside, and I had that freaky dreamed reality transition again. I understand that I was no longer dreaming, so I wasn't expecting to see anything hallucinatory, but when I walked into the trailer's main living space, something was sitting on the couch. Again, I was kind of frightened to see it at first. I'd never gone so deep as to hallucinate an actual person or life form. I think I might have freaked out if I was a of frightened to see it at first. I'd never gone so deep as to hallucinate an actual person or life form. I think I might have freaked out if I was a little less experienced, but I knew enough to know that what I was looking at wasn't real, and that it was quite possibly one of the beings from my dream

having sort of slipped into real space. I tried my best to keep calm, not for one moment thinking that something was actually wrong, and sat down on the seating opposite the being. What followed was almost exactly like my dream. I was speaking, but it was like the being couldn't understand me, and every time they spoke it just sounded garbled. I remember laughing at one point, because something the thing said sounded funny to me, and I was trying so hard to communicate with something that wasn't real that it was actually kinda hilarious to me.

The thing started laughing too, mimicking me, only it really wasn't mimicking me because it was me. I guess that might sound completely silly to some people, especially if you're not into psychedelics, but I'm just trying to explain how I felt in the moment, compared to how I felt about it afterwards. Anyways, I just sort of hung out with the thing in my head for a while, but after I gave up trying to talk to it, it stood up and made some kind of gesture like it wanted me to watch it. This being started reaching into its mouth,

then gently spitting out little jewels on the coffee table in front of me. They were this light glowing blue, almost like the Pacific on a clear day, you know. I actually wished it was real in that moment, those things would have sold for millions apiece I thought, and I suddenly found myself needing to touch the little jewels. It was almost like a, can I wake myself up from this kind of moment. If I made my brain realize that they weren't really there, maybe I could move my trip along or something. But when I reached out and tried to touch the little blue jewels, I found that I was actually able to touch them. And that constituted completely new ground for me. Being able to actually feel something in my fingertips that was a total fabrication from my own mind. I'd never experienced anything like it before and it was as frightening as it was

exciting. The little jewels were warm and slimy to the touch but they were so brilliantly shiny that I couldn't keep my eyes off of them. Somehow I got it in my head that if I could really feel them they must be real and that somehow my dream was bleeding into real space entirely. You gotta really understand me when I say that, as dumb as it sounds, I thought I'd crack the code to manifesting objects from my mind into physical space. Like I believed that with my whole heart and soul it wasn't a trip anymore. I was a modern day psychedelic alchemist and I'd made a scientific breakthrough so immeasurably valuable that I was going to be richer than my wildest dreams. But obviously I was high. I remember rushing around for something I could put the little jewels in, something secure that I wouldn't lose. And then I rushed back to the

sitting area and carefully began to put the jewels inside of what I later discovered was a half-empty jar of peanut butter. I don't know what I was thinking, but hey, I was tripping balls, so give me a break. I then stashed the peanut butter somewhere and went back to thank the being for the gifts. I then watched as the thing phased through the door and sort of out of existence. I remember crying a little, as humiliating as that is to admit, but like I'd already said, I genuinely believed that I'd experienced something truly groundbreaking, and I actually had something tangible to show for it. I can't remember what time it was by that period, but it was dark and I was exhausted, so after a quick amount of food, I took a shower and then went back to sleep. A few hours later, I think it was around dawn from the touch of blue in the sky I noticed outside,

and I woke up feeling terrible. I went to the bathroom, puked, and then on my way back, I realized Aaron was nowhere to be found. He had been in the bedroom when I passed out earlier and now he was completely gone. He hadn't tried to wake me up at all so I didn't figure that it was any kind of emergency, just that he'd gone out for a little walk in the morning or something. Even if he had, I was in no state to go find him so I stumbled back to bed with a glass of water and went back to sleep. I woke up 12 hours later. I wet the bed, but it was a lot less than it had been the night before, I guess. The dragonfly was finally working its way out of my system, I thought, and I was finally starting

to feel a little bit more lucid. It was actually kind of a relief. I mean, I was way into the whole tripping scene back then, and three days straight was just about as much as I could handle. First thing I did was grab a bottle of cold brew out of the mini-fridge and then sat on the toilet, drinking it while I was doing my business. I then took a shower, dried off while experiencing waves of trippiness come and go, and then decided to make myself something to eat. As soon as I walked into the trailer's little kitchen area, I saw it.

Fingerprint smears of something dark and syrupy on one of the cabinets. I really hoped it wasn't what it looked like, but it was. It was a very warm evening, warm in the trailer too, and I could smell the blood as I peered at it closer and closer. I started to panic, following the trail of blood to the coffee table and noticed that there were smears of blood on the trailer's front door too. Now I'm really panicking because I'm thinking it's Aaron's blood and that he's hurt and or in trouble or something. I go back to the cabinet, open it up, and there's my jar of peanut

butter with my jewels in it, with the same bloody smears all over it. I was almost too scared to open it up, but when I did, there were the same drops of blood mixed in the peanut butter. And after fishing around in that thick mess for a moment, I pulled out something small and hard. I wiped off a little of the peanut butter enough to know that it wasn't some fourth dimensional gemstone as I thought it was, but I still couldn't quite tell what it was. It was only when I washed it off in the sink that I realized what it was. It was a human tooth. Like I might have mentioned, my first thought was that Aaron was hurt, so I did like two or three laps around the trailer, calling out to him, but he was nowhere to be found.

This was before your average bum like us could afford a cell phone or anything like that, and we'd deliberately chosen the trailer because there wasn't access to a phone inside of it. There were payphones near the trailer park's little office thing, but none inside Aaron's aunt's trailer, and that meant that I had to stay there, freaking out, not knowing what the hell to do, for God knows how long before he finally returned, safe and sound. It turns out that he'd gone off to buy some medical supplies, the one thing we hadn't thought of because he thought it was me who had pulled my own teeth out after my trip took a bad turn. He didn't have the money for a dentist, but he did have the money for a few bandages, and he pushed through the peak of his trip in a total panic

in order to get me some help. I don't know how he didn't get picked up by the cops, but he was incredibly relieved to find out I was okay, and the feeling was mutual, but the question was still there. If they weren't any of our teeth that I'd stuffed into that peanut butter, who did they belong to? You can call me slow if you want, and it is what it is, I guess, but I only really put it together in that moment. The being that I'd seen, the one I'd assumed that phased out of my dream, that had actually been a real person. I couldn't communicate with them because I was tripping balls, and neither could I understand them for some reason.

I don't know if they were asking for help, if there was something wrong with them, or how in God's name they ended up taking their own teeth out. I don't even know if the actual extraction happened in front of me, but I know it must have been fresh because Jesus Christ, there was a lot of blood around the trailer. There was no way that we were going to go to the cops either. Both of us had a history with them, so we weren't about to go inserting ourselves into whatever kind of bad juju went down that night. We just cleaned up the trailer as best we could, caught a ride back into the city, and then tried our best to just forget about the whole thing. We were actually due to stay another

night, and there's no way that we should have been driving in that state that we were in, but there's also no way that we were about to stay another night in that place. I mean, would you? Like I said, the whole incident played on my mind so much that it became a sort of catalyst to my sobriety. I still think about it a lot too, as you can probably tell, which is ironic I guess, because I don't ever want to know what really happened that night. And if I really did have someone rip their own teeth out in front of me for whatever reason, I'm glad that I was so out of it that I didn't realize what was going on. My great-uncle recently passed away, so I thought I'd share a story that he told me a couple of years before he died. He had a stroke towards the end of 2021, so we knew that we only had a little amount of time with him left,

so me and my sister made an effort to visit him as much as possible over his last 18 months or so. We brought him his favorite foods, brought close and distant relatives to his home and back, and talking to him at length about all kinds of different topics. He wanted to know what we were in life, where we were headed, and what our goals and ambitions were now that we were fully grown adults. But there was also plenty of chit-chat about him too, especially the chapters of his life we weren't familiar with. And one of those chapters involved something so terrifying that I don't think our generation can even imagine it. The May Blitz of 1940.

Our granddad on our mom's side had died when we were still young, so we had to get all of this info from Uncle Freddy. We knew our hometown had been bombed during World War II, but we had no idea how badly. So as he began to talk about what it was like to live through, our jaws just hit the floor. Uncle Freddy said it started when he was about nine, during the late summer of 1940, when the first German warplanes were spotted in the skies over Liverpool. His only real memory of the first few air raids were hearing the sirens and then rushing to the local air raids shelter to take cover. But after a while, his mom stopped taking him to the air raid shelter and made him and his brother,

our granddad, take shelter under the kitchen table. We obviously want to know why she decided against an actual bomb shelter in favor of a piece of wood, and Uncle Freddy told us that it was because one bomb shelter, not too far away, had received a direct hit, killing almost 150 people, but not all at once. Those who weren't killed by the explosion were basically buried alive, and after that some people preferred their chances in their own homes. Then there was the time around Christmas when he and his brother got caught out of their neighborhood when the air raid siren started. Sometimes the siren would go off and it was just a false alarm, but that time it wasn't, and he saw something I'm glad

I'll never have to see. There were literally hundreds of planes in the distant skies, and my great-uncle and granddad could hear the deafening roar of their engines as they approached. It had to be about 4.40 to 5.00pm too because Uncle Freddy said the skies were still light enough to see all the planes approaching, but dark enough to see all the anti-aircraft fire shooting up into the air. I honestly can't even imagine how terrifying that must have been, and to think that they were still just kids when it happened, it blows my mind. But then the bombing itself isn't the story I want to share with you today. The Blitz just provides the backdrop for one of the more shocking stories that Uncle Freddy

told us. As you can probably imagine, life went from relatively normal to post-apocalyptic and it did so almost overnight. Then imagine varying degrees of bombing, night after night, for like six months straight. At one point, the city's prison was bombed, killing some prisoners while others escaped. Most of the city's police force was off fighting the war and had to be reinforced with volunteers known as air raid wardens. They were well-meaning but definitely unsuited to fight crime, so as a result, crime went through the roof. We like to think that people banded together during those times, the spirit of the Blitz and all that, but according to Uncle Freddy,

that didn't extend to everyone. Others took advantage of the lack of law in order to steal from each other, run ration card scams, all sorts of dodgy stuff that made life even harder for those around them. But then there was the other kind of criminal, not the gangster kind, but the monster kind. Uncle Freddy told us the story of one family and the nightmare they endured during one particular bad air raid. Like most other families, the man in the house was off helping with the war effort, leaving his poor wife alone with her four children. One night on December of 1940, the family heard the familiar sound of the air raid siren, but also the sounds of bombs exploding in the distance. Knowing that it wasn't a false alarm, the woman rushed to gather up her four children, then ran to the local air raid shelter to take cover. When they arrived, they piled in with

everyone else, then listened to the bombs fall around them while they prayed for safety. However, at some point, the woman noticed that one of her children, a little girl named Elsie, was missing. She searched the cramped air raid shelter, calling out to little Elsie, but she couldn't find her anywhere. Uncle Freddy told us that people in the air raid shelter had to grab onto Elsie's mother to stop her from running outside to look for her, knowing that doing so would mean certain death. The air raid lasted all night, but once the all-clear was sounded, there was no rest for some. Elsie's mother went off looking for her, joined by many of her friends and neighbors,

and later that day, they found her. Elsie's body was found in the rubble of a bombed-out house, and although she had injuries consistent with rubble falling on her, that wasn't what killed her. The bruising around her neck showed that she'd been strangled, and the other injuries she had don't bear repeating among civilized people, but let's just say the local community was as horrified as they were furious when they heard the news. The police promised to do everything they could to catch Elsie's killer, but everyone knew it was nothing but hot air. Uncle Freddy said the police couldn't have caught a cold during those days, let alone any actual criminals.

You had to be caught red-handed doing something, but if you were, the sentences were harsh. Anyway, a few weeks go by, Elsie's killer still hadn't been caught, and people were fast losing hope of them ever being brought to justice. People moved around a lot during that time, not to mention that they were killed on a nightly basis too. There was every chance that the person who'd strangled little Elsie had been killed by an air raid, maybe even the same night she was killed. After all, if he'd snatched her up or dragged her off before entering the air raid shelter, they must have both been outside while the bombs were falling. With that in mind, people were quickly moving. There was just so much death at that time and people were definitely

still outraged, but I suppose everyone was dealing with something at that time and just tried dusting for fingerprints in the rubble of a bombed out building. But then, one night a few hours after the all clear had been called, Elsie's mom was getting ready for a few hours of sleep when there was a knock at the door. Air raid wardens sometimes called at odd hours to pass on information or warn people about their lights being too bright, so although she wasn't expecting anyone, Elsie's mom went to open the door. Standing on the doorstep outside, dressed in dark clothing with their faces partially covered, were two men. They asked who she was, and when she told them, they invited her to watch the hanging of her daughter's killer. As you can imagine,

this probably shocked Elsie's mother, who had many questions of her own, but to cut a long story short, a neighbor agreed to watch Elsie's surviving children and she went with the men to listen to what they had to tell her. No one knows exactly what she was shown or told that convinced her, but they took her to the top of a hill on a spot at Parkland, one overlooking the numerous streets and houses below, and showed her her daughter's killer. Rumor has it that the men were all part of a smuggling operation, beer, cigarettes, you name it, and one night, one of their number had come to them saying that they had a little girl to sell. Naturally, the others were horrified and told the man to take her back to her mother before a mob came looking for them.

Only the man didn't want to go give Elsie back and instead he did something unspeakable and unforgivable. Again, this is all just hearsay at the end of the day. No one knows what happened except for Elsie's mom and the men who fetched her and the dead man they executed in the park that night. No one actually knows if she watched or not, or if she even tried to stop the hanging, but the man was found the next morning by an air raid warden, still hanging by the rope around his neck. Some even say that he had a sign around his neck, one that said, Merry Christmas to Elsie on it. The police visited Elsie's mom upon learning of the rumors and politely asked her to reveal the men's names.

She either didn't know or didn't care to tell them. Either way, that was the end of the matter. Knowing that my grandparents and a big chunk of their generation grew up in that kind of environment, it just doesn't seem real. It's like living in the Wild West or Fallout 4 or something. No law, bandits infesting the ruins of once great cities. Thankfully, both my great uncle Freddy and my granddad Craig both managed to get themselves evacuated to some family in the countryside, and they lived there for quite a long time to keep them safe from the bombs. But my great uncle Freddy didn't escape the war unscathed. We always knew him as being deaf, but I just thought that's because he was old. It turns out he'd always been a bit deaf, thanks to a near miss with a German

bomb just before he was evacuated. Apparently he was bleeding from his ears, but his mom couldn't get him to a hospital, so he lived his whole life with people having to shout at him to be heard. Mom thinks that he employed a little bit of selective hearing from time to time, especially when he didn't like what you had to say. But the fact remains, the Luftwaffe took his hearing while he was just a boy. Like I said, it just seems insane what those folks went through and how normal they all were despite growing up in such madness. But no matter how bad it is that my great-uncle lost some of his hearing,

it'll never be as bad as what Elsie's mom lost or what Elsie herself went through. I only hope what her killer went through was far, far worse. These days, I can do anything from my phone. Book a vacation, order a meal from a five-star restaurant, buy and trade stocks. But maybe the most amazing thing I can do is make my dirty laundry disappear and then reappear perfectly washed and folded. I have Rinse to thank for that. I just schedule a pickup in the Rinse app or at Rinse.com. A Rinse valet comes to get my clothes, and before I know it, they're back, crisply folded and ready to wear.

They even do dry cleaning, which is returned hanging in a nice Rinse garment bag. And with Rinse, my satisfaction is guaranteed. If for any reason I'm not happy, they'll re-clean my clothes for free. Best of all, Rinse saves me tons of time each week. That's time I get to do something I love versus something I have to do. So if you want to save loads of time by not doing loads of laundry, remember, there's an app for that. Rinse. Sign up now and get $20 off your first order at Rinse.com. That's R-I-N-S-E dot com. se.com.

During my late 20s and early 30s, I had a job as a motor vehicle collision analyst. And just like the name you might imagine, it's our job to visit the site of fatal vehicle collisions, but the specifics of the job involve assessing the cause of the collision in order to provide the policy and judiciary with expert testimony. 90% of the job is exceptionally boring. You pour over stats and figures, fill out piles of paperwork, and are just generally glued to a computer screen. But then for the other ten percent, you see some of the most horrifying, nightmare-inducing fatalities imaginable. In the four years of doing the job, I quite easily saw over a hundred freshly dead bodies.

Occasionally a body would end up outside of a vehicle and would be gone by the time I arrived. But the nature of car accidents means that, a lot of the time, bodies must be cut out of the wreckage, and that can take a long time. I've seen all sorts, decapitation, catastrophic head trauma, impalement, dismemberment, crushes, and burns. I know it's cliche, but it really is true what they say about getting used to it we were offered all kinds of mental health days and extended leave to help cope with it but honestly there's only a handful of bodies that really haunt me so to speak and this is the story of one of them it was late october and i got a call about a fatal single

vehicle incident just off the I-77. The driver had been turning through a shallow S-curve, but her approach had been way too fast. As a result, she failed to properly negotiate the first turn, which is where her vehicle enters a state of what we called critical velocity. And this has a fancy physics-based definition, but in layman terms, it's basically when a vehicle is traveling so fast that the driver just no longer has any control. You reach critical velocity, you're going to crash, period. Anyway, the wheels buckle on the passenger side, and she rolls over several times at very high speeds. Had she been wearing her seatbelt, her chances of survival might have been significantly increased, but she wasn't, so during that first roll, she was partially ejected

out of the driver's side window. Her skull was crushed between the outside of the door and the road and continued to flop partially ejected as the vehicle rolled. The skull was split from her left eye to the right rear behind her ear. This caused her brain matter to be strewn about the road and car. Her body was eventually thrown from the vehicle and came to rest on the side of the road. I then had to inspect the bodies for evidence of impairment, i.e. empty bottle of booze and pills. I approached the body while she was facing upright on her back and I see how her skull had been cracked wide open. So wide I could clearly see the inside cavity of the skull with no brain. The brain was deposited in chunks in the road and had a distinct smell.

The scene didn't bother me at the time. I had learned to switch my own brain off during this process long before. Hours later I get home and my wife and kids are in the kitchen doing something incredibly wholesome. They're carving pumpkins for Halloween and I catch them just as they begin to hollow out these two big pumpkins. They asked if I wanted to join them and I told them I was tired. I work for a paper company in Pennsylvania now. Yes, just like in the office but not nearly as funny. The pay and the benefits aren't as good, not by a long shot, but I've seen enough death for one lifetime, and what I lost in my salary, I make up for peace of mind. I was adopted as an infant and had known my entire life.

When I turned 21, curiosity got the best of me and I decided to search for my biological parents. I went to the adoption agency and they contacted my mother on my behalf. I soon received a letter from her inviting me to visit her in my neighboring state. My adoptive parents explained the reasons behind my adoption and the limited information they had. I had a few older half brothers and a sister and my biological father had disappeared, leaving them in a bad financial situation. My biological mother confirmed this in her letter and we had made plans to fly out for a visit. I arrived and we had dinner where I met my biological mother, her now husband, two of my

brothers and my sister along with a few nieces and nephews. My biological mother explained that the third brother was unsure about meeting and probably would not be coming. We talked about our lives and got to know each other as the night went on. Eventually everyone went home and I went to sleep for the night. The next morning I went downstairs and my sister and biological mother were finishing up some breakfast in the kitchen. We sat down to eat and planned for the day. We were interrupted by the front door slamming and we turned to look. Sam! You came!

Biological mom said with a smile. He looked at me and rubbed his face. There's a lot of emotion about this, he said as he slunk into the living room and turned on the computer. We continued our breakfast and my brother sat glued to the computer for the rest of the morning, ignoring me except for the occasional glare. We went out and enjoyed ourselves for the rest of the day and I took my flight home the next day as planned. I continued to talk on the phone or through Facebook with them over the next couple of years. My sister eventually moved to the same state but seemed uninterested in meeting up. She mentioned that my younger brother, Sam,

had some issues. I soon found out that he was in my state now as well and was homeless. I offered him the spare room in the apartment my then boyfriend and I lived in and he accepted. We spoke a bit and it seemed like we were starting to get along. My boyfriend helped him to find a job at his company and things were going really well for a while. We didn't ask for any money for rent and I made meals for all of us. One day I returned home from my college classes to find him and my boyfriend arguing about something. He slunk into his room and my boyfriend wouldn't tell me what they had argued about. A few days later Sam disappeared and took all of his things with him.

My boyfriend then explained that Sam thought that I was not really his sister and was somehow trying to scam the family. Another year passed and I was given a job offer in the same city where my biological family lived. They offered to let me stay until I found a place to live there. They were excited to have me come as they wanted to spend time with me and get to know me better. My biological mom told me that Sam was living there as well and I was fine with that. My boyfriend and I had split up and I was ready to start fresh. From the time I arrived, he would spend most of his time on his computer or just glaring at me. Once in a while he asked for a cigarette and I gave him some and soon I noticed them missing from my room when I was out

and about. I confronted him about it and he admitted to stealing them and apologized. My stepdad put a lock on my door so I would be able to lock it when I was out, and also gave me a small mini fridge to put some snacks and drinks in if I wanted. Soon my brother began to mutter about cups going missing, and I ignored it, unsure of what he was talking about. I didn't leave the bedroom door locked when I was home and only used it for going out at first. One night, he charged into my room, ranting about me scamming them. He was holding a large kitchen knife and waving it around.

I froze, realizing that he seemed to be very drunk. I know you're not my sister. You need to leave now. And with that, he charged at me, plunging the knife into the bed about half an inch from my head, screaming and held back tears as he stormed away. charged at me, plunging the knife into the bed about half an inch from my head, screaming, and held back tears as he stormed away. Feeling obviously unsafe, I slipped out and found myself

walking to the 24-7 McDonald's at the end of the road. I stayed there a while, sipping on a soda and snacking on fries, and once daylight returned, I went back to the house and told my biological mother what had happened. I told her I would go stay in a motel until I found something. She refused. She insisted he was just a nasty drunk and nothing like that would ever happen again. I agreed to stay but avoided Sam from that point on and kept my door locked when I knew that he was around. Several weeks passed and things were pretty much normal. My brother still glared at me from time to time and would make comments about cups going missing again, insinuating that I was the one stealing them. One evening, biological mom and stepdad were

planning to go out with friends. They asked if it'd be okay if they let my stepdad's sister stay with me until they returned. She was mentally disabled and needed some support, but nothing too difficult. I told them I was fine with it and they left us. I knew my brother was skulking around somewhere, but ignored him. I asked my stepdad's sister if she'd like to go to McDonald's for dinner and she nodded excitedly. We walked and got her food. She happily chatted about the field across the street with Hay and how she'd like to see the animals eat it. We returned home and she settled down to watch TV while I went upstairs to work on my laptop, leaving the door unlocked in case she needed me.

About an hour later, my door flung open, revealing Sam holding a large black trash bag. You're going to clean this room now and give me all the cups! He snapped, glaring at me as usual. What are you talking about? I have one cup up here that I'm actively using. I said, confused, looking around the reasonably clean room. Return them now. You've been scamming us from day one.

He shouted. What are you even here for? What are your motives for fining us? Seriously? I was curious about where I came from. Why do I need a motive? I asked, starting to feel annoyed with him. Well, that's not good enough. Seriously? I took you into my home when you were on the streets.

No questions asked. If I was scamming you, why would I spend my own money without asking for a dime in return? Not even a thank you. Yes, you did because you're my sister. He snapped. You keep accusing me of not being your sister. I said. I did a DNA test, and it came back 99% that you are.

He exclaimed dramatically, as if expecting me to be shocked by the revelation. And how exactly did you get my DNA? I got the hairs from the shower. Don't you know how DNA works, you idiot? He screamed, and he shoved me. I fell against the footboard and cried out as it painfully connected with my back. Crumbling on the floor, I couldn't react before he was on top of me, his hands squeezing my throat as he continued to curse at me. I struggled against him, finally managing to create enough space to knee him hard in the stomach. However, he was unfazed. I continued to fight and scratch at him as he continued to choke me. Desperately gasping for air, I mustered all of my strength and landed one last knee to his groin, causing him to cry out and release his grip.

I ran out of the room and grabbed my stepfather's sister, guiding her into another bedroom and locking the door behind us. She began panicking upon seeing the scratches and bruises forming around my neck. I called 911 as he started pounding on the door. It felt like an eternity until the police arrived. I heard them announce their presence as they made their way in, calling out Sam's name. One officer knocked on the locked door announcing themselves again. Slowly I opened the door. Sam had attempted to flee when the police arrived but they apprehended him in the backyard. I provided them with my statement and they took photos of my injuries. After ensuring our safety, they left. When I informed my biological mother of what had happened, she

became upset that I had called the police. Although she apologized later, I decided it was just best to leave, and since then I have had no contact with my biological mother's side. However, I was able to connect with my relatives on my biological father's side who, ironically, turned out to be the kindest and most accepting people I'd ever known. Despite my father being a bad influence, they have always made me feel like a valued member of the family from the very beginning. I started taking evening walks around campus in my final year of college. It wasn't long before I began noticing that it helped me keep my weight down and clear my head after a long day of work. After graduation, I kept up the practice and continued doing it to this day.

While many of those around me had become diabetic and hypertensive, causing them to become dependent on multiple medications, I have none of those problems. In fact, my blood pressure is consistently well within the normal range, just as my weight and blood sugar are. And at present, I'm the only member of my family able to make such a claim, actually. As I approach my 43rd birthday, I see no reason to ever stop those post-dinner walks. For anyone reading this interested in getting healthier, I recommend walking over jogging every time. You get all the benefits without the wear and tear on your body that you often get from running. Knee problems come to mind specifically. Anyways, like everything in life, there will always be a few downsides to any activity though. Most of those will come from the outside world and those things that you just can't control. The story I'm telling today involves one such downside. The setting was a nice, cool

summer evening. I had just completed a wonderful dinner with my family and set out for my usual four-mile trek around my neighborhood. I'd made this walk a thousand times and never encountered anything worse than a dog who'd escaped from its owner. In those cases, it only took a shoe or a wave with my walking stick to drive them away. These walks, being one of the rare times in my life I got to myself, I'd use it to plan out my future or just enjoy the beautiful music of nature going on all around me. For this reason, I generally walked alone. Although I never stopped anyone from coming along,

I think my family realized that I preferred the solitude. On this night, the sun was just beginning to dip below the horizon. I was coming up to the midway point where I turned for home. My street comes to a dead end exactly two miles from my house. At that dead end, there's a big oak tree that I walk around. I have no particular reason to do it, it just became a habit after a while. Anyway, I just made my turn and was heading back when a man's voice boomed out from behind me. Good evening, neighbor. I almost jumped out of my skin when I heard it. I looked over my shoulder and saw a man jogging up to me. I was so annoyed that I actually barked a curse at him. He seemed to come out of nowhere,

there was a bunch of trees off to the left, but I didn't see or hear anyone over there when I passed by. Something about it just didn't seem right, though. It was getting dark, but from what I could tell, I'd never seen the man before, and I had no interest in making friends at that moment, especially this guy. His popping up from behind me had me in a bad mood.

I'm not usually a rude person, but something about him bothered me and it went beyond a sneaky arrival. I attempted to just lose him, but he actually eventually caught up. Now I was sure that I didn't know him. It's unseasonably cold for this time of the year, isn't it? His attempt at small talk kind of grated on me, and I could feel the scowl on my face. All I wanted at that moment was just to get home. I fought the urge to tell him to just buzz off. I didn't want to be rude. Despite being clueless, he'd done nothing wrong, really. We walked another mile or so together before my house showed up and this entire time he'd continued rambling on about nothing important and I didn't really say anything back.

The relief that I felt seeing my house in the distance was quickly replaced by this sense of dread. I wasn't sure if I wanted this annoying man to know where I lived. Instead of turning onto my street, I just kept walking. I had no plan of how I was going to shake the guy, but I figured that I'd come up with it as I walked. We carried on for about 20 yards or so before he said something that just made my blood run cold. Hey, Nick, isn't that your street we just passed? This sort of sick feeling washed over me, and I actually felt like

I broke out into a cold sweat. I took another step and everything just kind of went silent. An indescribable rage boiled inside of me. I could hear my heart pounding inside my head, and finally I blew up on the man in a way I'd never had before on anyone. I screamed at him, who in the hell are you? I'd never met you before anyone. I screamed at him, who in the hell are you? I'd never met you before in my life and how do you know my name? I know I didn't tell it to you, I said. A smug smile seemed to kind of spread across his face and it was just beyond spine chilling in that moment. Well, it looks like he got me. He was already this rather imposing gentleman, but that smile made him just monstrous in my eyes. An air of menace poured off of him like cheap cologne,

and I grew more nervous the longer I stood there, but despite the terror that I felt, my ego prodded me to just assert myself there. To some onlooker, it might have been like seeing a sardine trying to intimidate a great white. I don't know who in the hell you think you are or why you decided to bother me, but I can promise you that if you ever bother me again, I'll shove my foot so far up your you-know-what, you'll need a surgeon to remove it. I actually said that. It was laughable and it was an empty threat. I'm an average sized man but he could have bent me into a pretzel if he really wanted to. By this point I was so scared and angry that it was shaking uncontrollably. I'm sure that he could see it and it probably went a long way assuring him that he had the upper hand.

Even after all of my sort of threats and yelling, that weird grin that he had never seemed to fade. There was another long, uncomfortable silence. I was almost relieved when that guy finally spoke. Have a nice night, Nick. I was at a loss at how to react, so I just turned and began walking toward home. Every few yards or so,

I'd look over my shoulder to ensure that he wasn't following. Each time, I half expected him to pop up right behind me and strangle me to death with his massive hands. I kept this up until I got inside my house, and now that I was, you know, quote unquote safe, the fear overwhelmed me so much that I had to run to the bathroom, and I legitimately vomited. I'd never done that before, but once I heaved up my entire dinner, I rinsed out my mouth and watched my face in the sink, and I kind of stared at myself in the reflection wondering why I'd reacted so negatively to that guy. Never in my life have I ever had an experience like this, nor can I fully explain what had happened. All I know is that every cell in my body told me to just get away. His very presence just felt wrong for some unexplainable reason, and this made me hate him. Had he not acted so strange when I confronted him, I may still be questioning my behavior. Now, I know I'm not

explaining it very well, and most of you probably reading this probably think I'm crazy, but I can only describe how I felt at that moment. I briefly thought about calling the police, but I had no idea what I would even say if I did. Making small talk with a neighbor is hardly a crime and if anyone acted suspiciously, it was me. Threatening to assault a stranger didn't sound like a sane reaction to the situation. I chose to keep my mouth shut and say nothing, and that includes to my wife. There was no way she'd even understand, and I don't really blame her. After that incident, I began carrying my handgun with me in the evenings and changed the route that I took. Fortunately, I would never have another experience like that again, but I would

see that man one more time. It had been five or six months since he and I had spoken. I was doing a good job putting the incident behind me. One afternoon, my wife and I were unloading groceries from the car and a silver four-door sedan slowly drove by. The driver waved at us and being the friendly neighbor that I usually am I waved back. I barely lowered my hand when I realized that the driver was that same stranger. All those awful feelings came flooding back. That horrible smile burned into my mind and I'm not sure how long I was really standing there and my wife's voice pulled me back to earth. She asked if I was okay and said that I

was white as a sheet. Rather than dredge up the whole story and risk looking like some insane person, I told her that I was probably just dehydrated. She accepted the excuse, and we went back to unloading the car. Five years have gone by, and I haven't seen this guy since. Even though I've had all this time to think about it, I still have no idea why he and I crossed paths that day. He obviously sought me out, but that's all I can be certain of. I've had some minor disagreements with a few neighbors, but nothing that I could think justified hiring someone to intimidate or even stalk me. He never gave me a message or threatened me like you'd think a person like that would. Unless he shows up again or someone brings it up, I can only conclude that he chose

me at random to just bully. And now that I've finally told people about what happened, I intend to make this the last time that I talk about it. Hopefully, sharing it here will allow me to let it go once and for all, and it can be forgotten about forever. There was recently a big hailstorm in my area that did a lot of damage to people's property. And as usual, a swarm of fly-by-night roofing companies and Mr. Fix-Its came crawling out of the woodwork in search of a cut of those juicy insurance checks. We lucked out though. While most of my neighbors suffered all kinds of damage around their properties, we had little to none.

I think a lot of it had to do with my solar panels and the angle in which our cars were parked. Our older car, a 2005 VW Jetta, did have a few little dents, but nothing worth getting upset about, and I couldn't see a single mark on my truck. When you compare this to my neighbors on the side street, many whose cars were so bad that they were written off as totaled, I can't think of any other reason. When it comes to our roof, it only had been a couple of years since ours was completely replaced. After battling the insurance company for a long time, I submitted a claim again and it was finally approved. Then maybe six months passed before we purchased the panels, which cover close to 85% of the roof itself. I doubt

the shingles had even had a chance to settle yet, a process that usually occurs in the heat of the summer. Clearly we're not in need of any repairs around my home, but this hasn't stopped the dime store repairmen from harassing us constantly. In the span of the week, probably six different individuals and companies came to my door. I was nice at first. I simply told them my roof was new and I didn't need their services. Most of them got the hint and went away, maybe leaving their car behind, but a few tried to convince me that I was wrong. This kind of behavior is what gets on my nerves.

When I pointed out that the roof couldn't be damaged without also harming the panels too, they realized what kind of person they were dealing with, and this put an end to the visitors. No one was tricking me, or so I thought then. The man who would prove me wrong showed up two or three days after the storm. I just happened to be out and when I returned, I found a business card and a flyer stuck in my screen door. Although the name on the card was not familiar to me, I noticed that he represented my own insurer. I wondered why they would send a rep to speak to me. They had to have known that they just paid for a roof not that long ago. I briefly thought about calling but it didn't seem worth the effort.

I'd just mention it to the guy if he ever came back. And this is about the time the scammers began showing up. The next few days were a constant flood of cowboys and independent contractors knocking on my door. I got really annoyed of the chaos pretty quick, so when the insurance rep returned the next week, I wasn't as kind as I should have been. In spite of this, he was understanding and thanked me for the information, and with that, I assumed that all of this was settled.

Another few days went by, and I ran into a neighbor while walking my dog. We got into a discussion, and he into a neighbor while walking my dog. We got into a discussion and he joked about me changing my mind. I ignored it at first. This neighbor isn't exactly a genius, but my instincts told me that there was more to it. I asked him to clarify his meaning and he told me that he had seen a man with a ladder and clipboard around my property and spoken to him earlier in the day. His description of the man sounded very similar to this insurance rep and this made me furious seeing as he knew the situation and had no reason to be there, especially while I was at work. I cut the walk short and returned home.

He owed me an explanation, I wanted it right then. I called the number on the card and was connected to the main operator. When I asked to speak to him, she hesitated a moment before transferring me. After briefly being on hold, a female voice came on and asked me again who I wanted to talk to. I told her the rep's name and she informed me that the man had retired and was no longer with the company. I assumed that she'd misheard me, so I spelled the man's name out to make sure that she hadn't. And she was adamant. He had retired over a year ago and could no longer help me, but if I needed assistance, she could help me instead. None of this made any sense. I was getting frustrated. Why was I being lied to? I told her everything that had occurred. The card. Him showing up

without notifying me, everything. And she apologized for all of the issues that I was having, but swore that she knew for a fact that he had not been at my home. I was losing my cool now. It sounded like she was calling me a liar, and I demanded that she take it back. I was prepared to cancel my policy if she didn't, and she assured me that that was not her intention, and I could hear the reluctance in her voice and began to sense something strange was really going on.

I prodded, I pushed, until she gave in and just told me. As it turned out, the man on the card could not have been at my house. Not only had he retired almost two years ago, but he had been forced to do so, because he had some terminal illness that had killed him not long after. Even after hearing all of this, I had a hard time accepting it. I foolishly asked for proof, and this is when she raised her voice. He and her had been close friends, I guess, since she had attended the funeral. I could hear her begin to sniffle and realize that, okay, maybe I'd gone too far, and I apologized and explained my level of confusion and concern. After speaking a little while longer, we concluded that it had been a man

posing as an employee, possibly to appear more professional. He had probably received some cards from the rep in the past, and now that I had finally cooled off, the entire situation was clear to me. He had used the information gleaned from a seemingly casual conversation to plan a break-in of my home. I had given him all types of information, including when I worked. He must have been in the course of robbery, but was scared off by the sight of my neighbor. I never thought that I'd be grateful to anyone for being so nosy but it appeared to have benefited me in this case. All of this is just conjecture of course. Without any proof of forced entry or the like it's gonna

have to do. But looking back I feel stupid for being so trusting of some random stranger. He must have known that the card would work on some idiot and I happened to be that exact idiot. It also explains why he was so forgiving of my brashness. In light of what occurred, I no longer speak to strangers coming to my door for obvious reasons. I encouraged anyone reading this, should they be so unfortunate to have severe weather in their area, be very wary of the people it attracts. I thought that I was wise to all the tricks, but they proved me wrong. If you didn't contact anyone to come to your home, they shouldn't be trusted.

There are a lot of underhanded people out there and their numbers will only grow as the economy continues to take some downturn. Make a plan and follow it. Otherwise, you may not be as lucky as I was. To be continued... but it's my sister who's been affected the most negatively by it. It wasn't as if, though, we could have seen it coming. Our hometown is small, no more than 20,000 today, and it was probably less back then. We grew up in a very religious house where the Bible was read every evening and church was attended twice a week. And despite no longer being part of the church, I enjoyed those days.

Everyone was kind and loving, and it was like having a giant family. Looking back, our home life appears to have been a normal midwestern one. Martina, my sister, and I never went without anything. Neither of us ever felt unloved or lacked support when we needed it. I'd almost go as far as saying that we had perfect parents, or at least as perfect as any could be. We still have a very close relationship, and I don't hesitate to go to them whenever I need help with my own kids. In short, I considered myself very fortunate to have them as parents, and I aspire to be just as half as good as they were with us. As great as our folks were, they couldn't watch over us 24 hours a day. They had to work, and we had to go to school.

Since first grade, Martina and I both had gone to a Christian private school in our city. Like most regular schools, we had a recess period. Ours happened to be after lunch and it was during one of these times when some stranger decided to make his appearance. I was 12 that year and Martina was 9. Since the school was small, all the grades took their recess at the same time. I'm just like any other big sister. I've always been protective of Martina. Even when she was off playing with her friends, I made sure to check on her every once in a while. On this day, I was talking to another girl my age when she brought

something to my attention. I looked over and saw Martina talking to a man by the fence. Since I didn't recognize him, I got kind of nervous. This was the 90s, mind you. All of us kids were getting that stranger danger talk drilled into our heads constantly. Unfortunately, Martina had always been friendly to anyone who was nice to her. In a perfect world, her innocence would have been sweet, but our world is far from perfect. I ran over to our teacher and told her what was going on.

She decided to run toward the fence and I followed closely behind. The man seemingly fled as soon as he saw us coming. Martina was crying when we reached her. The poor girl didn't understand why we'd driven her friend away, and I tried to explain it to her before, but she was just too naive and kind-hearted. I stuck to Martina like glue after that. She and I would eat lunch together, and I would stand near her during recess. She didn't like it one bit, but I didn't care. And for a while, her safety was all I thought about and I kind of became so obsessed that I had nightmares of her being abducted. It was far too much pressure for someone

so young to take on but the fear of losing my sister drove me mad. My parents were naturally concerned and did all they could to explain the dangers but stopped when she looked like she was about to cry. And now that I'm a parent myself, I understand why. There's a fine line between teaching your kids an important lesson and destroying their innocence. Even at 12, I knew the dangerous strangers posed despite not yet understanding what sick things they actually had planned. The mere thought of never seeing my family again was enough to keep me safe. Up until that incident, we had always walked to and from the school, but had to ride the bus after. This made the school day so much longer, and I quickly grew to hate it.

The school took the dangers seriously and hired a second safety officer to patrol the campus during recess. All the necessary measures seemed to work, and several months passed, and it was looking like the man had moved on. Eventually, the alert level was lowered back to normal and everyone got back to their regular lives. Even the second officer would be let go. We all thought that we'd be able to return to our old lives. From all appearances, the creepy man had given up. This wasn't the case, though. He'd taken a liking to

Martina. All he had to do was be patient and wait. We'd let our defenses down one day and when that day came, he would strike. And that day did come, about nine months later and it wasn't where we expected. It had almost been a year since the incident at the school. Most of us had returned to our old habits. I'd begun letting Martina out of my sight during recess, as had the teachers. The one remaining safety officer spent most of his time smoking in his car. It's safe to say, no one was prepared for what'd come next. It was a Saturday afternoon, the first truly nice and warm weekend of the year. Martina and I were at the park with our mom and some friends,

and I had been pushing Martina on a swing just a few minutes prior and was now getting a drink from the water fountain. I guess she was alone when he snatched her. I was alerted by her screaming and turned to see the same stranger running away with her in his arms. I immediately took after this man screaming for my mother frantically as I went. She and a few of the other mothers were just ahead of me, also chasing after him. It looked like he was going to get away, but just a few yards from the car, he stopped and put Martina down. He had this weird, sour look on his face and was patting his shirt. I remember seeing that. He was about to pick her back up, but noticed my mom was getting close. He hesitated

for a moment before turning and running for his car again, and amazingly, he had left Martina behind. He made it to his car and sped away, but not before my mom and a few others got his plate number. When we finally reached Martina we saw why the dirt bag had put her down. The poor girl was so terrified that she had wet herself. I can't imagine the fear that she must have felt. Mom scooped her up and held her suffocatingly close and we all cried our eyes out and it was equal parts relief and absolute heartbreak. The effects of the trauma showed up almost immediately. When the police questioned her, Martina wouldn't answer. She remained this way for several months. This once vibrant and talkative little girl was now almost catatonic. No matter who spoke to her, she wouldn't answer. A distant and empty gaze stayed fixed on her face,

and mom became inconsolable and I was at a loss of what to do. And the only bright spot was that we had the man's plate number, and while we waited for updates, mom did all she could to get Martina to talk. She'd see a long series of counselors and psychiatrists, but not much was achieved, and she would eventually speak again but there was no going back from that. The blind trust that she had once had was completely destroyed and much of her life after that was spent alone in her room, the only place that she felt completely safe. She rarely dated anyone and if she did it was boys that she had known for quite a long time and against all the odds she did eventually it was boys that she had known for quite a long time. And against all the odds, she did eventually find somebody,

but the relationship is constantly being tested by these issues and traumas of her past. Once word had reached us that the stranger had actually been caught, our dad volunteered to deal with the investigation from there on. All I know is that he did go to prison, but I'm not sure for how long or where he is now. And should he be stupid enough to show his face here again, it will not end well for him. These days, I can do anything from my phone. Book a vacation, order a meal from a five-star restaurant, buy and trade stocks. But maybe the most amazing thing I can do is make my dirty laundry disappear and then reappear perfectly washed and folded. I have

Rinse to thank for that. I just schedule a pickup in the Rinse app or at Rinse.com. A Rinse valet comes to get my clothes, and before I know it, they're back, crisply folded, and ready to wear. They even do dry cleaning, which is returned hanging in a nice Rinse garment bag. And with Rinse, my satisfaction is guaranteed. If for any reason I'm not happy, they'll re-clean my clothes for free. Best of all, Rinse saves me tons of time each week. That's time I get to do something I love versus something I have to do. So if you want to save loads of time by not doing loads of laundry, remember, there's an app for that. Rinse. Sign up now and get $20 off your first order at Rinse.com.

That's R-I-N-S-E dot com. Back in 2016, my first husband and I decided to part ways and I found myself homeless as the result. Now with only my check to rely on, anywhere I chose would be a major step down. And while I searched, I stayed in a budget motel. This was a huge culture shock itself and motivated me to find an apartment as soon as I could. Any free time that I had was spent searching and my determination actually soon paid off. Less than two weeks passed, and I found an old efficiency near downtown. There was no application or deposit. I simply paid first and last month's rent and moved in. Considering that I had little more than clothes, this process didn't

take long. The location wasn't ideal, but I figured it couldn't be too bad. The area had a low crime rate, or at least that's what the manager said, and even if he was lying, I was too relieved to care. Well, as you can probably guess, I wasn't moved in a week before my car was broken into. Not soon after, the family across from me was robbed while they were out. Crimes such as burglary became common around the complex. About two months went by until it was my turn. I really didn't have much to steal, but I couldn't shake the feeling that I'd been violated. My sleep was repeatedly interrupted by nightmares of men with guns and face masks,

and the lack of rest affected my daily life so much that I almost had several car accidents, if you can believe that. After making a giant mistake at work, I was finally forced to admit that something had to be done. Once the unit manager agreed to let me out of my lease, I began searching for a new place immediately. During this period, the burglaries continued, and it became such a common occurrence the police stopped coming out to investigate. Every night I had to remain in that place was a test of my courage and sanity. I was even more motivated than before to find a new apartment, but when I did, I was almost declined because of the price. In the end, I realized that I had to pay more if I wanted security and took it. My new complex was more like what I'd grown up in. There was a gate with

a code and everyone was friendly, and I felt so much better after moving in. I must have slept like 13 hours the first night. Things were going so well, I was afraid something bad was going to happen that would mess it all up. But nothing did though, and I was finally able to get settled in. I was moved in maybe a month when I met my first neighbor. She and I began talking at the mailboxes, and before I knew it, I'd been invited to a BBQ. And in spite of some lingering feelings of fear that I'd picked up at the last place, I took a chance and accepted the offer. And I'm glad I did. This would be the event at which I met my current husband, Brad. He told

me later that he thought I was a snob because I didn't speak to him, but he understood after I shared what I'd experienced in my previous apartment. It ended well, so I don't hold it against him, and truthfully I probably was a bit of a smarty pants back then. My opinion of myself was still inflated from the way I was raised. And this story isn't about my love life though. Instead, I'd rather tell you about a man that we'll call the man without a name. I saw him almost every day for a month and I'm sure I wasn't the only one. I'd check my mail every day after work and would see him doing the same thing or so I thought at the time. My curiosity soon got the best of me, though, and I tried to strike up a conversation.

He was always just too fast. After talking to a few of my neighbors, I discovered that they had similar situations. Other than one woman's young son, nobody had ever exchanged a single word with him. Nobody even knew his name. The boy asked, but the strange guy just change the subject and then rushed off to his apartment, seemingly. The location of his apartment was about all we knew. The people that lived around him said that they rarely saw or heard him, and he really was an enigma to everyone in the complex, and any shred of information that became

available spread like wildfire from resident to resident. One lady was so desperate that she threw herself at him only to be rejected. The entire saga took on a whole new angle when the man without a name disappeared all of a sudden. All sorts of theories and ideas were proposed, but none could actually be proven, obviously. We'd almost forgotten about him when the truth came out, and it was far crazier than any of us expected. A month had gone by and I was coming back from the mailbox when one of my neighbors stopped me and told me that the man had been arrested. I asked her why and she wouldn't tell me. All she

would say was to check the paper. I returned to my apartment and pulled out the local newspaper up on my computer, and you'll never guess what had happened according to the article. The police got a call from our complex that a then unidentified man had been squatting in one of our abandoned units. The squatter was taken into custody with no resistance. When the officers searched the unit, over $5,000 in stolen items were discovered inside. The items ranged from cell phones to laptops. More of the story was being released in the coming weeks. Under the terms of a plea bargain agreement, the man admitted burglarizing nearly a hundred apartments and homes across the city.

One of the apartment complex he admitted to targeting was the place that I had fled from a few months prior. And my mind was blown. The odds had to have been astronomical. It appears as if the only place that he hadn't robbed had been the complex that he was actually squatting at. I can only guess that he thought it would bring too much attention to him. And little did he know, his attempt at lying low was what made him stand out. The only thing I ever heard was how he was able to stay in the unit so long without being noticed. I have a few theories, but it's not important enough to include them here. And to this day, that remains the single most creepy and astounding time of my life. I'm a 19-year-old male currently about to finish my first year at Rice University. Until just recently, my father served in the United States Army.

Our family had to move around a lot as a result, and when I reached my teens, my mother got tired of shuffling from base to base, and we set down roots for the first time. My dad was deployed for much of this time, and I only saw him here and there. Mom and I found a small two-bedroom house in Virginia and got a little mutt from the pound. I was finally able to live like a regular kid and make friends whose parents weren't soldiers. Our neighbors were very friendly and often had neighborhood cookouts on summer holidays. finally able to live like a regular kid and make friends whose parents weren't soldiers. Our neighbors were very friendly and often had neighborhood cookouts on summer holidays, and I kissed my first girl at a July 4th party and met my best friend on my first day of school.

It was the life I'd always dreamt of, and although it was a relatively short time, I enjoyed every minute. Despite all of the things my mother had done wrong in my life, that one decision makes up for almost all of it. I bring up my rocky relationship with my mother only to lead into the point of this post. We had been living in the house a year when I noticed a man and a young boy had began walking by every day. This went on for over a month before I brought it up to my mother. I was honestly just curious if she knew anything about the pair. Rather than say no, she gave me a lengthy speech about minding my own business. I kept my mouth shut after that. Even when we'd see the two around town, I wouldn't say anything. My mom tried bringing them up once, but when I failed to take the bait, she never mentioned them again either.

Usually, whenever we saw them, they were standing around the same busy intersection, seemingly begging for money. The man held up a sign that said, Disabled vet. Can't work. Me and son need your help. Any donations accepted? The man would stand by a signal pole while the boy went from car to car with a coffee can. I felt bad at first, but I soon discovered the truth. It was a wet fall evening when my mom and I were leaving Walmart. The lot was so full when we arrived and we had to park around the back of the store. I was helping load bags into the back seat when I noticed the man and boy run up to an almost new Dodge truck and get inside. I did a double take just to make

sure. It seemed strange that they were begging for change but driving a nicer car than my family had. I realized that there may have been circumstances that I wasn't aware of and boy were there. But something about it rubbed me wrong. As time went by, I'd see the pair around town, but only saw that truck twice. The second time was where the story began to get scary. This occurred a few months later while my mom was working overnight. Like always, she told me to stay home and not open the door for anyone, and like most teenagers, I ignored her and did what I wanted. On this night, I was skating with a few friends at a drive-thru bank. It was around midnight when a familiar truck pulled up nearby.

The man asked if we wanted to go to a party. It was supposedly the boy's birthday, and he wanted some kids his age to celebrate with. Everyone declined the offer, even after he'd mentioned kids his age to celebrate with. Everyone declined the offer even after he'd mentioned that there would be party favors available. They offered once more before driving off and everything about the situation seemed strange and I must not have been the only one who felt it. Only later would I discover how wise our choice had been. 2019 soon became 2020 and with the new year, as you remember, some crazy stuff happened. I'd continue to see the two guys walking down my street and begging at the intersection until one day they just sort of disappeared. I took note of the figure that they had moved on just as my family had done so many other times.

It was a lifestyle and I was very familiar with it. Lockdown would soon come and my focus would shift on to other things. My dad would soon come home for a while and I'd spend all my time with him. It wasn't until well after the lockdowns had ended that the two strangers came back to my attention. I was browsing through Twitter when I saw a picture of a man connected to a headline. I clicked on the link and got the shock of my life. According to the article, the young man, name withheld because he was a minor, had showed up at our local police station and shared an amazing story. At first, the officers didn't believe him, but after a bit of research, they were eager to

hear more. A few years prior to their arrival to our town, the adult male, I'm not sharing his name, that scumbag deserves to be forgotten, had abducted the young man from a bus station in St. Louis. Over the course of several months, the man abused the boy until he grew tired of him, and rather than dispose of him, he began to use the boy until he grew tired of him, and rather than dispose of him, he began to use the boy to lure other young men into his trap. The pair would travel from city to city, begging during the day and trolling for prey at night. The boy estimated that the man had violated roughly 25 to 30 other boys during his time traveling with him. He was adamant that he never took part in any of the actual acts. His purpose was solely to bait the young men to the truck.

And although many of the young men were released alive, the boys said that he was almost positive a few were not so lucky. In one case, he said that the old man had blood on his clothes after dumping one young man off alongside the highway. And when he asked about the said that the old man had blood on his clothes after dumping one young man off alongside the highway. And when he asked about the blood, the old man grew aggressive so he didn't press the matter. However, without witnessing any of this firsthand, he couldn't provide any names or locations. And this dark way of life carried on until mid-2020 when the old man had actually contracted COVID and died. With nowhere to go, the boy figured that he'd just tell his story in hopes that someone may help him find his family. At the time of this story, it was written the investigation was still in its early phases and

I'm not sure how much more had been discovered since. If I find out anything more during the summer break, I'll post an update. The article put me in a state of shock for many days after I read it. I had been suspicious of the two from the get-go, but realizing how close I had been to being assaulted and possibly dead was just too much to handle. I briefly thought about sharing the story with my mom, but quickly changed my mind. Considering her behavior from the outset and that I had gone out against her wishes, it didn't seem smart. And as far as I'm aware, she still doesn't know anything about it. It wouldn't be out of the ordinary for her to miss something so major. She's always been very focused on herself at the cost of everyone around her. And really, that's

all I know for now. There was no information about what became of the boy, and he'd probably be an adult by now, and for all I know, he could be a fellow student at my school, or maybe even yours. There's also the chance that he took up his companion's habits, too. They say most of those who abuse were abused themselves. Somewhere tonight, there may be a young man stalking the streets looking for his next victim. And if anyone reading this has a young teen son, it might be a good idea to

share this story with them. It could save his innocence and more importantly, maybe his life. I'm sorry. Ever since I can remember, I always wanted to be a nurse, and when the time came, my parents paid for me to attend the nursing program at my nearby junior college. My last year of high school should have been a sign of what was to come, and despite all of my hard work, it just really wasn't to be. I managed to complete the first year, but my grades were so bad that I wasn't allowed to re-enroll for my second year. My parents were disappointed to hear this, but no one was as sad as I was. I felt like a failure for a long time. After a few months, I pulled myself together and began planning my next move. For the moment, I had no real clear path with my life, but I was certain of one thing. Above anything else, my parents deserved to be paid back. They naturally insisted that it wasn't necessary, but I made up my mind already and

nobody was going to change it. And but without a job, this was just not going to be possible, and therefore I began the search the following day. It wasn't long until I was hired at a small diner downtown. I never waited tables in my life, but it was a paying job. And that was all that really mattered to me at that moment. I took my new job rather quickly. It wasn't as difficult as I really expected. The shorthand was the hardest part, but once I'd learned it, everything else was pretty much gravy. I'd been at the diner about three months when this guy John first came

in for lunch. John, quote unquote, as he asked that I call him, was this older guy. He was thin and wiry and always wore a cap with a cross on it. That first Sunday, he just so happened to be seated in my area, and from there on, he made it a point to always be seated where I was working. I could tell that he was special from the start. I felt unusually comfortable speaking to him. We'd exchanged names before I even had a chance to get his coffee. It was like I was speaking to a family member, and despite his reserved manner, he was very honest about his life and the mistakes he'd made. On one of those Sundays, I mentioned his tattoos and he proceeded to tell me all about them. I was shocked when he said that

he'd served 20 years in prison earlier in his life. My perception of what a criminal looked like changed greatly after meeting him. His teens and early 20s were chaotic and his abuse of alcohol and drugs led him into a life of crime. One day he found himself neck deep in a plot to actually rob a bank. The robbery did not go well obviously and after a member of the public was injured he had to go on the run. He was eventually caught and his reluctance to name the rest of the gang meant that he was given the maximum penalty and after serving the majority of his sentence, he was released, I guess, in the early 2000s. But since that time, he had been keeping his nose completely clean, and most of his life was now spent between work and church, and he had

just left services that Sunday when he first dropped into the diner. If I was a religious person, I might think that we were destined to meet. It was during one of his other Sunday visits where my reason for waiting tables was brought up. John asked why a girl as intelligent as me was serving food. I told him about my dreams of becoming a nurse and my failed attempt at school. He talked about regrets and failures in his life. On his way out that day, he urged me to give it a second try at school before He talked about regrets and failures in his life. On his way out that day, he urged me to give it a second try at school before I got too old. In his mind, all I needed was a little life experience and I'd do better the next time. I knew that he was just being nice

for my sake, but I'll admit that his energy was very motivating. I thought my dream was in the past, but hearing his encouraging words proved me wrong. Psyched up or not, that phase of life was going to have to wait until I paid my parents back. And for the present, work was my focus, and I continued working every shift available, and every Sunday, John and I would grow more familiar with each other. This lasted for roughly three months until he stopped showing up. I guessed that he was sick or busy or something and figured that he'd come back the next Sunday, but when that next Sunday arrived and he was nowhere to be seen.

After three weeks of no-shows, I just gave up hope. It was a sad day when I realized that he wasn't coming back. He'd kind of become a father figure to me in that brief time, and his encouraging words had lifted me from the hole of disappointment that I'd been in for the past year. Unfortunately, life is a series of meetings and goodbyes, I guess. I picked myself up and just carried on with my work. Soon, I'd all but forgotten about this John guy, and five months passed and one afternoon I was doing something in the back when the head cook said someone wanted to speak to me. I walked out and saw a middle-aged man standing by

the cash register. He introduced himself as a police officer from our local department. When I asked what he wanted, he handed me this manila envelope with my name written on it. He proceeded to tell me that John had left it behind for me. I was naturally confused and asked what it was. He couldn't tell me, and I was beginning to get annoyed with him. When I started to press him for it, he made it clear that he couldn't say anything else other than that John was dead. I'd suspected that this may have actually been the case, but hearing it out loud started to really hurt a lot. I didn't have the heart to go on after that, and I simply thanked the detective and he left. With the envelope in my hand, I went back to open it. I now wished that

I never had. Inside was a stack of money with a bank band wrapped around it, and my mouth grew drier as I counted it. I recounted it several times and came up with the same amount. Ten thousand dollars, along with the cash. A note was included and read, If you're reading this, I'm dead. I'd wanted to give it to you myself,

but my old life caught up with me. Take this and pay your parents what you owe them. Use the rest to go back to school. You're too smart to be waiting tables at some greasy spoon. Life is too short to have regrets. Good luck and don't give up on your dreams. You got this. At the bottom of the page was his full signature, a name I'd never gotten the chance to learn, and there was a ton of emotions flowing through me in that moment. His faith in me was touching beyond belief, far more than I ever had in myself.

My mind drifted from the money for a brief time, but a sick feeling quickly came rushing through me a moment later. What was all this? Where had John gotten all this money from? He was some ex-con who drove a 20-year-old truck and painted houses for a living. I read back through his note and a chilling line got my attention. My old life caught up with me. What did he mean by this? Did he rob a bank or steal it from somewhere else? My heart began pounding out of my chest and I'm terrified that somebody may be

looking for this money and it leads them to me. I've also considered the possibility that it's all a setup by the police and maybe they think I was part of the theft and are waiting for me to do something else. I'm not a criminal. I don't know how these types of things work. It's been two weeks since I got the envelope and I still have no idea what to do with it. I still go to work every day like normal, but I'm always looking around for something to happen. I hate to involve other people in this, but I think I need advice from you guys. What do you think I should do? The money would solve all of my problems and set me up for the future,

but I can't shake the feeling that something bad is going to happen. Let me know what you think, and I could really use all the help that I can get. This happened during the holidays of 2011-2012. I had just turned 18 the previous spring, and my mom and sisters and I were traveling from Canada to visit family friends and spend Christmas and New Year's soaking up the sun and relaxing on the incredibly gorgeous Seven Mile Beach. During the day, I'd spend a lot of time with my family doing excursions, swimming with dolphins, snorkeling, paragliding, and enjoying the hot sun, a far cry from the brutal winter we escaped from. At night, I was mostly left to myself to find my own fun. My sisters were underage, so they couldn't go out drinking with me. I spent a lot of time wandering around the beach, going for late-night walks, and trying to meet other kids my age. It actually worked out pretty well, and I met some cool people. I hung out with a brother and sister from Toronto and met a 30-year-old woman who had stumbled away from her work party and thought that I was much older than I was.

As an 18-year-old, I had sort of this fake confidence where I had outwardly presented myself as someone who seemed like they knew exactly what they wanted. Excellent at talking to girls, brave, and even cocky, but inside I definitely couldn't back that up. I was shy and nervous and really had to force myself to talk to strangers. It was tough, but a bit of liquid courage made my conversations flow far more naturally, though the constant anxiety, especially when it came to girls, never really went away. I just pretended it wasn't there. One night I stumbled across a group of Americans, Jess, Amber, and Alyssa, and her boyfriend Caleb, as well as a local guy named Ernest smoking some weed on the beach. They were all around 20 years old and they invited me to join them. We spent a few hours getting to know each other and telling stupid stories. I had a bottle of rum. They had

weed, so for a group of dumb kids, it was a match made in heaven. It was getting late, so we all made plans to meet up the next night and do some bar hopping. The next night came, and I met them at the resort we go to this bar that Ernest suggests. It was a sports bar with beer pong tables, pool, and other games like Buck Hunter and Pinball. It was a sports bar with beer pong tables, pool, and other games like Buck Hunter and pinball. It was attached to a nightclub that had a dubstep Friday event that we planned to hit up after a few drinks. We start drinking at the sports bar and I met all kinds of interesting people including a girl from my hometown who went to school just down the street from my house. It was really a blast and I can't

remember having more fun at a bar in my entire life at that point. Usually when you go out to a bar you hang out with your friends and maybe meet the odd person here and there but this was different. It was refreshing getting to meet so many people from all over the place. After getting demolished by a couple in their 60s at beer pong, we began mingling with another group of kids our age, and it was this one girl. I'll just call her Amanda, who basically became attached to my hip upon meeting and extremely touchy towards me. Even though I was uncomfortable with this complete stranger, I just sort of played it off. I didn't want to be rude, and I wasn't interested in her advances.

Not only was she not giving me my personal space but I just simply wasn't attracted to her. I kind of had the hots for the aforementioned Amber and I wasn't about to let this girl get in the way of that. I was a bit short with her but still friendly enough to not upset her and some of the other people in her group were pretty cool so I just sort of let it slide. Our group of six had basically doubled in size so it was at this point we all decided to go to the nightclub. We get to the bar top and start ordering drinks and trying to be the cool guy that I thought I was. I order a round for the whole group. Everyone was pretty pumped and I felt good. I passed Amanda her drink and she squeezed my butt and gave me this sort of wink.

I basically ignored it and downed my drink with the rest of the group. A good 20 minutes pass and I'm having a good time dancing, drinking, and chatting with the Americans that I met the previous day when Amanda stumbles over to me and starts touching me again. Hey cutie, she says. How about you come dance with me? Uh, no thanks, I'm okay. I feel so messed up, she responds. Come on, it'll be fun. I'm really alright, I'm just gonna hang out with these guys. She looks dejected and then she does a total 180 on me that completely catches me off guard. You know, I'm pretty messed up. Did you put something in my drink?

Uh, what are you talking about? I reply. You definitely put something in my drink, didn't you? I only had a few and I feel so messed up. That's ridiculous, I proclaimed. Why would I ever do something like that? No, you definitely put something in my drink and I'm going to tell everyone here that you're trying to drug me. I was totally stunned.

I didn't even know this chick and I didn't even know what to say. I know stuff like this happens to people and you should especially be careful around strangers, but I most certainly did not put anything in this person's drink. At first I was a bit concerned. Maybe someone else did. The fact that she was using this to threaten me convinced me otherwise. I swear I didn't put anything in your drink swear I didn't put anything in your drink. He didn't put anything in your drink, Amber chimed in. I hardly even know this guy, but I can tell you he didn't put anything in your drink. How do you know that? Amanda responded. Maybe he put something in your drink too. I feel fine. Do you all feel fine?

She asked her group to a resounding yes. Leave us alone and find someone else to harass. Amanda smiled and winked at me and walked away. That was the weirdest thing I'd ever seen, said Amber. Just stick with us. We got your back if she comes around again. I spent the rest of the night incredibly anxious with my head on a swivel. She was there with her friends and I would occasionally catch her staring daggers at me, scowling.

It made it really hard to enjoy the rest of the evening. As the bar was closing, I went outside to smoke a cigarette and wait for the others when Amanda came up to me again. Hey, I'm sorry for accusing you of putting something in my drink. Do you want to come down to the beach with me? We can get some alone time and I can give you a proper apology. Alarm bells went off in my head. What was this girl trying to do? She accused me of drugging her and now she's asking me to be alone with her? Was this some sadistic way of flirting with me? Absolutely not. I said in the most stern voice possible.

This is insane. Just leave me alone, man. I didn't even let her respond. I threw down my half-finished cigarette and ran back into the bar to find the others and tell them what happened. They're near the exit of the bar with the people from her group, and I ask her friends what her deal was, telling them about what had just happened. And it turns out, she wasn't their friend. They had met her that night at the sports bar before we showed up,

and one of the guys said that she was acting inappropriately towards him as well and when he told her he wasn't interested she became really weird and kept asking him to be alone with her. When we left the bar she was nowhere to be found and I didn't see her again for the rest of the trip. I have no idea what her motive was or end goal was and part of me feel like she was just some weird girl who was trying to flirt and was completely terrible at it, but there's another part of me that feels like she had other motives that might have been more sinister. I don't know if it was a coincidence or not, but Ernest also disappeared after that, and I never saw him again, so maybe they were colluding to rob people.

If so, it wasn't very well planned. Either way, it was pretty creepy and I'm thankful that I didn't run into her again. Hey friends, thanks for listening. Click that notification bell to be alerted of future narrations. I release new videos every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at 7pm EST, and there are super fun livestreams every Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday night, and I'd love to see you this coming Sunday, as it's my birthday, and we get a little wild. If you got a story, be sure to submit them to my subreddit, r slash let's read official,

and you might 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 and bonus content over on Patreon, or click that big join button to hear about the extra perks offered for the channel. And check out the Let's Read podcast, where you can hear all of these stories in big compilations and save huge on data. Look at it anywhere you listen to podcasts. Links in the description below. Thanks so much, friends. And remember to always kiss your centipede. To be continued... Hey friends, thanks for listening. Click that notification bell to be alerted of all future narrations. I release new videos every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at 7pm EST. 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. you you you you you you