The Lets Read Podcast - 286: THE CRAZIEST BAR STORY I'VE EVER HEARD | 14 True Scary Stories | EP 274

Episode Date: April 8, 2025

This episode includes narrations of true creepy encounters submitted by normal folks just like yourself. Today you'll experience horrifying stories about crazy roommates, sports events & creepy strangers HAVE A STORY TO SUBMIT? [e-mail] FOLLOW ME ON - ►YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/letsreadofficial ► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/letsread.official/ ► Twitter - https://twitter.com/LetsRead ♫ Music, Audio Mix & Cover art: INEKT https://www.youtube.com/@inekt Today's episode is sponsored by: Betterhelp

If it's a flat or a squeal, a wobble or peel, your tread's worn down or you need a new wheel, wherever you go, you can get it from Tread Experts. Conquer rugged terrain with on-road comfort. Until June 15th, receive up to $60 on a prepaid MasterCard when you purchase Kumo RoadVenture AT52 tires. Find a Kumo Tread Experts dealer near you at treadexperts.ca slash locations. From tires to auto repair, we're always there at tread experts.ca. Thank you. I've been playing country music for almost 40 years now, in bars and honky tonks from Shreveport to Kalamazoo. Music has always been my first love, but my second is people. And part of the fun of playing music is getting to meet some of the folks who appreciate it so much. After all, their hard-earned dollars keep gas in

our tanks, food in our bellies, and strings on our guitars, so I figured the least I can do is accept a beer or two when they offer to buy and let them tell me all about their favorite Hank song. And every so often, you meet a truly great American, and there's some folks out there I'll remember for the rest of my life. But then sometimes you meet someone who makes you glad to be leaving town the next morning. We were in a college town called Brookings up in South Dakota. Nice place, and for the most part, nice people too. We played for three and a half hours at a joint called The Wild Hair. They had a good bar and a good crowd and served alcohol until two in the morning.

So after the show, we pulled up a stool, ordered some bar food, and then nursed a few beers with the locals until closing time, selling CDs and shirts and whatever else we could hawk to them. But it wasn't just about making a few extra bucks. You shake a guy's hand after playing his favorite song, and he's twice as likely to come back and see you the next time you're in town. Anyway, about 1.30 in the morning, most of the bar's patrons were steadily making their departure, and even some of the band had called it a night and headed back to the bus.

In the end, it was just me sat on a bar stool and our drummer, Larry, trying to convince people to play around a pool with him. I was getting ready to head out when some old-timer slumps down in the stool next to me and starts telling me how we played a damn good show. I told him I appreciate it, and then we got to talking about music and what it's like touring the country and living on the road. I remember how after ordering us the last couple of beers, the stranger asked me if we ever broke down, like out in the middle of nowhere. I told him sure, once or twice, but that sleeping at a truck stop could sometimes be way scarier than sleeping on some dirt road outside of Nowheresville, USA. He then asked if we carried any protection on the bus with us, and by protection, I don't mean the kind you keep in your wallet. I told him our driver,

who doubled as security on an informal basis, was usually packing a pistol of some kind and that, sure, there was occasionally a gun or two on the bus depending on where we were and who was touring with us. I made a joke about how I hoped he wasn't an ATF agent and the guy laughed before swearing on his mama that he wasn't no fed. He then asked if our driver had ever had to use his pistol. I told him we'd been in some sticky situations and had some real close calls but that by the grace of, I'd never seen anyone shot. He then started telling me how not only had he once been forced to defend his life and property, but he'd taken the lives of three men who tried to kill him. I asked if he was a veteran, because he looked about the age to

have served in Korea or maybe World War II, but he shook his head. Never served a day in his life. It had been a home invasion, and according to him, it was the most significant event of his entire life. The old-timer said that he lived in a big house that he'd bought many years before to house his wife and five children, but after a car accident claimed her and their two daughters and his sons grew up and moved elsewhere, he was left all alone. That kind of lifestyle suited the old-timer for a while, but then crystal meth got a hold of a lot of the folks around that county and everything changed. Theft and violent crime went through the roof and once all the gas stations, liquor stores and credit unions had been hit, the tweakers started targeting people in their homes. The first time the old-timer was robbed, the tweakers took one of his air conditioning units while he was at work. They must have figured that it was just him living

there alone because they start targeting the guy's house at least once, sometimes twice a week. He takes to staying up on his porch with a pot of coffee and a shotgun, just waiting for them to show up. Depriving himself of sleep like that damn near made him sick, but one night, he sees lights at the end of his driveway. Minutes later, two tweakers are sneaking up the path, then just as they come close enough, he fires off a warning shot over their heads. But then, instead of just taking off like scared jackrabbits the tweakers start shooting back as they run off. The old-timer ducks for cover as bullets come flying at him then the last thing he hears before the tweakers drive off is we'll be back you dumb son of a bitch

and when we do, we're gonna kill ya. And the old-timer goes to talk to the town sheriff who tells him that, while he had every right to use lethal force to defend himself against deadly threats, it might not be such a good idea if he was outnumbered and outgunned by a bunch of jacked-up tweakers. And under any other circumstances, the sheriff might have placed two of his boys on a nearby highway to act as a kind of quick reaction force, but given the recent meth-fueled crime wave, he didn't have the bodies to spare. And the old-timer said the sheriff told him how, on this occasion, it might be best that he made himself scarce for a few days once he made sure that he was up to date on his home insurance

payments. He was entitled to stand his ground and put up a fight, but he had to ask himself, was that old empty house worth dying for? And that old-timer said that he told the sheriff that he was right and that he'd head out of town for a few days before returning home, picking through whatever was left and spiking a for sale sign in the front yard. He even stopped by the sheriff's department to let him know that he was heading out, but not before making a few arrangements and tending to a few pieces of unfinished business.

A few days later, this guy rolls back into town to find bullet holes all over the rear doors of a moving truck that he'd rented before heading out of town. The house was fine, everything was in its place, but someone appeared to have shot up the moving truck that he'd rented before heading out of town. The house was fine, everything was in its place, but someone appeared to have shot up the moving truck. This guy is checking things out and sees no one's tried to break into the cab, but after opening up the back of the truck, he finds three dead bodies. A short while after, the sheriff arrives and this guy said everyone was almost gagging from how bad the smell was inside the truck. But he also said that it didn't take long to figure out why the inside smelled so bad.

Before shooting and stabbing the hell out of each other, three local tweakers had decided to use the rear storage of the truck as a bathroom. Then at first glance, after relieving themselves, the tweakers closed the truck's door then proceeded to cut each other up and blow each other away. The sheriff said that he'd never seen anything like it. But then again, all kinds of weird things have been happening since meth took over the narcotics scene. The old timer said that once the scene was all cleaned up, the sheriff told him that those tweakers had accidentally locked themselves in the back of the moving truck, because by the looks of things, the lock had malfunctioned and couldn't be opened from the inside. According to the sheriff, if it wasn't for the triple murder, the truck company might be liable

for damages. But then, the company might well have proof of maintenance, as they often do, meaning they could prove the malfunction was down to a consumer fault. And the old-timer said the sheriff then asked him, real plain, if he had anything to do with that lock not working. And he said no. So that was just about the end of it. Only that wasn't strictly true about the old-timer not doing any lock tinkering, and not only had he heavily tampered with the truck's lock, but he'd never even left town in the first place. The old-timer told me that he'd rented the most secure hauling truck possible, one that was almost impossible to break into from either inside or outside.

He then tinkered with the interior lock, tested it out on an unwitting friend of his to make sure it wasn't functional from the inside, then got busy with the next stage of his plan, making the back of that truck look like it was loaded up with electronics. He used all the old TV, radio, and VHS boxes that he kept up in the attic, stuffed them full of junk to make them feel fuller, then left the rear doors to the truck wide open like it was bait. And the next night, those tweakers show up just like they'd promised, three of them, all armed to the teeth. And they showed up to get revenge for that old-timer having fired that warning shot, which I'm guessing they thought was just a missed shot and not a warning. But upon seeing that big old moving truck

with what looked like thousands of dollars worth of appliances in it, well, they just couldn't resist. All three climbed inside, looked through all the boxes and hollering like they'd just won the state lottery. Then out comes you-know-who from his hiding place to slam the truck's rear doors shut, locking them inside. First, the tweakers were spooked. What with the doors just slamming closed on them like they did, then they got frustrated when the interior door handle wouldn't function, each of them saying something like, here let me try, and

then cussing the thing out when it wouldn't budge. It took them a while to realize that they were trapped in the back of that old moving truck, but once they did, they started to panic. The old-timer said they tried shooting the lock out, and when that didn't work, they tried shooting holes in the doors and then hoped their boots might be able to do the rest. He said they spent hours trying everything they could think of to get themselves out of that truck, but it was no good. There was no way out. The old-timer and his buddy had tested out just about everything, with the buddy being none the wiser, of course, until the old-timer was happy that the truck was inescapable. At least without any serious industrial equipment, and unless they just up and stole it, no meth heads are out there driving

with industrial strength cutting equipment. It took those fools hours and hours before they figured out that they were trapped and when they did, they started calling for help. And then and only then did the old timer call out to them and tell them exactly what had happened to them. He said they were furious and tried firing shots in his direction through the side of the truck, but as his presence there before me that night confirmed, those shots flew wildly astray. And he told those foolish sons of bitches exactly how he'd tricked them into walking into their own tomb. And he says it was only when he used that word tomb that it really dawned on them what was happening.

He said they begged and pleaded, swearing they wouldn't hurt him if he'd only let him out. The whole thing had been a big old misunderstanding, they said. Some people were not to be messed with. They just didn't know that he was one of them. They went from promising not to hurt him to promising him hundreds, then thousands, then tens of thousands of dollars as a reward. An old-timer said that he knew it was all bullcrap.

They'd have said just about anything to get out of that truck, and unfortunately for them, it was way beyond forgiveness. See, most people would have trapped those tweakers in that truck, called the sheriff, and then laughed their asses off while the deputies dragged them out of the back and cuffs. But that's not what the old-timer had in mind. He let those tweakers sweat it out in that truck with no food or water for three whole days, and by then, they were drinking their own pee and eating the cardboard from the TV and boxes to stave off the hunger.

After that, he didn't think it'd be much longer before they turned on each other, and when they did, it went off like the 4th of July in there. I'm not saying that those boys didn't get what they deserved. There sure is something poetic about them getting stuck in a kind of man-sized rat trap. But what really sent a chill through me was how proud that old-timer was of himself and how he laughed until he wheezed thinking about them begging for help. He said that they were praying, crying for their mamas, and he was grinning like a madman telling me the things that he'd say to them. He used to talk about them eating each other, wondering who was going to draw the short straw. He did his best to make sure that they went slowly crazy without any

food or water until they finally just snapped. As I mentioned already, I'm not saying those tweakers didn't get what was coming to them, but it was the way that old-timer was describing the whole thing, how he was proud as a peacock for what he did, that's what I found so chilling. If he wanted to deal with them to a permanent end, he could have shot the truck full of holes or set it on fire or driven the thing into a goddamn lake. But he let those boys starve and dehydrate and slowly lose their goddamn minds until the thought of eating each other drove them over the edge. At first, that old-timer had seemed like a good man, and I guess he was in so many ways. But to think that he had that kind of cruelty in him,

that kind of darkness, I'm not ashamed to say that it terrified me. I also know that if those tweakers had gotten their hands on that guy, they would have done equally terrible things to him. But you expect that kind of behavior out of those kinds of folks. I didn't expect that guy to have ever done something like that, and certainly not to find it all so hilarious, neither. I mean, he laughed himself into a coughing fit after he mimicked one of the tweakers wailing, mama, mama, I'm so sorry,

and I shuddered just imagining it. Again, I'm not saying that that guy didn't do the right thing. I'm just saying, I think he went about it in a completely wrong way and lost a piece of his soul in the process. I was a real idiot when I was younger. I got hooked on OxyContin, got in trouble with the cops, then ended up faced with two choices. Either go to jail, or take part in a state-mandated rehab program called The Farm. The Farm was, unsurprisingly, a farm, and I'm guessing its owner had friends in high places because he managed to wrangle himself a deal whereby he could get himself all the

dirt-cheap labor he needed, so long as they were all troubled youths facing jail time. I guess that sounds real exploitative or whatever, but looking back on it, I'm not sure it was the farmer who benefited more. I guess I can't speak for the other kids, but working in that place sure as hell saved my ass. And sometimes I think it just might have been a stroke of genius sending us to that place, because picking up trash on the side of the highway is one thing, but seeing how putting time and love into something really can create something beautiful, it fixed a part of my brain I didn't know needed fixing. I made friends at the farm that I still talk to. Granted, it's on Facebook because we live at opposite ends of the country now, but

the point still stands. It gave me discipline and self-belief, which is amazing considering I showed up expecting it to be nothing but baby jail. But then, I guess it's the irony of ironies that all of the crazy stuff I did on the street, it all kind of pales in comparison to something I went through at the farm. So when you first got to the farm, you were assigned a job and a roommate. Your job could be anything from livestock and crop management to irrigation or pest control, but your roommate was there for one purpose alone, to help break you into the routine and make sure you stayed on track. These roommates were ideal for the role because the system was working for them,

and they could talk from the heart about how it could work for the newbies too. And that's how it worked with my mentor anyway and when it came time, I gladly accepted the role myself. I knew it'd be a challenge and I'm sure I myself was a challenge when I first arrived, but I also knew that I had to give something back before I left the program and moved on with my life. Not everyone made it to mentorship level, and as cheesy as it might sound, I considered it an honor and a privilege. For the first time in my life, I felt truly appreciated and wanted to share my own appreciation in return. So around nine months into the program, I'd risen to the position of livestock supervisor

and had been given my own two-bedroom living quarters in preparation for receiving my mentee. Obviously, the dorms were very strictly divided by gender, so I knew my mentee was going to be female. But what I didn't know, and had no way of knowing until I met her, was how cooperative she was going to be. If she was chilled out, repentant, and receptive, then the next month would be an absolute breeze for me. But then if she wasn't, I knew things could get very rough. I'd already heard a bunch of horror stories and how troublesome uncooperative mentees could be when the rubber really hit the road, and in one or two classes, fights had broken out between the mentors and their roommates.

I really didn't want that to happen, so my whole game plan focused on pacification and building a rapport between myself and my mentee. Pretty much the exact same tactic my own mentor took back when I first arrived at the farm. So, the day my mentee was due to arrive, I was actually really excited to meet her, and I wasn't in the least bit discouraged by her attitude upon arrival. Now, she obviously didn't want to be there, but very few did upon first touching down, so I understood her reticence and took it in my stride. Since I was still on livestock, she accompanied me on a few days' work with the animals after her induction was finished, and although she really didn't take to it at

first, she warmed up with time and showed rapid improvement. She was due to be with me for a month, and the month could have either been very short or very long, and by about week two, it was looking like it was going to be the short kind. Shauna, my mentee, was fitting and well, and although her attitude needed major work sometimes, we were making some major breakthroughs together. And then came the day that the cops arrived, two of them, and I spotted them talking to a very concerned-looking group leader. I walked over, mainly intent on listening in on what they were saying,

but when the group leader spotted me, she called me over to talk. I found out the cops had driven all the way out from the city because they were looking for someone, and that someone just so happened to be my mentee, Shauna. They didn't just want to talk to her either. She had a warrant out for her in another county, and they were there to arrest her. Obviously, this kind of presented us with a very precarious situation, because we didn't know how Shauna was going to react to all this. She could potentially be going back to jail for whatever she'd done, so if she saw the cops coming, she might just try and run. I mean, it wouldn't be the first time, and she's been so volatile at the beginning that no one could be 100% sure about what she'd do.

But then, as we were thinking about it, I had an idea. If I could go and talk to her first and break the bad news, it might be received better coming from me instead of cops. I remember how, when I was on oxys, just the sight of a cop would give me major anxiety. And I don't know, maybe in another life I'd have made a run for it too. And all that progress, all that hope, so suddenly and cruelly being taken away. It was a nightmare, but one that was about to be Shauna's reality in the next couple of minutes, unless I was there to soften the blow. Once the plan was agreed upon, I walked off towards the dorms to where I was pretty sure Shauna was just kind of chilling in

her room. She was right where I expected her to be when I walked in, and I sat down in the bed opposite her and told her how we needed to talk. I think she genuinely had no idea that that other warrant was out for her because when I dropped the news, she was devastated. To say it was emotional would be the understatement of the century and she actually did bring up the idea of just running off before the cops could see where she went. But then somehow, I managed to talk her into just going with the cops to see what the warrant was about because it was better to face the music than run from it and make things worse. The thing that really seemed to convince her was when I asked her if she was 100% truly certain that she didn't know what the warrant was about. Then when she gave me yet another convincing no, I told her that it couldn't have been that serious. She'd remembered robbing a liquor store or shooting someone, but if she seriously didn't remember and wasn't blackout drunk when it happened,

then it couldn't have been any worse than a missed court date or a traffic violation. Shauna calmed down a little like, damn, you're right. And after promising that the group leaders would put in a good word for her so that she might be able to come back, she agreed to follow me over to where the cops were waiting. I remember how we were walking side by side after we left the dorms, but when we turned the corner of the community hub and the cops came into view,

Shauna slipped from my side and started to drop back just a little. It was obviously just a little hesitancy on her part, but I figured we were over that and kept encouraging her. But when I looked back in her direction after she totally slipped from me, I didn't notice that she was reaching for something. But she must have been because I looked back towards the cops and the next thing I know, there's a knife at my throat. I just froze for a few seconds, and feeling the knife to my throat was one thing, but realizing it was Shauna that was holding it was another thing entirely. I was completely blindsided, and all I could do was just stand there as Shauna held my head with one hand and the knife with the other as cops drew their weapons and started to approach.

Shauna started telling me to walk backwards, which I did, but I think the movement kind of kicked my brain into life because the words, what are you doing, just started tumbling out of my mouth. I said stuff like, Shauna, what are you doing? Shauna, think about what you're doing. And she responds, I know what I'm doing. I'm not going to jail. I'm getting out of here. All the while, the cops are screaming to put the knife down, put the knife down. But all Shauna seemed focused on was walking backwards and not cutting my throat on accident. I remember telling her, They're going to shoot Shauna.

They're going to kill you if you don't stop. And she just yelled at me to shut up and keep walking which again is what I did. Kids had come running to see what was going on because they could hear all the yelling and so as we're walking backwards almost hip to hip there's this big gathering of kids all watching from near the community hub and it was chaos but I never once believed Shauna would ever do me any harm. It was just a desperate attempt to avoid going to jail and as soon as she got to the trees over near the livestock fields, she was going to make a run for it. But that's not what happened. There was about a minute where I

was trying to convince her to let me go, but Shauna was too busy trying to get the cops to keep their distance. She was yelling at them to stay back and all this other stuff and totally ignoring anything that I had to say to her. But then there was this moment when she stopped and it was like she came back to me for a second. At first, she told me to shut up again, but I kept telling her how what she was doing wouldn't work. If the cops didn't catch her on foot, she'd end up running from them on her own in a place where she was unfamiliar with. If she stuck to the roads, she'd be in cuffs within hours, but if she stuck to the woods, it'd be her versus the bears and

cougars and mother nature. And I told her again, this won't work, Shauna. And in reply, she told me, yes it will, because they'll be too busy trying to save you than to chase me. I could write all night I guess and still not even get close to how terrified those words made me feel, and like I said, I was 99.999% convinced that Shauna meant me zero harm and had just panicked when she realized she was going to jail. But maybe she even remembered what the warrant was about and remembered that it was way worse than she first thought. Who knows, not like she's around to ask her either. And the last thing she yelled as she intended to draw the blade of that knife across my throat was

I'm sorry. But she didn't just say it, she yelled it, and I guess that was all the cops needed to hear. She yelled that apology and I felt the blood hit my face. But it wasn't mine. It was Shauna, after one of the cops heard her cry, took aim and pulled the trigger. I had a tiny cut where the knife nicked me as she fell, but other than that, I was completely unharmed. Shauna, on the other hand, was probably dead before she even hit the dirt. The cop put the bullet right through her brain stem, and there was a hole in her face between her nose and her eye. I just started screaming. Like I didn't know if I had been shot, how bad the cut to my throat was,

because, like I said, it was the cut to my throat was, because like I said it was bleeding a little and I was in a state of complete hysteria. I got down on my knees and started trying to wake Shawna up, like shaking her. I thought that there'd be a chance that she'd survive the shot. I mean, people survive crazy head wounds sometimes. But I think I just knew, maybe from the look in her eyes, that there was no more life inside her anymore. That day was the worst of my entire life. It's not something I'll ever get over either. I've just learned to live with it. I know Shauna had to die so that I might live,

and I heard the sureness in her voice, and I know in my heart that she might have been about to kill me. But that doesn't mean that every single day I don't think about her and wish that she'd made a different choice. I remember when I was a kid I would watch and even attend some football games with my dad, and it was something that we bonded over. When he passed away when I was in the 10th grade, I stopped watching football though. It just didn't appeal to me like it did when I would watch it with my father. And a few years ago, I fell in love with the game all over again. Now for some context, I was 27 years

old when I started following football again. I would watch the games with one of my best friends and his wife and Sunday nights became a tradition at his house. Good food, good friends, good times. Falling in love with the game again started to bring back so many fond memories that I had with my dad. I know a lot of people out there may not enjoy sports, especially American football, but sometimes the memories you can make can go far beyond the game itself. However, the memories are not always good. And this story that I'm about to tell you happened last year and instead of a fond memory, I was left with a very lasting nightmare. As I mentioned a moment ago, I got back into

football a few years back, but I wasn't able to attend a game until last year. My buddy surprised me on my birthday with tickets to an NFL game, and I was beyond pumped. This was going to be the first game I attended since before 10th grade. My town unfortunately doesn't have an NFL team, and the closest stadium is almost three hours away. I didn't want to drive all the way home after the game so I decided to actually book an Airbnb close to the stadium. My friend who got me the ticket was also attending the game with me and he was bringing his wife as well. They didn't want to stay after the game so they planned on driving home after. And this was honestly fine with me, I was actually looking forward to the quiet evening to myself. The game was awesome, other than one minor hiccup

towards the end, and the score was tied in the fourth quarter and our team actually had the ball, and a crazy series of plays transpired and as you might expect, the crowd was going insane. So insane that someone actually bumped into me and caused me to spill some of my beer onto the gentleman in front of me. And he wasn't pleased. And I apologized, but he continued to lay out this very verbal assault. After a minute or two of getting yelled at, the man went back to watching the game, as did I. Not long after the game ended and our team came out victorious and we cheered and celebrated with the rest of the home team fans. I won't say what the team was for my anonymity and that night I got back to my Airbnb and just kind of hung out and relaxed. I decided to order myself a pizza and

just sort of enjoy my little scenic getaway. The place was very cozy and on the outskirts of that town and it wasn't like in the middle of nowhere or anything like that but it definitely felt kind of secluded. I'm not exactly sure what time I fell asleep but it was late, after midnight for sure and at some point during the night I woke up because I thought that I could hear this very strange noise. I sat in bed for a minute trying to focus and I didn't know if it was just my imagination or if I actually had heard something. A few seconds later I heard it again and then again right after. This wasn't creaking floorboards or any of the other things that people say when they think you're being paranoid. This was without a doubt the sound of something being thrown at the

side of the house. Something small, almost like a rock or a pebble. I got out of bed and turned most of the lights on, mainly because I was a little spooked, but also because I didn't know the layout of the house and I didn't want to stumble my way through the darkness. I'm a bit clumsy and I have a knack for breaking things and I made my way to the window that was on the other side of the house. And that's where I had heard the sound coming from. I cupped my hands and looked into the darkness, but I didn't see anything. And I was convinced that whatever I had heard was probably nothing. And being the anxious person that I am, I just decided to go investigate outside. I understand this may seem like the

worst idea in the world looking back, but I had convinced myself that nothing was out there except maybe some wildlife and I just wanted to make sure. I spent a few minutes outside, walking around, having a smoke, and I didn't see anything weird or out of the ordinary. I did see a few small rocks on the side of the house where I thought I had heard the sound, but it was a pretty wooded area and those small rocks could have just been there the entire time. I decided to chalk up this entire ordeal to just my anxiety and nerves and being away from home. I started making my way back to the house and that's when I froze. Because I had turned a lot of the lights on, I was able to see inside the house from outside.

And there, walking through the kitchen, was a person. Someone who was wearing a hood. I was able to see them through the room clear as can be, and I immediately took cover behind a tree, ducking down. Thankfully, I had my cell phone with me, and immediately I called 911. While I waited for the cops to show up, I just sort of watched this figure through the window slowly creeping through the house. He seemed to be opening doors and even checking closets. I had my small duffel bag on a little table in the kitchen and this person went through my bag, even grabbed my wallet and went through it a bit but didn't even take anything.

After a couple of minutes this person started to move a little faster. He was whipping open doors and he looked like he was looking for something and he looked frustrated. He must have heard the police because as soon as the cop car showed up, he jumps out a window and starts to flee into the dark. I came out from behind the tree and flagged down a cop and tried telling him that the intruder had just ran, but they were very focused on calming me down in that moment. Finally, the police were able to take my statement, but by that time, this intruder was long gone. To my knowledge they never caught this person and nobody knew what he was doing or who he was looking for. The owners

of the house were alerted by the authorities and they claimed that they had no idea why anyone would do that and I believe them. I remember telling my buddy the story that next morning and he believed that it might have actually been that disgruntled fan from the football game, the one that I spilled beer on. I think it would be outrageous and borderline improbable for an intruder to have followed me all the way home, but the more I thought about it, this person did fit the profile of that crazy fan. He was even wearing the same color as the team, but that might have been common for the area as well. And this all could have easily been a coincidence, but I don't know. It really made me think. And it's really scary that sometimes people out there can just do things like this,

and we truly will never know why. I used to live on Parkfield Road near Lark Lane in Liverpool. My local supermarket was the Tesco on Agberth Road, so every time I needed to buy food, I'd walk all the way down Parkfield from my flat, which was in a house at the very top of the road near Prince's Park. Most of the houses on Parkfield are basically old Georgian mansions. I'm talking beautiful old buildings with long drives and grand entranceways that I'm guessing used to be occupied by the city's elite. But nowadays, most have been converted into apartments which have five to seven flats in them. Some of them boast some truly exquisite architecture, but while they're nice

to glance at, it's generally not good form to stop and stare at someone's house or place of work. So I just minded my own business and kept on walking past. But that's not to say that I didn't notice that one or two of the old mansions had been converted into stuff that wasn't apartments. I knew one had been converted into a nursery and another was like a vet's or something, but I was never curious to find out anything more about them. So one morning, I leave for work at 7 a.m., so I'm walking down Parkfield still half asleep, earbuds in, podcast on, and some coffee in hand.

And I was about halfway down the road, headed for St. Michael's train station when I saw a guy standing still in the pavement in front of me. It looked like he was waiting for someone, maybe a taxi or a car share to work or something, but other than very briefly regarding him, I didn't pay much attention to him at all. And that all changed though when I walked past him and he said something that I couldn't make out over the noise of my podcast. I was almost certain that it was directed at me so I stopped and pulled out my earbuds and then asked who he was talking to. He was looking right at me as I turned so clearly he was talking to me.

But he didn't answer my question or anything, he just kept on talking even though I hadn't heard the first thing he'd said. I remember exactly what he said because it was one of the weirdest things anyone's ever said to me in my entire life. He goes, they're all burning, in one big pile, and every day, there's more and more. It probably took my half-asleep brain a microsecond longer than it normally would, but as soon as I realized the fellow was just chatting nonsense, I said, yep, okay, in like a sort head cases from time to time. I just didn't expect to encounter one that early in the morning. It didn't scare me or anything, I just thought, what a weird bloke, and then by the time I got to the office and saw the massive stack of invoices that I had to work through, it was basically forgotten about for the next eight hours until it came time to commute home again. The fella wasn't there that time, nor was he there any other time I walked down Parkfield Road for the next two months.

But then one morning, bright and early, there he was again in the exact same spot I'd seen him the first time. And he wasn't alone. The fellow was standing with two women, both in their fifties or sixties, who both appeared to be reading. Since there was three of them on the pavement, I decided to cross over onto the other side so I'd have more room to pass, but as I did, I couldn't help but peek over at the three of them. The fella caught me looking and although he didn't say anything, we

locked eyes and smiled before I quickly turned my head away. But before I did, I noticed the two women who looked like they were reading from little books appear to be whispering something too, like they were reading aloud. Now this is the point where a lot of your American listeners are going to stop and think, hang on, this sounds familiar. And to be fair, if you're thinking what I think you're thinking, then you're thinking the right things. But the issue in question isn't such a massive deal over here as it is over on your side of the pond. I'm not trying to turn it into a dunk on you or anything. We just have different issues over here.

Cue the overwhelming and unflattering agreement. And that's why I could walk past them a second time and not piece together what they were doing with where they were choosing to do it. I blame it on the sleepy brain personally. Both times I saw the weird fella I had only been awake 30 minutes and since I was on my way to work I didn't exactly have time to stop and chat. It was literally days later when I realized that we were standing outside of the vet facing the place from across the street, so I decided to employ a bit of the old Google food to try and work out what was going on. It was called something like

the Daffodil Clinic. Not its actual name, of course, but something equally unassuming. It then took me mere minutes to figure out what its purpose was. There was a lot of flowery language around the subject. They just didn't come out and say it on one page, but after just the teeniest bit of clicking around I discovered what the clinic was for. It wasn't a vet, it was an abortion clinic, and that's why the people were praying outside of it. I've since come to learn that protesting abortion clinics is quite a big thing in the states, and a lot of the time the protests get pretty vicious, I guess. Now, before the comments section erupts, I'd like to make it clear that I'm not trying to cast dispersions on anyone.

In a free country, people should be free to pray wherever they want, right? And I don't live there, so I don't really know exactly what's going on. But that's not what I found so creepy about that man. The one who said that initially unintelligible thing to me about them all burning down there in one big pile. He was talking about the aborted babies and he was talking about them burning in hell. I think he'd have to be exceptionally sturdy of a person

for that mental image not to send a shudder through you. It certainly did with me once I realized what that guy was referring to. Sometime after that, I heard about the fella getting arrested. I'm guessing someone reported him to the police and that he was in the habit of saying things to people as they walked past. I don't know what law that's breaking, but that's just not on, is it? Saying things about babies burning in hell to people going through a horrible period in their lives. Now I know this can be a controversial topic, but I don't know, if you're going to pray, do it quietly across the street like those two women. Don't make a big thing out of it. And certainly, don't go telling passing strangers things about piles of babies burning in hell.

My mom and I moved around a lot when I was a kid. I was born in upstate New York, lived in Connecticut for a while, then after my parents got divorced, my mother and I moved to San Diego to live with her boyfriend, before we eventually moved up to Portland, Oregon to live with my maternal uncle when I was 12. We stayed there till I was 18, and aside from one or two cons, there were a lot of pros to growing up in Portland. But when I first moved there, I'd say for the year or so, I hated it, and it was mostly down to one man. A couple of days after we moved, I was riding my bike up and down the street when I saw this kid around my age walking up the street. He had a plastic grocery bag in his hand and it looked like it was full but whatever was in it was moving. And as I drew level with him I stopped my bike and asked what he had in the bag.

And he smiled, walked up to me, then opened up the bag to show me a bunch of fish that he'd caught that afternoon. I'd never been around much fishing or hunting so I thought it was wild that this kid was just walking up the street with a bag of fish that he'd just pulled out of a pond. But to him, it was like the most normal thing in the world. And what blew my mind ever more is when I asked what he was going to do with them and he replied, Probably eat them. I thought he was the single coolest kid I'd ever met in my life. And it turned out that he lived down the street.

So, I asked if he'd teach me how to fish. He said sure. Then a few days later, we were on our way down to the old fishing hole that he used to frequent. Brett, my new buddy, used to make his fishing rods out of nothing but sticks, along with whatever hooks and lines he could steal from his dad. I thought it was the most badass thing ever. A kid of 14 years old catching his own fish with homemade rods, and from then on, I was obsessed.

And that whole summer, Brett and I would go fishing just about any chance we got, and we'd take any fish that we caught home to his mom, who would just fry them up and then serve them up with some hush puppies and coleslaw. And we had some great times at that old fishing hall. But after a while, Brett said that he'd found an even better place to fish. It was a longer walk than our first fishing spot, but Brett said that it was a much larger pond, which meant much larger fish, so off we went one Friday afternoon to check it out for the first time. Brett was right about it being a much better pond, the only problem was we didn't know that we were intruding on anyone's spot. People can get real grouchy if you're too close to their preferred

fishing spot and downright angry if you try and supplant them all together. So we were actually aware that someone might come along and take issue with us being there. And then lo and behold, it took just hours before someone did. We were sitting on the edge of the pond when we suddenly heard someone yelling, hey, what the hell do you boys think you're doing? And our heads spin around and Brett and I both see this 50-something guy with a bald patch and a pot belly wearing a black t-shirt and khaki shorts. We told him we were just fishing, and he started asking if we had permission, if our parents knew what we were doing, basically all this stuff to try and get us to leave. Brett starts talking back to the guy asking

if our new spot was on his land and he said no, but that it must have been someone's land and he'd call the cops on us if we didn't make ourselves scarce. I was about to suggest that we just leave and come back later or something when we heard another voice from the opposite side of us asking what the problem was. Brett and I once again turned around to see a second guy walking towards us from the opposite direction. He looked to be about the same age as the guy trying to chase us off, but was taller, skinnier, and had well-combed hair and wore a cardigan, kind of like Mr. Rogers if Mr. Rogers wore glasses. The angry guy started explaining that we had no right to be fishing there, especially

without a license, but then the guy with glasses said it was his land that we had no right to be fishing there, especially without a license, but then the guy with glasses said it was his land that we were fishing on and that we had his permission to be there. I remember how he said, you can call the police if you like, but I don't think they'll appreciate you wasting their time, do you? And the pot-bellied killjoy guy looked all flustered for a second and then walked off grumbling to himself about how kids got no respect these days. And once the guy was out of earshot, we thanked the Mr. Rogers lookalike for having our backs and also for giving us permission to fish on his land. And he just chuckled and said, this isn't my land, but that guy was a jerk off. And he told us his land boundary was about a half mile back, but that he liked walking out that way because of all the wildlife and stuff. Seeing as we were on public land, we'd have to relocate if the cops did show up,

but Mr. Michaels, as he called himself, had bought us a little time before anyone else came along who found reason to bother us. Obviously, we thought Mr. Michaels was awesome and he seemed very impressed by Brett's improvised rods and then after a brief exchange he carried on with his nature walk and we just carried on fishing. With it being our regular fishing spot, we visited that larger pond as often as we could that summer and every so often we'd spot Mr. Michaels out in one of his walks. At first, all he'd do was come talk to us a little, ask how the fish were biting, stuff like that. But then after a while, he'd see us, say hi, and then come back around 20 to 30

minutes later with some of his wife's baking or some cold cans of soda, whatever you could spare. Mrs. Michaels must have been an incredible baker because whatever he brought us was guaranteed to be good, and sometimes he'd stop and eat with us, enjoying the scenery and asking us questions. Most of the time we talk about nothing in particular, either fishing or baseball or school. But then one day, Mr. Michaels asked us if either of us had girlfriends. Now, I was 12 and Brett was almost a whole year older at 13, and though we'd experienced very innocent crushes here and there,

we didn't have girlfriends or anything like that. Mr. Michaels asked if there were any girls at school we liked, and having already discussed the topic, both me and Brett were like, no, not really. Mr. Michaels laughed and told us, well don't force it, the world's gonna tell you how you should want all sorts of different things, but the only thing you should be paying attention to is what your heart tells you. Pretty wholesome, right? We thought so too. I mean, we thought Mr. Michaels was just about the coolest person either of us had ever met, and having grown up without a stable father figure in my life, I

definitely appreciated having someone like that around. Especially when Brett had to go visit some relatives out of state and I was left on my own if I wanted to go fishing. I had my own homemade fishing rod by that point, so it wasn't like I had to ask Brett to borrow his. I wanted to go fishing. I had my own homemade fishing rod by that point so it wasn't like I had to ask Brett to borrow his. I used to walk down to the fishing hole whenever I wanted, dig up a few worms and then get to luring the biggest fish possible out into the shallows. Fishing was just as much fun as it was with Brett but I used to worry about being alone. I was always short for my age and with my slight stutter, people who didn't know me all that well tended to think that I was either much younger or

much dumber than I was, which naturally made me a very ripe target for bullies. I didn't think that I had to worry about that out near the good old fishing spot, as I tended to just see Mr. Michaels on his walks or stopping by to deliver some muffins. But then one day, Mr. Michaels stopped by while I was fishing and started acting a little weird. He used to ask us questions from time to time, just about our lives and such, and that day, Mr. Michaels started asking me about my family. I told him everything, or at least almost everything. That I had moved around a lot and that I had a dad and then a stepdad and then no dad at all. He then asked if I liked

living with my uncle and I said it was whatever and that my mom would probably move us again soon. Mr. Michaels usually had some piece of worldly advice to offer, something that would cheer us up or help us look on the bright side of things. But when I said that thing about probably moving soon, he didn't say anything at all. He just got up, walked off, without even saying goodbye. That wasn't like Mr. Michaels at all, but at the time, I wondered if something I'd said hit a little too close for comfort. I might have been 12, but I wasn't dumb. I knew grown-ups got upset over weird things, or not weird, but things they either couldn't or wouldn't explain to me. I figured it was either

something like that, or that he felt guilty for bringing up a sensitive subject. I noticed a lot of adults seemed to show sympathy for me whenever the subject of family came up. It was something I'd been dealing with ever since my parents divorced back when I was like six or seven. So maybe Mr. Michaels just felt bad all of a sudden and walked off because he was kind of choked up. I say all this because I thought about it a lot.

And I did so because I had time to think about it a lot. Because all I did after he walked off was sit there fishing for another few hours before finally calling it a day and walking back home with my meager catch. The next day I headed back down to the fishing hole after lunch, and after about an hour of sitting there, Mr. Michaels showed up again. He greeted me warmly as he approached so I figured all of yesterday's awkwardness had been forgotten. He didn't bring it up at first, he just acted like it never happened, which was honestly fine by me because I didn't want to talk about it either. He just walked up, sat down next to me and asked how the fishing was going. We made small talk for a few minutes about the fishing, the weather, stuff like that, and then he said something like,

I want to apologize for just walking off like that yesterday. I told him it was fine, and he went on to explain that he too had grown up in an unstable family. My situation reminded him a little too much of his own, which, as I said, was one of my initial suspicions. Mr. Michaels then said that family wasn't always a matter of blood, and that the best part about growing up was that, at least to a degree, you got to choose your own family. I figured that was probably the poignant, life-affirming thing that he wished that he'd said the day before, and I appreciated it all the same. And I also appreciated it when he said that if I wanted to, I could consider him a member of that chosen family, but only if I really wanted to. I told him sure, and thanked him, but I knew it was kind of a platitude. He just felt bad hearing a kid talk

about the same kind of childhood he went through, and all he wanted to do was make me feel better about it. But like I said, I'd been experiencing the same thing almost all my life, so while I knew to just be polite and thank people for whatever it was they'd said, it wasn't like it was some Hollywood moment where I burst into tears like, well gee whiz, Mr. Michaels, does that mean you're gonna be my new dad? Instead, I asked Mr. Michaels if he had kids of his own and he said yes. He had two girls, but they had all grown up and moved out, one to the city and one to college. I thought I'd figured out another reason why he liked me and Brett so much. We were like the two young sons that he never got to have. The next time that I went down to the fishing hole it was Saturday. Brett was due back from his relatives on that Monday so it was my last solo

fishing session for the foreseeable future and I was pretty sure that I'd see Mr. Michaels at some point with it being a weekend. I was there for maybe an hour or so before he showed up, and when he did, we did our usual thing of making small talk and watching the world go by, until he turned and asked me a question. He asked if I thought about what he'd said, about a chosen family, and I said, sure, a little. He then asked if I liked the idea of him being a kind of father figure to me and while I said sure I guess it wasn't entirely out of courtesy. I liked Mr. Michaels and so did Brett and although the whole chosen family thing seemed kind of cheesy to me I thought it was coming from a good place so I figured I'd just go along with it. But then Mr. Michaels started acting strangely again. He told me that the bond of family came with a certain kind of love and I just sat there wondering where

he was going with that and then he went on to say that over the previous few weeks, he'd come to develop feelings of familial love, and that he'd been wondering if those feelings were reciprocated. He spoke real fancy like that at first, and I guess because he was beating around the bush, but I think that he must have saw the look on my face and figured it was there because I didn't understand him, because in the next moment, he just straight up asked me if I loved him. There was a brief pause before he clarified that it was that familial love that he was talking about, and I remembered giving him a very reluctant, sure, I guess so, but he wasn't done. This is the point where I think Mr. Michaels was another one of

those adults who thought that I was a little slow because of the way he was talking to me. It was like he was talking to a much younger kid, or maybe one with a learning disorder or something. Twelve isn't eighteen, but I was still like, why is he talking to me like this? I knew something wasn't right. I just couldn't see exactly what was happening. Not until Mr. Michaels began to talk again. He told me that people who love each other sometimes touch one another as a way of expressing that love. And that's the point where I started to feel truly uncomfortable. Mr. Michaels saddled up to me a little and I remember feeling my body tense up

as he did. I realized where he was going and what he was trying to do and it made my skin feel like it was going to crawl off my bones. Mr. Michaels then asked in this sort of shaky voice if he could touch me as a way of expressing his love. And the moment he finished his sentence, I got up and walked off without saying a word. Just like he did, the day before. I remember walking back to my uncle's house, and at the risk of sounding overly dramatic, it was almost like that part from the opening of Saving Private Ryan, if you know that movie. Do you remember the part where Tom Hanks is just kind of sat there on the beach and he's having some kind of episode where his ears

are ringing and everything seems like it's really far away? That's honestly what it felt like walking back to my uncle's place. I just felt kind of numb. Like I was so trapped in my own thoughts that everything else seemed far away or like sort of background noise. And I walked into the kitchen via the back door, which was kept unlocked during the day so I could get in and out at will, and I walked straight past my mom and up to the guest bedroom without so much as even looking at her. And that gave her a clue that there was something wrong, so she followed me up and asked me a few questions, and then it all came spilling out of me, along with many, many tears. I think one of the worst things about it

was I was old enough to actually understand what was happening. It's a terrible thought, but I guess some kids get touched so young that it becomes sort of a repressed memory. I'm not a psychologist, but I know that's a thing. But that obviously wasn't the case with me. And the second Mr. Michaels mentioned touching after asking if I loved him, my first thought was basically, oh my Jesus titty slapping Christ, Mr. Michaels is a predator. I wasn't confused on what his intentions were, even if he was trying to put such an innocent mask on such an ugly thing, and honestly, it absolutely destroyed me. It was the idea that someone so nice, so seemingly nice anyway, could have such vile intentions, and that he could be so cunning about it.

I mean, he'd been slowly, steadily, and patiently grooming us for almost two whole months. He'd been working to earn our trust, waiting for the right moment, and then when he'd heard that my mom and I had moved around a lot, and possibly coupled with an assumption that I was a little slow, Mr. Michaels figured that I was the perfect target. He was wrong, of course, and I got away before he could do anything, but simply the fact that he considered me a target was something I found incredibly disturbing and upsetting. Now, this was back in the late 70s, and honestly, I'm not sure what kind of reaction it'd get now, but after I told my mother, she told my uncle,

and when my uncle told the local sheriff, they did something. I don't know what it was, cause I don't think they ever officially arrested Mr. Michaels. All I know is that one day I was told that I didn't have to worry about him anymore, and that he'd move someplace far, far away. We were told it was safe to go down to the good fishing hole again without any fear of seeing old Mr. Michaels walking up in his cardigan and with a basket of his wife's baking. But that didn't have the desired effect, because I wasn't relieved to hear we'd never see him again. I was actually heartbroken. Brett was just as shocked as I was to find out Mr. Michaels was what he was, but his reaction mirrored my own in many respects.

We were devastated to think that we wouldn't see him again, but not because we truly missed this guy, but because we realized Mr. Michaels never really existed in the first place, at least not in the way that he presented himself. It's kind of hard to articulate, I guess, but we knew we'd miss the Mr. Michaels who had our backs, who brought us food, and who gave us life advice. Only the brutal truth was that the version of Mr. Michaels we'd come to know was a lie. A person dreamed up by an incredibly dangerous predator whose goal was to lull us into a false sense of trust and security. And when the truth became clear, it changed the way I thought

about adults for a long time. I guess you could call it our loss of innocence. The summer me and Brett realized that the world was much darker than it seemed. Many years later, when I was all grown up, I heard some radio evangelist talking about the devil. How he lies, how he deceives, how he tricks you into thinking he's your best friend before he turns and shows his real face. If that's the case, then I think I met him, and his name is Mr. Michaels. I was a university lecturer for the better part of 20 years, and in that time, I met some great students and some not so great students. One lad, an international student from a country that'll remain unnamed, was probably the most difficult student I'd ever come across, and his country of origin shall remain unnamed because, frankly, he was the only problematic student from that nation that I'd ever had the displeasure of dealing with. Every other international student from this particular

country was respectful, considerate, and exceptionally hardworking, but this one was not. The first thing he told me after realizing that my first initial stood for Maria and not something like Matthew was that no one in his country would take a female professor seriously. I simply replied if he wanted a passing grade, he could take the attitude of when in Rome. He seemed to find that amusing and while he claimed that he'd show me all the respect I deserved, he did so with a deeply patronizing tone he claimed that he'd show me all the respect I deserved, he did so with a deeply patronizing tone that suggested that he would never have done the same if we were in his nation of birth. And when it dawned on him that he'd actually have to work to get a passing grade,

the student in question became incredibly ill-tempered and his performance dropped off completely. He became more and more problematic as the weeks went by until one day he simply stopped attending lectures. Initially I had absolutely no issue with this whatsoever because it had gotten to the point where he could be rather disruptive from time to time. But after a while I started to wonder what was happening with him. I ended up asking a colleague if she'd heard anything about him and I'll never forget the look on her face as she asked me, you haven't heard? As it turns out, the surly student that I'd had problems with had been arrested by the Cambridgeshire police

on charges of kidnap, false imprisonment, and grievous bodily harm. It took a while for the whole story to come out because at first no one knew anything other than the crimes he'd been charged with. But it didn't take long for people to piece things together and link it to another worrying on-campus incident. About a week before the problematic student stopped attending lectures

someone had filed a missing persons report with the police. This person claimed a friend or housemate of theirs, a female Taiwanese student, had gone out for a drinks date with a fellow student and then failed to return home. Students staying over at each other's flats or dorms is a very common occurrence, so for the first 24 hours or so, no one batted an eyelid. But then after another 24 hours without any communication from her, the girl's friends became concerned. They contacted the police and gave them the name of their friend's date and officers were dispatched to the date's home. And the date turned out to be the same student I'd had problems with, but he claimed to have no idea where she was. The police then tracked the girl's mobile phone

and discovered it was within just 50 meters of the guy's flat. So back they went to ask him a second round of questions. But not before acquiring a search and seizure order from a local judge. This allowed them into the student's flat, where upon entry, they found their missing Taiwanese girl. After accompanying the male student for drinks, the student had followed the male back to his flat. He'd been perfectly nice and charming through the course of their evening, but upon arriving back at his flat, his demeanor must have changed completely. When she expressed a desire

to leave, the student became violent, and when things became physical, he restrained her, tied her wrists and ankles, and then proceeded to beat and torture her with a cigarette lighter. The victim was told that it was her education on why she shouldn't leave him, and the sooner she accepted that she was his property, the sooner her ordeal would end. From what I understand, the whole thing caused something of an international incident at the university, and the girl's family wanted to see their daughter's abuser prosecuted to the full extent of the law, and he was. It's just the punishment wasn't anywhere near in line with the crime. Instead of being sent to prison, the student agreed to pay the victim a hefty sum in compensation

before being deported from the UK and given a lifetime ban from returning. I know that's at least something. But hearing that he'd basically gotten away with it was just as shocking as hearing about what he'd done in the first place. There must have been an awful lot of diplomatic wrangling going on behind the scenes, and although I've only a cursory knowledge of it, I know the word of international relations can be a murky one indeed. It just makes me sick to think of that poor girl, of everything she went through, and know that the person who did it was simply able to buy their way out of a prison sentence. Because for men like that, prison is the only place for them. Back in 2009, when I had just turned 22, one of my best friends since childhood met a girl on Facebook. Dean was a bit of a trailblazer in many respects because back then, we thought of him having a Facebook girlfriend as pretty sad.

Whereas nowadays, meeting on dating apps or sliding into DMs on social media is a totally normal way for couples to find each other. We used to joke about her being a catfish before catfishing was even really a thing. We didn't use that exact term, but there were a lot of jokes about Louise turning out to be a Louis who was three times his age. Turns out, Louise was a real person, and when we met her, we understood why Dean was so smitten. They seemed perfectly matched for one another, and within about 18 months of them getting together, Dean announced that he was moving down to Bournemouth so they could be closer. We were gutted to see him go, because Bournemouth is a seven-hour drive from where we grew up in Durham,

and without a car, it wasn't like he could pop home whenever he liked because the trains took even longer and the fares were outrageous. Since Louise lived with her mom and brother, Dean started looking for flats down in Bournemouth, and then when he got a bit of money saved up and had somewhere to live, off he went. We later found out that he'd moved into a shared apartment just outside of the city center, and that he'd quickly found a job as a kitchen porter, so he didn't burn through too much of his savings. His job was alright, his relationship

was flourishing, and the only thing stopping him from getting a flat with his girlfriend was the fact that she didn't have a job yet. On top of that, his new flatmate sounded like a sound fellow, too. The only thing was, Dean wasn't very forthcoming when it came to information about him. As you can imagine, he was very proud of himself for having landed on his feet in the way that he did. He told us all about his new job, all about how nice his new neighborhood was, and he briefly touched on how cool his new flatmate was. They'd have a drink together, have a smoke together, watch horror movies together, but when we asked what he did for a living, or what he looked like, or what he was interested in, Dean was suddenly all vague or one-worded answers. We just put it down to him still being new in the area, and it's not good manners not

to pry into people's lives, is it? And regardless, we were pleased that he was doing well, even if it did mean seeing less of him. Anyway, about six weeks go by and Dean ends up inviting us down to Bournemouth for the weekend. We were all about 23 or 24 at the time, meaning that we didn't have a lot of cash to throw around on hotels and all that, but Dean's like, no brother, just crash at my place. We drove down on Friday morning, got there in the late afternoon, then went looking for Dean's flat out near a place called Boscombe. We found it no problem. Our mutual friend beeped his horn when we were outside, then we had an ecstatic reunion in the car park of his apartment block. We hadn't seen Dean in nearly two months, so we were over the

moon to be reunited. But after he invited us inside for a cup of tea and a chinwag, we realized something wasn't quite right about him. He looked pale, he looked like he'd lost weight, and he looked like he wasn't sleeping very well either. And not only that, but the flat that he was living in was an absolute pigsty. We didn't bring it up right away, but we were too busy chatting about this and that and trying not to break into our beer stash too early. But in the end, I asked him if he was feeling up to a few drinks that night because he looked a wee bit peaky. And I'll never forget how he let out a deep sigh before talking and when he did, he told us that the last two weeks had been some of the most difficult of his whole life.

Dean's new flatmate had started out as a sound fella, but then after a few weeks, he'd started letting his true colors show. The flat was in such a sorry state because Aaron never, ever cleaned up, and the only way Dean had been roped into living there was that the landlord had scrubbed the place down and made sure Aaron was out of the flat during the viewing. I wouldn't go so far as to say that Aaron and his landlord conspired to trick Dean into signing a six-month contract because, from what I gathered, they loathed each other with a passion. But they both had something to gain from Dean living there, so I suppose there was some degree of collaboration.

You see, Dean hadn't moved into a cozy apartment with an eccentric but playful older roommate. He was living with a mentally unstable alcoholic, who never paid his rent and was prone to violent, psychotic outbursts. He just hadn't realized it until it was far too late. Dean said that when he first moved in, he met an Aaron that liked the same kind of music, liked the same kind of films, and who made him feel as welcome as possible by handing him a can of beer every five minutes. But then Dean started to realize that Aaron drank pretty much all day, every day, and that by work, Aaron meant that he went out stealing. He didn't tell Dean what he did to make money at first, but once he seemed on the level, he told him that he shoplifted, burgled, went out stealing

money from blackout drunks on a Saturday night, just about anything but make an honest living. He also refused to pay any rent, refused to vacate the apartment, and once told Dean that the police would have to come in and drag him out of there, and that's only if one of them fancied losing an eye. The only reason Aaron gave Dean an easy ride, which he didn't seem to give anyone else, was the fact that he was apparently his new drinking buddy, and smoking buddy, and if Aaron had anything to do with it, they'd be sharing other things before long. According to Dean, Aaron didn't just drink and have a bit of puff. He did all sorts. Whatever he could get his hands on, and the harder the stuff, the more volatile he became. Dean said

that just a few nights before, he'd come home to find Aaron smoking spice, this sort of synthetic cannabis stuff. He said he was out of his mind on it, and then after playing his stereo way too loud for hours in his bedroom, Dean said Aaron came out of his bedroom with an effing samurai sword and started doing moves with it. I don't know what you'd call it, I'm sure the Japanese have a word for it, but Aaron was waving the sword around like he was practicing a fight, but in slow motion. Dean said he retreated to his bedroom immediately and locked the door, then just hoped that Aaron would decide to leave him alone for the night. Aaron never turned his music down when he partied like that, and his neighbors had long given up on making him try.

Dean said he learned to live with the incessant droning of industrial metal late at night, but had never gotten used to the sound of Aaron throwing fits. He'd start randomly screaming, or he'd kick or throw something against his bedroom wall, and Dean told us the random and violent nature of the sound would always wake him up. Aaron ate disgusting, smelly food, his hygiene was atrocious, and on more than one occasion, Aaron had tried to climb into bed with Dean in the middle of the night. He'd obviously needed to start locking his door, but he couldn't spend his entire life in his bedroom. What Dean really needed was help getting the hell out of there at a time when Aaron couldn't notice he was leaving.

Apparently, Dean had already raised the prospect of moving out after he and Aaron had a minor disagreement over something, and Aaron exploded. He asked what his problem was, if he didn't like him, and if he didn't like him, he should just come out and say it so they could settle their problems like men and not little girls. Aaron's words, not mine or Dean's. Dean had managed to talk his way out of that one, but he realized that if he was going to make an escape, it had to be a quick one, and without Aaron being aware. And that, ladies and gentlemen, was the real reason he'd invited us down for the weekend. Not for a little reunion with the boys, Dean was planning a not so great escape. Now he told us all of this and we

still hadn't met Aaron yet. But by that stage, and to be perfectly honest with you, I was a bit nervous about the prospect. I mean, once we'd heard about the whole samurai sword thing, a replica, but still sharp, and how he was so quick to go and grab it, that definitely added a scary dimension to the whole thing. It wasn't a case of just helping Dean move some boxes, we had to plan the whole thing like some type of military operation. And what's worse, we had to wait 48 hours until Sunday to do it, as Aaron would most likely be in the apartment until Sunday afternoon, at which point he'd go out stealing and try to earn a bit of drug money. Then suddenly, right as we agree that Sunday is the day that we help Dean move, we hear keys sliding in the flat's lock, signaling that Aaron had returned home.

The door slams, he walks down the little hallway towards the living room where we're sitting, and the whole time, I watch Dean just sort of shrink. I'd never seen him act like that before, ever. His bark was definitely a lot worse than his bite, but Dean wasn't some pushover. So to see him suddenly but definitely cowering at this Aaron fellow as he was approaching, it was quite something. Aaron walks into the room, and Dean and I's mutual friend lay eyes on him for the first time. He wasn't quite what I expected, in that he looked more like a metalhead than the kind of shoplifting pawn life we were used to up in Durham.

He was covered in tattoos, had shoulder-length dyed black hair, and had one of those bullring nose piercings which he removed to look less conspicuous while on the rob. We were obviously a bit wary of him, but at first, Aaron seemed really friendly and welcoming. Apparently he had no idea Dean had invited us, but he also didn't seem to have a problem with it either. In fact, not only did he seem keen to have a stay for the weekend, he thought it was a good excuse to throw a party. Dean played along, as did we, as Aaron talked about inviting some girls over, getting a few bags and bottles, and all meeting back at the flat in a few hours once it had gotten dark.

Dean then says that he wants to walk us around the area a bit, show us the pub that he liked to drink in, then we popped out after saying our goodbyes to Aaron. Now, as you can imagine, first thing we bring up when we're out of the flat was something like, what the hell are you doing agreeing to a party tonight? This fellow goes mental when he adds a few lines and you're putting us in harm's way. Blah, blah, blah, blah. Aaron then replies that no, it's perfect, because if Aaron blew all the cash that he had on that Friday night, he'd then be forced to go on a shoplifting spree the next day, because he always started craving crack when he's hungover. And our jaws were just on the floor. We're at an age where the cure for a hangover was like a McDonald's breakfast, and in his desperation to be closer to his Facebook girlfriend,

Dean had managed to become the flatmate of an actual crackhead. We understood that if we had a blowout that night, we'd be able to move Dean out of that flat and into his girlfriend's mom's garage, which could serve as temporary accommodation. But there was a lot we couldn't reconcile. We each had at least two dozen questions for him. I mean, that walk to the pub turned into a proper little interrogation. But all of the questions we asked, like why didn't you leave earlier, or why don't you just get the police involved, all of his answers came down to one of two things. Number one, Dean was legitimately scared for his safety, and if everything he'd told us was true, especially the stuff about the samurai sword, then he had a right to be. And number two, he needed his friends.

He was in a brand new place, new next to no one, and he was tired, depressed, and afraid. Dean said what little time he got to spend with his girlfriend, he was so exhausted that all he did was catch up on sleep. He needed our help and he needed it badly and, by God, after all was said and done, we were ready and willing to give it to him. A few hours later, we've got a few beers in the fridge and Aaron returns from picking up his sniff with his girlfriend in tow. She had a similar looking lifestyle to Aaron, but unlike her boyfriend, she seemed a bit soft and dopey. No offense to the

girl, but she seemed a bit slow, like she'd only ended up being Aaron's girlfriend to begin with because he found her easy to manipulate. And that might sound a bit harsh, but that's honestly the reading I got after meeting her, and it's also my way of saying that while Aaron was a maniac, his girlfriend was just a bit daft. Now anyway, we're all sitting around and drinking and while Aaron thinks we're having a party, me and Dean's mutual friend were basically there as bodyguards. Aaron was nice and friendly at first, but as he worked his way through beer after beer and started doing some harder drugs with his girlfriend, he started to get more and more aggressive. It started when he was doing lines. He offered Dean and me's mutual friend some, and when he declined, he started berating

us about how we were no fun. He told us, even Dean has a bit of Charlie with us, don't you? And us, as his old friends, were thinking, no he doesn't, Dean likes a beer but he's hardly ever touched any drugs at all. But then, right there, before our very eyes, Dean leans over and does a bump before giving us both a very sheepish look. I suppose he'd learned to take the path of least resistance, as they say, but seeing how intimidated and browbeaten our old mate was, it was shocking. After all, we hadn't seen Aaron's wild side yet, so it didn't make sense why he was so scared of him. The night went on for a little while longer without incident. Aaron started acting like a total prick, saying the most obnoxious crap you can imagine about just about everything you can imagine. But there were no indications

that any swords were about to be produced, so me and Dean and our mutual friend all stayed quite chilled out, and more and more beers were getting drunk while Aaron's working through his bag of sniff, and then eventually, he announced that it was time to put some music on. I suspected he was about to put on something very loud and fast, and I wasn't wrong, but he turned the volume up so loud that we had to literally shout to make ourselves heard. This didn't seem to bother Aaron though, and he actually thought it was funny that the music was ruining what little vibe we'd got going, instead about trying to make us sing the lyrics to songs we'd never heard before in our lives. Shortly after, Aaron was up dancing, if you could even really call it that,

while we just tried our best to get through it in the assurance that it meant getting out of there a day earlier than planned. We kept the drinking to a minimum, knowing we'd be moving boxes or whatever come the following day, but being forced to listen to Erin's shite music made me want to get blackout drunk. He was content to dance on his own for a while, but after a few songs, he asked his girlfriend to dance with him. She joined in, but very awkwardly, like she was scared of what he might do, and it wasn't long before Aaron showed exactly why she seemed so anxious. They were dancing at first, but then Aaron started getting rougher and rougher with her, until some of his dance moves consisted of him just choking her from behind. I don't mean like putting his hand around her neck either,

like you could see on his girlfriend's face that she couldn't breathe. He did it a couple more times, and we're getting ready to step in because he's choking her for longer and longer each time. But then his girlfriend suddenly elbows him, shoves him off, and slaps him. And then, all hell breaks loose. We later found out Dean had been a witness to a lot of this sort of behavior and had always tried to intervene where possible. But he could only do so much knowing that he had to live with the bloke

and by that, I mean, he couldn't just deck him like he'd wanted to. But then, since me and his other mate were there and knowing we had his back, Dean launches himself across the room as Aaron starts throwing punches at his girlfriend's face. We followed in his footsteps and within a few seconds, we had Aaron restrained. Dean starts shouting at his girlfriend to leave, but she didn't move. She just stood there, frozen, like she didn't know what to do. I joined in and shouting at her to call the police, but instead of snapping out of it and calling 999, she ran off into Aaron's room and slammed the door shut,

leaving the three of us basically sitting on top of him. We do a bit of shuffling about, then I'm able to get off of him, grab my phone, and call the police. I told them that we had a mental case in our hands. A bloke had gone berserk and he was going to hurt someone because we couldn't restrain him all night. The lady on the phone said that she could hear Aaron screaming about how he was going to kill us and that she'd get someone out to us as soon as possible, which she did. Aaron was still screaming bloody murder when the police got there and after he tried attacking them as well, that was it. He was off to the cells for

the night, giving us a tidy 24 hours to move Dean's stuff out into his girlfriend's mom's place. It'd be cramped, but Aaron had no idea where the house was, so there'd be no tracking him down, and sharing a bathroom with three normal people was better than sharing one with a dangerous and violent psychopath. We got Dean out of there, so it was mission accomplished, and then we went out to celebrate on the Sunday before we drove back to Durham. But now I look back on it, the celebration feels a bit bittersweet. Aaron made things easy for us by trying to bite a policeman, and so it was a quick in and out, and Dean was able to end a miserable little chapter in his life. But I sometimes think about Aaron's girlfriend, how even after choking and punching her, she'd run into

Aaron's bedroom at the first sign of trouble and just stayed there. We shouted at her to leave, to call the police, but she chose to run into the bedroom of her abusive boyfriend and lock the door. And sometimes I really worry for that girl's future. But with the attitude she's got, I suppose there's only so much she can do. And that being said, I hope someone gets her some help, some proper help, before it's too late. When I was in high school, I loved the game of basketball. And I was one of those kids from the late 2000 era when ball was life. I knew I was not good enough to play at the next level, but it didn't stop me from playing the game I loved when I was back in high school.

And I played with the same group of guys for years. And by the time we became seniors, our team was making a run for the playoffs. And it was a very exciting time and the whole community was buzzing around it. And after a very massive win, our team was only one win away from a sectional title, which was just about the greatest accomplishment I could have ever made in high school. And the sectional game was six days away from our last win and our coach did something a little unorthodox. He set up a scrimmage for us so we could stay in game shape. And for anyone who doesn't know, setting up a scrimmage this close

to a big game is kind of a recipe for disaster. As a coach, you're risking your players' durability and potentially opening them up to an unnecessary injury. As players, we didn't really care, though. We wanted to play as much as we could. We were high on winning and any chance to improve our game, we wanted that. And the main reason our coach set up this scrimmage was to really test our skills and start to push us to the limit. The team we were set up to play was a team made up of players from all over the state. They didn't belong to one school, and these were essentially the best players in the area.

It was going to be a test for us. If we were able to hang with this team on the court, we could be more than ready to compete in the sectional game. The game was on a Thursday evening after school, and we played the game at a neutral location. And the gym was nice, but the surrounding area had seen better days. It was one of those sort of run-down parts of the city. One of the downfalls of the gym was that it only had one locker room, which the other team used. And my team was forced to change in the basement, and basketball season is in the winter for anybody who doesn't know, so let's just say that the basement of this building was absolutely freezing. Not only was it freezing in the basement, but it was very dark. Even with all the lights on, it felt kind of dim. Something about the basement was just off, though. It was creepy down there,

and not just because it was a dark basement. From the moment I got down there, I was joking around with the team that this basement felt off and was weird, and most of the guys just kind of laughed it off and called me paranoid, which I'll be the first to admit, I am kind of a paranoid person by nature, listening to podcasts like Let's Read. And while we were in the locker room before the game, we were all joking around, just being typical high school idiots. I continued to press my teammates about something just not being right about this place. And one of my teammates was using his cell phone to shine a light in the

dark corners of the basement, but it just looked like junk and boxes everywhere. This was 2009, so the flashlight on the phone wasn't as powerful as it is today. And eventually the coach joined us and once we got focused on the game, I forgot all about that creepy basement. And after the game, which we lost by the way, we went back into the locker room to discuss plays and talk about what went right and what went wrong in the game. After our coach gave the final speech, he left the locker room with the other two assistant coaches and my team got dressed and continued to talk about the game. And one by one the players started to filter out of the locker room until it was just me and another player. And just as we were finishing up, we heard a loud crash come from the back of the room. It was a loud and very jarring sound that caused us both to freeze in our tracks, and as soon as I heard that loud crash, that horrible feeling about the creepy

basement started to come back. My buddy asked me if we should go investigate, which I was completely against, and I didn't want to scream like some coward, so I just sort of went with him. Now this time it wasn't paranoia. As he shined the weak cell phone light into the back corner of that basement, standing as still as a statue, was a man. A man I would say was maybe in his 30s at the time. He looked very disheveled, and he looked angry. And my friend and I both just stopped and sort of stared at the man, and all three of us now just stood completely still. These few seconds felt like the longest stretch of time I had ever experienced, and just as my friend tried to say something, the man just started to scream. It wasn't even words, it was this weird growl of a scream and we both decided to run.

Whatever was happening, we didn't want to find out the result of his screaming. As we sprinted towards the stairs, this man ran after us, and he was fast, fast enough that he was able to grab my hand and yank me down to the ground. Fortunately for me, he fell on the ground in the process of pulling me down, and with the momentum I had from both of us falling, I was actually able to bounce back up pretty quickly and continue running out of the basement screaming. My friend and I ran into the parking lot screaming our heads off and the rest of the team and the coaches were waiting outside. I couldn't speak, but somehow my buddy was able to concisely explain to the coaches what had just happened to both of us in the basement. One of the assistant coaches stayed outside with us and the rest of the team and called the police, while the head coach and the other assistant coach ran inside

to confront this man. I still have no idea why they did this. I'm sure in the heat of the moment, they probably felt compelled to defend us, I guess. In a few minutes passed and the police showed up and ran into the building. It was the first time in my life that I had ever seen the police spring into action like that. We were all freaking out because during that time the coaches never came back outside. A minute or two after the police ran into the building, the two coaches finally emerged. The assistant coach had his arm around the head coach who was holding his arm as if something had happened to it. From our vantage point, we couldn't really see exactly what was happening. The only thing we could see for sure was that the coach had what looked like blood all over

the front of his shirt. And not long after the two coaches had come out, the police came outside with that man handcuffed. It didn't seem like he was struggling or resisting at all. I do remember that he had this sort of wicked smile on his face as he just sort of stared blankly ahead of him. And that's where the nightmare ended on that specific evening. Now it wasn't until years later when I ran into my old coach at this fundraising event that he finally told me what happened. And he told me that he and the other coach ran into that basement shouting. They thought that we made it up at first because they didn't see anyone down there.

And while we were standing near the stairs, the man jumped out and cut the coach's forearm with some type of switchblade or something. The coach thought that it could have been a box cutter. Right after he got cut, the other coach tackled the man to the ground and basically detained him by sitting on him until the police showed up. The coach had to get stitches in that arm and all types of blood tests because they didn't know if the blade was actually clean. Thankfully, he was fine. And it was arguably the scariest part of the story was that nobody knew anything about this guy. He seemed to have no identification and he was clearly not right in the head. And the area that I live in unfortunately has always had issues with people with drug

issues. And as far as my old coach knows, this poor man was just another unfortunate soul whose mind was lost on the streets. And if it wasn't for my assistant coach, my head coach might not have been alive to tell that story. And that's something that still freaks me out today. I've been a lover of sports my entire life, and ever since I was a little kid, all I ever wanted to be was a professional athlete. I was really good in high school and received a scholarship to play football in college as well, and I wanted to have a good college football career actually, but nothing near what it would actually take to get to that next NFL level. I was able to make a little money after college doing commercials for local businesses and doing some autograph signings, but that quickly faded away and I moved on to life after sports. I've had a pretty successful career as a working professional, but my biggest

accomplishment and the pride of my life has to be my family, my beautiful wife and our amazing daughter. My daughter has taught me how to be a better person and I love her more than anything else in this world. And I'm sure if some of you reading this are parents, you can relate to those sentiments. About two years ago, I was invited back to the small town where I played college football for an event surrounding the completion of their new facilities on campus. They were going to do a tour, a dinner, and obviously some drinks and snacks in between. They invited alumni, sponsors, and some higher-end boosters to try and get everyone together to network and more obviously

to fundraise as I'm sure the new facilities were not cheap. I really didn't feel like going but my daughter seemed interested in taking a trip with me so I figured that we'd go and make a little daddy-daughter date and have some fun and head out of there early. Once I arrived though I wondered if I had made a mistake. The last thing I felt like doing was schmoozing with all the boosters and talking about the good old glory days. I prepared myself for having the same conversation about a dozen times, but since I had my daughter with me, I figured most of my attention would be devoted to her and I wouldn't have to really entertain a lot of other conversations, at least for a long period of time. There was one person I didn't recognize who seemed to keep giving me a bit of a side eye,

or looking at me like he seemed annoyed that I was even there. Every time I caught him staring, I would look over in his direction and he would immediately look away. As I made my way around the room, I felt like this person was kind of shadowing me, always staying a fair distance away, but every time I looked up, it felt like I could see them, which I hadn't noticed with any other person at the event. I was so busy that I eventually shook it off and made sure my daughter was having enough to eat and drink and that she was having a good time. And as soon as she got bored, I was going to head out of there and just take her home. She really enjoyed our tour of the new facilities and even got to see the mascot and take a picture with them. We got some free swag, which she really enjoyed as well. It was well worth attending to see the consistent smile across her face.

And my daughter and I were sitting at a two-person high-top table and the dean pulled me aside for a conversation. I got up from the seat, grabbed my daughter's hand and told her that I was going to be right there and that I was just standing up to talk to a few people. My daughter was still directly to my left so I could see her while I was having a conversation and shaking some hands and the dean introduces me to the new head football coach and we make some small talk and share a few laughs. I'm making sure to every few moments look back at my daughter who was playing with a team branded fidget spinner and I entertain the conversation what felt like another 30 to 45

seconds and said, well, I'm going to get back to my daughter and see if she wants to hit up the dessert table with me. And as I go to sit back down, I realize my daughter isn't there. My stomach immediately hits my throat as I dart up on my toes to see if I could see if she walked away or maybe she's hiding under the table. I saw her walking about 50 feet in front of me down the hallway, exiting the main room and heading towards the new facilities or the exit. She's too far away for me to see who she is with, but it's clear that she's with another man. I yell out to her and beeline through the crowded areas, barging through people and yelling my daughter's name. It makes quite a bit of commotion and I can hear people begin to get quiet to see what's going on.

I catch up to her and pick her up and ask her what she's doing and if she's okay, but she's still smiling and as happy as can be, and my attention immediately turns to the well-dressed guy who was seemingly escorting my daughter somewhere. Seeing his face, I realized this was the same guy who had been staring in my direction all night. I ask him what the hell he was doing with my daughter and contemplate knocking his teeth in before he even gets a chance to answer. He gives me some weak answers and to be honest, as shocking as it is, I don't remember exactly what he said. I just remember saying that I'm calling the cops. Apparently this guy was some big donor to the school and was known by most of the people there.

And before the police arrived, I absolutely ripped into the dean asking him what type of people they allow to donate to the school. I don't think I could have done anything more to show my disappointment and outrage. All the while I was trying to do all of this without making my daughter upset. The guy must have weaseled his way out of the room when a lot of the commotion was going on because I didn't see him again after that. I did make sure that I talked to the police and that all his information was provided to them as a lot of people at the event knew who he was. I got out of there shortly after and took my daughter for some ice cream letting her know that nothing was her fault but that in new places she should always stay with me and never walk away, especially with people she doesn't know. I don't know what ever came from the incident, I don't know if any laws were broken and I don't know what excuse he actually gave. I would assume and I hope that this matter would have been taken seriously but once I got back to my home many towns over, I never heard anything back from

the authorities or asked for any additional information or statements. Looking back, I'm just glad my daughter was safe and that I was able to step in before anything terrible happened. It just goes to show you that no matter how diligent you are, you need to be even better to protect your children. Back in September of 2017, my girlfriend and I of three years ended up going through an extremely bitter breakup. And since we were living together, I boxed up my stuff and moved out on October 1st. I stayed in a hotel for almost two weeks, and working by day and then searching for apartments by night. But most of the places I saw advertised online were, in a word, depressing. My initial searches excluded all shared apartments because I did not like the idea of having some random roommate. But as time went by and my hotel bills started creeping towards four figures, I started dropping more and more of my search filters.

I started to seriously consider the possibility of having a roommate, especially if I could meet them prior to moving in, so I could kind of assess if they were going to be a problem or not. Everyone I talked to on the phone seemed either sketchy, unreliable, or a combination of the two. But then, right when I'm about to give up, I met Florian. Florian was seeking a roommate to help pay the rent on his two-bedroom apartment in Bushwick, and when I clicked on the photos of his place, I was shocked. The apartment was really, really nice. Kind of like a rustic warehouse type of vibe, but all the fittings and furniture looked brand new.

But the best thing was what Florian wrote in his little About Me section. He'd written something like, I work exclusively at night, so you have the apartment to yourself in the evenings, but I require complete silence during daylight hours. I just started working from home at the time, and complete silence in the day was exactly what I was looking for. I sent him a message, we spoke on the phone, and then I arranged to stop by the apartment to talk face to face. The place was even nicer in person, and in many ways, Florurian seemed like the ideal roommate.

He was tall, this skinny Estonian guy, very dry and reserved and wore a dark turtleneck and glasses. He said he was a filmmaker and was undertaking a project that exclusively involved night shoots, hence why he'd be out of the apartment by sundown. He was a sober vegetarian, but didn't mind if I kept meat or alcohol in the apartment. In fact, he didn't seem to care what I did, so long as I didn't smoke or make any noise whatsoever during the daytime. After explaining my situation and why silence during the day was ideal, I decided to test out his sense of humor and ask if he was a vampire. He didn't laugh. He didn't even crack a smile. He just replied,

No. As I said, I'm a vegetarian. And thankfully, my attempt at humor didn't spoil my chances, and since I volunteered my share of three months' rent in advance, he offered me the room right there and then. The following Monday, I was moving my stuff into the apartment. I had to wait until after 7pm, but with the help of a very flexible moving company, I had everything moved in by 11, and by the end of the next day, I was unpacked and settled in. Living with Florian was like living with a ghost. He kept his end of the staying silent deal by being a ninja whenever I was asleep,

and since sometimes I'd go to the gym or go grocery shopping around the time he left for work, we'd sometimes go days at a time without seeing each other. I had a quiet place to work during the day, and had someone who wouldn't infringe on his schedule or lifestyle while paying half the rent. It was ideal, really. But sometimes, a flurry in was so quiet it was almost spooky. I'd wake up, head downstairs to make my coffee and walk into a spotless kitchen. But then when I opened up the fridge, there'd be a week's worth of vegetarian meal prep

all boxed up and ready to go, when the previous night there had been nothing but a few beers and my leftover box of halal cart street meats. I know that might sound like a weird thing to complain about, but I'm not even really complaining about it. I guess what I'm trying to say is that was the closest thing to a red flag I ever got with Flurian, and I kind of wish there had been more to go on. And so, for the first seven to eight weeks, I lived in a state of almost complete bliss. I'd somehow managed a clean break from my ex-girlfriend, so although it still bothered me somewhat, it wasn't like she was blowing up my phone and she certainly didn't know where to find me. And then having my brand new uber-quiet, super-gucci

workspace with its minimalist decor and monochrome color scheme made it very easy to pour myself into my projects, find my peace, and just sort of move on. I'd found the perfect temporary living arrangement, or at least I thought I had. One day, I finished work at around five, walked down the block to get some noodles from the good old Cantonese place. Then, when I was walking back to the apartment, I felt my cell phone buzzing in my pocket. It was Florian. And when I answered the call, he asked me in his typically dry tone, for a favor. The location that they had in mind for that night's shoot was, in his words, unavailable.

And to avoid having to reschedule the entire shoot, Florian wanted to know if he could use the apartment. He was very apologetic, promised it'd be a one-time only thing, but told me that I'd have either to vacate my apartment for the evening or remain in my bedroom for the duration of the shoot. I told him it was no problem, especially if it was just a one-time deal, then told him that I'd meet him back at the shoot. I told him it was no problem, especially if it was just a one-time deal, then told him that I'd meet him back at the apartment. About an hour later, Florian arrives with his two friends, one guy and one girl, and they have a bunch of what appear to be equipment bags with them. The girl was small and attractive, and the guy was a little bit

overweight and balding, and despite being American, both shared Florian's sort of art hipster vibe and were just as quiet and reserved as he was. Once they were ready to set up, I grabbed my laptop and stuff and then started walking up to my room. The apartment had a small second floor, and Florian asked if we could talk in private. I invited him into my room, asked him what he wanted to talk about, and for the first time since I'd known him, Florian had some semblance of emotion on his face. Florian looked unusually concerned as he explained how some might consider his project to be, quote, unusual.

It required complete immersion on the part of the cast and crew, which was why under no circumstance was I to leave my bedroom during the shoot. This was around 8pm and I was due to sleep at around 11, so I had no problem retiring to my room to play some Civ or just watch Netflix until I dozed off. Florian said that was good, because the shoot was going on until about 1 o'clock in the morning. Obviously, I wasn't all that excited at the prospect of having my sleep disturbed, but that led Flurry in to ask if I had a good pair of earplugs or some headphones that I could use to drown out the noise. But then that got me thinking, what kind of noise was he talking about? I half-jokingly asked if he was making an adult movie down there,

and in his typically dry fashion, he said no, that was not the kind of movie he was making. And my curiosity was pretty truly piqued at this point, so I asked him what kind of noises I could expect to hear, and in response, Florian told me something I'll never forget. He told me, you might hear some things that might frighten or disturb you, but I can assure you no matter what you hear, it is merely a simulation, and there's no reason for you to be alarmed. I asked Florian if he was making some kind of horror movie, and he said no. It wasn't a horror movie as such, but it did contain elements which some people might associate with horror films. Apparently, this is why it was so

important that I wear headphones or earplugs, otherwise I might not be able to sleep. I told him as long as there wasn't any screaming, we'd be fine and that's when Florian asked again if I wouldn't be happier just vacating the apartment until 1am. Honestly, I was way too tired to head out to some bar and force myself to stay awake until 1 and since I had a good pair of noise cancelling headphones that I could use, I figured I'd just brave the noise and at worse, stay up until the small hours watching movies extra loud until the shoot finally finished. And the plan worked perfectly for a while, and for the first hour or so, I didn't even have to switch on the noise cancelling

setting on my headset. I actually had it switched to ambient aware because by that point I was honestly so curious as to what kind of noises Florian was worried about me hearing. I figured there'd be yelling, probably some screaming after a flurry and soft admission, and I just severely underestimated the kind of screams I'd be hearing, as well as the effect they'd have on me. Now, I'd been playing Civ V for about an hour and change before I started to hear the first noises coming from downstairs. It was the sound of a woman sobbing, like these drawn out uh-huh uh-huh uh-huh sounds. And since Florian had already told me that she was an actress, the sound only made me uncomfortable, not frightened or disturbed. Then I switched my headphones to noise cancelling

and turned up the background music on my game and found the combination instantly drowned out the sobbing noises. I think that lasted for maybe 20-30 minutes until eventually I started to hear another kind of sound, one so loud it started to cut through the noise cancelling feature on my headphones. I reached up to the speaker covering my right ear, lifted it up, and then instantaneously recoiled when I heard the sound that I'd been shielded from. The girl downstairs, actress or not, was letting out the single most blood-curdling scream I've ever heard. I could hear the exact moment she ran out of breath as the scream kind of weakened and died, and then she started up again right after with yet another ear-splitting screech. She did this over and over, and at one point I clearly heard someone yelling louder at her,

but I couldn't tell if it was Florian or his friend. I knew it wasn't for real, I knew it was just an act, but there was something about that lady's scream that set my teeth on edge. I could only sit there listening to it for a minute or two before I secured my headphones over my ears and just pumped up the volume on my laptop even further and tried my best to forget it was even happening. I tried my best to just focus on playing this game, but I could still hear those nails on a chalkboard style screams. And they might have been very faint, but I could still hear them if I focused my attention on them over the music coming from my headphones. The only way to completely drown them out by then was to boost up my volume in my headphones to like 100,

but that got so loud that it started to actually hurt my ears, so it wasn't sustainable for more than a few minutes before I had to lower the volume again. Thankfully, the screams had petered out altogether by the time it came to lowering my headphone volume, and I got to spend the next few minutes in relative peace before I suddenly started to hear the sound of frantic begging creeping through the music in my ears. Once again, I lifted my headphones, and once again,

I heard some skin-crawlingly convincing acting from the lady downstairs. Only this time, she wasn't screaming. She was begging. Begging through tears and shallow breaths. She kept saying, no, please no, please God, no, and other variations on that theme and she did it non-stop for about 14 straight minutes. I guess talking loudly was easier on her vocal chords than balls to the wall screaming, but that allowed her to do it unceasingly for way longer than she screamed for. Again, I was thankful that I was able to just drown it out without deafening myself with the music from the game that I was playing, but somehow, all the begging got to me even worse than the screams did. And I swear to God, even with Florian's warning that the whole thing was

just acting, every fiber of my being wanted to make her stop. I guess it bothered me in this sort of deep, lizard brain kind of way. Something passed down from our ancestors, that means, when you hear someone begging for their life or screaming in agony, it's impossible to just sit there and ignore it. And that's why, even when I couldn't hear the girl begging and sobbing anymore, I could still sort of feel it, you know? The screams came and went for another few hours, then around 10.30, I decided to take a shower and to try and get some sleep.

Both upstairs bedrooms were fitted with attached bathrooms, another perk of living there, so I got to drown out the noises with a podcast and running water while I got clean. But then, once I got out of the shower, there was a brief window where I had to get my hair dry before putting my headphones back on, and in that time, I heard the most disturbing thing yet. I was still listening to my podcast, and I'd picked probably the loudest person possible to listen to, shout out to Tim Dillon, but as I was drying my hair, I started to hear what sounded like all three people chanting downstairs. I was kind of curious as to what they were chanting,

so I walked over to my phone and lowered the volume on my podcast and heard, Hail Satan, Hail Satan, Hail Satan, getting louder and louder. Well, they sure must have been talented actors because they were giving in everything they had, wailing those two words again and again like they were in total ecstasy. I ended up lying on my bed, headphones on, blasting myself with some YouTube playlist called Relaxing Ambient Music that ended up being neither relaxing nor ambient. And when 1am rolled around and everything finally went quiet, I literally whispered thank you Jesus out loud to myself before finally drifting off. In the next morning, I felt kind of groggy after getting less than six hours sleep, but

as my brain booted up in the shower, I remembered all the screaming and chanting from the night before. I couldn't really be mad at Florian because he'd warned me a whole two times to vacate the apartment, and besides, there were much worse things than him owing me a whole two times to vacate the apartment and besides, there were much worse things than him owing me a favor. As I mentioned earlier, Florian and I rarely bumped into each other so it was days before I got a chance to ask him about the screaming and when I did, he gave me about as dry an answer as you can imagine. He apologized profusely for the disturbance, both literally and figuratively, but was also quick to remind me of the warning I'd been given.

He said the screams and the chanting for what he called ADR, or automated dialogue replacement, which is basically when you dub audio over a movie to make it sound better. No one was being threatened, imitated, or hurt in any way, and the lady in question was just a very talented actress. If the sounds she made disturbed me, then it simply meant that she'd put in a good performance and nothing more. This was obviously quite reassuring, I guess, but my main objective was to get a second assurance that it wouldn't happen again, and if it absolutely had to, then to give me advanced warnings so I could book a hotel or something. And he agreed, and I thanked him, and that was that. Now not even two weeks went by before Florian asked me for a second favor.

I had a feeling it'd be related to using the apartment for his work, and lo and behold, I was right. He opened his pitch by telling me that he was more than happy to pay for a night in a hotel, but that after a studio had pulled out on him, he'd been left with nowhere to shoot. I told him it wasn't necessary for him to pay for a room, that I could maybe find a place to stay and even if I didn't, I was perfectly happy to pay for my own hotel room. Florian then gave me the date of his shoot, which was a couple of days away on a Friday evening. I happened to have been dating at the time, and it was just around the stage where it'd be acceptable for me to

propose a kind of sleepover, if you will. And I proposed as such, and she accepted, so I had that Friday evening covered. I had no reason whatsoever to return to my apartment, until of course I realized that I whatsoever to return to my apartment until of course I realized that I'd forgotten part of my laptop charger, the plug part that connects to the little box thing, and there'd be no starve together land party unless I returned to the apartment to grab it. I briefly considered proposing a movie date instead, but the girl

I was dating had seemed super excited to play, so I thought, screw it, and then caught the train back. I figured it'd be an hour at most, and that once I got back, we could get down to our land date. Plus, I called Florian in advance and gave him prior notice that I needed to stop the shooting for all of 30 seconds maximum, then be off the hook for any interruptions. I texted Florian as I was walking to the subway then when he didn't reply I gave him a call once I was back in Bushwick. He didn't pick up on the first call so I tried again only for that one to ring out too and I figured that he was busy and his phone was set to do not disturb or whatever so I texted him a second time saying that I was minutes away from the apartment and would only be interrupting him for like a minute max. Again, I got no reply and I was kind of worried that my intrusion might

cause some kind of issue between me and him. And at the same time, I was thinking, I pay my rent, I'm a good roommate, I can be in and out in 30 seconds with a few apologies and then if Florian's mad, well, I can just deal with that issue as and when it comes. A few seconds later, I'm at my apartment building, walking to the elevator, then a minute more, I was at my door. Since I don't want to disturb too much, I start knocking on the door. I had my key ready, but just like with the texts and calls, I wanted to give Florian as much advanced notice as possible. I knocked once, got no answer I wanted to give Florian as much advance notice as possible. I knocked once, got no answer, then tried calling Florian one last time. He sent that one straight to voicemail, so I knew that he knew that I was trying to get in touch with him. And that's when

I started to get a little annoyed. At least work with me, you know, don't just ignore my calls. I get that he was busy, but he literally could have just grabbed my laptop cable, opened up the door and given it to me and hey presto, he's back to his shoot. But he didn't. He actively ignored me. So after a minute of waiting for a call or text, I took up my key and opened up my apartment's front door. The first thing I noticed upon closing the door behind me was that someone had taped a bunch of clear plastic sheeting all over the place. They were on all the floors, on the walls, and there were strips hanging between open doorways like they were supposed to be flimsy replacements. And I'm thinking, what the hell?

And then I started calling out for Florian. The second I called out, I started hearing heavy footsteps coming towards the apartment's entrance hallway. They were walking with urgency, so right away I'm thinking, uh-oh, and I'm halfway to unleashing a string of apologies when two masked men stepped into view. They looked like nightclub security or something. Black suits, black shoes, black shirts, and black ties, all very

well fitted. And the only difference was, these guys had these matte black masks on, real thick plastic by the looks of things, and the moment they saw me, they started power walking in my direction. And I'm like, wait, who the hell are you guys? But they didn't say anything. They lunged towards me, grip me up, and then the next thing I know, they're slamming me down onto the floor so hard it knocked the wind out of me. I'm lying there for a moment trying to catch my breath, then when the fight comes back to me, I'm trying my best to buck them off, and I'm failing miserably. The whole time I'm yelling at the two guys, who the F are you doing, get the hell off me, but again, they just completely ignore me and start yelling intruder.

I'm like, I'm not an intruder, I live here. And right then, I hear the crackle, crackle of a stun gun before I feel this intense pain shooting up my leg and suddenly I can't move or talk anymore. I tried to carry on fighting when I realized that I could move again, but I was so frazzled from the stun gun that I felt like it had drained my battery or something. There was nothing left of my tank and all I could do was just lie there while those two heavies had me pinned and wait until I had another opportunity to escape. I was still yelling for them to get off of me when someone down in the apartment's open sitting area, who I couldn't see, asked in a very authoritative voice tone what was going on. I immediately went quiet. Then one of

the two masked men repeated the same word, intruder. And the person who spoke, whose voice I didn't recognize, then told them, quote, remove me. The two heavies immediately dragged me into the hallway outside the apartment, dumped me on the ground, then went back inside and closed the door behind them. I was like, what the hell just happened? And then after I picked myself up, my first instinct was to call the cops. Something was going on in my apartment, and whatever it was, it didn't seem like any kind of movie set or whatever. And the first thought was that it was some kind of home invasion. But then, what was with all the clear plastic sheeting? They reminded me of something from forensic files or hostile or the kind the

Mexican cartels use in those kill houses so the walls and floors aren't soaked with blood. That's what freaked me out so much that when I called the cops, I wasn't like, I'm pissed and those guys are going to pay. It was more like something terrible is happening up there in my apartment and it's down to me to stop it. Yeah, I was angry at those two masked men for body slamming me and tasing me, but it wasn't like they were two crackheads who broke my nose after stealing my laptop, another true story. The way those guys were dressed, the masks, all the plastic sheeting, they were security for something that was going on in there, something no one was allowed

to see. And in my humble opinion, that can't have been anything good and legal. In fact, screw legal. I've had neighbors growing pot back before it was legalized and all the power to them is not hurting anybody. But whatever I just walked into, it sure as hell looked like someone was either getting or was about to get hurt, and really badly too. The cops took a whole 20 minutes to get to me, and that's with the dispatcher telling me that mine was a priority call. They followed me up to my apartment, opened the door for them, and I was right in the middle of telling them about all the plastic sheeting when we saw it was all gone. Both cops gave me a disappointed look as if to say, we didn't have you down for a schizophrenic, and then right as I'm explaining how it was there not

even 20 minutes ago, Florian appears with an explanation. He'd thrown a party, a rather exclusive one, and the two security guards his guests had employed had just been a little overzealous when it came to unexpected guests. According to Florian, there was never any plastic sheeting or black masks, and he wasn't sure what it was talking about in that respect. But what he was sure of was that he and his guests were profusely sorry for the confusion and that they wished to extend their sympathies for the inconvenience. I was angry.

Like inconvenience? I was just assaulted. But then I noticed something else. Flurian was showing more emotion and sincerity with the cops than he'd ever shown me. His natural state was dry and sarcastic, but with those two NYPD officers, he was like the most articulate and passionate person ever. And that's when it hit me. He wasn't being sincere. He was acting. The cops wanted to know who the two security guys were and the ones who ended up assaulting me,

but Florian claimed that they were provided by an anonymous guest and that he had no idea who they were or where they'd been hired from. The only two people Florian knew, according to him anyways, were his male and female friend, both of whom would be happy to answer any question the cops had. When asked why all the guests had scattered before they arrived, Florian told the two officers that they were incredibly embarrassed at the confusion. He also seemed like he was being totally honest when he said that, with his guests knowing their security would be in trouble with the cops, and they walked out of the apartment building's back door to where their cars were waiting. I could see through Florian's bullcrap.

And somehow, by the time the two officers were leaving, they seemed convinced that Florian was as apologetic as he said he was, and that it was all just some big misunderstanding. After the cops left and I asked Florian what had been going on the previous night, he changed his tone completely. He said I had no right to know what had been going on, and that I shouldn't have come back to the apartment when I'd told him I'd stay away all night. He also added,

in a way I found incredibly chilling, that I should consider myself lucky that nothing worse happened to me. And I couldn't believe the sudden switch up. He put on such a good act for the cops that when he turned, it was like seeing him transform or shape shift or something like that. He told me he wanted me to move out and I told him I was planning on it and then I spent the next few days searching for other places to live before finally finding one that suited my budget. I was lucky though.

I found somewhere decent pretty quick and to be frank, I was close to living in my car because I did not feel safe around Florian anymore. And to this day, I don't know what he and his friends were doing up there, and actually, I kind of don't want to know either. And that wasn't always the case. I used to spend many an hour trying to figure out what he was really doing, because whatever it was, I didn't think it was anything even remotely innocent. I kept trying to get in touch with the other two cops I'd dealt with to see if there had been any updates, but it quickly became clear that they weren't remotely interested at all and that they figured that I was some gate crasher who'd probably got what

was coming to him. At least, that was the vibe I got. Because after all, this is New York City. A place where there's a major crime every four minutes. But if the walls of that apartment could talk, I bet they'd tell some truly terrifying tales and these days, I'm happy not hearing a single goddamn one of them. There really isn't an atmosphere like a college sports game. The student section alone usually makes the ticket worth the price of admission. Even people who don't like sports know how contagious it can be to be a part of that atmosphere. Unfortunately, there's always a downside.

Some people can't control their emotions and let the game become more important than it needs to be. And let me tell you about something that happened to me a few years ago, and I'm only realizing recently just how dangerous it was. And I guess all things considered, I'm lucky to be alive. It was a college basketball game, and like always, the home crowd was amazing. It was loud in the arena before the game even started, and it was impossible not to get swept up in the emotion of the crowd. I had decent seats for this game and the section I was sitting in was filled with mostly fans of the home team. Before the game started, I struck up sort of a casual conversation with the guy in front of me.

He seemed like a good dude from just our short conversation. It turned out he was one of the few guys in the section who was cheering for the other team, and we laughed about it and had some friendly debates before the tip-off of the game. And once the game started, we gave each other a sort of fist bump and tuned in. The game was late into the season, so the outcome kind of had a lot of weight on the remainder of the season. It didn't take long for the crowd to start getting borderline hostile to the other team and the referees. I admit, I was caught in the heat of the moment and I started to chant along with the crowd. I swear, sports crowds are sometimes like a mob mentality. You just want to jump right in with your pitchfork. And shortly before halftime, I could tell my new buddy from earlier was starting to get kind of irate. He was getting loud and throwing his hands up, complaining about every call that didn't favor his team.

I could feel the legitimate anger in his voice. And there was a specific call right before halftime started that caused the whole arena to erupt with cheer, and as a result, my new buddy threw his hat on the ground. I know what I did next was wrong, but like I said, I was caught in the heat of the moment, and I put my arm on his shoulder and said something like, Sorry dude, maybe we'll get better calls in the second half. I definitely said it with sort of an arrogant attitude. He violently shifted his entire body to get my arm off his shoulder,

and he screamed, shut up, get your hands off of me. I was more surprised than anything else, but just sort of laughed it off and headed to the concourse to grab another drink. I got my drink quickly, and on my way back to my seat, I ran into a couple of my old friends. I stopped for a little while and caught up with my friend before the beginning of the second half. While I was standing in the concourse, my new buddy bumped into me aggressively and said in a clearly ironic voice, oh, I'm sorry about that, buddy. Maybe next time I'll see where I'm walking. I was annoyed, but just ignored him. I could smell the alcohol in his breath and I just assumed he was drunk. My friends laughed and were confused by the weird interaction, but I just shrugged it off and told my friends it was just some salty drunk guy. And the rest of the game went much like the first half.

My new friend would get angry and say some passive aggressive comment, and the only difference from before is that this time, I was just completely ignoring him. I could tell that this guy wasn't right, and I didn't want to enrage him or make him angrier than he already was. After the game, I was walking to my car, and you'll never guess who came up behind me and continued to try and verbally spar with me. That's right, the guy from earlier. And I ignored him all the way to my truck, which wasn't easy. Imagine a big burly guy yelling at you at the top of his lungs in a packed parking lot. And I bet you would struggle to ignore him as well. And when I got to my truck, I finally turned

around and told the guy to get away from me. He started to laugh and just stood there as I got into my truck and started to drive away. I thought this annoying ordeal was over when I finally got home that night and it took me 40 minutes to get out of the parking lot traffic. And so between the drunk fan and the traffic, I was all done and just wanted to just unwind on the couch and watch a movie. Before I knew it, I had watched two of the Batman movies and realized that it was after two in the morning. I wasn't tired for some reason so I decided that I was going to put on the third film

in the trilogy. Only a few minutes into the movie, I saw these bright headlights shine in through my window several times. I lived on a pretty quiet street. It was rare to see headlights at even seven at night, and it was extremely rare to see them at 2 in the morning, but not impossible. But then I saw them again a few minutes later, and then a few minutes after that, and something felt wrong. After the third time, I decided to glance out of the window, and I couldn't believe what I was looking at. Someone was out there,

looking into the windows of my truck which was parked across the street from my house. None of the houses on the street had a driveway so the residents just parked in the road. I could see the person trying to open my truck door. Thank God it was locked. And once he gave up on the truck door, I saw him looking around

and that's when I noticed his face. It was that dude from the basketball game. And I was even in more shock now. And I grabbed my phone and called 911 and while I was on the phone, I saw the man making his way to the house directly across the street from my own. The house where my truck was parked in front of. It was clear that the man was trying to break into the house where my truck was parked in front of. It was clear that the man was trying to break into the house. He must have thought that the house across the street was my own, and that's what I told the dispatch woman, and I could see from my living room window that he was ramming

his shoulder into the door trying to get it open. What I find most disturbing now, and didn't realize was that big of a deal back then, was that he clearly had some kind of weapon in the back of his waistband, something I'm sure in his wacky state of mind he wanted to use on me. Thankfully the police showed up quickly and thankfully they arrested him before he successfully broke into the house of my neighbor across the street. When the cops were taking him away, it was clear that this man was belligerently drunk, and honestly, in my opinion, he may have been under the influence of something else as well. When he finally sobered up, this guy had no memory of the game or the horrible events that followed.

I have no idea what horrors this man had intended for me, and even more terrifying is that this man didn't even know what horrors he had planned, and it's scary to ponder what his intentions were in his messed up state. I also have no idea how he found my house. I guess the true horror here is just how a seemingly normal and nice individual can turn into a literal demon. I played volleyball all the way through middle and high school and didn't want to give it up just because high school was over. Then I ended up joining an adult league after high school and played whenever I could. When I was 21 years old, I blew out my knee and I was more devastated by the fact that I couldn't play volleyball for a whole year. By the time I was 22,

I realized that I had lost a lot of burst from my knee injury, and I decided to try one of those over 21-year-old adult leagues. I was never a fan of them because they seemed like it was more about drinking, but I decided that I was ready to start a new chapter of my life. I can honestly say that I loved it. It was a weird adjustment at first, but before long, I was all about it. I made so many friends, and that became my life for the next 10 years. Last year was the last time I played, and I think that I need to take this year off. And this is the first year I'm not playing since I started the 21 and over league. And let me tell you about what happened last year, and you can tell me if you think I'm overreacting. It was the first or second game of the season and we

played a team of three girls and a guy. It was a co-ed league. The game started like most games. It was fun and competitive and had just the right amount of trash talk to keep those things interesting. At one point during the game, my teammates set the ball for me and I attempted to spike it over the net. I was met in the air by the man on the other team who lightly tapped it back over onto my side. The play caught me off guard and we lost the point. Once it was dead ball, the man came over to me and told me that it was a great attempt and better luck next time. He was handsome and he flashed his pearly white teeth at me. I laughed and we joked about it for a few minutes and I felt like we were kind of vibing but

I think he was just a nice guy and I was overthinking things. And we finally went our separate ways after the game and he asked if he could buy me a drink but I declined. He then told me and my friends that we could join his team in the bar to hang out again, but again, we declined. Not because we were sketched out or anything, this all felt very normal and nice, we were just covered in sand and wanted to be done for the night. My friends and I talked in the parking lot for a few minutes and eventually we all said our goodbyes. I was standing outside my trunk, putting my bag away and getting ready to leave when I heard someone clear their throat loudly behind me, like the type of noise you make when you want to get someone's attention. I turned around and standing behind me was a small blonde woman. I recognized her right away.

It was one of the players from the team we just played. She wasn't saying anything at first and she was just kind of looking at me and I asked if I could help her with something and she just continued to stare at me. I ended up just saying whatever and got into my car and drove off. That was weird. I looked into the mirror once and the woman still seemed to be just creepily staring at me. It wasn't objectively scary or anything but it was very creepy. And that night I got a bunch of phone calls from a restricted number. I answered a few times, but it ended up just being breathing.

And I also got some DMs on Facebook from a clearly made-up profile that started calling me some pretty offensive things. I was annoyed, but just ignored my phone for the rest of the evening. And this went on for a few days, but then stopped completely on the fourth day. I figured whoever had a problem with me was over it by now. The next week came and so did our volleyball game and after the game, we decided to hang out for a little while before calling it a night. Inside the bar, I saw the handsome man from the previous week. He said hi to me and I simply waved back and that's when I noticed the blonde woman standing

behind him. And I started to put together some pieces. He's probably dating that woman and she's jealous. Well, I didn't want to be some homewrecker, so after my little wave, I just pretended like I didn't see him. And the rest of the night, I could feel her staring daggers at me from across the room. It was uncomfortable, and I just wanted to leave, and so eventually I did. Those restricted calls came back that evening, but I just turned off my phone. And nothing happened all week until it was time for volleyball once again. The night was like all the others, except I did feel a little anxious. I didn't want to see that handsome guy again and then just be weirdly stalked by this strange blonde woman.

And I was doing my best to focus on just the game, which was going good for the moment. And at some point during the game, I heard someone yell behind me, Watch out! And I turned around and saw a volleyball fly by my head. And before I could see what was happening, that small blonde woman ran from the side with a bottle and smashed me over the head, screaming at the top of her lungs. I felt the bottle crack my head,

and I vaguely remember trying to get myself into sort of a fetal position so this woman couldn't cut me or anything with that now broken bottle. To me, this all felt like slow motion, but it was only about 10 seconds. Two of my teammates grabbed this woman and held her down as she tried to whack me again with this broken bottle, which would have done some major damage. She wasn't saying words either, just screaming like a banshee. The cops arrived after they subdued her and arrested the woman. I was being looked at by the EMT, probably going to need stitches when that man came over and apologized for her behavior. And he went on to tell me that she was not his girlfriend and never had been. She was a friend of one of the girls on his team and she apparently was obsessed with him.

He had to tell her several times that they weren't together because she kept telling people that they actually were dating. And she even made a joint Facebook account for the both of them, even though there weren't any pictures of them. I'm not sure why they kept this woman on their team, but it was clear to me that her marbles were messed up from the very beginning. And I'm lucky I left that altercation with just a minor laceration, because it could have been much worse. Anyway, I'm done with volleyball for now. I don't want to show up to that bar one day and take a shot to the head from a bottle. And I hope that woman found the help that she needs,

because you can tell by just looking into her eyes, she was not well. When I was 18 years old, I went on my first major trip alone without my family. While I wasn't completely alone, I was with my friends Mike and Stan. It was 2013 and we made the voyage to a small town on the outskirts of New Jersey for WrestleMania. And let me first say that the three of us are huge wrestling nerds and still text about it to this day even though we all live in different states. Back in 2013, this was going to be the greatest weekend of our lives. For those that don't know, WrestleMania is kind of like the Super Bowl for wrestling fans, and this event was going to be at MetLife Stadium, which is where the New York Giants and Jets usually play. The main show

was on Sunday, but the entire weekend was filled with special events. The hotel that we were staying at offered a free shuttle service anywhere within 10 miles, which was pretty amazing, and we planned on taking the shuttle on Saturday into town to do some of the activities. Stan got the address of one of the venues, and we gave it to the man who provided the shuttle service. There was a clear language barrier, but after a little bit of back and forth, we figured out where we needed to go. The man dropped us off, and we got out of the shuttle like three excited idiots. We didn't even look where this man dropped us off. Once all three of us were out of the shuttle, we realized that we were clearly not

in the correct location. We were in a sort of run-down and sketchy part of town, it seemed like. Everything looked abandoned, almost condemned. Stan called the hotel and told them that we needed a pickup, but the lady on the phone told him that it was going to be a little while because the shuttle service was already on another call. We begged her and told her that he literally just left less than a minute ago, but she didn't seem to care. And us being younger, we didn't really fight it and just sort of accepted that we were basically stranded in this sort of almost abandoned part of town. We wanted to get mad at Stan for giving the driver the wrong address, but we honestly didn't know if it was our fault or his. And we put the address into the GPS of where we needed to go, and it was

about a 10-minute drive from our current location, so we didn't want to walk it. And this was also before Uber was a very big thing, so we couldn't just easily Uber ourselves. And being young and naive teenagers, we decided to walk around this sort of beat up area. It was scary and unsettling just being in this area, and we saw people living on the street who were pretty messed up on something. It was scary, but truthfully, it was just kind of sad. And while we were blissfully walking along, Mike noticed that someone had been kind of following us for a few minutes. He told us that classic line of don't look now but it looks like someone's kind of tailing us here. Stan didn't care but me and

Mike started to feel a little uneasy. We started to move a little faster and noticed the person following us was matching our speed though and it was obvious now that whoever this person was, they were on our tail. It wasn't long until we broke out into a straight up sprint and to none of our surprise, this person actually begun to run after us. Mike and Stan were both great athletes and were able to create some distance from the guy, and I on the other hand am a horrible athlete and the man was closing in on me pretty fast. I didn't know what to do so I decided to stop and step up to the man and that was a horrible mistake. This guy didn't stop when I did and he just barreled into me, knocking me to the ground. Now while I was down with no warning or threat, he buried an elbow into my eye with a lot of force.

He hit me so hard that everything just went black for just a second, and while I was down the man grabbed my wallet and ran back from the way he came. Mike and Stan ran back and helped me up. They called the cops who showed up but didn't do anything. They told me that this area is very bad and people get mugged all the time. The likelihood of me getting my wallet back is slim to none. I was defeated and heartbroken and just wanted to get back to the hotel. Stan and Mike were shaken up as well and they decided that we'll just hang out at the hotel and watch basketball or something and get ourselves

excited about the big show on Sunday. They told me not to worry about the wallet until after the show and then they would help me replace my ID and figure everything out. The cop I reported the mugging to was at least kind enough to drive us back to the hotel. I really did try and forget about that mugging but I just couldn't get the guy's face out of my mind. Not to mention my face felt like it was smashed with a shovel. That night, all three of us were woken up by the sound of a very loud bang. As I jumped out of bed, I saw the single worst thing I could ever imagine. It was someone trying to open our hotel room. They had the door ajar, but thankfully, I locked the latch so this intruder couldn't get inside completely. I ran to the door in an attempt to slam it shut and in the brief moment before shutting the door,

I saw someone on the other side. I screamed, telling Mike to call the police. Stan tried to be some hero and unlock the door to chase after this intruder, but by the time Stan got to the hallway, all he saw was the door to the stairs slamming shut. While we waited for the cops, we were trying to figure out what had just happened and then it dawned on me. Someone might have stole my wallet and inside the wallet maybe there was a room key which not only had the name of the hotel but also a little piece of paper with the room number on it. I don't know. The cops came and we all just reported

the incident to the hotel which was able to move me and my friends to another part of the hotel and I didn't sleep the rest of the night. I remember looking out the window at one point in the middle of the night and I saw a man walking around the parking lot. I called the hotel lobby because being young and stupid I was scared to call the police a third time. And by the time I got off the phone, this guy was gone and I never saw him again. We did get to the show on Sunday, but I couldn't enjoy it. Every person I saw with a dark coat made me freeze up. And when we got home on Monday, Stan and Mike helped me to pay for a new ID and even lent me some money until I got back on my feet.

Somewhere out there in the world, some guy has my wallet and even thinking about it now makes me cringe. I'm just happy that I remembered to latch the hotel room door that night. Maybe it wasn't related, maybe it was someone completely different. In which case, that might have been the worst night of my entire life. The story I'm sharing with you today took place around 10 years ago. I've always been a huge sports fan, from watching my favorite teams or playing sports throughout high school and into college. As a summer job during college, I became an umpire for a softball rec league. Baseball was always my best sport, so I figured my game knowledge would transfer easily to umpiring. From what I remember, I think I had to take a brief course to be qualified to ump, but there were no other qualifications other than experience within the sport and

maybe a high school diploma or something. The league was desperate for help, so I was brought on right away. And this story takes place literally while I was umping my first game. Everything seemed to be going well. I shook off the first game jitters and was settling in. The game itself was back and forth and we hadn't gotten any arguments or comments from players or fans. Fast forward to the final out of the game and there is a close play on a catch in the short outfield and I immediately called out. Now from my angle, it looked like the ball was trapped in the glove and caught for an out. I was pretty sure that I got a great look at it which is why I made the call.

And at the same time, the head umpire called safe and waved his arms saying that there was no catch. And both teams are yelling and looking for clarification, so the head umpire comes up to me to discuss it. Again, this is the last out of the game and the head umpire says that he had the best angle and that we're going to have to stick with his call. Being my first game, who was I to argue? So I just let him make the final call. He then told me that I should get out of there quickly because people were probably going to be upset and that he would try to take some of the heat off if needed. We clarified the call and stuck with safe which allows a winning run to score and the team that had the call

reversed was beside themselves. They were screaming, jumping up and down and rushing onto the field. I immediately head to my car and get out of there as fast as I possibly can. I don't really know what happened but remember some of the things being shouted at me as I made my way to my car. Now I'm a very anxious person already in my daily life, it's something I've tried to deal with and also been medicated for. I couldn't stop dwelling on the game and how upset the people were and as hard as I tried, I wasn't able to shake it out of my mind. It was consuming my every thought and I couldn't focus on anything else. I knew the best things were allowing time to pass and distracting my brain with something else. I decided to try and run some

errands to preoccupy my mind and distract myself. I grabbed some groceries and snacks at my first stop and as I got back to my car, I could barely get into my driver's side door. The truck parked next to me was so close that there was barely any room for me to get in. It was a black truck with some rust and it had one of those stickers of the cartoon character peeing on a sports team logo. The dashboard was also a mess and I mumbled something under my breath as I tried to get into the car since I was already in a bad mood. Next stop, Barnes and Noble to grab a few books since it was close to the grocery store. Looking around the store did help temporarily get my mind off of things and I grabbed a few books that were on sale that I figured I could start later that night.

For some reason though, I couldn't shake the feeling of being watched as I was reading the synopsis and walking through the aisles. I had this uneasy, tense feeling but agreed that it was my anxiety taking over and manifesting itself into different forms. I walked back to my car, got in, and as I got ready to leave, I saw that same black truck was parked across from me in the parking lot. Weird, I thought, but no one was in the car, so I chalked it up to just simple coincidence. I grabbed some food, just wanting to get home and curl up on the couch and watch a movie. I got home, closed the blinds, put my phone on the other side of the couch and turned on the movie

Clue and just started eating. About 15 minutes into the movie, I heard a loud noise. It sounded like a car door, but the sound was so loud that it sounded like the door fell off the damn car. Five minutes later, I heard the same noise. Annoyoyed I got up to look out of the blinds and there was a truck parked directly across the street on the curb in front of my driveway. I rolled my eyes thinking like, well I guess I'm not going back out tonight so I don't have to worry about backing out of the driveway. I headed into the kitchen to get more food and felt like I heard it might be raining outside. I didn't think there was supposed to be any rain, I thought that that was kind of weird and then the rain turned into hail and it sounded like it was smacking

off my roof. I looked out the back sliding glass door and the motion light turns on and I see no rain and the noise also stops. I headed to the front door, opened it, and saw that a person was standing at the truck aiming something at my house. I immediately slammed the door shut and ducked for cover. I called the police and let them know what was going on. They stayed on the phone with me for a while, but it seemed like it was silent outside. Then I heard someone yelling outside my house, but I couldn't make out what was going on. They stayed on the phone with me for a while but it seemed like it was silent outside. Then I heard someone yelling outside my house but I couldn't make out what was being said. I screamed out that the cops were on the way and then heard the man say something about being lucky. I look out the window and the truck door slams and starts to peel off. I immediately turned my cell phone to video and actually was able to grab an image

of this guy's license plate. I tripped over myself trying to run to the door after the car had started and began moving. I zoom in as much as I can on the back of the truck as it screeches down the street and I run back inside the house waiting for the cops to arrive and try to re-watch this video to see if I can actually get the plate. As I'm playing back the video, I notice the same sticker that I saw on the black truck from earlier that day, and my heart felt like it skipped or momentarily stopped. I don't know if I was having palpitations or a shot of adrenaline in my system. It all clicked that it was someone following me around from the game earlier. Some deranged lunatics took adult sports way too seriously. I couldn't believe that's why

they were following me and why they were screaming and shooting outside of my house. I was able to figure out the license plate or at least what I thought was an accurate license plate in the video. The police arrived shortly after and I filled them in on all that was transpiring and what I thought happened and gave them a vehicle description and also a copy of the video. They had to calm me down a few times as my anxiety was causing me to stutter and shake. They were extremely nice and seemed like they took that threat seriously. The cops did an inventory of the damage to the house and came back to me and said that thankfully it looked like it was only paintballs and maybe a pellet or a BB gun as well. There was paint but it also looked like some small indentations on the siding that would

have been made by a BB gun or something similar to it. It made me feel better, a little bit, that someone wasn't shooting an actual gun at my house, but it still took me a very long time to get over the incident. I never heard anything back from the police, which I thought was surprising, but I'm honestly glad that I never have to deal with the person or that interaction ever again. After it happened, I just wanted to forget and not have to deal with that person or an escalation of the incident ever again, and I never officiated any other game. These days I just stick to pick up baseball or open gym nights with my friends. I'd be interested if anyone else has had any crazy experiences with a fan or player from an adult league. Feel free to reply to this story below and let me know

what happened to you. To be continued... 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.