The Lets Read Podcast - 317: MY FRIEND BECAME POSSESSED IN THE WOODS | 16 TERRIFYING True Scary Stories / Rain Ambience | EP 302

Episode Date: October 21, 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 & terrifying tales off of reddit HAVE A STORY TO SUBMIT? [e-mail] FOLLOW ME ON - ►YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/letsreadofficial ► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/letsread.official/ ♫ Music & Cover art: INEKT https://www.youtube.com/@inekt Today's episode is sponsored by: - Mood - Betterhelp

I don't know. We're going to be able to be. We're going to be. We're going to be. on a camping trip to Harriman State Park. It was me, Simon, and Eddie, just the three of us looking to get away from the city for a weekend. We planned it for weeks, packed our gear, and drove up from Brooklyn on a Friday afternoon. And the park was quiet when we got there and we set up camp near one of the smaller lakes, a spot that we'd picked off of a map because

it was far from the main trails. By the time we had the tent set up and a fire going, it was already getting dark, but the first night was awesome. We had hot dogs, a few beers, and the first serious catch-up in months, and the next day we decided to hit the trails. It was late morning, and we didn't have any kind of plan. We just followed a trail until it kind of petered out and then kept going anyway. My buddy Eddie had his phone out, snapping pictures of mushrooms and random rocks, while Simon kept talking about finding a good spot for lunch. I was just along for the walk, half listening to them argue about whether there were Bigfoot's in New York. And after a couple of hours, the trees started thinning out and we came up on a small lake that we hadn't seen on the map.

It was small, less than 100 yards across, and right there near the shore was this lone wooden shack. It wasn't much to look at. The wood was this sort of weathered, grayish-brown type and splintered in various places like it had been sitting there for decades at this point. The roof kind of sagged a little, and there was no glass in the single window, just a square hole with a torn scrap of curtain hanging inside. The door was left ajar, not locked, just creaking on its hinges when the wind pushed against it. Simon said it looked abandoned, and Eddie agreed. But I wasn't so sure.

Something about it felt off, but we were curious, so we went closer. Inside, it was pretty dim. The light from the window barely reached. the corners in the air just smelled musty, like old wet dirt and old wood. There wasn't much in there, a wooden table in the middle, a couple of broken chairs tipped over in the corner and some rusty nails sticking out of the walls, and the table caught my eye first. It was rough, splintered, and covered in some dark stains, these sort of big, uneven patches that looked almost black in the shadows, and I ran my fingers over one, but I couldn't tell what it was. Eddie said

it was probably bloodstains, Simon agreed, pointing at the walls. They were lined with hooks, maybe a dozen of them, screwed into the boards at different heights. Some were bent, others rusted, but they were empty. No tools, no ropes, nothing hanging there now, and it made sense to think a hunter had used this place, maybe to skin deer or whatever else he'd shot. And that's what we told ourselves anyway. It was creepy, but I suppose not unexplainable. And we continued poking around for a few minutes. Simon kicked at the curtains and Eddie took a picture of the table saying he'd show it to his brother who hunted upstate, and I just stood by the door, pretty much ready to leave. To me, that shack did not feel right, and then when we stepped

outside, I was glad to be breathing lake air again. We started walking back toward the trail, figuring that we'd head to camp and eat, and it was around about then that Simon tripped. He was a few steps ahead of me near the side of the shack when his foot caught on something. He stumbled, his arms went flailing, but didn't fall. Eddie and I caught up, and there it was, something metal sticking out of the dirt, just an inch or two above the ground. It was dull, rusted in certain spots, and half covered in soil. And at first I thought it was a knife or maybe a hatchet, something a hunter might have dropped and forgotten. Simon crouched down and brushed some dirt off of it, but it didn't budge. He said that it was stuck. Eddie handed me his water bottle and told us to

dig it up. I grabbed a stick and started scraping at the dirt, and Simon used his hands, pulling up clumps of earth and just tossing it aside. And the more we dug, the bigger things got. It wasn't a tool. That much was there. There was a curved edge, and then another, and soon we could see it was hollow inside. And after ten minutes, we had it mostly on. uncovered. It was a helmet, or at least something that looked like one. The metal was heavy, maybe iron, pitted and rusted, but solid. It was tall, pointed at the top like a pyramid, and the front had two slits for eyes shaped like crosses. Not the kind of crosses that you might see at a church. They were sharper, uneven, like someone had hacked them in with a chisel.

And the whole thing was strange. It definitely didn't belong here. and it creeped me out just looking at it. Eddie steps back, asking what it was, and Simon picked it up, actually grunting at how much it weighed and held it out in front of him, saying something like, uh, looks like a clanhood or something, he said, but metal. And I didn't think it was that. The clan didn't wear iron pyramids on their heads,

and as far as I knew, it felt older and heavier, like it wasn't meant just for show. Simon turned it over, looking inside, and he said it smelled like rust and mud, then smiled and then smiled and said, I'm going to put it on. No, you're not, Eddie said, snatching it from him. And he sat on the ground and wiped his hand on his jeans. It's filthy. At least clean it first.

Simon shrugged, but I could tell that he was serious about trying it on later. But I didn't like it. The helmet gave me a bad feeling, like it was almost. watching us through those cross slits, but I didn't say anything. I didn't want to sound paranoid like I've been listening to your channel for so long, and we left it there by the shack and headed back to camp. The hike back was pretty quiet, though. None of us talked much, and we just kind of kept our eyes on the trail. And by the time we got to the tents, the sun was starting to go down low. We built a fire, cook some pasta on the camp stove,

and sat around eating it with some jarred sauce on top. We talked, and before, before long that helmet came up again. Eddie said it was probably some art project, maybe a prop from a movie shoot that got left behind. Simon, though, he didn't buy it. It's too heavy for that, he said. Why bury it? And I didn't have an answer. I just kept thinking about those stains on the table and the hooks on the walls. The shack didn't feel like some hunter's place anymore. Not with that thing outside. But we let it drop and finished eating and stayed by the the fire until it burned down to just embers. It was after sundown, maybe about nine or ten, when Simon got up. The sky was dark, and there was no moon, just stars and the faint glow of the coals,

and he didn't say anything, just grabbed his flashlight and started walking off into the trees. Hey, where are you going? I called after him. He didn't answer, though, and just kept going. Eddie and I looked at each other. He's getting the helmet, he said, and I nodded. We could have stopped him, but we didn't. Simon was gone for a while, longer than I should have taken to walk to the shack and back. Eddie started pacing, muttering about how stupid he was for walking off on his own like that, and I just sat by the fire, poking at it with a stick, trying not to think about that helmet sitting out there in the dark.

When Simon finally came back, he was empty-handed. He looked pale and he wouldn't look at us. Eddie asked what happened Simon sat down in a log and just stared at the ground I threw it he said out in the woods somewhere

didn't want it looking at me Eddie asked what he meant by looking at him and Simon didn't answer he just shook his head and Eddie continued to press him but Simon wouldn't say anymore he looked shaken like he'd seen something he couldn't explain

and we didn't push any harder than that and the fire was already dying, and none of us wanted to stay up much longer. We climbed into the tent, zipped it shut, and tried to go to sleep, and I just laid there for a while listening to the wind and Simon's uneven breathing. I kept picturing that helmet, though, those crosslets starting out from wherever he tossed it, and wondered what kind of person would make a thing like that. And the next morning we packed up early. No one said it, but we all wanted out of there.

The drive back was quiet. Just the hum of the engine and the occasional car passing us on the highway, we didn't talk about the shack or the helmet. Not then and not later, but it stayed with me. Sometimes I'd catch myself wondering what it was, where it came from. I'd think about that shack and the stains and the hooks and that thing buried in the dirt. It didn't feel like some hunter's tool or some lost prop. It felt like something darker, something that none of us were supposed to find. And years later, I looked up Harriman State Park online trying to see if anyone else had come across

that shack. I didn't find much. Just trail maps and reviews from hikers. Nothing about a lake with a shack or a buried helmet. Maybe we'd wandered further off the path than we thought. And maybe it's still out there, rustling in the woods where Simon tossed it. I don't know. I haven't been back and I really don't plan to. And whatever it was, I'm glad we left it behind, but sometimes, late at night I still see those cross slits in my head and I wondered if we walked away from something worse than we'll ever understand. I think people know this already by now, but most adult shops are nothing like people used to expect. I mean, sure, I'm sure they started out like that.

Men in long coats, buying dirty magazines hidden inside brown paper bags, and then scurrying in and out as if they were committing a crime. These days, they're actually very clean, tasteful premises filled with a host of diverse clientele. There's no peep show behind a plastic curtain. No sticky pink carpet underfoot, no faint sounds of moaning coming from somewhere in the back, no 80s weird videos playing on a grainy TV bolted to a ceiling corner. There were stores like that, though, and I worked in one. And I'll just call it Angel's Delight, which was actually the name of the rival business my bosses hated.

It wasn't a single-story mall on the outskirts of Bumfrick nowhere, and even being a store that sold adult toys and dolls, we were still one of the classiest joints in that whole godforsaken building. I don't like to speak badly of others, but, man, some of the motley crew that I got to know during my years in that place. There was the tattoo artist, who I'm convinced could have made a stick figure look like complete crap, and there was the piercing store that basically guaranteed a ride on the sepsis train with every ear piercing. The liquor store where, rumor had it, the liquor was the least intoxicating thing they sold.

Then there was the inexplicably high-fashioned boutique run by an elderly, very conservative couple were about as fire and brimstone as you could really get. And yet, every Friday night, they'd come into Angel's Delight and buy some of the most specific adult films we stocked. Just doing our part to get this smut off the streets, the husband would say to me every single time while the wife clicked her tongue disapprovingly. If it was really for that purpose, then tell me, why did they only rid this? streets of adult films that featured a very specific whole, a very specific racial combination, and came from a very specific production company whose movies had a serialized plot.

Maybe they watched it for the articles. Genuinely, I heard about the articles so many times that I lost count. And my dude, I work here. I don't care. I'm not judging you. Hell, if he didn't slither in to buy hardcore adult mags, my bosses wouldn't be able to pay my wages, and I'd have to take out student loans just to get through college. And that's why I was working there. I'd attended college for one year and the crushing

anxiety of even a partial student load for that one year had led me to put school on hold and spend a few years working to earn enough to pay the rest of my way through. Adult shop manager was far from the only job I could find, but comfortably the best paying prospect I had. You'd think that a position in a shop like that would be easy to fill. But when I first got the job, My bosses told me that I'd been only the second applicant. When they asked about the first, all they said was that some people were such big freaks that they could even scare away the hardcore fantasy crowd, and I didn't ask any further questions, just sort of snapped up the opportunity.

And after a few years there, I was genuinely considering whether I wanted to go back to college or if I should focus on this career in this industry. Things are really going to pop off throughout the 2000. my boss has said in 2002, things were really looking positive for the brick-and-mortar adult shop field. And yeah, I'm glad I decided to go back to college the following year, and the event I'm going to tell you about played a big role in sending me running back to academia. It was an entirely unassuming fall Friday at the mall, a couple of hours from closing time, and we stayed open later than most stores due to the nature of our business and other premises in the mall had already

shut their doors for the night. Mr. and Mrs. Fashion Boutique had already been and gone with their latest VHS acquisition. The day was winding down nicely, and like I said, most of our customers kind of snuck quietly into the store. Not this guy. The front door came flying open with such force that had discovered that it had permanently broken the chair of the little bell that hung above it, and that was the least of my worries, though.

The guy came sort of stalking through the store. He was tall. Really tall. Easily six and a half feet tall, but he wasn't big. He wasn't muscular or broad, just very lanky, not really imposing or anything, kind of gangly. And if he hadn't burst in like that and stormed toward the counter, I wouldn't have thought anything of him. Instead, I had to, because he got all up in my face, slamming down a brown paper bag, he jabbed toward me with his finger. This product is defective, and I'm going to return to it. for a refund.

I rolled my eyes visibly in gesture to the huge no-returned sign on the wall over my shoulder. You can return this, he insisted. I knew better than to reach into any brown paper bag purchased

from Angel's Delight. The bosses told me how some frat bros would try to return their used adult toys as a prank and to this day I don't know if this was a joke or an urban legend or what, and it's never happened to me, but I'd be damned if I was going to risk touching anything that had been in anyone else.

Uh, what's the item? I asked. Can you remove it from the bag? The guy sighed theatrically and took the product out of the bag. I didn't recognize it immediately, but he flipped the box over, and I saw that it was an inflatable rubber mask, kind of like a gimp mask, but made of stretchy latex rubber. A hose ran from the mouthhole to a pocket. pump and the mask could be inflated while being worn.

I had no idea when this item had been purchased. We'd had one in stock ever since I'd worked there, and at some point in the last few months it had been sold when someone else was on shift. I knew it had to be over a week ago because I noticed it was gone from the wall by then. What's wrong with it? I asked. The guy fumbled with the box, not out of embarrassment, I don't think, but anger. He pulled the rubber mask out, the hose flapping against the counter, and he held it up.

It's torn. Look, he said, and there was a tear at the neck, as if the material had sort of corroded. Hell, maybe that's exactly what had happened. I know rubber and latex expire after a while, and the mask could have been ancient, just sitting on the wall since the store opened in the 80s. It might be entirely not this guy's fault, and his gimp mask had unfortunately. been defective. No returns absolutely meant no returns, though. Even in a case like this, and the only way my bosses would have allowed me to refund a customer would have been out of my own pocket. And if you agree to no returns ever, then that means no returns ever. Why should I have to give this guy $20 plus sales tax out of my own hard-earned money? That's a shame, I said. I guess you

should have been more careful when you were putting it on. And I know I was being a jerk, but I didn't like this guy getting all up in my face. And, oh boy, did I pay for it. I barely had time to react when tall man reached over the counter, grabbed me by the back of the head, and slammed my cheek against the desk. I could feel the pump of the goddamn gimp mask pressing into my temple. Tall man leaned down to my ear, and he didn't whisper when he spoke, and I'm afraid that I'll have to paraphrase here.

The years haven't been kind to my memory, so I don't have a perfect recollection of exactly what he said, but I think you'll get the gist. Listen here, you smut, peddling, smug, dipstick. I know it says no returns, but you sold me a defective item. Would you expect to pay someone else's mistakes? No.

Then why should I be expected to pay for yours? He pressed down harder on my head, and I swear to God, I thought my skull was going to pop right then and there. The guy was way stronger than he looked. Nuh. I remember blabbering through my mouth, mushed into the desk. Oh, sir. So I want to return this item for a refund, he said. And he held me there for a second, and I wondered what the hold-up was.

Then I felt a cold metal pressed against my head. I want a we font, he said. Then the metallic touch left me, and after a few seconds he let go. When I straightened up and could see properly, I didn't see a gun on him. And like most people in October, he was wearing a long coat, and to this day, I can't say for sure that this angry adult shop customer had held a goddamn gun to my head over a $20 inflatable gimp mask. I'm not sure. But what I can say for sure is that,

He got his money back. Hell, I gave him $30 because I was shaking too much to count out the right amount. And then it was like his whole demeanor changed. He brightened, smiled, thanked me, and then left the store, and he even took that mask in the bag with him. And so I couldn't even prove to my bosses that any of it had really happened. Not that I would have called the cops anyways. Not in that mall. Not when I was working at that store. It wasn't the really kind of place where you even bothered with the cops. I did tell the bosses about it, though, expecting them to probably doubt me, but when I described the guy, they seemed to know exactly who I was talking about. Oh yeah, him, the one boss said. He can get like that sometimes, the other boss added.

Next time, just process the return. Now that night, I decided that I'd saved up more than enough money to go back to college, and so the next day I handed in my notice, worked out my next 60 days, and then left that mall adult shop industry and never looked back. right to your door. They've got a cool way of blending THC with specially chosen ingredients that cater to just about every mood and health concern you can think of. I'm talking about mood.com's incredible line of functional gummies, and you can get 20% off your first order at mood.com with promo code read. Forget one size fits all supplements that only get you high. Mood's functional gummies are optimized to kick in in as little as 15 minutes and take you to the mood you're looking

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but, as I mentioned, listeners get 20% off their first order with code read. So head to mood.com, find the functional gummy that matches exactly what you're looking for and let mood help you discover your perfect mood. And don't forget to use promo code read when you check out to save 20% on your first order. It was the summer of 1979 when the idea of going on a camping trip first came up in conversation. Mark, a close friend of mine since high school, had been griping about his job for weeks. He'd been working some soul-crushing desk gig at an insurance company, and our mutual friend Joey and I weren't much better off either.

I was bouncing between temp jobs and Joey was stuck in a warehouse moving boxes for minimum wage. We wanted to get away from things so bad, anything to break up the monotony of either working or hanging out, but we didn't have the money to go jet-setting to the Bahamas, and we couldn't all get the time off for an extended road trip. And so instead, we decided to go camping. After a little discussion, we decided that the Harold Parker State Forest should be the spot. With it being just an hour's drive north of Cambridge, it was close enough to home that it made for an easy journey,

but far enough and large enough to make it feel like a real escape out to the wilderness. When I say it's big, I mean it's big. It's over 3,000 acres of pine and oak and takes about six or seven hours to walk across on a good day. day. We knew because we'd been there once before. A day trip a few years back, so we figured three nights in early fall would be just right before the weather turned too cold and too wet. We started planning in more detail once the day got closer, pulling our resources to keep our costs down. My old rusted blue hatchback barely passed inspection, but it had due for the trip to the forest while Mark managed to dig out his dad's ancient two-man tent from his garage.

It was still in decent shape despite a few patched-up holes, but since it only fit too, Joey brought along a little one-person deal that he'd bought cheap at an Army Navy store. We split the rest of the gear, sleeping bags, a cooler, and some cool cooking stuff. And Joey tossed in a fishing rod, and I grabbed a couple of tarps in case it rained.

Mark got a hold of a map of the park, one of those foldable pamphlet things that you can still get from the park's welcome center, and then after that, we figured that we were all set. I remember the drive being a lot of fun going up. We left on a Friday afternoon. The sun was still high in the sky as we blasted going up country

and born to be wild on the car stereo. And then about an hour later, we rolled into the forest just as dusk started to settle. The gravel lot near the entrance only had one other car parked in it, and after putting a few bucks in an envelope at the small wooden self-service kiosk, we picked a campsite near a place called Barry Pond. It was a flat clearing, surrounded by tall trees with a fire ring already set up. The ground was blanketed and needles and through the trees maybe 50 yards off. The waters of the

pond was shimmering in the light of that setting sun. It was beautiful, thinking back on it. We unloaded the car, hauled our stuff over to the site, and then got to work setting up camp. That first night was great. Mark got a fire going with a lighter and some crumpled-up newspaper he'd brought, and then we cooked the hot dogs on a stick and heated the beans in a dented pot that I'd found in my mom's basement. The food wasn't exactly gourmet, but out there it was tasting better than I expected it to. When we were done with the dogs, we cracked the beers and then sat in a log that we dragged over to the fire. I leaned forward, just kind of staring at the flames and felt the stress melting away from me as I thought, this is exactly what I needed.

The next day, we decided to do some exciting. exploring, and so we picked a three-mile trail that looped around the pond and up to an overlook. The path was narrow, and the woods were alive with the sounds of leaves rustling overhead, and squirrels and animals darting through the underbrush. And the view from the overlook was well worth the hike, though, with a forest stretching out before us under the morning sun, and we sat there for a while, passing around a bag of trail mix and kind of dumbstruck by how beautiful everything was. It was all just so peaceful, and as much as the forest appeared wild and untamed, we felt safe. But we were wrong to feel that way.

Sunday started just the same. We hiked again, a longer trail this time, and then got back to camp in the late afternoon, tired but very satisfied. Mark napped in the tent as I gathered more wood than, after eating while the sun was setting, we figured that we had to sleep early since we were so beat from the day's hike. With Joey's tent, just this dark lump nearby, I zipped up our own, and then as I got into my sleeping bag, Mark was already snoring beside me. The forest went quiet, just the occasional sound of an animal, and then I drifted off to sleep.

But I remember waking up cold. The air in the tent felt wrong, damp, and cold. I fumbled from my flashlight, clicked it on, and saw the flap was unzipped. I sat up and shone the light around. round. Mark's sleeping bag was empty and his boots were gone, but his jacket was still there, wadded up in the corner of the tent. I checked my watch and it was just after 4.30 a.m., so I figured he'd gone to take a piss somewhere and would be back any second. I lay back down and wait a minute, but there was nothing but silence. Another minute went by and there was no whistling,

no footsteps, nothing. After another minute I sat up again, clicking my flashlight back on as I shuffled towards the flap of our tent and peeked outside. It was pitch black out there. The darkness was just swallowing up the beam of my flashlight as I scanned for any sign of mark. I moved it one way, then another, but there was no trace of him anywhere. I felt kind of silly as I climbed into my sleeping bag. Something like, was I really that much of a sissy that I'd given myself the creeps over nothing more than a friend going to the bathroom? him. And as I put on my boots, I figured that I'd probably get no more than 10 feet before I'd

spot Mark returning, and I'd have to explain what a little scaredy cat that I was, getting the willies over him going wee-wee. But this other voice in my head kept speaking over the others asking, but what if you don't? What if he's in trouble? And after pulling on my jacket, I climbed out of the tent and stood up and turned around in a circle with my flashlight in my hand. I was ready to see him walking back, but when I didn't, I took a few footsteps before calling out Mark's name. Kind of low at first, so as not to wait Joey unless it was absolutely necessary. And I circled the campsite, shining the light into the trees, but when I saw that there was nothing but shadows, I started to get this really bad feeling that something was wrong. I called out Mark's

name again. Louder that time, and that's what woke Joey. I heard rustling in his tent before he unzipped it, and I turned, trying not to blind him with a flashlight, and he just blinked up at me. His hair was a mess, and then he asked what was going on. We went through this whole back and forth of me telling Joey that I thought Mark was missing, him asking if Mark wasn't off taking a pee, and me assuring him that I wasn't just being a pansy. Then, once he was convinced something was wrong, Joey put his boots and jacket on and then climbed out of his tent. We went off searching in different directions at first, circling the campsite at a wider berth while calling out Mark's name, and my flashlight cut through the dark, picking out trunks and bushes, but no sign of Mark. When we met back at

the campsite, Joey suggested Mark might have been sleepwalking. Apparently he'd done it a few times as a kid, and that one time he made it all the way downstairs and into his backyard. I doubted it, but we widen the circle anyway, moving deeper into the woods. Only that time we agreed to stay together. As we walked further and further into the woods, the ground began to slope downward with loose roots threatening to trip us up with each step into that darkness. And my feet and socks were already soaked, and the night was so chilly that my hands shook holding that flashlight. The forest felt even bigger now, denser and harder to navigate. But still we pushed on, yelling for Mark as we went.

After about an hour of what felt like walking pretty much in circles, Joey suddenly stopped. He pointed his flashlight toward a bush and something gray that was snagged on it. I aimed my own light and when I did, my heart sank. We each saw the unmistakable sight of Mark's hat, that faded blue one that he'd been wearing the whole trip hanging from the bush's thorns.

We stared at it for a second. or two not moving and then Joey spoke up, saying it didn't make sense. We kept moving, each calling out Mark's name again, then about 50 feet onward, we found his socks, one, then the other, tossed aside like he just peeled them off and left them there. Next, we found his jeans crumpled in the dirt, and then his t-shirt, and then his boxers, all spread out over the course of maybe 50 to 60 yards and on a very deliberate path. Each of us started trying to make sense of what we were seeing, with Joey asking if I'd seen Mark drinking any liquor or using anything stronger.

We drank all that beer that we had with us on that first night, but then as much as I didn't like seeing him drinking any, there was no guarantee Mark hadn't been sneaky with a secret fifth of bourbon or something. But even if he had gotten drunk out of his mind in secret, He wasn't the kind of guy to go streaking through the woods in the middle of the night. And that just wasn't Mark's brand of humor, I guess. We went back and forth for like that, maybe for a few seconds. Carried on calling out Mark's name as loud as we could,

and then I think maybe a minute or so later, we saw it. Just ahead of us, lying chest up on the ground, was the lifeless, decapitated body of a young man. Blood soaked the ground around it, having poured from the stump above his shoulders. The cut looked clean and straight, too. And the rest of the body looked untouched. No marks, no wounds. Just pale, unblemished skin, bright white in the beams of our flashlight.

And I think I kind of just shut down for a second or two. I couldn't move. I couldn't speak. And it's weird to think about all these years later, but there was a moment where I thought to myself, Is this even reality? I didn't think it was a dream, or that I might be hallucinating or anything like that. It just looked fake to me. I guess my brain refused to accept what I was seeing for a second and had me thinking it was some kind of movie prop,

the way the bright white skin had this almost bluish tone to it, or the way all the blood had sort of congealed around the neck wound and made it look like plastic. I'd never seen a dead body before, so I guess I had no idea what to expect. But for the life of me, I didn't expect to see all of that. I guess Joey had a similar kind of reaction. He didn't think it was Mark, or at least he didn't want to think that it was Mark. And I'll never forget the deep feeling of hurt that I felt when instead of accepting,

it, Joey carried on calling out his name. Joey yelled louder and more frantic, over and over, pacing around that body but never looking at it. He kept saying it wasn't him, that it couldn't be. His voice kept cracking as he spoke. And I just stayed frozen. The flashlight I remember trembling in my hands as it slowly just sort of sank in for me. That was Mark. The height, the build. No tattoos or scars. It had to be him. And besides, all his clothes were lining the forest just a few yards away from us. My throat closed up as I tried to get the words out in the end I had to force him out saying, Joey, it's him. It's Mark. He shook his head saying no over and over. He still wouldn't look at the body.

He just paced back and forth, hands on his head as the tears welled up in his eyes, and I said it again louder and angrier. My voice trembling, and he stopped yelling, and then started just sobbing into his hands. My legs felt weak, but I couldn't sit. I did the only thing I could think of, which was walk over to Joey and try to console him. Once Joey's cries had quieted to just gasping, I held him while saying we've got to do something, man. I know it's messed up, but we've got to do something.

Once he kind of calmed down enough to understand, we made our way back to camp as quickly as possible, even running at some points where the ground allowed us to. I don't know why we did that, looking back on it. Maybe it was just to feel like we were helping in some way, but by then, time wasn't an issue anymore. Our friend Mark was gone, and he was never coming back, no matter how fast we ran.

Once we were back in my car, we took off along that road until we reached Middleton, and then after turning left towards Ranger H.Q, there it was ahead of us. There were only two Rangers manning the place since it was still before 6 a.m., but after we stumbled in, panicked, grief-stricken, they gave us some cups of coffee and let us tell our story. Joey did most of the talking and his voice was an absolute mess, but I did my best to help him out whenever he stumbled over his words. They asked us questions we could hardly answer, and we gave up trying to explain and just begged to let us show them.

The sun was coming up by the time we got back to our campsite, and everything looked just as it was when we left. And from there, we walked the accompanying ranger out to Mark's body, and when he saw it, all he could do was tighten his jaw. He then turned to us, narrowing his eyes, and asked what happened. I said we didn't know, and that we just found. found him like that. Joey nodded, and at that point, his voice had gone hoarse. The Ranger just stood around asking us a few more questions, but it slowly dawned on me that

whatever we said, he was not buying it. He didn't act hostile in any way. There was no pushback at all, in fact, but something about the way he acted told me that he didn't believe us. He got on his radio and called it in. One body, decapitated, two witnesses. Then he told us that we weren't free to leave yet, and we were to wait back at our camp. EMTs eventually got there, and then the cops followed and two cruisers with their lights flashing silently, I remember. They split us up, me by the tents and Joey near the pond, and then they started to question us. Where were we when it happened? What did we hear? Did Mark have any enemies that knew about this trip? Their questions came on thick and fast, but there was no sympathy or comfort issued.

they thought we did it, and I could see it in how they treated us. After we were done talking, we were told that they'd have to bag everything up as evidence, and when I say they took everything, I mean they took everything. Our clothes, our gear, the cooler, both tents, all three sleeping bags, and the little knives that we'd used for cooking. We didn't object to any of it, and we knew that we'd done nothing wrong, and we just wanted to go home. Once the two cops had finished questioning me and Joey, they talked amongst themselves for a while and then told us that we'd better head to the station with them.

We weren't under arrest. They just wanted to question us someplace that they could properly record it. Again, we hadn't done anything wrong, so we didn't object and they drove us to the precinct before putting us in separate rooms. And those interrogation rooms were small and gray, with a metal table and a one-way mirror. A detective sat across from me with a notepad out asking the same things the two uniform cops did over and over, just in different variations. I told him everything that happened that night, from me waking up to seeing the flap was open, then the search, the clothes, and the body.

When I finished, the detective leaned in and then asked if Mark and I had fought, or if I'd been jealous or angry with him for any reason. I said no. and it was a forceful one too. Me and Mark were friends, best friends. The detective didn't blink. He just wrote it down and then started off on the same old line of questioning. Where were we when it happened?

What did we hear? And did Mark have any enemies that knew about our trip? A few hours later, they let both me and Joey go. He got pretty much the same hotbox treatment as I did, and by then he'd also realized that the eye of society, suspicion was firmly upon us. We were scared, really scared, and each of us imagined some botched trial that see both of us wrongly convicted of first-degree murder. But even when faced with such a terrifying prospect, our fears were still dwarfed by the horror of what in God's

name happened to our friend Mark. It still doesn't make any sense to me even all these years later. If we'd come across him lying there, dead from a single gunshot or stabbed to death, but fully clothed, that would have been bad enough. But then, how'd he end up taking his clothes off like that? And who took his head? About a week after we were questioned, forensics came back clean. It was good news, but neither me nor Joey ever felt like celebrating it. There was still the matter of Mark's death, and more importantly, who the hell killed him. But after many, many months of obsessively investigating, the case eventually turned cold. The cops had no weapon, no motive, and there was another thing that stayed missing. Mark's head. Cops and rangers searched

the area around the scene for days hoping it had turned up someplace, but it didn't. Whoever killed him had taken it with them. It all feels like a lifetime ago. Joey moved west about a year later, got a job out in Oregon someplace, and we don't talk a lot these days, but we do keep in touch. We just don't talk about what happened. I stayed around Cambridge, but I fell apart for a while. I couldn't hold down a job, even stuff like stocking shelves or driving delivery. I just blank out mid-shift, see Mark's body again and the blood soaking in the dirt, and then I'd

I'd just disappear from whatever I was doing and drink. Days were bad, but the nights were worse. On the off chance that I was sober when I fell asleep, I'd inevitably see Mark walking away from me through the woods, stripping as he went. I'd run after him, calling out his name, but he was never able to hear me. Then when he did finally turn around, he was headless. I'd wake up in a cold sweat with my heart pounding,

wondering why I wasn't still back in that tent. friends eventually drifted off and my girlfriend too she stuck around a year and then bailed when i couldn't open up about what had happened and my drinking problem and i didn't blame her i still don't i was a complete mess drunk or sober i'd sit in my apartment lights off staring at the wall and then sometimes if i had to go out i'd drive past wooden spots and see the trees and my grip would tighten around the steering wheel years later I eventually hit rock bottom I lost another job stopped leaving the house and stopped eating all together and then lost a bunch of weight my sister dragged me to a doctor who put me on meds and they dolled the edges but the nightmares just didn't go away for a long long time she found this therapy program cognitive behavioral she said a pretty intensive one too and I started in the spring twice a week and those shrinks were good They didn't push too hard, and one said writing something could help force me to face it instead of burying it. I could lay it all out, all the details, and maybe it'd lose some of its power over me. It worked better with time, just not by much.

Mark is still gone. His case is stayed cold, and no one has ever found his head, who took it, or why. I don't go near that state forest anymore or any wooded area at all for that matter, and while I'm better than I was, I'll never be the same person that I was before. The old me stayed out there in that forest and in the exact spot that we found Mark's headless body. And just like my old high school buddy, he's never coming home. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. October 10th is World Mental Health Day.

And this year, we're saying thank you, therapists. BetterHelp's therapists have helped over 5 million people worldwide on their mental health journeys. That's millions of stories, millions of journeys. And behind everyone is a therapist who showed up, listened, and helped someone take a step forward. Moments in therapy, like the right question, a safe space to cry or a small win can change lives. This World Mental Health Day, BetterHelp is honoring those connections and the therapists who make them possible, while showing how easy it is to get guidance from a licensed therapist online with BetterHelp. We're here to show you that finding the right

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time from our personalized recommendations. With more than 30,000 therapists on board, BetterHelp has become the go-to online therapy platform, helping over 5 million folks around the world. And it really delivers boasting an impressive average rating of 4.9 out of 5 for live sessions from a whopping 1.7 million client reviews. This World Mental Health Day, we're celebrating the therapists who've helped millions of people take a step forward. If you're ready to find the right therapist for you. BetterHelp can help you start that journey. Our listeners get 10% off their first month at betterhelp.com slash read. That's better. H-E-L-P-com slash read. I'll get this out of the way up front. My name is Paul and I was a mallcock.

You'd think this would have been unbearable, but I served my stint as a security guard at a certain small-town mall in the 90s, so I'd left the job before the movie came out. I worked in private security now, but back then I was employed directly by the mall. It wasn't a huge mega-mall by any means, but it had a couple of stores, about 20 stores in fact, and a food court and a central fountain that the kids would throw coins into and make a wish. What this mall did have was a huge warehouse complex at the back. This is one of the big draws for businesses in the mall. They got a portion of the warehouse area as part of their lease to store stock and what have you, and some of them didn't need it and others took advantage of it. Then other local businesses would lease warehouse space to store their own goods and items.

The point is, this mall had a large maze of interior storage units out the back, so the area of the mall that shoppers saw was maybe only 40%. of the property. Shoppers would stroll around browsing radio shack or boarders or the one store that always stuck out to me, Gadzooks, all sorts of clothing stores too. I won't explain the mall layout exactly. It was haphazardly built, kind of a pain in the ass to get around and sometimes you could find yourself in one section of the mall's upper floor and you'd have to go down one escalator and back up another to get to the other side. If by any small chance anyone who lived in the area around the 90s is listening, this description plus the storage warehouses is probably enough to make

it clear which mall I actually mean. If you know, you know, as my kids say. I'm painting this picture so you understand that the mall wasn't some big open-plan architectural masterpiece with wide walkways for shoppers. It was cramped, claustrophobic. By the time I started working there in the 90s, it was already feeling run down and out of time. Coupled that with a huge warehouse complex out back, can imagine why they needed round-the-clock security. There was a lot to explore, a lot of hidden corners that could hide all sorts of ill behavior. And for the first year in the job, I barely had to deal with anything more than a few shoplifters. One old guy was purving on a young woman, a missing kid who was found safe and well sitting in a photo

booth, and a few kids who got dared to try and sneak into the warehouse to stay overnight. Weirdly, they were the ones that management came down on the hardest. really wanted to prosecute them to the full extent of the law. In the end, nothing came of it. They were barely older than 18, but the bosses were weirdly angry about someone trying to stay in the mall overnight. I guess when you think about it, they could have caused untold damage,

but like I said, we were a 24-hour security detail, so one of us on shift would have caught them pretty quickly. The weirdness really began a couple of years into the job. The first time, my buddy Chris and I were on a mall shift, and an older, more seasoned guy, Bryn, was in the security office monitoring the cameras. It was mid-afternoon, mid-week, and the mall was average busy. Then I get a call over the radio. It's Bryn.

He told me we had a code whatever in my sector for an unattended package. Now, this was one thing that would make most of us jumpy. We were only a few years past the Oklahoma City bombing, and tensions were still high about any abandoned packages or vehicles and populated public areas. We never had a direct bomb threat, but we'd found a few abandoned bags and things. I guess we were pretty reckless,

because we'd never called in a bomb squad. Usually you could just see that they were things shoppers had bought and accidentally left beside a bench and whatnot. This time, it was one of those filthy duffel bags tucked underneath a bench in the corner overlooking the central fountain. Nobody was looking at it when I reached the area Bryn directly, me too. I'm not sure if nobody had noticed or nobody cared, but I remember that damn bag like it was

yesterday. It was dirty, like it had regularly been rolled in dust and debris and maybe chalk. And as I got closer, it was clear that it stank, of piss of all things. I remember thinking, who pisses on a goddamn bomb? And that's why I just sort of strolled up to that damn bag and grabbed it, just swung it out from under the bench. I know. I always, was an effing idiot and I put lives at risk. Present-day me would give my past self a swift backhand to the head, but I was a dumb kid, and in my defense, as I'd gotten close, I could see the bag was open and that there were clothes inside, and that's where the piss stink was coming from.

And that's what was in the bag. A black sweater, a pair of black jogging pants, a pair of black socks, all stinking and clearly well-worn. No big deal, I thought. someone just kind of abandoned their old clothes after buying a new fit that day I guess the only slightly odd thing was the filthy plush cat also tucked into that duffel bag clearly an old much-loved childhood toy I don't remember much about it to be honest but at the time I just shoved it back into that duffel bag a bit disgusted at the smell and

tried to push down any thoughts of what the cuddly toy might imply or who it belonged to I radioed Bryn that everything was fine. It was just a bag of clothes, and took it out to the dumpsters out back, making sure to thoroughly wash my hands afterwards, didn't even get reprimanded for my reckless decision to grab a potential bomb. Nothing happened for a week or two. And then, like deja vu, I get a message over the radio again from Bryn about an abandoned bag.

Don't be a dumbass with it this time, kid. He'd seen me swipe it up on the cameras, of course, so not a message. much point in hiding it from him, and I confirmed that I would not, went to the area that he directed me to beside one of those fake plants in another forgotten corner of them all, and sure enough, there was an identical duffel bag. This one didn't reek, though, and it was clearly a newer bag, but aside from that, it was the same. This time it was more out in the open, so even though it was a bit reckless, I was able to approach and sort of peer into it without touching anything. Again, I know I was an idiot for not even calling this one in, but to my underdeveloped mind,

I could see that it was closed again, so it was going to be the same thing, and I was sort of right. There was no plush cat this time or toy of any kind. Instead, there were a few food wrappers, junk food that you get from a grocery store, sort of like twinkies and beef jerky, that kind of thing, and some packaged goods. So either that was a goddamn weird coincidence or, The same guy had left the same generic set of clothes and the same brand of duffel bag lying around them all twice in one month. Despite this one not being so foul, I'd still disposed of it in the dumpsters out back, and really thought nothing of it beyond mentioning it to Bryn and a couple of other colleagues.

The next duffel bag sighting came only a few days later. This time, one of the store workers had found it in a female dressing room, And by now, talk of the previous two duffel bags that I'd found had spread around some of the workers, which I guess is why they called this in. I remember talking to the girl who called it in. She was barely over 18, and she went totally white when I said that it could have been an explosive device, hadn't even considered it. I acted all macho and sort of stern about it, like I'd been the picture of responsibility when I'd found mine. Yeah, not really. The girl had already opened the bag, so there were no surprises this time, except for the smell.

This one stank even worse than the first one, really old, musty, rotten almost. Thankfully, no piss this time, but that didn't make it better. The girl looked like she was about to puke, so, being the galliant, manly security guard that I was, I took it off of her hands, and you guessed it, to the dumpster out back. This time I didn't even check if there was anything else in there besides clothes. I wasn't touching that crap. And so by now, we've had three abandoned identical duffel bags with three abandoned identical sets of clothes.

I think it was Chris who first brought this up one day on break. And due to the job, it was rare for us to take breaks at the same time as each other, but for some reason that day we were. Maybe there's someone living in the mall, he said. He was joking, but I latched on to it, coming up with arguments about why that could be right, how it made sense, etc. In the end, I think Chris kind of got annoyed with me and left, telling me that I was some conspiracy theorist or something like that,

and maybe he just didn't want to deal with a possibility. But no, hear me out. My logic went like this. Three identical duffel bags. Three generic identical outfits. Two of them had clearly been dumped because they were stinking and old, and who knows about the middle bag. Maybe there was some damage to the clothes that I didn't see because I didn't exactly examine them or anything.

Maybe the guy had crapped his pants that time, who knows. So I started putting together reasons why the details could be the way that they were. Because the guy was taking them out of the storage warehouses. They were stock from one of the clearance outlets in the mall. You know the type. Sells cheap clothing, bags, all that good stuff. So this guy was dressing in cheap clothing from the warehouse and what? living in there?

When I present it all like this, it makes me sound like some crack detective who worked this out in seconds, with one of those boards with red string and all of that kind of stuff. It wasn't like that. It took a few weeks for me to put all these pieces together. It's something I thought about

absently from time to time. And during this period, a fourth duffel bag had been found in one of the men's public restrooms on the first floor. Nothing to do with me that time, but I heard about it from the guy who found it, and this time it had been found emptied all over the ground. The contents kind of

just strewn about. The theory was that someone else had found it before us and gone through it to see if there was anything worth stealing. Hell, maybe there had been, but I don't think so. It was just the old clothes or more perishable food wrappers. My chance came a few weeks later. It was my turn to switch with the night guys, and I liked the night shift. I was just coming out of a bad breakup at the time, so I like the silence, the time to think. I've always been that kind of person when there's badness afoot. I like to be by myself, kind of lost in my own head, and I have a couple of creepy hiking experiences because of this that I might send in one day, who knows? And so I was glad that I had the night shift because I needed the space for my head, but I also am glad because it gave me

an excuse to poke around the warehouse unimpeded. I tried to bring it up with colleagues in the previous weeks, but the senior boys in particular were very keen to dissuade us from poking around back there. And at the time, I started to entertain some really weird thoughts about it all, but later discovered that it was totally unconnected. Some local business that rented this space did so under the agreement that poking around wouldn't happen. And I guess that explains the haphazard security camp coverage in the warehouse areas, too. Certain areas, especially inside warehouse B were complete camera blind spots for the most part. I had a pretty strong suspicion that the blind spot areas, and thus the areas my night shift led me to patrol the most, were where

someone might actually be hiding. I've told events slightly out of order because I guess I have a flare for the dramatic. And in the weeks leading up to the start of my night shift, I'd become convinced that I was seeing things. Nothing wild, not talking or creepypasteteer, just obvious things. glimpses of black-clad men carrying that specific black duffel bag always blending into a crowd or disappearing around a corridor people whose faces i could never get a full look at who always seemed to be deliberately keeping just out of my reach but at the time i knew that i'd look like a nut job if i pursued that or even told anyone hell maybe in the years since i've built it up in my head and remember it happening more often than it did but it's enough that even looking back now it gives me

the grown-ass man who's worked some tough security jobs, the shivers. There was something about the shapelessness of it. The idea that someone wearing black was sneaking around the mall, my mall, even though they hadn't done anything bad except for leaving stinking clothes around. Well, not yet anyway. So first night shift I almost ran to warehouse B route and eagerness. Dumb, I know, but when I got there, I kind of paced myself, started walking the route normally. The warehouses had lights, and we were allowed to have them on during patrol,

so it wasn't some sinister-pitched black walk through the dark. Or at least it wasn't meant to be. I walked the route, probably whistling, trying to look like a picture of doesn't care to who, no idea, and this area wasn't even covered by cameras. But then I started looking a little closer at things. Just take a look, I thought, you know. And I remembered this shelving unit belonged to one of the clothing clearing,

stores. And I figured that it wouldn't hurt to double-check the boxes. You know, that kind of thing. Like, I was trying to convince myself in my own head that I wasn't investigating the idiotic idea of someone living in the back corridors and hidden corners of the mall, because obviously that wasn't happening. How could it have been? Why would someone? But then, I found the nest. Yeah, okay, it wasn't a nest like that, not some creature's layer, but it was a collection of boxes on a huge bottom shelf that had been opened and taped together to form a kind of tiny room. It was barely disguised, and I have no idea how anyone missed it before I found it. To this day, there's a tiny part of me that suspects that he wanted to be found, and specifically by me, because I had been the one to find

his first duffel bag, and I'm sure that's just my dramatic side talking again, but, you know, you start to wonder. As small security, we had these extendable baton things, and I never had a cause to use mine for violence, and I hope that night wouldn't change that. But I had been waiting for an excuse to extend it with a whooshing wrist flick motion in the line of duty, which I did at that moment, or at least tried to. Of course, that's the time that it didn't work properly, and the baton got stuck, and I had to extend it by hand, and I'd shown that move off to buddies, God knows how many times, and the one time I finally got to use it, I fumbled it. So I approached this obvious nest of boxes.

Of course, I didn't know what was inside at this point, just that it was a bunch of boxes taped together, and I could see an opening in a space beyond. Hey, anyone in there? I called out. Mall security. I'm giving you one chance to come out with your hands up. I don't know why I said with your hands up. We didn't carry guns.

It just sounded like something I shouldn't say. Yeah? I called out or something else, and there was no movement from inside the box. And I reached forward with my baton and parted the flap that served as a door. And holy crapola, the stench. It was honestly like chemical warfare. Jesus Christ. And until that point, I'd had no idea that the simple odor of the human body could end up being

that foul. It wasn't soil from a human or anything like that. It was purely the stench of human existence. No wonder this guy. And it obviously was this guy kept disposing of his bags of clothes. There was a bundle of generic brand sleeping bags in the nest. One clearly slept in and the others used for padding. I mean, the guy had access to all of this backlog stock, so why not? There were also two or three of the black duffel bags in there, still in cellophane wrapping and a stack of the generic black clothes that I'd been finding. I backed up a little bit and assessed my surroundings, trying to place which store this particular area of storage belonged to. And then things clicked into place. The shelving area had belonged to the budget clothing store that had gone out of

business last year. I guess, for whatever reason, they shut down suddenly and left their stock behind. and eventually someone would have come to clear it out. I had no idea what happened in a case like that, though. I wasn't a retail worker. I do remember that around then it was unusual, but not unheard of for a store to suddenly shut down. And clearance generic brand clothing sold cheap. You don't have to be a genius to connect that kind of store with sweatshops.

So who knew what possible reasons could have led to a shutdown and abandonment of stock? Now, leaning back in, covering my nose, I tentatively peered into the den that my squatter had been inhabiting. Nothing else really identifying or interesting, and I figured that we'd have to call the cops to report an intruder, and they could go through this little living area and the warehouse overall and search for any identification or evidence of wrongdoing besides breaking and entering. I was a security guard, not a detective,

and it wasn't my job to investigate the crime, just to stop it from happening. It felt like an anti-climax, but I was a security guard. I was relieved to finally have the matter taken out of my hands. As I backed away from the den and straightened up, I realized two things at once. One, the den was empty, which meant the guy was gone. And two, the den was empty, which meant the guy could be anywhere. And I fumbled for my radio, dropped the freaking thing, because of course I wasn't acting like the manly hero I'd always pictured in those scenarios.

Then, when I was sure the brick of a unit wasn't broken, I'd radioed three, and I radioed to the security office. One of my favorite colleagues was on that night, and she was a motherly figure who brought in home-baked goods, and we all affectionately called her mom. I can't even remember her real name, to be honest with you, and how she ended up in mall security was something I'll never figure out, but of all the senior guards who could be working the cameras on any night, having mom there was a particular reassurance. I realize now how weird it must have sounded to be overheard, saying,

mom i think there's a guy down here into the radio but it was the squatter guy who would have heard me so screw him naturally she radioed back asking me to confirm just what in the blue blazing hell i was talking about and whether i was okay i didn't even have time to reply when and i swear to jesus christ almighty above the lights for the entire warehouse b building went out boom total pitch black darkness. And this wasn't something that often happened. It was no fancy timer, no famous generator problems. If the lights went out, it was because someone hit the switches. My mind didn't run through the usual, I'm being pranked nonsense. The nest, the duffel bags, they were not a prank. Nobody I worked with had the imagination or the motivation to pull off something so elaborate. Just wasn't a thing.

So the only explanation I even entertained was that the guy who had been living in the mall was still in the warehouse, and it just shut off the lights. Thankfully, we carried flashlights on the night shift, and I tried to get mine off of my belt just as, and I swear to God, I heard footsteps pounding across the warehouse floor, running footsteps coming directly at me, fast. The light switches weren't far from where I was. I got my flashlight up just in time to see someone wearing black, a scrawny figure charging straight at me. He barrels into me at just the wrong moment, catching me perfectly off guard so that I fell right backward slamming against a shelf. I heard him mutter something, saw him stumble in the waving beam of my flashlight, and then just take off down the aisle. God damn it. What should I even do, I thought. I wasn't paid nearly enough to get a lot. I wasn't paid nearly enough to get. and murdered on the job, but my pride had been hurt and my shoulder. So I got up and ran after him

as I radioed to Mom, panting out what details I could, getting frustrated as she kept asking me to repeat things. The guy seemed like he was darting down corridors in the dark, and I was barely keeping up with him using just my flashlight. In the end, I just yelled for Mom to call the cops to the warehouses, now, and drop the radio so I could run faster. For a moment, I lost him. Then I heard a door slam somewhere down a corridor and knew where he must have been headed. There was a small complex of rooms between warehouses A and B, just a break room, a bathroom, etc. And I started jogging down there. And for all I knew, he was waiting on the other side of the door with a machete or a gun or even a fire extinguisher, and I probably didn't take nearly

enough care as I burst in. The lights were still on in there, causing me to kind of wince and reel back, Thankfully, no weaponized squatter was there waiting for me, just an open door leading into the bathroom. I went through the open door. The bathrooms in that area were two individual rooms, men's and women's, with one toilet, one sink, et cetera, and each. These were public bathrooms, just for people who had reason to be in the warehouse zone. The women's bathroom was open and I could see a ceiling vent covering lying on the ground like it had been pulled off and tossed aside. I stepped in and shown my flashlight up into that hole, and I thought I could hear the faint sound of someone crawling away through those vents, but maybe that was just my imagination. I was so fixated on the vent that it took me a moment to notice the writing in the mirror. Now, I can't say for sure that it was from this guy.

It could have just been graffiti left by literally anyone at any time, but like I said, these were worker bathrooms, the female bathroom as well. Does that really matter here? I tend to think of women as just generally less likely to vandalize bathrooms. And if that makes me sexist, so be it. I just couldn't imagine anyone doing it in their own workplace. And on the mirror, in Sharpie, someone had just written the F word and eat poop. Not exactly like that. Layed out exactly like that, with the F word on one line and and eat poop on the next. I remember the exact wording to this day, and to this day, I have no idea if our guys sharply simply just didn't work for the word off after the top line, or if he wrote exactly what he meant to write. Sadly, I can't tell you that I pursued him into those vents like some action hero, or Batman, I guess. Absolutely not. Sorry, I wasn't about to die in a vent in my 20s for an almost minimum wage security job. I'm not die hard.

and I waited for the cops who showed up very shortly after. Now, I'll rush through what happened next. Basically, the cops investigated, and we had, indeed, had a squatter living in the mall. He hadn't limited himself to his den in that warehouse either. The cops' management and us guards found at least four other areas around the mall, and only one of them was in the warehouse. The others, well, we'll just say that he got around the whole complex.

It was an old maze-like building, as I said earlier. Not all that hard to get lost in the corridors and maintenance closets and the vents and the gaps between stores. In every little nest that he had, we found duffel bags in the same black outfits. We never found any boots, though. He'd been wearing heavy boots when he charged me, and I remember those thundering footsteps. I guess his boots meant something to him, so he never changed them. But the clothes, yeah, just these basic black garments. and trash, loads of food wrappers from stuff that he'd stolen from the warehouse and eaten,

nothing really nutritional, and he must have been in terrible health by the time I chased him off. And we really found nothing else. No sort of manifesto, no sinister plans, no other writing, no ID, no personal belongings. But I always remember how in that first duffel bag there was that one dirty plush cat. And had I throwed that guy's one beloved possession into the dumpster out back? And is that why he told me to F off and eat crap? And that phrase became a running joke around the security guards for a while, until like all things had eventually fizzled out. It was kind of just easier to focus on that than consider how incredibly creepy and unsafe it was that someone had been living in the walls of the mall for who knows how long. Probably the same reason management

was very focused on keeping it covered up. I never found proof that anything truly terrible what happened, but of course the vents and crawl spaces had access to the bathrooms and the private and public ones. There were dressing rooms, all sorts of places for someone to hide, and if they were so inclined, he might even watch. Well, publicly agreed that it was better to just not know, as long as he never came back, and you can believe security was pretty tightened up, at least for a while. I left the roll about 18 months later, and by then, things had calmed down somewhat. But those of us who had been there at the time still talked about that shadow in the walls, so I really don't have any definitive collusion about who this creepy, stinky guy was

that knocked me over, and I know that's pretty disappointing, but I do know who he was, sort of. As about ten years later, after I left that job, I was in a very different place and position in life. I was in a relationship with someone who would later become my wife, and she was also from the same town. We'd grown up together, but we'd grown up together, but but not together, if that makes sense. The kind of relationship where you meet later in life and remember each other. She knew about that mall shadow, obviously, and many of the other bizarre stories. But this one had always stuck with her because she'd been to that same mall many times.

Even though we lived across the country by that point, my wife, though we weren't married yet when this happened, still got our local weekly paper mailed to us by her mom. It was sort of a cute thing, but now I kind of wonder if her mom did it pure. for this purpose. There was a story a few pages in about a man who had been arrested. His charges were stalking, harassment, and conspiracy to kidnap. He appeared to be an unhoused individual and had been living pretty rough, while repeatedly stalking a handful of women in the area. This time, when they picked him up, they had found a manifesto.

According to the newspaper report, it was a notebook that he had just filled with scrawlings about one unnamed young woman in particular. I couldn't find any more about the case online and never really have even in the years since and I guess the charges were eventually dropped or maybe he died or something. He looked very sickly in his mugshot that they printed out and I only saw his face once

and a sort of frantic flashlight all the way back then while he was charging at me, so I can't be certain. But I know that was him. That was the guy who had been living in those dens throughout that goddamn mall. And it just goes to show you that you really never know who's out there. You may never find out what people are thinking or what they might do if push just the right way. And sometimes just thinking about that keeps me up at night more than any confirmed murder

or direct act of violence. Just the idea that it could happen at any time from anywhere. I'd always been drawn to the outdoors, and my buddy Chris was the same. We've been friends since we were kids back when we'd skipped class to mess around in the ravines near our neighborhood in Toronto, though, and over the years, that turned into a ritual. Every summer, we'd pick a spot, pack pretty light, and head out for a weekend of camping. Then, as time went by, we found that we had to raise the stakes to get that same old buzz. We coined the term hardcore camping, which I'm pretty sure is a case of parallel thinking

rather than just us being original. But it basically involved no tents or stoves, just ponchos, ground sheets, and whatever we could carry on our back. We'd bring a little food with us, but in such small amounts that after a couple of days, we'd have to forage and fish and otherwise live off the land if we wanted to eat. It wasn't easy, but that was the point. Then the year that we were both 24, we chose Algonquin Provincial Park, a massive chunk of forest and lakes up in Ontario for seven days of wilderness living. And we started out strong.

The first day we hiked 12 miles from the trailhead, cutting through thickets of pine and birch, and the air was cool, the sky was patchy with clouds, and after our day's hike, we set up camp near a shallow creek. I rigged my poncho over a low branch while Chris gathered sticks for a fire, and then we ate some jerky, boiled some water from the creek, and let the flames of our campfire die down as the stars started to come out. It was quiet, just the rustling of leaves and the occasional hoot of an owl. But that was kind of how we liked it. No noise, no people, just us in the wild. Day two was a little tougher. The terrain got harder, all rocks and roots, and we had to climb a steep ridge to keep heading north. My calves were burning by midday, and the much taller Chris

kept out pacing me as long strides ate up the ground in front of him. And that night, we slept on a flat stretch of moss, and the ground was very cold, and I woke up once to the sound of a twig snapping, my hand fumbling for the knife that I kept at my side, but apparently it was just a deer moving through the dark. Now, by day three, we were nicely warmed up, and we fell into a steady rhythm. Our packs were lighter now, our food supplies were dwindling, but we were used to it, and hunger was always the best motivator to me. That afternoon, Chris caught us small trout in a stream with a line that he made out of something in a hook, and we cooked it over a fire, splitting that flaky meat with our own hands and drinking water that came from the

fast-moving streams, and it was better than any bottled mineral water on the market at the time. We checked the map every now and then, but mostly we moved pretty much on instinct, letting the forest guide us to potential campsites. Algonquin was huge, thousands of square miles, and we were deep in the middle of it, far from any roads or ranger stations. But that's exactly why we were there, you know. No safety net, just us and the great green beyond. The fourth day started just like the others. Chris was already awake and rolling up his ground sheet as I climbed out of my tent.

Then we ate the last of our granola, shouldered our packs, and started up north again. The forest was dense, and we didn't talk much. we just fell into step, with our feet being pretty much the only sound we could hear. Now around noon, we stopped at a narrow stream to refill our canteens. I knelt by the water, splashing some on my face when Chris tapped my shoulder. You see that? He asked, pointing off into the distance. And I followed his eyes, and there it was.

At first I couldn't see what he was pointing at, but then I saw it too. a shape, with too many straight lines to be natural. We grabbed our packs and moved closer, pushing through the underbrush. The trees started to part and there it was. A building, or more specifically, a church. The walls were old wood, gray and cracked like they've been standing for a hundred years or more. The roof was steep, covered in moss and fallen needles, with a rusted cross perched at the top. Another cross hung from the front door, which was boarded up and chained shut with a heavy padlock.

There was no steeple, no windows, just this worn, weathered box, half swallowed by the forest. I remember turning to Chris saying something like, what the hell? And he didn't answer. He just pulled out the map, spread it out on the ground, and began tracing our route with a single finger. And there was nothing where the church should have been. No marks, no symbols, no hint of anything man-made from miles in any direction. I remember saying how strange it was, seeing a church with no paths or roads leading to it, and far from any residential areas, too.

Chris folded the map up. His eyes were now fixed on the building, and he said something like, Let's check it out. We circled the structure, stepping over roots and ducking branches, and the chained-up door was the first thing that caught my house. my eye. The rust was very thick, and the padlock seemed untouched. It looked like no one had been here in forever. Then as we got around the side, we saw a hole where the rotten wood had been scraped away. It was low and very jagged, just big enough for a person to crawl through.

It's got to be an animal, Chris said, peering into the dark. Probably used this place as a den. And he was probably right. But when he shrugged off his pack and dropped down to his hands and knees, that's when I started to feel uneasy. I said something like, Are you kidding, dude? You want to crawl inside? And he says something like, duh. You don't want to see what's in there? I mean, I did, but I figured we could just shine our flashlights inside and then take a look from outside the hole. And I suggested that, but Chris ignored me, just dropped to his stomach and started wiggling through that gap. And I couldn't let him go inside alone, so, of course, I followed. I ditched my pack and followed him, the rough edges

scraping my shoulders as I crawled through that hole in the wood, and the air inside that church was damp, cold, and stale. We stood up in the dim light, brushing dirt off of our pants, and the place was completely empty. No pews, nothing. Just bare walls and a floor of packed earth littered with dry leaves. At the far end stood a huge wooden cross, but what really stopped me was in the center of the room. A steel trap door, partially covered in dirt,

and its edges bolted down and wrapped in thick chains. Another rusted padlock hung from the lynx sealing it tight. I stepped closer, staring at that trap door. It looks solid, no scratches, no markings, Just cold, dirty metal. Chris then walked over and knelt beside it, and the chains rattled as he gave them a tug. They were clearly solid.

I remember wondering out loud what might necessitate something like chains, and Chris looked up. Maybe it's not a church anymore, he said. Maybe it's some kind of hideout. Now, that much was obvious, but for what? And who? Chris stood up wiping his hands and said it could be anything. Cash, maybe, some smuggler's stash, or loot from a robbery, locked up and forgotten.

I mean, why else would be chained up like that? I just shook my head. A bunch of cash seemed like a stretch, and it could just as easily be something dangerous. Nuclear waste, chemicals, something toxic people didn't want found. I think I made a pretty good point, but Chris just wasn't hearing me out. his eyes had this sort of edge to it like he'd already decided what he was going to do we got to get in there man he said heading for the hole and the woods outside let's find something to break the chains i yelled for him to wait and then grabbed his arm but he yanked free and crawled out anyways and i just scrambled after him now outside chris started pacing around the church kicking at the ground i asked what he was doing even though i already knew and got the exact answer I expected. I told you, I'm looking for a rock, he said.

Something heavy enough to smash that lock. But the forest floor was flat there, just needles and small stones and nothing big enough for what he needed. I said he was acting stupid, that even if something was down there, it was a crazy idea to try and go get it. I told him that if he was right and there was cash or jewels locked away in there, they might belong to some gang member, in which case, stealing from someone like that would be like signing our own death warrants. Again, I thought I made a pretty good point. But it was like

Chris couldn't hear me. I'd never seen him like that before. He was a spontaneous kind of guy, but he wasn't stupid. I asked him to stop, but again, he just ignored me. I'll hike till I find something, he shouted, striding off into the trees. I don't care how long it takes. And that's when I snapped. I ran after him, grabbed his shoulder and spun him around, and I asked him what the hell had gotten into him. And he shoved me back, and then we started wrestling. He might have been taller, but Chris, he was much skinnier, and it was hard work, but I had to shove him against a tree before anyone got hurt. I yelled at him to stop again, to just effing stop, and then suddenly, it was like he could hear me again. It was like he came too.

He froze and then let go of me and I stumbled back. Both of us were breathing heavily from kind of tussling for a bit there, and I asked again, what the hell had gotten into him? And he looked up, and his face at this point was pale and sweaty, and he said he didn't know. And I was just like, talk to me, man. What's going through your head right now? You didn't eat?

Chris repeated that he didn't know, and then after a second said that he couldn't stop thinking about that trap door, what might be down there, felt like he needed to know. It was the adventure he was looking for. He looked kind of distant as he spoke to, rubbing his temples like he had some type of headache. And I crouched beside him, feeling the adrenaline fade as I asked if he was good to keep moving. He nodded and we just went back to grab our packs and then we put that weird church behind us. And the rest of the trip though felt kind of off. We camped two more nights and stuck to our routine, hiking,

foraging, boiling water, but that spark and excitement for being out there was clearly gone. I kept watching, Chris, waiting for that weird energy to reappear, but thankfully it didn't. He was a little quiet, but otherwise back to normal. And by the time we hiked out and drove back to Toronto, he was cracking jokes again like nothing weird had even happened. We started calling that church the cellar stash, turning it into some story that we'd laugh about over beers, but whenever I thought about it alone, it never felt all that funny to me. And back home, life slipped back to normal. I went back to my boring office job. Chris went

back to working in kitchens, and we'd still meet up for drinks to plan our next camping trip. And whenever we did, the subject of the church would always come up, but it was always light and there was always a punchline. I'd ask him if he remembered losing it over that trap door and he'd just kind of grin, shaking his head and say something like, of course I'd do. It would be millionaires right now if it wasn't for you. We'd laugh and then change the subject, but neither of us ever suggested going back. In fact, we steered clear of that part of Algonquin altogether from there on out. It's kind of ironic, given how it was Chris that it seemed so suddenly and unexplainably obsessed with it.

And not for me, but over time I realized that I couldn't get that church or the trap door out of my head. I just kind of lie awake some nights picturing it. The gray door, the rusted crosses, the trap door sealed with its chains and padlocks. Chris's theories were wild. Cash, jewels, but I wasn't buying it. Something about the place felt wrong, like it was something way more sinister than some crook's secret staff. I'd think about how Chris acted, how he had that manic edge in his eyes that I'd never seen before, and wondered if it was just him or if it was something in the church or us hiking.

I don't know. It did something to him, though. And then the months passed, and then a year, and Chris never showed another sign of cracking, and to this day, he's been solid as a rock. We went on other trips, smaller ones, closer to home, and it was like a sort of an unspoken agreement that Algonquin was off the table. I'd scroll through forums sometimes, looking for anything about a church in the park, but nothing seemed to match, no records or stories, and it was almost like that place didn't actually exist.

And maybe it didn't, not officially anyway. Maybe someone built it out there, away from everything for a reason we'd really never know about, long, long ago. And I'd tell myself it was just an old ruin, a relic of some forgotten time and that me and Chris had just overreacted. But then I remembered the chains and the way that they'd sort of gleamed in the light and the hairs in the back

my neck standing up. Chris moved on, or at least he seemed to, he'd talk about the trip like it was nothing, like the church was just a weird blip. I played along and kept it light, but deep down I knew that we brushed up against something that we weren't meant to find.

I never told him how much it still bothered me, how I dreamed about that trap door some nights and how I sometimes wandered if we dodge something worse than we realized. And it's been years now, and we are still friends. He's the same Chris, loud, stubborn, and loyal, and I don't think he dwells on it too much, but me, I don't think I'll ever fully let it go, hence why I sent it here. And that church, I know it's still out there. I'm sure of it, standing silent among those trees and whatever's chained up under that trap door. I sincerely hope. It stays there.

So just for clarity, I'm British. So just for clarity, I'm British, and I have a bit an unusual job. I go from place to place usually at night all around the country, fixing vending machines, jukeboxes, and arcade cabinets. My company hires and trains people to fix any of these devices that someone might rent for their public space. 95% of my work is vending machines. Usually some crap like a pack of space raiders had gotten stuck in the prongs and nobody's confident enough to give it a good thwack. I don't advise that anyway. It voids your warranty. Now, anyways, sometimes it's more fun though, and I get called halfway across the country to fix Mario Kart. If I'm really lucky, it's a classic arcade cabinet, an actual honest-to-god 80s one that's still

functioning. These things are surprisingly robust and mostly just need a bit of maintenance. Tonight's job was in a motorway service station that's attached to a much bigger mall. After hours, Only the service station area was open, which was a large open-plan room with a row of fast-food kiosk, a side room with a few arcade machines, a corridor leading to public toilets, and then a big crate that would normally lead into the now-darkened mall. I pulled into the car park. The huge unlit mall loomed over like a squat brick house, and honestly, the lights of the service station area were really welcome at that point. I've been driving for hours. I was frazzled and craving a cup of garbage vending machine coffee. The car park had a few vehicles in it. I grabbed my bags out of the back of the van and headed into the service station.

It was warm and smelled of McDonald's, very lush. My stomach rumbled, but the rule is no food until after I'd done the job. I grabbed a cup of black coffee with two sugars from the vending machine and headed over to the job, which in this instance was a two-player Mario Kart arcade. GP cabinet. One of the seats had come loose and one of the wheels had some drift to it, so I just needed to do a bit of maintenance. I got the job done in half an hour, quicker than I'd anticipated, and I'm pretty single-minded, so I hadn't really taken in my surroundings until this point. I guess I'm not one of those constantly hyper-aware true-crime buffs who sometimes

write in, who assess every possible threat. There were three fast-food kiosks, which seemed to be staffed by just one person, a bored-looking middle-aged man with tattoos running up his gloved arms. In the back corner sat a group of people in hoodies who, I guessed, were teens, and then at a table in the middle sat two women, maybe early 20s. They seemed nice, so I smiled and nodded to them and then headed over to grab my usual Filet of Fish meal order. Yeah, I'm the one who orders that. I got the food from the grumpy fast food worker, sat down, and began chowling down on my fries. I was about half. halfway through the meal when the group in the corner got up from where they'd been huddling.

When they stood, I could see that they were all decently tall, except for one of them who was particularly short. Nothing unusual, just notable, and made me doubt that they were actually teenagers anyways. My heart fell when I saw that they were all wearing masks. Again, nothing ridiculous, just scarf-type masks pulled right below their eyes, and hoodies pulled down low. You know, the usual picture of the British tabloids paint of knife-crime hoodie youths. In my experience, though, that's mostly scaremongering and blusters, so if anything, I thought this was a wind of. At least I really hope so, as the group of four made their way over to my table. They stood there facing me, no speaking, nothing.

Can I help you, fellas? I asked, and I was trying to sound polite and not rattled, and I'm not exactly some weakling, but I'm not eager for a fight either. I was trying to catch the eye of the girls at the center table to see if they were in on it or anything, and the hoodie gang stared at me. Then one of them lunge forward and shove the table. Not hard, but enough to try and make me jump. Absolutely classic school bully behavior. All right, lads. I'm just trying to wind down after work. Don't want any trouble. Be on your way now. I thought I heard one of them giggle like that was hilarious. the one who shoved the table leaned in and said you got a problem mate he hissed okay they were angry

little lads with something to prove no mate just trying to eat my burger no mate just trying to eat my burger he echoed just trying to eat my burger one of the other tall ones said the third tall one slammed a gloved fist down on the table, and my drink toppled over, and I caught it before it could hit the floor. Come on, lads, I said, it's not worth it, is it? I hadn't noticed the short one circling around behind me while the others distracted me. Hands fell on my shoulders. Not worth it.

The voice was quiet, and I couldn't tell you if it was a girl or a little kid. My gut says that it was probably a kid, maybe both. probably why I didn't immediately respond with a swift over-the-shoulder elbow. All right, forget this, I said standing up. The hoodie behind me had to jump backward to avoid getting hit by the cheap service station chair. I grabbed my bags and made my way to the entrance, and of course that gang followed me. O'y, bud, I'm sticking around. They jeered, but I was over it.

I dealt with my fair share of schoolyard bullies and, well, obviously school, but it was way too old for this bollocks, even if it meant abandoning a McDonald's. And as we walked into that car park, I hoped that the service station worker would have the sense to lock the doors behind the gang, or maybe these kids were known to the service station folk, I suppose. Maybe this kind of thing happened here all the time. And as I fumbled at my van for the key, I saw the two women looking at us from the window. The gang were in the middle of the car park about five or six meters away from me and they were just watching me i didn't want to turn my back on them by going to the back of the van so i opened the passenger door and threw my bags onto the seat

keeping my eye on them i did slip a socket wrench out of one of the bags though and hit it up my sleeve all right i'll be off lads i said backing around the van to the driver's side i thought it would probably be better to keep engaging them instead of acting too scared keep up the bull craft I guess. And they stood there and just simply watched as I got into the van, and I gunned that engine and put it into reverse, and I thought that I was going to get away Scott-free. Then suddenly, they charged toward the van, just ran at the bonnet, slapping on it, hooting and hollering like some hyenas, and I jumped visibly, and they just laughed harder.

They had no fear at all that I might just drive into them or anything, so I slammed down on the pedal and peeled backwards in a use shape through the almost empty. car park and drove off. They chased me as I turned, slapping and banging on the side of the van a few times and then sank back into the darkness. Maybe I should have just run them over, but I bet that would have worked out worse for me than them, especially if one of them really was some kid. I stopped at a later service station to see if any damage had been done, and there was a big, thin gash along the side of the van. It definitely looked like it had been scraped with a knife. I spoke to my boss and then did call the cops, who said that there was always trouble at that service station and they'd swing by.

I never heard anything about it, though. The thing that terrifies me is that I'm not convinced they intended to let me get away. The way they lost control at the end there, like these wild beasts. I'm certain if I'd gotten out to confront them, I wouldn't have been leaving that service station in one piece. I've been looking forward to that I've been looking forward to that camping trip for weeks. Myself, Craig and Tanner, my buddies, had planted out, nothing really fancy. It was really just supposed to be a night in the woods.

We picked a spot in the middle of nowhere, out in Tennessee, somewhere deep in the back country where the trees were thick and the rows were complete dirt. And it was just us, our tents, some beers, and a fire. It was pretty simple, the kind of thing that we'd done a hundred times growing up. I figured it would be a good time, and it was until the morning. We got there late in the afternoon. The sun was already dropping down, and, We set up camp quick, pitched the tent, gathered some wood, and got a fire going.

The night was going smooth, and the woods were pretty quiet. We sat around, drinking and laughing, just sitting around the crackle of the fire, keeping us company. And it felt good to be out there, away from work and the noise of town. And when I woke up, the fire was just down to ashes, and the sky was gray, and we could see that early morning light coming in. Craig and Tanner were still all cold, so I crawled out of the tent, stretched my legs and then figured that I'd get some coffee going. I walked over to my truck to grab the pot from the back, and that's when I saw it. There was a skin, some kind of animal skin, stretched out across the hood of my truck.

It wasn't just tossed there. It was laid out flat, like someone had taken their time spreading it. The fur was gone, scraped completely off, and the underside was raw and pink, just glistening. and wet. Blood streaked down the windshield, thick and dark and already starting to dry at the edges. I couldn't tell what it was. Maybe a deer, maybe something smaller. The head was gone and the legs were cut off and jagged like they'd been hacked with a doll blade. And it stank. That sour, meaty smell that gets in your nose and just stays there. And all I could do was freeze, just staring at it as my hand started to get all shaky.

I looked around half expecting someone to be standing there watching me, but the woods were dead still. No birds, no wind, nothing, just me and that thing on my truck. I kicked the tent to wake Craig and Tanner. They stumbled out groggy, but when they saw it, their faces went white. We didn't say much. We didn't need to. Something was clearly very wrong. We tore down camp fast, threw everything in the back of the truck without folding it up. I grabbed a stick and pushed that skin off the hood. It hit the ground with a wet slap and I didn't look at it again. We piled in and I floored it down the road, tires kicking up dust and the whole way I kept checking the rear view like something might be chasing us. But there was nothing there and I really

couldn't shake that feeling though. And we didn't talk about it much on the drive back. Craig kind of just stared out the window and Tanner kept messing with his hands, picking at his nails and I just focused on the road, trying to keep my mind blank and avoid whatever was back there. And when we got to town, we split up pretty quick. I went back home, washed the blood off of my truck with a hose, and stood there watching as the red kind of just swirled down the driveway. It really didn't feel real, but my gut wouldn't settle. And later that day, I started asking around to see if anyone knew anything. This guy, Mr. Harris, at the gas station, gave me a look when I mentioned it, and he said that he'd heard stories of people finding skin animals left on their cars or porches

out in the deep woods, said that it had been happening off and on for years. No one knew who did it, but folks figured it was some type of warning, a message for outsiders or people who didn't belong. Harris said he'd seen it himself once, way back in the 80s when he'd camped too far out. He woke up to, I guess, a skinned rabbit on his cooler and apparently never went back again. I didn't sleep much that night, and I just kept picturing that skin the way it was stretched out all careful, and I eventually got online and started digging. I found posts for people all over, all the same stories, these skinned animals left in the night, always in these remote spots. Some said it was hunters gone crazy or pranksters, and others thought it was something older,

something tied to the land. One guy swore that he'd seen figures moving in the trees after it happened to him, but he didn't stick around to find out more. And the more I read, the worse it got. People talked about feeling watched, hearing noises after they got home, like whatever did it wasn't done with them. And I told myself it was nothing. Just some sick joke, maybe kids messing around, but I really couldn't shake it.

And I don't know who did it or what they wanted. Maybe we'd cross some line, camp somewhere we shouldn't have. Maybe it was random. But I know it wasn't an animal that skin that thing and put it on my truck. I haven't been camping since, and I don't think I ever will. Craig and Tanner pretty much feel the same way. We haven't really talked about it much, but it's there, pretty much looming over us. And I still drive that truck, but every time I look at the hood, I still see that skin. I keep the doors locked now, and I don't know if it'll have it'll have ever stop. All I know is that I ain't going back in those deep woods ever again. a country where certain bad things are even more taboo than they are in the West. We do not like to

speak about them, and one such time was in this tale told me by my mother. In my municipality, there was a local shopping center that had recently been torn down, and I remember that when I was small, I used to visit this mall, and it was filled with smiling, laughing faces, people buying things, having a good time. I remember there was a food court on the bottom floor with all sorts of sights and smells that captivated my young mine. Cookies baking in a kiosk that smelled delicious and cuisine from all over the world. I love going to that mall, running about and looking at all the stores. And I recall this huge spread of goods and services, from colorful children's toys to beautiful clothes we dreamed of wearing someday. And to me as a child, this mall seemed like

a magical wonderland and trips there with my mother, father, and siblings or with friends and their parents were always very special and happy times. Now, when I was about six, we were told that the shopping center would be closing down, and I remember crying. I knew my father worked there, and I believed that the mall closing would mean that he would lose his job. But no, he did not work for the mall itself. He was the manager of a chain store inside, and he had recently been promoted anyway. I soon forgot about my sadness, the mall, and moved on to other things as I grew up. It was only years later, returning home to visit my parents and seeing the news of the center's final fate, the demolition of the long abandoned building, that I learned the true story of the mall's closure.

It happened in the summer, shortly after the mall had closed the public for the night. This shopping center was small, but very tall. There were perhaps six stores on each floor with the food court taking up almost all of the bottom level. The next floor held toys and electronics and fun things, and above that was clothing and home goods, and finally on the top floor, some office space in a single stationary store I remember finding sort of exciting. The center of the shopping mall was open to the skies with a large sculpture roughly in the middle, and on a bright day, the sun would catch the sculpture just right, casting a sort of rainbow effect. And because of the dizzying height and the open design of the central column,

each floor had strong reinforced glass to prevent anyone from falling to their doom. And I remember looking through the glass on the top floor, not even tall enough to look fully over the side, sort of craning my neck to try and see all the way down to the bottom. Of course I couldn't, but I remember that the balcony's walls were higher than my head, so they must have come up to about chest height for an average adult man. The store my father managed was a sort of menswear shop on the third tier. That summer, the company he worked for had recently collaborated with a notable fashion designer,

and a product release party was held in his store. It was just a small affair with a handful of fashion journalists and photographers and a select group of customers invited for early access to the products. And that's why there were maybe 15 people in my father's store that evening after closing time. My mother cannot explain why she stepped out of that store at that moment. She recalls needing some air, but she's never been the type to need some air. She says that she's been outside no more than a minute when the body fell from the sky. He was not close to her, but rather directly opposite across the central opening of the mall.

A man fell seemingly from nowhere. He was wearing a brown business suit, and as he fell, his jacket flapped like wings and his tie cracked almost like a whip. About three quarters of the way down, one of his shoes came off and veered off course, perhaps from the flailing of his legs. His face showed first shock, and then terror, and then he vanished from my mother's view. He didn't scream, and my mother made a point of this to say that, the man didn't yell, cry out, or scream. He just uttered no sound at all.

Then he hit the ground, a hard, solid floor from a great height. My mother won't say more about what followed, but I do know that when a body falls from that height, it is no longer a body when it hits the ground. And I know that what remains spreads out so far and wide that it's easier to close down a mall forever than try to clean it all away. And that is not the only reason that the mall closed forever that night. The man who fell was the proprietor of the mall itself. Apparently the mall had been suffering from severe financial difficulties, and the management company was on the verge of bankruptcy.

What this would have meant for the mall or for the stores operating within it, I'm not sure. It was deemed a terrible accident that the mall's proprietor fell from the top floor, over a chest-high balcony railing on a night when the mall should have been closed but wasn't. Perhaps he forgot that and was leaning over to adjust to clean something when he slipped. Perhaps contrary to what authorities believed, he was not alone that night. or perhaps something else happened, deliberate and personal. But out of respect for the deceased's family and a place like the one I grew up in when a tragedy like this occurs, you learn what is and isn't okay to speculate about.

All that's left behind is an abandoned building, now reduced to rubble, and the memory of the man who fell from the sky. Hey, friends, thanks for listening. Don't forget to hit that follow button to be alerted of our weekly episodes every Tuesday at 1 p.m. EST. And if you haven't already, check out Let's Read on YouTube, where you can catch all my new video. releases every Monday and Thursday at 9 p.m. EST. Thanks so much, friends, and I'll see you in the next episode.