The Lets Read Podcast - 62: Episode 055 | Crazy Homeless Guy & Paranormal Proof Stories | 25 True Scary Horror Stories

Episode Date: February 10, 2020

Welcome to the fifty-fifth episode of The Lets Read Podcast! This podcast includes narrations of true creepy encounters submitted by normal folks just like yourself. Today you'll experience horrifying stories about Crazy Homeless People & Proof of the Paranormal from Passed Loved Ones.  HAVE A STORY TO SUBMIT?► www.Reddit.com/r/LetsReadOfficial FOLLOW ME ON- ► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/letsread.official/ ► Twitter - https://twitter.com/LetsReadCreepy ►YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/letsreadofficial ♫ Background Music: Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFvrqVSJE8E PATREON for EARLY ACCESS!►http://patreon.com/LetsRead 

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whose daughters and in-laws were like my big sisters. Being the eldest child, I liked being baby by them since I was always expected to be the big sister for my little brother. I was maybe 11 years old or younger. Neither of my parents could remember when it exactly happened. I just want to say, as a kid I loved milk. I still do, though I tend to stick with skim milk now. When I was younger, I had a favorite local brand that had the usual strawberry flavor. The brand was called Ultra Milk. It was always cool that I was always drinking something pink. Unbeknownst to my parents, a gift basket had showed up to our doorstep and the maids had taken the gift, thinking it was a present from one of my mother's friends. My parents had even seen the gift basket and didn't think much of it. It was full of fruit, sweets, etc. The usual kind you send to someone maybe on a special

occasion. It should have been weird that there wasn't a special occasion but another weird part was that usually gift baskets had a card or something to indicate where it had come from but there was no indication from who it had come from but the maids had overlooked it and my parents didn't notice at the time. They had assumed that the head maid had checked it through. She didn't. In the gift basket there was my favorite tiny carton of my favorite milk, even strawberry flavored. I had lessons with a tutor and oftentimes the maid accompanying me to the lesson would bring me snacks or food since the tutoring would take a few hours. I was at my tutor's house and she was teaching me about the homework I got today

when I got thirsty and I got my carton of milk to take a sip out of it. I was ready to take a sip of extremely sweet artificially flavored strawberry milky goodness but something was wrong. It didn't taste right. I don't remember what it did taste like but I knew that it was wrong. I remember describing it to my parents that it felt like I licked the bottom of a foot of a metal-framed chair I had in my room at my desk. It just tasted awful. I think that maybe it was spoiled. My mom had warned me about drinking spoiled milk and how it can really upset your stomach. I immediately, without swallowing, grabbed some tissues at the table and spat out the mouthful into the tissue

and was surprised to see some sort of weird metallic beads in it. Like metal, but it was liquid. I had never seen anything like it, and I was confused. My tutor was even more confused and horrified that I had just spat out a strange metallic substance from my mouth. I didn't really understand what was going on but my tutor asked to take my carton of milk where I had tried to drink from and told me to just continue working while she went to investigate. Apparently my tutor and her head maid went outside and poured a bit more of the milk into a tissue and there were more of this weird metal liquid in there. She asked me if I had drank any of it, and I told her that maybe I took maybe a sip and swallowed before I realized that something bad was in there.

After that, my tutor apparently called my mom and told her that I had been possibly poisoned. I went home, without finishing my lesson, becoming slightly concerned that maybe something was wrong. I went home and I don't really remember what happened after that. There wasn't a poison center in my country and no emergency services that would really respond. Third world country and all of that. So my parents took me to a doctor to have blood tests. I remember being pulled out of school. My mom wanted me to stay home from school for the next few days which was great for me. No one told me the severity of the situation and my mom just told me that she wanted me to chill at home for a while. No school? I get to

have fun? No way. So I did. I stayed home and watched Avatar The Last Airbender on DVD while my parents were fretting over the idea that I might have been poisoned by mercury. The gift basket, which had already been taken apart and stored to eat for later, it was all reassembled and my parents tried to go with this to the police but they really couldn't do anything since we literally had no leads on where the gift basket came from since I had no card and the police couldn't really care less about our situation. Again, third world country. I don't really know what happened other than that I was pretty cool with staying home and playing. My life at home wasn't perfect. I got some issues with my parents but they were really nice to me

during this time so I enjoyed it a lot since I didn't really understand. I think my parents but they were really nice to me during this time so I enjoyed it a lot since I didn't really understand. I think my parents kept a lot of things from me to keep me from getting scared. My parents even took me overseas to Singapore even taking the liquid found in the carton with them in a tin or whatever to show the doctors there where I got tested some more and didn't seem to have any signs of poisoning. I didn't swallow enough of it. I'm not really sure if it really was mercury, no one had ever told me, but at the end of the day everyone was glad that I didn't drink enough of it to get affected by whatever it was. Now to get into the suspect part, the parents later told me that they had a sneaking suspicion

that it was possibly that great aunt Sheila was the one who tried to poison me. I didn't know this at the time but around the time of this incident, grand aunt Sheila was found to have stolen gold and jewelry from my parents' store for years worth thousands. My parents were furious, wanted to report her to the authorities but my grandma, her sister, loved her too much and instead just cut contact with her. Since then, Grandaunt Sheila had seemed to want to enact vengeance over being caught and has been trying to get back to us. My mom had warned me that I couldn't play with my big sister's, Grandaunt Sheila's daughters anymore since they

did something very bad and I'd never get into a car with them if they showed up at my school, but it didn't click in my mind until now. Thinking back, Grand Aunt Sheila was close enough to me to know that I love drinking milk and maybe tried to hurt my family, even if it meant hurting her grandniece, not sure what I would be to her. We can never confirm if it was her, but Grandaunt Sheila had continued to be a thorn in my family's side for years now. Though my parents have learned a lesson and ensured that whenever we received a gift basket, there had to be a name on it. My grandmother doesn't believe her sister did it though, but my parents firmly believe that she will be responsible. But we had no proof other than her horrible character.

We've received weird gifts like black seeds and hair that was supposedly some sort of witchcraft thing. Witchcraft and sorcery is popular in Indonesia, believe it or not. We assumed that this was all from Grandaunt Sheila, who still lived in the same city as us. It only made sense. My grandparents never bought me the Ultra Milk brand again, which I was okay with since that moment spoiled the Ultra Milk brand to me. I was reminded of this story while drinking strawberry milk the other day, different brand, and I'm no longer living in Indonesia, not in the same country as Grand Aunt Sheila. Even so, to Grand Aunt Sheila or whoever was the one that tried to spike a carton of strawberry milk to poison an 11-year-old girl, you truly are sick and demented. Fifteen years ago I had the misfortune of meeting Dave. I was new to riding the bus to school and when my first day came I hopped on and took a seat towards the front. I didn't happen to

know anyone on the route and sat by myself with my headphones in, rocking some now classic Good Charlotte. Back then, I didn't get much attention from the opposite gender, but could feel eyes burning in the back of my head. I turned a couple of times to look behind me and that's when I saw Dave. He had light eyes, brown curly hair and quickly looked away every time I caught him staring. This went on for about a week before he finally said something to me. He told me I had nice hair and he liked my band t-shirts. He asked right off the bat if I would be his girlfriend. I said absolutely not.

I didn't even know him and his creepy staring made me so uncomfortable. He brushed past my quick no and told me there was a newly instituted hug toll that needed to be paid before getting on and off the bus. I stared at him as he blocked the center aisle and gave him a half-hearted one-armed hug. I know, I know. Why would you hug the guy when you felt like he was a creep? Well, I had pointed him out to a few people in school and everyone I talked to said he was the nicest person they'd ever met and just a bit of an odd duck. Back then, I was worried about hurting anyone's feelings or being seen as rude, so I went with it. I have brothers on the spectrum. Maybe he is too, I thought. Next thing I know, Dave has joined my photography class.

My after school programs. I saw him around every corner and every hallway of the school. He started popping up from behind things to try and hug me and tickle me. Meanwhile, everyone just kept going with the chorus of he's a super sweet guy and just an odd duck nonsense. When I found out he was telling people that I was his girlfriend, I knew I needed to put my foot down. It was around this time I became unwilling to pay the hug toll and feed his delusions. That's when things really took a turn. Suddenly, anonymous notes were popping up in my locker. Most of the notes said always and nothing else. Some had longer declarations of love but the always ones got me the most. The simplicity of the message gave me chills. Always. I knew it had to be Dave. My suspicions were confirmed when

pictures of me began showing up along with the notes. The pictures were all taken from a slight distance and clearly without my knowledge. They were black and white and developed on the same type of paper we use in photo class. I knew it had to be Dave. Who else would be doing this? I finally got scared one Saturday afternoon as I was watching TV in my bed. I heard Dave's voice next to my bedroom window. He said he watched me walk home one day to see where I lived and wanted to stop by for a visit. He said I knew I wouldn't let him in so he figured he would just stop by my window to talk.

How he knew which window was mine was a thought that chilled me even more. The way this was escalating I knew I needed to get an adult involved. My mom thought I was exaggerating. He was just young and infatuated and hormonal according to her. She acknowledged the notes and pictures as weird but nothing other than some serious infatuation. So I went to an instructor at the school I knew I could talk to and laid it all out on the table. Mr. K had also had Dave as a student and noticed some of his quirks and obsessive behavior and didn't doubt my story for a moment. He spoke to Dave's guidance counselor and they both sat down with Dave and,

I assume, told him he was making me uncomfortable and to stop. This made Dave mad. He stormed up to me in the lobby of the school with the glass rose in his hand and threw it at the wall behind me. It shattered and he screamed in my face about how I had broken his heart just like the rose. A few teachers broke up the situation. A few days later he dropped out of school and I went 8 years without seeing Dave. 8 years later I was craving some mac and cheese as one does and hit up a popular spot in town to grab some to go. I look behind the counter and there's Dave. I had no idea he was working there and debated leaving for a moment. I decided to stay in line

to get my food. High school was so long ago I hadn't heard from him since that day in the lobby surely this guy could not still have this obsession with me it was a huge relief when another register opened and a young woman could take my order I wondered if maybe he was even more mortified and didn't want to interact with me and had her open wrong again he seemed to take my visit to work as a sign that I was ready to love him. At least that's what I've been told since. I got a friend request from him that night and immediately deleted the request. A few nights later I'm getting home and walking across the street when I see that someone is standing on the side of my house opposite the door in the shadows. I haul it into my house, lock everything and watch. It's so dark

out but I turn on the lampposts out front and hope to god I was just imagining things. Then I see him. He slinks from the side of the house trying to stay in the shadows and runs across the street and towards the house he grew up in. Unfortunately for him, I saw his stupid curly brown hair. I called the police and reported this but of course there wasn't much they could do. There was no proof. He hadn't approached me or tried to get in. It couldn't be proven it was him. They did agree to keep someone on lookout in the area and I saw police patrolling more than usual the following nights. Eventually, the police patrol died down and that's when the late night knocking began. I could hear it softly on the windows and occasionally on the back door but never dared to

answer or get close enough to look. It wasn't every night, maybe two or three nights a week. The police never seemed to be close enough in the area when it happened to catch him. A couple of weeks after the knocking began I received an envelope wedged into my screen door. It was full of the creepy candid pictures from high school and another note that said always. I had had enough and didn't know what to do. I went out to my car to drive everything down to the police. I don't care if I couldn't prove it was him, I just wanted to have some official record of what was happening to me. That's when I saw the word always carved into my back bumper. I lost it,

breaking down in heavy sobs as I drove to the police station. Again, all they could do was take a report but I decided on another course of action. In my rage, I took a picture of the police station sign and of the report being filed. I sent them to Dave over Facebook Messenger. I told him to leave me alone, that the police were involved and he didn't want to ruin his life this way. He simply responded, you're right, and disappeared. I've since heard he stalked a widow shortly after her husband had passed, pounding at her windows and doors trying to break in until she screamed out of a top window that she was calling the police.

I can only imagine how she felt trying to grieve her husband and deal with Dave's obsessive ways. You may find yourself wondering if the mac and cheese was worth it. The answer is no. It wasn't warm enough and it came with a side of stalker. This happened when I was probably 7 or 8. I don't remember all the details, but I do remember some really messed up stuff. When I was a kid, I lived in a pretty sketchy neighborhood. We lived in those long apartments, the ones that are attached to the sides rather than stacked on top of each other. The front of the apartments faced the main road and there was a little side street to access the parking and backyards of the apartments. Behind the apartment was a massive field. It was super overgrown, so much that it was almost a little forest and my friends and I used to go back there

to build hobbit holes in the grass. My mom hated it when we went out there because there were some rough people that lived in the neighborhood, and she didn't like a group of seven-year-olds playing out where people also shot up, so... One day, I was out in the woods by myself just exploring and pretending to be Indiana Jones or something. As I was coming out of the tall grass I could see the little back alley in between the parking and houses in the woods and I saw a deer lying in the grass. I thought it was just sleeping so I crept up on it to try to scare it. I know, not cool. When I got there I knew something was off. The deer was so still and it smelled horrible. I couldn't see its face as its back was facing me but when I got up to it I nearly had a heart attack when I saw that its

entire stomach was ripped open and all of the insides were spewed around the ground. I wasn't a smart kid but I knew that this was messed up. When I turned to run back home to tell my mom, I saw a second deer nailed to the tree next to the first deer. I don't know how I didn't notice this before but its two front hooves were nailed above its head to the tree. The stomach was also cut open and the ribs had been broken open to expose the gaping hole. As I stood there staring at it, a car drove past on the little alley. I remember it was a white car with tinted windows and was driving really slowly. I mean, everyone drove slowly on this alley because it was a residential street, but these people were barely even moving. I couldn't see inside, but I got the sinking

feeling that they were just watching me. Obviously I can't be sure that they were the ones who mutilated the deer but I'm like 99% sure it was them. Once they were gone I booked it home and told my mom the whole thing. She told me not to go in that field anymore and I happily agreed. I didn't particularly enjoy seeing the deer's insides and I would have loved to have just forgotten about the whole thing for the next month or so I saw that car everywhere it would drive up to the main road while I was playing on the front yard it would drive down the back alley when I would be in the backyard and I even remember seeing it at the grocery store when my mom and I went shopping that could have just been another

tinted windowed white car but they were definitely stalking the house. It was always the white car, always the tinted windows and always driving way too slowly to be normal. I told my mom about it but she chalked it up to just being a neighbor down the road or something. One day my mom was out mowing the front lawn. Because of the way the apartments were set up she had to push the lawnmower around all of the apartments to get to our backyard. Being the helpful little kid I was I was going to meet my mom out back to open the gate for her so she could put the lawnmower in the little shed. As I'm walking out to the gate I see the car come along the back alleyway.

Normally, the car slows down. As soon as it turned the corner, however, the driver stepped on the gas and zoomed up to me. The back door closest to me opened and someone got out and started running toward me. I don't remember what he looked like or even if it was a he, I just remember hauling it back into the house and peeing myself the whole time. After that my dad yelled at me for wetting myself and neither he nor my mom believed me about the guy in the car. I never saw him again after that and we moved a few months later. My parents still think I made the whole thing up even though they know how sketchy the neighborhood was. I don't remember anyone going missing around that time in my town and I didn't find anything when I googled it but it was really messed up and I have no idea who these people in the car were,

why they mutilated the deer or what they had planned for me. So I have a friend who had just recently been getting into these entitled parents stories. We eventually started talking about them and would laugh at the sheer stupidity of Darwin's failed experiments until last week. She began to be more and more quiet when I finally pressed her. She revealed that she had been coming across some of the stories of attempted kidnapping and they reminded her of a night years ago. She never made a reddit account so she asked me if I could post her story. After telling me what happened we're both still not sure if it fits here or not. Many moons ago in the early 2000s, my friend Sarah was going to the local state college. Now, while the college was in the city, she lived out in the

country with her father and would use the bus system to go to and from school. One afternoon after class, her and her friends went to one of the apartments to study for some exams. While being the young and responsible young adults that they were, studied for maybe 10 minutes before things turned to a more festive gathering. After a few hours, Sarah happened to glance at the clock which caused her mind to snap. Hey, idiot, what time's that last bus run? Screaming profanities and prayers warding off her demise by her father, she quickly ran to the bus stop just in time to catch its final trip of the night.

With a huge sigh of relief, she flopped down into a seat in the back and threw her headphones on, lost in thoughts of what elaborate tales to tell her father. She hadn't noticed the little boy walking up to her until she noticed movement out of the corner of her eye as he sat down beside her. She somehow managed not to recoil at the sight of the child because while the child was completely filthy and reminded her of someone from Deliverance, it was his creepy smile that she remembered the most. He just sat there smiling at her until she slowly slid her headphones down and the following interaction began. Hello? Hello? Hello? You're pretty. Well, thank you. What's your name? Now, Sarah had this policy of never giving any personal info to strangers but kids were usually harmless in her opinion. But every alarm was going off in her head.

Katie? That's a nice name. Oh, I like it. Then the kid just sat there smiling at her. After like a few minutes of smiling the kid finally said, You would make a great mom, and hopped down and walked back to an even more dirty and unkempt monster of a man, whom she could only be assured was the boy's father. Because just like his son, he was just smiling at her. When she looked at him, he nodded politely and kept smiling. She put her headphones back on and dug out a book to pretend to study,

but she kept looking back and noticed both of them just smiling right at her. As each stop came up and went, she prayed that they would get off, but as the bus began to empty of other passengers, she found it was just her, some middle-aged woman, and those two. The bus was beginning to slow for its next stop in a small town that had a series of restaurants. She couldn't take them anymore and decided that it was safer for her to go to the McD's and wait for her father than sit on that bus any longer. So she gathered her things and prepared to disembark. As she allowed the woman to pass, she noticed that the man was also gathering their things. Oh no, she thought.

But she didn't want to make it out like she was trying to avoid them, so she moved to the seat near the front and sat back down. To her horror, she watched as the man and his son took another seat and sat back down, still smiling at her and nodding. Her anxiety was through the roof at this point as she watched more stops come and go until her stop was coming up. What was she going to do? Her mind raced. As the bus came to her stop, she gathered her things again and watched in horror as the man gathered their things. Instead of getting off, she sat back down behind the driver.

How much further till the end of the line? Three more stops. Sarah then leaned in and told the driver about the man and her son and asked if it was possible to have the police there when they arrived. The driver looked into the mirror and then told her he'd take care of it. Sarah glanced back and her heart jumped into her throat as while the little boy was still smiling at her, the father wasn't. She described it as the look a parent gives their child when they've done something wrong and wait till we get home. Now Sarah was usually a very strong individual but she was in tears as she took out her phone and tried to

call her father. Voicemail. Who else could she call? She finally decided to call her ex. He may have been a disloyal idiot but she could always rely on him when it counted most. Please answer, please. Hello? Quietly as she could she poured her heart out about what was happening and asked if he could meet them at the last stop. I'm at Rogers right now and I'm about 20 minutes to get there, but I'll get there as fast as I can. Please hurry, she begged. Finally, they came over to Hill where the final stop was. Frantically, she looked for something, anything that could help her, but there was nothing. Finally, the bus pulled in and the door swung open. The man glared down at her, waiting for her to get off first. The driver said,

Hold up, miss. I need to talk to you about your bus pass. The man stood there for a moment until the driver told him this was the last stop and he needed to get off. I'm waiting for my... Sir, you need to get off. If you're waiting for her, she'll be along shortly, but I need you to get off now. Angrily, the man stomped off with his child in tow. As soon as they got off, the driver shut the door. What the? The man began yelling and banging on the door and Sarah was scared he was going to

break the glass until she noticed two police cars pulling in, followed shortly by the little junker Jack, her ex-stroph. The police ordered the man away from the bus and towards them and she couldn't hear what was being said. Jack later revealed that the man was claiming that Sarah was his daughter and he was taking her home. Once Jack asked him her name and he said Katie, that was all she wrote. In the end, the man got into a fight with Jack and the officers but was finally arrested. When she got home and told her father what had happened he tossed her the keys to his old 82 Ram and she was to never ride the bus again. While it was loud and a pain

to drive she never felt safer but she did ride the bus one final time after that when she delivered a plate of cookies to the driver who saved her life. I'm a woman in my mid-twenties who lives alone in a cozy flat in the attic area of an old Victorian building, up in the old servants' quarters where I belong. The design of the roof hanging over my window and the high drywall means that I can get some interesting acoustics. During the quiet night time the sounds bounce up from the whole long street, even from out of sight, and I can hear the footsteps and conversations of passerbys as crystal clear as if they were in the room with me, yet standing down in the driveway you can't hear them at all.

It was almost 4am and pitch dark outside. I had been finding it hard to sleep properly the last few nights so I was still up and pottering around in my PJs with the lights on. I had the windows cracked and the blinds half open to get some fresh air in. I usually keep them closed if I have a light on at night. You can see right up into them from the street and houses across which I sadly did not realize for my first couple of months here. Sorry to my neighbors if you saw me dancing and cooking in my underwear. However I was so flustered from not getting to sleep and desperate for air I thought everybody else would be snoozing. I had done the same for the previous three or four sleepless nights. I had just made some tea and settled down to read a book when I heard my door

buzzer ringing. I remember thinking it was odd that I had not heard anybody approaching as I was just sat by my window but I brushed it off as being sleep deprived. Nobody who visits me ever rings my door buzzer. They call my phone so I grab my phone to check if I had missed something from friends or family. Nothing. I ran to the window to look down at the porch but unfortunately I could only see the steps leading up to it. The motion sensor lights were on and I could hear a strange scuffling noise then some thuds. I figured somebody had called the wrong flap by mistake and was probably drunkenly stumbling around. Even with my rational

explanation, a strange sense of unease overwhelmed me. I felt on edge after I heard the thuds and turned my lights off so I could gawp through the blinds without being seen, and unfortunately couldn't see much. After a few minutes, the noises stopped and the motion sensor lights turned off, although I didn't see anybody come back down the steps. I figured I'd either miss them in the dark or the person they were looking for had let them in. After 20 minutes or so, I relaxed and turned my lamp back on to potter around again. About a minute later my buzzer rang again. This time it was ringing repeatedly as if someone was aggressively holding the button down.

I froze and stared at it for a while, unsure of what to do. It was starting to get annoying and I began to worry that it might actually be somebody I know who needs help. Why else would they be ringing my door past 4am in the morning? I plucked up the courage to answer, albeit with a shaky hand. Hello? I replied. I can hear somebody breathing heavily through the phone static. It sounded like a man. Who is this and what do you want? Again, no reply, just heavy breathing. I hung up thinking they got the wrong flat or the telecom was playing up again.

I stayed by the wall phone for a few moments staring at it, unsure what to do. The buzzer went off loudly again and I about jumped out of my skin as I was so tense. Who is this? Why do you keep calling me? All I can hear is static again. Thinking I was getting knocked down gingered, ding dong ditch for my US friends across the big pond, I went to hang up with the phone again. Just before I did, I could hear a muffled voice and I whipped the phone back to my ear and demanded to know who it was. What was that? Let me in. Huh? Who are you? Let me in. Please. Please. His voice starts breaking into a panic. I'm not letting you in. You haven't said who you are. There's people coming to get me.

They tried to jump me and I ran away. I'm not safe out here, please. You've got to let me in. Let me in. Help me, please. Immediately, I hung up the wall phone. There was no way I was letting a strange man into my building he wouldn't identify himself, especially as I had to leave the safety of my locked flat to physically go down to the front porch to open it. My gut told me that his story was nonsense, but on the

off chance it was true, I was worried there was about to be a crazy fight on my driveway. I grabbed my mobile phone and dialed 999 as I ran to turn my lights off and shut the blinds again, peeking out through the crack. The man had been ringing my buzzer non-stop since I hung up but shortly after I turned the lights out it stopped again. The weird shuffling and thumping noises on the porch started up again as I explained the situation to the emergency operator on the phone. She urged me to stay calm and stay on the porch started up again as I explained the situation to the emergency operator on the phone. She urged me to stay calm and stay on the phone with her and said that the police were already aware something was happening. Somebody else in my building had called earlier to say

that a man had been trying to break into the front door after trying on the ground floor windows down the side and back. They had had a similar call a few nights before too. That explains the weird noises I kept hearing and why I didn't hear him approaching from the street at the front. The noises had now stopped but I was beginning to panic hard. I asked the lady when the police would arrive. She said that they would send out a unit as soon as one was available, yay recent cuts to police funding, and to stay locked inside. After ten minutes of no activity outside and the motion light turning off, the lady said to stay in my flat with the door locked, sure, like I was going to do something else, and to call back if he reappeared, and they'd escalate it on their end if he made it into the building and she ended the

call. I sat by the window watching and sure enough a few minutes later the noises started again and the light below came on. I don't think he ever left or he went down the side to the car park at the back. I still couldn't see what was going on because of the angle from my window. I was about to call the police again when a taxi driver passing by slammed on his brakes and shouted out his window. I stopped to listen. Hey you, what are you doing over there? I dropped you off on the other side of town an hour ago.

The taxi driver knew this man. What a twist. Oh hey, I lost my keys. My friends live here and I'm just trying to get a hold of them to let me in. I see the shoulder and leg of the man come around the corner slightly. You told me you were going home to sleep it off and wouldn't be causing any more trouble like earlier. I asked you to get out and you begged me to drop you home still. So I did, and now you're not at home. I just said I had no keys to get in. I'm trying to stay with my friends. They live here. I could hear that the man was getting agitated,

and an edge was creeping into his tone as he lied again. So why are you skulking around this side, making a ruckus instead of ringing the bell. What's going on? What are you really doing? The man gets angry at this and storms down the driveway to confront the taxi driver. This is my first time getting a proper look at him, although I could only see the back of him. He looked like a normal, well-presented young guy with brown hair, black t-shirt, jeans and trainers. I was surprised based on his appearance. He would not be somebody I would normally think to avoid late at night. I couldn't really make out what was said next as they were both shouting over each other but I could hear the taxi driver yell police and the man suddenly leapt towards his car door.

The taxi driver quickly screeched off down the road leaving the man standing there swearing and seething. It was at this point that I realized I had been an idiot, frozen by the window watching this scene unfurl beneath me without calling the police to let them know he was back. I ducked down to pick up my phone, which I must have dropped amidst the commotion. As I spoke to a different operator the man turned around and strolled down the driveway a little bit but seemed to hesitate and stop, staring up at my building. I tried to get a good look at his face but it was too dark to make out much detail. He stood like this for about 10 minutes, just standing there and staring

up at my window, occasionally swaying from side to side. I knew rationally that he couldn't see me peeking out but I could swear he was staring right at me and knew I was there. He stopped looking at my window and turned to stare at the door for a few minutes. I was begging the emergency operator to get the police out here sooner as I was worried he was going to try the door again. However, I think the confrontation with the taxi driver made him lose his nerve and he was worried about the police showing up. I could hear him make an odd huffing, snorting noise of frustration as he turned and left my driveway, slowly walking down the street and out of sight. I updated the emergency operator with the direction he was headed off in and ended the call.

About ten minutes later, I saw a police car cruise by with its headlights off, heading the way he'd gone. Unsurprisingly, they never found him, as it had been too long and there were too many side streets and alleys around for him to slip away down. He didn't come back again but I stayed vigilant by that window until sunrise, crying my little eyes out and chain smoking. I didn't sleep properly for weeks afterwards and I kept extremely paranoid walking to and from my building now. I've stopped taking the bins down if the sun is even slightly setting. Luckily I had already begun

the process to move elsewhere for unrelated reasons so I only have to live here for a couple of more weeks before I move to a big house with friends. I liked living on my own before this. Now I'm very grateful to be losing my privacy to have some backup. Shout out to the brave taxi driver who stopped to confront him. You were more helpful than the local police and I don't know if he would have left if you had not scared him off. I wish I could ask you what had happened when you met that man earlier that night. The Story of a Woman have been during the winter because it was very cold every morning which isn't a usual thing where I lived. I remember being afraid every morning because it was very dark outside and I only had the light of the moon to guide me and back then cell phones didn't have flashlights that you can use to guide your way in the dark. There were only three other houses on my small street and

they were all on a big hill with paved driveways going down and meeting a gravelly road. The houses were arranged around a gravel cul-de-sac which many people used to turn around if they went down the wrong road. I live in a desert area so there were leafless mesquite trees and cacti around to where it was very reminiscent of a forest or dense flora area. It was so quiet that all you could hear were the bats fluttering around the one streetlight that decided to work on the off day, but usually it was just pitch black. Along with the yapping of coyotes and crickets chirping, other than that all I could hear was the crunching of the gravel beneath my feet. The first time I saw the man in the van I wasn't that surprised. A lot of the time we would

get these white vans passing through because they delivered the papers to the surrounding houses. I then started to realize that this van would stop right next to me when I was standing alone waiting for the bus to arrive. There was a stop sign there but there was no reason for the person in the van to be stopped there for 10 minutes until the bus picked me up. He must have started to get brave after that because he would roll his window down and ask me if I was cold. I'd say yes and ignore his presence and pretend like nothing happened. I just figured he was trying to be nice to me. He was an older Hispanic man in his 70s. Again, the next day he pulls up even closer to me. Are you cold? You look beautiful today. You look so cold. This time I just ignored him and waited

for the bus to pull up and I got in. I would watch his van pull away after my bus left. He kept doing this for two weeks until one day he looked at me through his window and said, I could use a pretty girl like you. It's cold outside. You must be so cold. Come inside my van and I'll keep you warm until your bus gets here. I looked at him in horror and luckily the bus pulled up a few seconds later and I decided I needed to tell someone about him. My dad is in law enforcement and I told my dad what had been happening. He asked me what he looked like and when the van would pull up. He said I should have told him sooner but he's glad I told him when I did. He called the police and I told the police what had been happening. They said they had similar reports in the area and that they would try and catch him.

The next day the police hid behind me where the cul-de-sac is and I stood in my usual spot where I stood for the bus. I remember that day the street light was finally working and I could see this man's face in the van. I didn't realize the officer was there until he made a full turn around the cul-de-sac and started towards me. The police turned their lights on and pulled him over. I could hear him yelling as the bus pulled in and I left for school. I could see the police lights glaring on the bus windows. The next day, my dad sat me down and told me that he had to talk to me.

Apparently, the man had many suspicious things in his van. He had duct tape, plastic bags, zip ties, condoms, lube, black trash bags, a machete, and some other strange things. He claimed to be a newspaperman and he would distribute the newspapers to my neighbors yet the police never found one newspaper in his van when they had searched it. My dad ran a background check on him and he had a CD passed. I'm not sure whatever happened to the man legally but he never showed his face on the street again. But whenever I stood there on the end of the street all I could think about is if he had gotten the courage to step out of his van that I would have no way to defend myself and no one would have heard from me again.

I'm a foreign student studying in a small town in Germany. At the time this particular event happened, however, I was still living in Berlin. I lived in an older apartment with an older lady who rented the unit to me. The kitchen connected the two apartments that she owns, so we technically live in separate units, but we share the kitchen. The star of our story is, however, not the lady. She is nice, I still talk to her sometimes. The apartment building is five stories high with a staircase, no elevator. We live in the second story. The lady who rented the unit to me has always had a problem with the neighbors right downstairs because they were always

very noisy, they fought a lot, and when they are on their balcony it always smells heavily of smoke. The neighbors downstairs are an older couple, probably in their late 50s or early 60s. I didn't know much about them except for their phone number and their names which the landlady scribbled on a piece of paper for me in case they got too loud so that I could call them. Turns out I never needed the number to get to know them. One afternoon as I was cooking the doorbell and the landlady's apartment rang but she was out and not long after that it rang on my side. So I thought it must be her guest trying to reach out or something. So I looked out the peephole and there stood some older lady so I thought it must be the landlady's friend. So I opened the door and to my surprise there stood the said lady without pants, as in

she was with a shirt but was in her underwear. Now at that point I was only in Germany for a couple of months so I wasn't really sure if this was normal and my German was also not that good. This lady was mumbling something that I could barely make out but since she rang the bell on the landlady's side first I assumed she was looking for the landlady and I tried telling her with the best German that I could that the landlady was out and we'll probably not be back until later but this lady stood there mumbling something I really could not understand her so I just shook my head apologetically and smiled so she began gesturing for apologetically and smiled. So she began

gesturing for me to come with her like she wanted to show me something. So I quickly turned off the stove and I followed her downstairs after grabbing my keys. She then started to ring a bell on the door right below us. Oh, so this is the neighbor. Then came another shock because after she repeatedly rang the bell, came a man to the door with no piece of clothing on except for his socks. I tried so hard not to make my weirded out face very apparent because I wasn't sure about German customs, yet at that point I didn't want to be rude, and so this must be the husband. She gestured for me to come in. I was starting to wonder what her actual intentions are calling me all the way down here. I thought it was something important for the landlady but she just offered me something to drink and I declined but she insisted on getting

me water anyway and walked into the kitchen. Now I'm still standing nearby the front door with this man who is now staring at me top to bottom. To be honest it looks kind of drunk and right at that moment I remembered how the landlady used to tell me that all they do is fight and get drunk so I just smiled at him and stood there awkwardly but he decided to be suddenly friendly because he kind of just grabbed my shoulder and dragged me inside of the house to show me different rooms and the balcony and their small garden and everything. I mean the house itself is beautiful, such a contrast to the people living in it. It was uncomfortable to say the least because he was very much naked and staying at a very close proximity to me. His arm

on my shoulders and he was just looking at my face so closely. I could feel his breath on my face. He then proceeded by asking if they had a beautiful garden. I just said yes and kind of laughed awkwardly. Thank god the wife came out from the kitchen at this point and then she started shouting at him for doing what he is doing. She told him it is no way to treat a guest and she handed me a glass of water, all the while still wearing no pants. I never drank the water and quickly excused myself saying that I needed to check my cooking upstairs. After some debate I got out of the house but the lady is still holding me at the door pleading that I could stay a while and sit

at the garden with her. I was ready to come up with more excuses before someone came through the front door of the building and interrupted. It was the young man that lives two stories above us. Apparently he just got back from grocery shopping and he somehow dealt with them and told me to go back upstairs so I went and waited upstairs to thank him. He was done talking to them after about two minutes and he came upstairs to ask if I was right and told me to not get mixed up with those folks because they were apparently known to be problematic. So yeah, he saved my day and I thanked him for it. After that experience I kind of just hurried my way up to my apartment every time I got back from somewhere so that I don't run into them again. I actually

did meet her once after that. She looked sober and thankfully was wearing pants this time. This happened last year. So for some pretext, my parents live in a nice neighborhood in a pretty nice house. The street their house is on dead ends into our driveway, which goes behind the house. There are not any other houses behind or near, because it is surrounded by 13 acres of woods. In short, the backside of the house is completely hidden from the rest of the world. Every now and then, people pull all the way into our driveway, as they either don't realize the road dead ends, or they are trying to turn around. It's pretty annoying, but it's never bothered us too much.

Anyways, one evening I was eating a late dinner at the house with my girlfriend. It was probably 9.30pm, because my ex and I had both just got off work. We were planning on eating dinner together, but I offered to bring some food back for my mom because my dad was out of town. We were the only ones home that night, because my sister was out of town with some friends. It was a pretty gloomy night, and it was incredibly dark and quiet outside. We were sitting at our kitchen table eating, and out the window we saw an old beat-up sedan pull into our driveway and go right up to the side of the house. We figured whoever it was was just lost

or turning around as usual. But after five minutes of the car still being there, it became a little unsettling. We talked amongst ourselves and tried to figure out if it could be someone that we knew. Not a single person came to mind. There was literally no one that we knew that would show up unannounced at 9 30 at night in a car we'd never seen. I peeked out the window to try and see who it was. Sitting in the car I saw a thin man probably in his mid-30s wearing very dark and worn clothes with a face covered almost entirely in black tattoos. He was just sitting there completely silent, by himself looking at the house. I watched him for a minute or so, and began to get really, really eerie feeling. Something was just off about this man. By

now he had been in our driveway for almost ten minutes, not moving, not on the phone, just staring at our house. I decided at this point I should probably do something, so I told my mom and ex-girlfriend to just stay at the table, and I walked out on the balcony overlooking the driveway with two very large dogs in tow. The man didn't panic when he saw me. He didn't roll down his window to talk to me. He didn't leave our driveway. He just stopped looking at the house and stared directly at me. We stared at each other for about 20 of the most incredibly uncomfortable seconds of my life.

It felt like an eternity. It was getting even darker outside, and it was still silent besides a few crickets occasionally chirping. I know it sounds stupid, but even without the guy looking creepy and wearing all black clothing, something about him just wasn't right. Now being even more nervous about this guy, I motioned for him to roll down his window. He rolled it down. I asked him what he was doing. The only two words he said to me were,

I'm hiding. My entire body got immense chills. I somehow managed to muster the words, I'm sorry, but you can't hide here. We stared at each other for probably another 30 seconds before I told him that if he didn't leave, I'd call the police. He didn't react at all, just sat in his car not moving, staring at me. I went back inside and told my mom to phone the police

and went and grabbed my dad's 12 gauge. While we were all hustling around trying to figure out what to do, my ex-girlfriend looked back out the window, and he was gone. We didn't hear him leave, didn't see any lights. He just all of a sudden left without showing any prior attention to do so. The entire situation was just bizarre and unsettling. My mom, already on the phone with the police, told them he'd left, and they'd said they'd send a cruiser to drive around our neighborhood and keep an eye out.

I didn't sleep at all that night. I sat in our family room with a shotgun in my lap until the sun came up. I still to this day don't know what the guy was doing or why he pulled into our driveway. I'm not sure if he somehow knew my dad was out of town and thought my 50-year-old mother, 16-year-old sister were home alone. The scary thing is that my mom would have been alone if I hadn't decided to offer to eat dinner with her. I don't know if he was scoping out the place for a robbery, or if he was actually telling the truth and was hiding from someone.

I have no idea who he would have been hiding from and why he was doing so in our driveway. I also don't know why the guy was so damned cold and eerie. If it's a flat or a squeal, a wobble or peel, your dread's worn down or you need a new wheel, wherever you go, you can get a pro at Tread Experts. Conquer rugged terrain with on-road comfort. Until June 15th, receive up to $60 on a prepaid MasterCard

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If you have questions or concerns about gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. When my mom was first diagnosed with cancer she became a born again Christian. But back in the 90s she was all into the new age stuff and has told me and my sister that if it was possible she'd contact us from the afterlife to prove that there was something after this.

When the breast cancer came back the second time, this time metastasized into her lungs and stage 4. She decided she couldn't face chemo and all that again for a less than 50% chance of not beating it, but only extending her time. But she did extend her prognosis by moving to Colorado and using therapies there to keep her weight up. After three years the decline couldn't be stopped and she came home to Alabama September 2017 to make memories with everyone and set affairs in order. She was there for my wedding in Texas. We all had a last Christmas together with lots of laughing and pictures. She taught me how to make jelly and can it. June 2018 mom started telling my sister and dad about the shadow people that she had started seeing. She would see them in the yard or they would move through the rooms of the house as if the walls were not there, sometimes standing by her for a period of time before

walking off. They weren't frightening or scary to her, she just wondered why they were there. My sister speculated that for my mom, the veil, or whatever separates the living from the dead, was getting thin, but her approach to it was so gradual she might be seeing through it. Mom passed three months later in September, and at first when I saw her in my dreams it was leaving me very stressed out and distraught when I woke up and I hadn't told anyone but my husband. I was trying to tough through it on my own. Then there was another dream. Mom sitting at the kitchen table, not talking but just hanging out and two of her sisters came over. My aunt R was headed to sit at the table in the chair Mom was in but right before reaching

went, Oops, can't take that one, Bee is there. I was shocked and said, You can see her? And Aunt R laughed and said, Yeah, of course I can, she's visiting all of us. After that when I woke up I called my aunt R and after beating around the bush a little I asked if she was having dreams with my mom and she was then I found out so were my sisters and

my dad but so far mom didn't talk in mine she was telling my dad to go places and giving advice and those sorts of things to others I became less stressed and saddened by her presence in my dreams. Two months ago, mom came to me in a dream and told me I needed to go see my grandmother, her mother, soon. She didn't say why, she just said I needed to and to do it soon. And soon was very pressed upon. Then this dream I called my oldest sister to tell her about it and I started crying on the phone with her which is what woke me up with tears still on my cheeks. So the first thing I do is complete the dream and call my sister and tell her about it so she can go visit Granny.

It's not as easy for me living a thousand miles away. Last month my sister tells me granny's mind is now slipping pretty regularly. For example she went to three yard sales with my aunt and bought stuff at all three. Then they went out to eat lunch and someone mentions maybe they will see some more yard sales after lunch. Granny says, Yeah, maybe we'll find one now. Ain't seen a single one all day. And she wasn't joking. These last two weeks, Granny started having breathing distress

and was in the hospital for a week. Now she's been released to home hospice. I'm flying back this week. My mom only spoke up in my dreams to warn me and it came true pretty fast. She always told us if she could bring us proof of the afterlife, she would and to me, she has. These stories were all told to me by my stepmom and she's okay with me retelling them. All of these stories take place over 20 years ago and she hasn't had anything like what she had shared with me since.

So back when my stepmom was a little girl around 8 years old, she lived in Mexico with her parents and 5 other siblings. My stepmom is the eldest and because of that she shared her room with the babies of her family. One night she explained how she was woken up randomly and saw these two little kids holding hands and standing right next to her bed. She said that they were see-through and that they just stared at her, unmoving. She was terrified but didn't make a noise as to not wake her siblings and instead remain frozen in place. After a while she blinked and they just vanished as if though they weren't there. She went back to sleeping, brushing it off and in the morning she didn't say a word to her parents.

Over the course of a few weeks she started seeing glimpses of the two kids throughout her house but it was always out of the corner of her eye. On one morning she was in the kitchen helping her siblings get some breakfast when she looked up and saw the kids right by her youngest baby brother. She immediately grabbed what was closest to her, a wooden spoon, and launched herself at the kids shouting at them to leave her brother alone. They disappeared and her siblings were all confused as none of them had seen it. She told them it was alright though and continued on with their day. Eventually she said she had started to see them almost every night.

She'd wake up from dreams she couldn't remember and see them staring down at her, their faces void of any emotion but always holding hands. She tried telling them to go away and leave her family alone and they'd disappear only to come back at night. Eventually one day she saw them actually move and reach a hand out towards her mother. She screamed at them to not touch her mother and they snapped their heads to look at my stepmom. She stood her ground and told them to leave her mother alone and they vanished again. Her mother quickly started asking her what the problem was and she explained what she had been seeing. Her mother instantly freaked out and told her father what happened. As soon as he heard they took my stepmom out of the house and told her father what happened.

As soon as he heard they took my stepmom out of the house and to her aunt's. They didn't say anything but that they'd bring her siblings with them and that they'd be staying with their aunt for a bit. My stepmom later learned that when her mother was pregnant with her she had seen the same kids and they had tried to touch her stomach where my stepmom was still unborn. After her mother gave birth to my stepmom she stopped seeing them. So when my stepmom told her mother how she had been seeing these kids she freaked out. They ended up calling for a priest and eventually moved out of that house. Just a couple of years later they moved to the United

States and everything was fine. My stepmom explained how she remembered occasionally seeing people wandering around looking lost but that she could see through them. She ignored it and after a few years she stopped seeing them. Fast forward quite a few years to when my stepmom was single and had her three kids all still very young, babies and toddlers. She lived two houses down from her parents house where some of her brothers were currently staying. During the time she lived she always felt that someone was watching her and she just felt this really angry atmosphere around her. She explained it like trying to relax but stuck being tense. She didn't live in that

house long and here's the reason why. On the last night she slept there she woke up to something or someone pushing down on her chest. She kept trying to get up or throw her arms at whatever was pushing down on her but her hands just kept hitting air. She struggled for a few minutes just feeling this weight on her continuously pushing until she suddenly was able to throw herself upright. She immediately got out of bed and grabbed her kids and ran down to her parents' house. She frantically knocked on the door until her brothers opened it up and let her in. They were worried and asked what was wrong.

They had never seen my stepmom so scared before. She's the kind of person who won't hesitate to fight someone to protect people and doesn't take nonsense from anybody. She also helped raise her siblings so they've always seen her so strong for them. She explained what happened and told them she refused to go back in that house. Her brothers led her to sit down and she made sure her kids were alright and that's when one of her brothers noticed that she had this huge bruise on her chest. She went to the bathroom to look in the mirror and sure enough there was this large bruise that looked like misshapen hands.

She spent the night with her kids and in the morning she explained to her parents what happened she still refused to go back to the house and her brothers ended up moving everything out of the house for her she moved somewhere else and to this day she still hasn't set foot anywhere near the house and refuses to get close she has no idea who the owners if any of them had any sort of experience like she did. She just blatantly refuses to have anything to do with that house. She told the story to my dad once and he tried to say it was sleep paralysis but she vividly remembers being able to move around just unable to get up and she had multiple witnesses to the bruise she got from it. She won't talk much about it but swears something evil

is definitely living in that house. This took place when I was in college so in my early 20s. One of my classes offered a trip overseas for a couple of weeks. The girl I was interested in at the time was going so I naturally jumped at the chance to go as well. In general the trip was pretty uneventful but still enjoyable. The girl, Jen, and I spent much of the time getting to know one another, taking in the sights and throwing around some subtle flirting. It was the day before we were scheduled to go back home that everything that could go wrong did. It started off as normal

any other day. We had decided to go to a popular bar nearby with some of the locals that a few of us had made friends with as a going back home party. On the way I happened to spot a shady looking guy bumping into someone on the edge of a crowd. My eye was drawn to him just long enough to spot him sneak up and steal something from someone's bag while they were distracted. My sense of justice kicked in and I figured I'd show off in front of Jen by taking down a pickpocket. I strode over quickly and exclaimed, hey, just before reaching out and grabbing him by the shoulder. He swung around, lashing out wildly with both fists, managing to strike me across the right eye and the right side of my nose. I stumbled backwards and ended up falling on my tailbone,

which was quite painful. The thief took off and disappeared into the crowd as witnesses flagged down some nearby policemen. I did my best to describe the guy. Dark hair, five o'clock shadow, black hat, tan coat, blue jeans. I didn't get a good look at his face and he was long gone so there wasn't much that they could do other than keep an eye out and see if he came back later. We continued on to the bar and I slumped down in my seat with my bruised face, butt, and ego. About half of our local friends were concerned about the encounter, the other half finding it amusing, which ended up causing some friction for a short while. Luckily, peace was restored with the introduction of alcohol. The cute barmaid even brought me a cold compress for my face which had begun to swell already.

I tried my best to keep the chemistry going with Jen and the situation seemed to improve with every shot we took, so we kept taking them. Eventually I realized that I was starving, so I ordered a dish that was the local take on nachos. In my drunken state, I claimed that it was probably the best thing that I've ever tasted. It had some kind of spice meat that wasn't beef and was loaded with onions which I love. I offered some to Jen but she looked repulsed saying she hated how strong the onion smell was. I decided that it would be super funny if I asked if my breath was bad, then exhaled in her face. She covered her mouth and nose while pushing herself away from me, saying that she needed to use the restroom before leaving. I just shrugged it off and kept eating.

After a while I noticed that she hadn't come back yet. I started to feel anxious so I said that I was going to the restroom. On the way I spotted her sitting in another booth and smiling. My heart sank as I saw three guys who looked to be in their early to mid-twenties sitting with her, one of them with his arm around her shoulders, the other two sitting opposite from them. I felt hot under the collar as I walked up and just stood next to them. It took a little under a minute for her to notice me, looking surprised before saying, Oh, Kyle, um, these guys are... Creep 1, 2, and 3. They're musicians. She gushed and my stomach turned. Uh, Jen, can I talk to you for a minute? I asked. She opened her mouth for a fraction of a second,

but Creep One pulled her closer and said, Hey, come on, don't go. We can talk here. Jen looked a little unsure. Uh, is it important? She inquired. It's about Judy. Our safe race for getting out of bad situations. Jen looked concerned but creep one butted in again. Well I'll tell you what. You can take Judy to the hospital or wherever she needs to go and we'll make sure this little miss gets home safe. He said while giving Jen a slight shake. It sounded as if this idiot couldn't even remember her name.

I was a bit relieved when Jen was able to shrug his arm off while she shook her head, but it was short-lived. Wait, wait, wait. Is Judy here? She asked while looking up at me and lowering her hands to touch the table she was sitting at. My eyes darted to each of the guys, all of them sitting up a little more and sharing looks like they were silently communicating. I looked back at Jen and nodded. She scoffed at me and said, no, wait, actually, no. No, no, it's fine. I'm sure it'll be fine. You can look after Judy. In a terse, dismissive tone. I opened my mouth to protest but the look on her face as she folded her arm said it all. I was defeated. Creep 1 was now grinning smugly at me as his arm draped over her shoulders again, turning his head to smile at her as she did the same.

I went back to our table to drown my sorrows, leaning over into the aisle every so often to look at their booth. It was out of sight if I was sitting up straight. At some point Creep One had gone to get more drinks and now had her boxed in between himself and the wall on the other side of the booth. I grew more and more frustrated as the night progressed. Another time I checked on them it seemed like she was trying to refuse to take another shot but he kept scooting it closer and closer towards her until we got fed up and pressed the edge of the glass to her lips, smiling and speaking softly to her until she reluctantly downed it. His buddies clapped and he kissed her on the cheek. I shot up out of my seat and stormed over. It appeared as if Jen looked a little relieved as

I approached. Creep One noticed her looking and followed her gaze. Ah, it's Amy, alright then? He asked, sounding less enthused about my return. Judy. And it looks like it might be more serious than we feared. You should really come with me, Jen. Once again, Creep 1 spoke up. What's with all this? Is he your keeper or your boyfriend or something? Jen looked kind of flustered and out of it while mumbling, I... I... This was it. He had just given me the ammo I needed. I was about to bark yes, sweep Jen away from these scumbags and make sure we both got home safe and sound.

No, Jen said flatly. I rocked in place, her eyes raised from looking at the table to meet mine. No, she repeated softly. I was truly finished now. The next half an hour or so felt unreal. I wallowed in my misery while grazing on my nachos and sipping at any drink that was within arm's reach, regardless if it was mine or not. I was only snapped out of it by an ear-piercing scream, some shouting and the shuffling of many feet. I stumbled over to the forming crowd and saw a man lying on the floor,

the bartender pressing a rag down on his throat. Was he strangling him? People weren't stopping him and they were shouting for an ambulance to be called. The man was shaking as they rolled him onto his side. Then I saw blood coming out of his mouth and nose. It turns out that he had shown up to confront his cheating girlfriend, who had been seeing a guy who was known to be bad news. The bad guy saw him coming and, I suppose expecting a fight, broke a bottle and preemptively slashed the man across

the throat before fleeing out the back through the kitchen. I watched as paramedics showed up and took over. They got him stable enough to move before taking off with him. Quite a few people left the bar after the ambulance. It felt so somber. The rest of our group was discussing how tragic it was and how we should probably leave soon. A light clicked on in my mind. I hadn't checked on Jen in nearly an hour. I had sat

facing away from their booth to keep myself from looking, in case I saw something that would make me even more miserable, but making sure she was safe was now back at the top of my priorities. I spun from my sitting position to my feet, wobbling drunkenly before striding to the other side of the bar with as much confidence as I could muster. My breathing stopped completely when I saw that the booth was empty. I looked around frantically but saw no sign of them. I checked the bathrooms, both male and female.

As I came out I asked a nearby waiter if he had saw where the people from that booth went. He said that the four of them left already. He had called them a cab a little while ago. I rushed outside. The street was nearly empty, no cabs in sight. One of my classmates came out and asked me if something was wrong. I told her everything, saying that we should call the police or try to track Jen's phone somehow or something. I was panicking hard and my breath was coming in short, rapid gas. She took me back inside, sat me down and we all discussed it. They were all pretty much under the consensus that she just went home with a local guy and we'd be back in the morning. If not, we would file a report. I straight up told them that they had all lost their minds. Jen could be on her way to

a ton of terrible things like human trafficking or organ harvesting and their plan was to wait and see. They accused me of being overly dramatic and too drunk to think clearly. I left the booth to go sit at the bar. I stayed there helplessly perched on a stool for a while before the group told me that they were heading out and asked if I wanted to ride with them. I refused saying that I would call a cab or something when the bar was about to close. I was staring down at the bar, my head in my hands and on the verge of tears when I saw a drink slide into view. I looked up and saw the cute barmaid with a sympathetic smile on her face. She glanced from side to side,

I guess to make sure her boss wasn't watching and murmured, It's on the house. I smiled weakly as I drew it closer and sipped on the straw a little. It was horrible, wasn't it? What happened? She said while staring at the part of the floor where the man had been lying after he was attacked. I nodded silently, my mind still on Jen. You know, I get off in about an hour. I'd feel a lot safer if I had someone to walk me home.

It's just a few blocks from here. She continued. Even while that wasted, I could tell when a movie is to be made. I smiled and agreed, setting the rest of my drink aside, thinking that I should at least attempt to sober up as I could before attempting to get lucky. About 45 minutes later she came back to me and said that she was just going to get her stuff from her locker and to meet her at the front door. I used the restroom one more time before doing so and we left together. She mostly talked about how seeing that man almost losing his life made her feel like she needed to live life more, be more outgoing and try new things. I mostly tried to walk straight

and keep from burping obnoxiously, the nachos from before giving me heartburn and indigestion. We were a couple of blocks away from the bar when we rounded a corner and I was suddenly jerked into a dark alleyway by my arm. I came face to face with scruffy facial hair, not quite a beard, a knit cap and a turtleneck. He was holding a knife close to my chest. Give me what you got, he demanded, then pointed the knife at the barmaid. You too. She looked shocked for a moment, then took off. Lucky me.

He slugged me in the stomach. I panicked, thinking I had just been stabbed, but thankfully it just punched me. Unfortunately, that was the only motivation needed for the bar nachos and all the alcohol I had consumed that night to come spewing out of my body. The mugger and his friend that I was just now noticing made sounds of disgust as they danced away from the puddle of vomit forming under me. It burned coming up and made it difficult to breathe. I seriously felt like I would pass out at one point as I would try to inhale only to have another wave of puke surge from my mouth. They took this opportunity to rifle through my

jacket and pockets as I fruitlessly tried to bat them away. They got my keys which I didn't need at the time but it was still aggravating, my phone and my wallet. I had luckily left my passport with my stuff at the place I was staying. I received a few insults as well as a couple of more kicks to the stomach and ribs from them before they departed. A perfect way to end this night I thought to myself while getting to my feet, wiping my vomit-covered hands with a newspaper I picked up from the ground before making my way to a nearby payphone. I called a cab. I had some loose change in my pockets from the phone. I kept coughing and clearing my throat as it burned. My face and sides

and lower back all ached and or throbbed. I just wanted today to be over and to skip ahead to when I wouldn't feel like complete and utter garbage. I'd have my stuff back and Jen would be safe. The cab took me to where my friend and I were staying, this little shop that a kind elderly couple owned and would rent out the place above it to people visiting. I couldn't pay of course so the driver followed me upstairs where I asked my friend to spot me the fare. I obliged and said I would pay him back when I could. I couldn't even be bothered to call and have my cards cancelled. I just wanted to pass out and forget this nightmarish day. I laid in bed, drifting on the edge of sleep before a cramp rippled through my stomach.

I groaned and clutched my abdomen before rushing to the bathroom and having the worst case of the runs I'd ever had before or since. To top it all off, my nose started bleeding again during this, so I had to twist up a square of toilet paper and shove it up my hemorrhaging nostril. Sleep finally took me over after I got back into bed and I'd never been more grateful. I awoke the next morning and just laid in bed, dreading what new horrors would befall me as I recovered from the previous ones. After a few minutes I realized that I didn't even have the slightest bit of a hangover. I rolled out of bed to use my bathroom only to stop in front of the mirror. There was no evidence that my face had been double punched yesterday.

Hope welled up inside of me as I did a quick search of my possessions. Wallet, keys, and phone, all accounted for. Impossible, I thought. I mean, I've had dreams every so often of very brief, fleeting moments, but they were always just little snippets of time of very mundane things. Stuff like segments of a conversation while riding in a car with friends or staring down at my ketchup covered fries while overhearing a conversation in another table. It had never been an entire day and I certainly didn't live those dreams before they came to pass. You're not supposed to be able to feel pain during a dream and I felt quite a bit of pain. I decided that there was nothing to do but roll with

it. I got a free do-over I guess. I wasn't going to complain about the terrible day I just had. The smallest details would come to me right before they happened. I found myself muttering other people's lines under my breath before they said them, like I was watching a movie that I had completely memorized. It was surreal. I could remember everything I did in response and would try to reenact my part for the day, up until the moment when I saw the pickpocket. At first I thought I'd just ignore him, but that was a no-go on my moral compass. Plan B was to just call him out, but keep my distance. I didn't want to get punched again. I don't know if I'm stupid or just stubborn but I wanted to nail this guy for what he was doing and what he had done to me. I opted for walking up behind him quickly and tugging the collar on his

jacket down the middle of his back keeping his arms from reaching up past a certain point. I yanked him back so he fell before restraining him with his jacket with one hand and my other hand on the back of his neck, keeping him from struggling free as he flailed and yelled at me. I shouted for police, knowing that they were already in the area and they showed up in seconds. He was still struggling, shouting and swearing as I told them that I saw him stealing and he was searched turning up at least half a dozen wallets and other personal items that were clearly not all his they cuffed him and thanked me as they dragged him away our group joked that I was secretly a vigilante for the rest of the night and it kind of became a thing that rarely came up for the next

couple of years or so I was just glad the guy was off the streets and that my face was still pretty. The story of my heroism was told and retold to our local friends, as well as anyone who would listen once my classmates drank enough. This time when it came to drinks, I just stuck with my beer every so often, and for food I would nibble on a couple of crackers from the snack platter on her table. I didn't want any risk of this stuff coming back to haunt me. Jen took notice after her second round of shots and asked why I was being so reserved in my consumption. I replied that I perform better when I'm not a sloppy drunk and my stomach isn't full of greasy bar food.

Her eyebrows shot up and her mouth opened slightly in shock. I thought I may have gone too far with that comment and she would think I assumed she was loose but she laughed it off and said, well alright then hotshot, we'll see. I breathed a sigh of relief. I just had to keep things light and I might get the happy ending I was aiming for. Jen took to eating a little here and there as well as switching to beer. Things were going well, then Jen said that she had to use the restroom. I remember where this went last time, resolving to get up and follow her just a few short minutes after her to try and steer her away from the creeps that were surely sitting on the other side of the bar. I sat and waited, bouncing my leg impatiently as I watched the doorway and tried to

count slowly in my head. I got up when I couldn't take it anymore and had just taken a couple of steps before, surprisingly, Jen reappeared, looking confused and disturbed. I walked over, telling her that I was on the way to the restroom as well before asking her if something was wrong. Oh yeah, it's nothing, just some creeps tried to get me to sit with them while I was on the way back. She said, avoiding looking at me and rubbing her arm. I asked if that was all. She shuddered and said that one of them had grabbed her arm, not enough to hurt, but firmly enough that she had to tug it away. My blood boiled.

I'll talk to them. I growled and walked past her before she could respond. There they were, smiling, drinking and laughing while talking about who knows what. I was brimming with confidence now that Jen was on my side so I didn't hesitate when I brought my hand down and slammed it on the table right in front of Creep 1, causing all of them to jump and spill their drinks a little. I quickly leaned down and got in his space before calmly ordering, Keep your hands to yourself. Maintaining eye contact for almost a minute as he kept glancing at his friends, all three of them at a loss for words. They seemed rather subdued when I emerged from the bathroom, avoiding looking at me as they cleaned themselves

in the table with some napkins. Jen grinned upon my return, as did I. At that moment I felt like I had cleared all of last night's hurdles. The merriment of the night continued while Jen and I grew more comfortable with each other. It was during a round of local drinking songs that for some reason almost all sound was drowned out. All sound except for the distinct creak and thud of the bar's door leading to the outside. I turned my head and there he was. The man who had gotten his throat slashed by the guy with the bottle. I got up without excusing myself, watching as the man craned his neck, searching for his girlfriend. He had just spotted her near the back of the bar and began to head over when I stepped into his path and put my hand on his chest.

He was a lot bigger up close, taller than me, much broader than me, could possibly toss me around like a ragdoll. I could see why bottle guy didn't want to fight him fairly. His heavy brow furrowed as he looked down and saw me. What do you want? He began. I interrupted with she's not worth it. He looked shocked and confused and then angry. I started to worry as he was looking for her and bottle guy to me then back to her, drawing in short breaths and exhaling loudly like he was working himself up. I stood my ground until his expression changed to hurt and heartache, clenching his jaw and swallowing before he looked back to me and just nodded stiffly. He slowly turned and left the bar with his head hung low.

I felt rather sorry for him, but it was better than the alternative. Jen questioned me upon my return, but I simply replied, I had to stop a fight. I thought that it would be smooth sailing for the rest of the night, but there was one last little bump. As our group was getting ready to leave I noticed the three creeps looking over frequently. As I helped Jen out of the booth she stumbled a bit and leaned on me for support while laughing at her clumsiness. Shortly after

she regained her balance I felt someone slip past me and then I saw creep 2 take her by the arm. Thanks, mate. We'll make sure she gets home. He said before trying to lead her towards Creep 1 and 3, who were standing in the doorway leading to the other side of the bar. Jen looked shocked but still managed to yank her arm out of his grasp, causing him to look shocked as well. What are you talking about? She snapped. His confused look flashed the frustration,

then settled into a smile as he said, Come on, hon. You're mad. We were just making sure you get home safe. Jen glared. I'm fine, thank you very much. She spat back at him. His eyes narrowed, but before he could address her again, I stepped in the way. I was a little taller than the guy, not quite as muscular but our group of friends was still milling about around us, only a couple of them taking notice of the situation. Look, just let us take the girl, you don't want this fight friend. Creep 2 said in a low menacing tone, his two buddies stepping closer. I gave him a flat, emotionless smile. Fight? I asked loudly, causing the rest of our group to stop talking and I felt them gather behind me. What fight, friend?

I asked, watching him shrink back slowly as he was confronted by about 16 people. He and his friends were severely outnumbered, as well as a couple of the locals we knew were big burly dock workers so they naturally backed down. They seethed and muttered obscenities that I only caught a few of as they retreated back to the other side of the bar. I asked other local pals to keep them occupied for a few minutes while we were all outside and filling into cabs. I was later told that the creeps were in a bit of a hurry to get to a cab as the one Jen and I were in was taking off and then shouting about being illegally detained once we were around the corner, but we were pretty much home free at that point. I guess their last ditch effort was to follow and possibly jump us when we got out of the cab. Idiots. I had asked the friend that I was bunking with to make

himself scarce for the night to which he agreed informing me that he had made plans with another local girl. Jen adored the warm cozy place we were renting from the old couple and I got my happy ending. Just me and Jen and a bed by candlelight. We're married now and we agreed that it was one of the most passionate nights we've ever had together. I'm glad that when I woke up the next morning I found Jen in my arms rather than the day being rewound again. To compound the strangeness of the events that took place, the guy I had prevented from getting his throat cut met me later in life and is now one of my co-workers and best friends. He makes appearances in a few other stories, which I will get to eventually. I'm an 18 year old female who now lives with my fiance. When we first started dating, he had just moved to Maryland from Seattle, so his house was new to him.

A week after we started seeing each other, he told me he heard tapping on his bedroom wall. It seemed to happen at least once a week he would report hearing footsteps in the hallway or more tapping on the wall. Once I started sleeping over at his place the activity increased. It started with hearing footsteps out in the hallway. Just to get an idea of how disturbing this is the hallway outside of his room is tile and we would hear the sound of bare feet slapping on the tile when we knew no one else was in the house. Late one night I had gone to the bathroom which was down the hall. I didn't bother to turn the hall light on so I didn't find it strange when I saw a large black shadow in front of the laundry room. I assumed that it was just the drying rack

and paid it no attention. About an hour later I went to the bathroom room. I assumed that it was just the drying rack and paid it no attention. About an hour later I went to the bathroom again only to see that the shadow was gone. I asked my fiance if he had gotten up to move the drying rack to which he looked confused and asked what drying rack? I told him when I had gone to the bathroom that I had seen a shadow in front of the laundry room and he turned white. He assured me he hadn't even done laundry that day. This shadow figure prompted me to look up my fiance's address on the website diedinhouse.com. This search revealed that a man had died in the house in 2010, who I will just call Robert, to protect his family's privacy. As a joke, whenever something would go bump in the night, we began to call out, Robert, knock it off.

However, whatever was in that house did not like being called Robert, because after we began to use this name, the activity began to get scary. Instead of quiet footsteps, we began to hear running coming down the stairs to our bedroom door. Doors to closets began to open, lights would turn on by themselves, and my fiancé's dog began to growl at night. This was especially unsettling because these dogs never growl at anything, besides other dogs. One particularly scary experience was when I awoke late one night while my fiance was sleeping. The hall light was on and was shining underneath the door. I heard the footsteps coming down the stairs and to my horror I also saw two shadows appear

underneath the door, as if someone was standing in front of the door. The shadow eventually moved away just before the hall light clicked off by itself. The breaking point came one night when I was staying at my own house and my fiancé and I had fallen asleep on FaceTime. Around three in the morning, a horrible screeching, growling sound woke me up. The sound was so loud it hurt my ears. I thought it was my speaker next to my bed malfunctioning so I ripped out the power cord. However, the sound didn't stop. I then realized that it was coming from my phone which was still on FaceTime. I turned my phone volume all the way

down but the sound was still unbearable. So I figured it was a glitch of some sort and hung up the video call and went back to sleep. The next morning my fiancé called me in a panic, telling me about how he had woken up at 3 in the morning hearing this horrible screeching sound, only he couldn't move. He was stuck in a sleep paralysis episode. He heard the ding of the FaceTime call ending while the screeching continued. He said it was so loud it felt like it was inside his skull.

While in his sleep paralysis he saw hooded figures around his room whispering. I felt sick and told him that the sound had woken me up too but was especially freaked out since it had continued in his room even after I had ended the call. After this incident my fiance and his mother saged the entire house. After the sage the activity came to a screeching halt. Now we occasionally hear footsteps but nothing nearly as terrifying as it was before. We're about to move to a new house and I just hope there isn't any malevolent spirits in this house that we will have to deal with. When I had first moved into my medium-sized home, everything had seemed so calm and peaceful.

My family as well as our animals seemed to like it. I had yet to notice anything which I now find odd with my own ability to see the paranormal. I should have seen what was yet to come. We moved my little brother into the room directly above the front door. He was happy to have such a big room. Now skip to a few weeks of living there my brother had been waking up screaming and crying almost every night since the move And that had my mother worried But seeing the look on her face I felt she knew something I didn't Sick of the sleepless nights and having to get up to comfort him

We decided to switch him in my little sister's room In the middle of the process I noticed the dresser was pushed up against the closet door. I pushed it out of the way and my mother finally broke down admitting the closet door had been opening by itself and rattling when I wasn't home. I immediately opened the door and reached inside feeling the ice cold air. However I didn't want to frighten her more so I kept a straight face and continued to help move the rooms. Little did I know what was to come that night that I was meant to babysit. It's around 10pm, everything seemed fine. I was playing black ops zombies with my best friend in the basement, then the screaming

and crying started. I jolted up bringing my phone, my friend and I were on a call. My little brother E was hysterical yet my little sister and grandmother sleeping on the couch visiting for the weekend had not woken up to the loud cries. I tried to comfort him and brought him into his room sitting him on his bed when I noticed the closet door was wide open. I closed the door and sat beside him to further calm down while texting my mom to see if she had maybe left the door open. Three minutes later, he seemed asleep and still no response from my mom. So I slid his wooden easel against the closet door so if it opened I would be able to hear the bang. Now I'm back halfway down the basement stairs to resume my games when my mom

texts me that she had left it open and asking why. Then it happened. The bang and the screams started while my call to my friend dropped suddenly. I remember distinctively this moment. I remember the negative energy consuming me as soon as I ran into his bedroom. I remember feeling the heaviness and screaming too. I was freezing cold. I remember yelling for him to stop crying. I felt this evil until I carried him down to the living room where my grandma had slept, as if we weren't hysterical, as if she was in another dimension than us, same as my little sister, sound asleep. After we calmed down

I put a movie on for him just deciding to wait for my mom to get home when I noticed the time, 3.01am. I was too freaked out to really notice the ticking sound of some plastic hitting the wall, how did I not realize the time? Everything was seemingly normal by the time my mom got home moments later when she pointed out that the thermostat meter was open and asked if I was playing with the heat. So that was the ticking noise. My stepfather being the spiritual and the traditional Native American man he was, smudged the house with sweet grass and everything just seemed to stop. To this day I don't feel normal. I feel the little darkness that entered my entire body. I feel that energy that took over all my motor functions for those 15 minutes and I still wonder to this day, why didn't my

grandmother and little sister wake up? Were we in the other world? Were we hidden for the torture the spirit world would make us endure? Why did it only come after my brother? Will I feel like this forever? I do believe in the paranormal, considering that I've had a little experience with it throughout my childhood. Most of them have been harmless, which I can post about later, but these two experiences were different. I'm not sure how to explain them. Now, the first encounter happened to me about five years ago when I was in high school. Now I'd like to say that I've never experienced sleep paralysis in my life. I do have depression and anxiety but not so severe to cause this. We were in a new house that we moved into about a year prior to this experience.

The house isn't very old and nothing really was creepy about it so I never considered something paranormal could happen here. But one night when I was sleeping a dreamless sleep I suddenly couldn't breathe. Still asleep I could feel pressure on my neck and was gasping for air. I finally was choked into waking up, sitting up straight and grabbing my phone to flash around the dark room to see if someone had broken in. I was alone. I was still gasping for air when I pointed the light at the foot of my bed, and that's when I saw it. It was a small creature, maybe about three feet tall,

with grayish, slimy skin. It was scrawny, and its face was round, but it had no eyes, only a mouth with sharp teeth. It was creepily moving under my bed as it hissed at me and disappeared. This was round but it had no eyes, only a mouth with sharp teeth. It was creepily moving under my bed as it hissed at me and disappeared. I sat in absolute shock, still trying to breathe. Let's just say I couldn't sleep that night. I called my boyfriend at the time having a panic attack and still struggling to catch

my breath. I'm not sure what that was and thankfully I hadn't seen it since. I knew that it wasn't a dream because I sat up and had my phone on. I was fully aware of what had happened. I also realized that my blanket or anything else couldn't have choked me since it was at the far end of my bed. I have read once that when people feel like they are falling in a dream, it's because a demon is choking you and that's why you jolt awake. But I didn't have that falling feeling, which I do experience a lot. This was different. I was so full of fear.

What if I hadn't woken up? Has anyone else experienced this before or at least known what this is? My second experience happened a couple of weeks ago. I'm home from college for the summer and I'm staying with my parents. This is still the same house that my last experience had occurred in. Again, this takes place in my room when I was sleeping. It was roughly around 1am. One of my dreams I got this intense pain in my stomach like I was going to be sick and my insides would be ripped out. It was such a strong pain that it jolted me awake.

I was still feeling sick but I also got this intense feeling of dread. I rolled over and looked at the ceiling. I froze. There was this dark grey blotch on my ceiling that almost looked like TV static, and in the dead center was a face, the eyes dark, small and hollow, with what I can only describe as a Jack the Pumpkin King grin. It was close to me, then slowly retracted back into the ceiling. I grabbed my phone and shone the light upwards. Nothing. I was in a trance for what seemed like an hour but could only be a couple of seconds. Then I felt a buzz from my phone. It was from my ex who I was not on great terms with at all. I had been trying to avoid this abusive guy but I guess I had unblocked him at some point.

He asked if I was up. Since I still had the sick and dreadful feeling and due to the fact that I'm trying to trust my gut more I asked him if everything was okay. He did have some drinking issues and I still care about people that don't really care about me. Then to my horror he said he was outside my house and wanted me to come outside to take a ride and talk. Uh no, I knew this guy and if I ticked him off enough he'll get violent. I wasn't getting in the car with him and since I still felt this overwhelming pain in my stomach I told him to buzz off. He eventually left and I couldn't sleep for a long time. I just felt like I was being watched and also the sick feeling didn't go away for hours. I would have passed this as my body's instincts telling me that there was danger around but the face of my ceiling makes me think otherwise. I haven't

experienced this since then but then again I haven't spoken to my ex pretty much either. I'm not sure what is going on and I'm terrified since they have actually caused some sort of harm to me. I just want answers and if someone knows what these beings are or have a similar experience please let me know. I'm just scared that these things will come back and finish what they started. So I was raised in a pagan family. We believe in spirits and ghosts, but we also believe that there are different kinds that come to bring messages or omens. If you don't get the messages the first time,

it's likely they will keep coming back until you do. But that wasn't the case in this story. The message wasn't heeded and they never came back. The following is a true story from my mom who encountered wanderers. Back in the 80s before I was even a thought in my mom's head, She was around 14 years old. She would hang with the kids in her neighborhood and they had all formed a very close-knit group over the years. The day Wanderers appeared was much like any other. My mom had hung out with her friends, eaten dinner, showered, and gone to bed. She was sleeping soundly when there was a knock at the front door. She was annoyed having been woken up at 4am. She laid in bed not wanting to get up and hoping that whoever was at the door would go away.

That didn't happen. Ten minutes later the knocking still persisted. My mom groggily went to the front door and opened it to see the most bizarre sight. A man and woman in wedding attire stood in front of the door while a car boasting a sign with the words, just married, was parked in front of our family's locked gate. Uh, yeah? My mom said. The woman spoke first. David Neesio. The woman promptly pointed at my mom's friend's house who lived just across the street. Uh, okay, I'll be sure to check on him in the morning. My mom went to close the door before the man interjected sharply,

He needs you now. My mom stared at the couple blankly before asking them why, but the only thing that they would say is that David needs her. He needs her now, over and over again. Finally she caved in and said, okay, I'll get my shoes and I'll head over. The couple stared at her as if waiting for her to get her shoes. Do you need something else? She asked. You will go to him? The woman asked. Yes, I'll go to him the woman asked yes i'll go to him my mom replied with that the couple looked at each other and turned around to walk away my mom closed and locked the door then quickly looked out the window to make sure the two strange people were in fact leaving

it only been a few seconds between her closing the door and her looking out the window, but the couple and their car was gone. She was confused how they'd gotten into the yard with the gate locked, gotten out so quickly, and why she hadn't heard their car start or drive away. But these were questions she could ponder later in the morning because right now she was tired and needed to go back to sleep. So that's what she did. She went back to her room and crawled into bed. Around 7.30am my grandmother went into my mom's bedroom and woke her up. The look on my grandmother's face was pained as she stroked my

mom's hair. Baby? She said, not really knowing how to say it your friend david he's dead my mom was distraught because david was one of her best friends his house was where all the children in the neighborhood would go after school his mom would let them listen to loud music and play games she had just seen him the day before how could he he be dead? Early that morning, David's mother went to wake her son up for breakfast. It was a Saturday. He was going to eat, shower, and hang with his friends, but when she walked into his room, she instead found her son's dead body. The police ruled that it was self-inflicted. However, no one believed it because of the circumstances he was found in and the fact that David was always the happiest kid

without a care in the world. He would talk about his future and dream so passionately. His personality was said to be electric. David was found naked, with a bag over his head and a belt that didn't belong to him tightened around his neck. His hands were tied behind his back and his bedroom window was open. The wanderer's message made sense only after it was too late. My mom never forgot that morning. She never stopped blaming herself for her friend's death. Strangely, after that, the kids in the neighborhood would still go to David's house after his

death. They loved his mom and having them there helped her grief. For the first two weeks after his death David's favorite song would echo throughout the house but no one could ever find the source of where it was coming from. His mom sold the house shortly after and moved. My mom never saw the Wanderers again. TreadExperts. Conquer rugged terrain with on-road comfort. Until June 15th, receive up to $60 on a prepaid MasterCard when you purchase Kumo RoadVenture AT52 tires. Find a Kumo TreadExperts dealer near you at TreadExperts.ca slash locations.

From tires to auto repair, we're always there. TreadExperts.ca. This happened back when I was still in high school, so I was about 16. My friends at the time, let's call them Jack and Dan, and I would often skip the last class or two in favor of hanging out at one of their places. My parents were more uptight about playing hooky or cruising around in the old school muscle car that Jack had fixed up with his dad. One day we swung by a grocery store that had a place in back that made pretty good Chinese food and that sounded like it would hit the spot right now. We parked, browsed the aisles a little, and picked up some sodas as our orders were being prepared. The three of us paid, and on the way out, I told them I had to take a leak, giving my bags to Jack to look after. The bathrooms were

usually at least fair on the cleanliness scale, but I guess that day someone was asleep at the wheel, and no one had bothered to notify the staff of the mess inside. I was, and still am, somewhat shy while peeing, so I like to use stalls when able. The handicapped stall's toilet was filled to the brim with murky brown water and toilet paper, more wet paper clinging to almost every surface within two feet of the toilet. Yeah, no. The stall next to it was worse. Someone had been finger-painting in there, so to speak. The final stall I checked, the one closest to the door, had urine all over the seats and some on the floor, as well as some brown smudges and damp toilet paper on the seat.

But I figured I didn't have to touch any of that. I just used some clean paper to lift the seat, wipe my hands thoroughly and then did my business before flushing and leaving the seat up, not wanting to give anyone that might come in the idea that I had left the seat down and peed all over it. Unfortunately, that's exactly what happened. Enter the homeless man. He had long, dark, matted hair and a matching beard. His face was almost completely hidden. He wore the typical hobo garb, dirt-covered coat, slightly torn jeans, worn sneakers that might have been white at some point, and frayed fingerless gloves. I gave him a small smile and polite nod as he shuffled past, giving me no more than a quick glance. I was washing my hands by the time he reached the stall he had seen me come out of. I heard him huff and grumble a little before he backed out of the stall and growled, nice, at me.

I tensed and looked over to him. He was nodding in a thanks a lot kind of way, gesturing into the stall as his eyes glared at me between his thick, coarse beard and his bushy eyebrows. Being the extremely awkward and non-confrontational teen that I was, all I could muster was a somewhat spastic, that wasn't me. Totally convincing. This wasn't you? He rumbled, his voice suggesting he was somewhere between confused and furious as he pointed at the soiled toilet. I shook my head,

staring wide-eyed at him before quickly rinsing my hands and stepping over to the paper towels. I could see him out of the corner of my eye, still looking at either me or the stall and grumbling under his breath. I was almost done drying my hands when I heard him stomping up behind me. I whipped around and saw him reaching out with his left hand. I initially thought he was reaching to grab some paper towels, but his hand clapped down on my shoulder, his right hand swinging up until his fist was pressing painfully into my chest. He had one of those foldable knives with the serrated edge hovering just above my neck. You little heathen, he spat through his teeth, his face red with anger.

You think you can just treat me like this because I live in my car, just because I'm dirty, huh? He roared, getting louder with each sentence. Honestly, I think I would have heeded myself back then had I not just taken care of that. All I could do was stare at him with the classic deer-in-the-headlights look, standing on my tiptoes and trying to press my back into the tile wall behind me to avoid contact with his knife. I wanted to explain that the seat was already dirty when I came in, and that I wouldn't want to clean up some inconsiderate person's mess, either. Again, words escaped me, and all that came out was me squeaking, Please don't hurt me.

I started to blubber, unable to stop the tears from welling up and running down my face. I guess this shameful display moved him to take pity on me, taking his hand off my shoulder. But he pressed his fist harder into my chest, causing me to let out a choked cry as I closed my eyes and leaned my head back, waiting to feel the blade slide across my throat. I felt him lean in, his foul breath on my face as he whispered, Next time, I'll make you lick it up. The pressure was removed from my chest so I suddenly almost fell on my face, but I caught myself, spun around and ran without looking back.

My friends were talking and leaning against the car when I came tearing out of the store. They chuckled at first asking if I had fallen in but quickly realized that I was in distress. I told them everything that had happened. Jack being almost like a protective big brother to me, stormed inside and notified the store's employees. The police were called and ended up catching the homeless man as he sat in his car parked in the grocery store parking lot. They had him cuffed in the back of their cruiser as they questioned me a few times. I kept glancing over nervously. He never took his eyes off me, staring daggers at me until they

took him to the station. He apparently had a few priors of aggressive behavior but had never pulled a weapon before today. I did feel kind of sorry for him. I have a soft spot for the less fortunate, inherited from my father, and despite him coming within inches of cutting my throat, I felt bad that he had become such an angry person due to his situation and it was now getting him into deeper and deeper trouble. I don't know what happened to him after that. My friends and I avoided that store and the area around it for the rest of the time that I lived in that state. Jack offered to let me drive on the way to his place seeing as I had asked him almost every day

to get behind the wheel but I told him that I didn't think it was a good idea right now my hands were still shaking a little right right he said awkwardly we sat in silence during the drive and while we ate turning on the tv for some background noise things did pick up as time passed and it was a decent night after that. I feel a little better as weeks went by but ever since I've had the bad habit of wiping down the seats of any public toilet I use even if it's not my mess. I can just wash my hands after I tell myself. Now to the homeless man that accused me of looking down on him pinned me to the wall of a grocery store bathroom and held a knife to my throat, I hope I didn't make life too much harder for you and that you are doing well.

But just in case you still hold a grudge and possess that knife, I think it's best for both of us to never meet in that bathroom again. room. Again. So in my third year of college, I had been dating this guy on and off for about a year at this point, and he was gorgeous. Dark brown skin, tattoos, perfect smile, lips, nice body, and everything. He was a student at my university. We studied the same subject and worked in the same field. Luckily for me, he was into curvy white girls with hair down to their butt. We were on and off due to his cheating, but I would continue to take him back. He was so persuasive and charming, I couldn't help myself. He made me fall in love through a cocktail of personality mirroring attentiveness and a huge, grand gestures after a mistake.

So one night, about a year into the relationship, we had decided to sleep at my tiny studio apartment in the college town I resided in at the time. I cooked dinner, we watched a Mike's Ep stand-up special on Netflix, had some dialogue about how our day had gone while we weren't together, typical couple things. So we had settled in and finally began to wind down and doze off. I fell into a deep, deep sleep. The kind of deep where you're so asleep that your dreams feel real and you can feel sensations such as smell, taste, and touch. I was in the grocery store. I was sampling the free samples. Delicious. I was smelling the baked goods. Scrumptious.

I ran into my neighbor and we talked about her mom who was going through chemo. Suddenly the cancer had disappeared. I piled my cart high with groceries and enjoyed each aisle, enjoying my time alone. I wheeled myself to the checkpoint and as I was on my cart high with groceries and enjoyed each aisle, enjoying my time alone. I wheeled myself to the checkpoint and as I was on my way to the open checkout line, I was stopped by a very tall and seemingly fit and muscular elderly man. Tufts of white hair poked out of the sides of his hair and a puff on his chin. He had either veneers or dentures. He was dressed in a blue with white pinstripes, button-up, short-sleeved shirt with dozens of pens in his shirt pocket. He wore coke bottle glasses. He smelled of peppermint. He had gently grabbed my elbow and called my name. Nothing in the entire world could have prepared me for what he said once he gained my attention. There's someone in your apartment. You need to wake up now. You have to get out. He repeated himself several times. I left my cart and headed

for the exit. He followed me but not menacingly. He became increasingly louder and began chasing me. Somehow I could feel his concern. As soon as I reached the automatic doors and felt the whoosh of the air through my hair, I sat up in bed quickly in a cold sweat. The clock read 2.47. My boyfriend woke up to me and told me to stop moving around so much. I sprang out of bed, grabbed my biggest knife from the block and circled through my apartment, throwing on the lights and screaming. I shoved aside drapes, the shower curtain, stormed my pantry and crawled under my bed. No one.

Silly me, it was just a dream. A week later at 2.47am on the dot, I had escaped my apartment. I saw the time on the stove illuminating my almost pitch black kitchen as I rushed out the front door and sprinted to my car in a t-shirt underwear and barefoot. My boyfriend and I got into an argument that day about his ex calling incessantly. My last message was sent around 6.45pm according to my phone records. I told him I wanted a few hours to myself to gather my thoughts and feelings, so I didn't say things I didn't mean. I turned my phone off, I grabbed a coffee, bought a novel I had wanted to read, and sat at my favorite coffee shop until close.

I met my best friend for dinner and drinks. She offered to let me sleep over with her for moral support, but I really just wanted to be alone. I hit the gym until 2. I walked home. 2.10. I was in the door. He was there. Waiting for me.

Furious. He beat the life out of me. He was mad I denied him access to me. The dream flooded my memory as I drove myself to the ER barely able to see. My eyes were swelling shut. I remember seeing the man throughout the entire store but never paying any mind. I remember hearing his voice echoing in my ears. I remember thinking in the following days after the dream if I should change my locks or buy an alarm system. I brushed it off. It was just a dream. I couldn't feel my face. Hot blood dripped onto my bare thighs from my face. My lip was busted and giant. My eyes were black and looked like plums, so swollen. He had screamed obscenities at me about

how I was out cheating. All these terrible things about me being disrespectful, about how he would put me in my place as a woman. I remained silent throughout my beating that night. Even a whimper would be too much of a reward. He eventually tired out and told me to shower and we would sleep together. He apologized and told me he would fix it tomorrow. I sat motionless on the floor of my studio, stripped of my clothes, bruised and bloody. He stood and waited for me to head for the shower. When I didn't respond quickly enough, he locked the front door and took my keys into the bathroom and locked the door. I had a spare set.

As soon as I heard the water run and the curtain close, I threw on a big white t-shirt I used for painting, grabbed my spare car keys from the cabinet above my fridge, checked the time with a glance, and let the door slam on my way out. I had to be fast. I got to my car, locked the doors, and threw it in reverse. I made it to the freeway and felt my vision failing me. Was I passing out? Was I even going the right way? Hey Siri, that has never been handier. Turn by turn I made it to the ER. No idea how long I waited to be seen, I passed out in the waiting room chair.

No dream this time, it was a shallow, shallow sleep. I felt them poking and prodding me, taking off my clothes and replacing them. I heard my mother's frantic voice and my father's grunt. He's a man of few words. That old man from my dream was trying to warn me and I didn't see it. I thought he meant an intruder. I have seen him one other time in a dream and it was the night my ex was sentenced. I was in the grocery store. He stopped me by my elbow, but this time, all I got was a wink. I wasn't always a kid moving through their adolescence at light speed, wanting to grow up fast and keep up with the lifestyles of those who acquainted me.

By age 13, despite still partying young, experiencing the fascinating things the world had to offer, I was still pretty innocent. I played online gaming with people I'd known from school, had a reasonably good relationship with my family who considered me to be on the lower end of the sensible spectrum for a guy my age. That side of me diminished quickly, my personality and lifestyle transforming into the more somewhat independent, rebellious, naive, risk-taking type at the flick of a switch. Experimenting with various hallucinogenics and alcohol was my main

priority, with everything else in my life becoming something I had no care for. Years and years of bullying, abuse, neglect, isolation, and alienation had caught up with me, and the fact I had substances to cover all of that up with was, well, at the time, my safe place. The whole world around me became nothing more than a big adventure from that moment onward. I moved cities by myself when I was 14 to pursue a girlfriend I had never even met other than on social media. I stayed in that town for six months on and off, acquainting myself with locals of all ages and lifestyles. Still, I felt alone and something was missing in my life. I'm sure we all go through this dilemma at least once in our adolescence and deal with it all in different ways. It's subjective to who we are, the way our brains

are wired, who we are surrounded by, our environment. I attended high school briefly in this town where most of my classes I would have my head buried in a book, writing Jim Morrison poetry, along with a bunch of other things that were going on in my inner monologue. My girlfriend had severe mental health issues, to the point where I couldn't even spend time with her without being taken to a cemetery where she would ask me if I would help her bring different names of people home so we could look after them. Her voice would change and she would fluctuate between the teenage girl she was and from what I presumed to be an infant. An average day would be smoking in the

morning, school for as long as I could stomach being attentive to the class without getting too absorbed in my own thoughts, and then over to either one of the two or three friends I had made to smoke and drink even more until the sun came up. After that relationship ended, I moved back to my hometown and tried my hardest to ease myself into a routine, thinking doing so would balance out my head. I attended therapy, was diagnosed with different psychiatric disorders and medicated for them. Once I was settled in, the partying started again and new people came in and out of my life. I was smoking more, selling to support my own habit. A certain group of us would love to trip, hoping to achieve some sort of spiritual enlightenment from doing so.

We took whatever we could get our hands on. I look back and can't seem to decipher whether or not I reached the level of enlightenment I was hoping to achieve, but I don't care. There were good times and bad times, of course. I got bored and moved from friend group to friend group. I started drinking heavily, attending parties, either with other acquaintances or by myself, just floating around our seaside city, lost, confused, and something was missing. A couple of the dodgiest people I'd ever met showed me what methamphetamine was, in which case I wasn't interested. I hated it, due to what I knew it did to your body, mind, and soul, finances, and family. One night I ended up with

that one guy, we'll call him Z, and a few of his other friends who I didn't know. I was drinking and tried meth for the first time. I didn't feel a thing and went home that night with a belly full of booze and fell asleep within minutes of putting my head on the pillow. I woke up and realized I had just cut the seal, so to speak, of the drug in which I swore I'd never touch. Now, it would always be an option for me. I knew what I was like. Fast forward six months or so, and it was autumn equinox. I was at a dance party, the outdoor type with 24-7 music, ravers, drugs, and mischief. You know the type. I had arrived with some close friends, but after dosing up on psychedelics, I found myself on my own. To put

it bluntly, I was off my head. I had no idea where I was, what to do, how to have a conversation with anybody. So after a few hours had passed and the early hours of the morning were dawning, I sat at a big bonfire surrounded by fellow ravers enjoying their night. I mentioned rather loud that I had Somali if anyone wanted to partake. I was introduced to Jay, who took me to the back of his car, which was full of three other people. We spent the next couple of hours until the sun came up using our noses as vacuum cleaners and all talking at a million miles per hour about the most beautiful things we could fathom in our brains at the time. You know, the molly roll. Lovely memories. I keep in contact with these guys.

They had a room at their flat which I was going to fill as I had nowhere else to go and unfortunately Jay had to go to prison for some charges that caught up on him. My new family were all I had at the time. They were all I chose to have. I was more lost than ever. I'll never forget the first night that it was only myself and the family there after Jay was locked up. We smoked about a quarter gram of meth to ourselves that night and I fell in love with it. The whole thing fascinated me. The way the product shimmered in the light, how it melted down in the pipe, the feeling you got when you inhaled a huge puff and felt as though you just had a big glass of ice water at your most dehydrated point. I loved twirling the pipe and experimenting with different

ways of doing so. I loved the deep conversations, also bringing each other to tears with the connections we felt that night. I love the feeling of pure dopamine or overriding my system, not having a care in the world about what's going on anywhere. Emptiness, numbness, playing PlayStation together until the sun came up, only stopping our conversations and gaming to smoke more or slow ourselves down with some ganja. The next few days were foggy. I didn't want to eat, didn't want to sleep. All we focused on was the fun, in which we called scoring more drugs to go around and continuing our bender. I got really bad at this stage and was isolating myself from the rest of the house. We acquired another roommate, whom I'd known since I was younger. He was worried every day that he'd open my door in the morning so we could have our morning smoke and coffee,

that I wouldn't be with us anymore. I was a mess. I started owing people large sums of money, all in which could have risked my life. I knew I was moving too fast, but I was just so alone. Drugs filled that empty space, or so I thought. I met a girl at this point, who I won't talk much about, but to cut a long story short, she was physically, mentally, and spiritually abusive towards me from almost day one, and trapped me in a relationship with her for almost two years. Those two years were full of partying, the last two years of high school, pain, pain, and more pain. After getting her out

of my life, the terror starts. I moved back to my hometown and was more lost than ever. I had no purpose. My family and I had long since fallen out because of my life choices over the past few years and the groups of friends I had were all fallen out because of my life choices over the past few years and the groups of friends I had were all broken up and people were going their own way. I landed myself a job moving furniture, which tied up my days and brought in the money I needed to survive. I was alone. I felt alone. I'd had enough one day and Z arrived at my house. He brought out a pipe full of crystals and let me go

for it until I felt like my feet weren't even touching the ground. I met other dealers, whom of which let me take meth on credit, which always landed me in so much trouble. I had connections all around me wanting to sell to me, wanting me to sell for them. Every day I smoked, went to work, almost collapsed out of dehydration, went to work, almost collapsed out of dehydration, trying to keep myself together in front of customers. Things were getting weird. I started to get tired. I could catch myself falling asleep standing up at 4am in the morning in my room. I was deteriorating. A girl came into my life who was seeing someone else. We became obsessed with each other, knowing full well about her boyfriend.

That made me worse. The guilt was unbearable, mixed with the lust of wanting her all to myself. One day, one of my acquaintances decided we should take a drive. I had drugs on me and so did he. We ended up getting surrounded by police cars after being parked for around 15 minutes and I was cuffed and taken away. I escaped with a possession charge, he escaped with nothing. For the rest of my life, that night's going to be the one time I wish I'd just stayed at home. Life will never be the same. I met a dealer through a mutual friend. She told me she had

a massive connection and that it was mine on tap if I wanted it. I took advantage of that and used manipulation to trick her into giving me as much as I wanted throughout a month where she thought I was expecting some sort of inheritance money to arrive. I was loaded. I had pockets full of the drug that everyone knew I desired. Everything. Bottles of liquor. Anything you could want. I was the guy to be around. That month or two I don't think I slept. Many people came and went, had the best times of their lives adventuring around the suburbs and the country at my expense.

So many beautiful messed up memories. Meanwhile, I wasn't okay. I was deteriorating more and more physically, mentally, and spiritually. The psychosis started. Nobody took me seriously when I reached out. The people who were there for the drugs and the company just found it funny. My family didn't have a clue what to do. Therapy wasn't working because I didn't want to stop. What unfolded next was the most terrifying time of my life so far. In the park next to my house, which I could see clearly through my window, I would obsess over people and lights that would accommodate the trees and bushes from the moment it got dark until the moment the sun came up, falling asleep in between, almost

destroying my room's walls trying to find hidden cameras and microphones, scaring away everyone who wanted to hang out with me by my terrifying demeanor. I was sleep deprived, paranoid, and dangerously unpredictable. I never heard anyone, but people thought I would. I would think drones would fly laps around my house with cameras. Shadows spoke to me, gestured to me. I would hear a knock at the door and think it was something arriving to end my life. Once the dealers wanted their money that I didn't have it made things worse. I faced potential boot rides, extortion techniques and all other sorts of psychiatric torture. Too many people were after me, real, not real. I

didn't care. I was gone. After some contemplation, I left town and spent four or five days up to old habits in a different city. Got death threats for whole new reasons, jaw almost broken by being assaulted for no reason, and ended up homeless. I lost everything. I had hit rock bottom. Two and a half years later, I've been sober of all substances since August of 2017. I'm engaged to my safe place. A beautiful woman I met just after I hit rock bottom. She's my best friend and helps me through anything as I do her. Two messages for this story. Don't touch meth. Be careful with the consumption of any drugs. You never know what's around the corner. Two. No matter how scared you are or how deep and dark you are down a hole, there's always a way

out. There's always a chance of escaping addiction. You've just got to pick the right moment and don't look back. Surround yourself with new people. Set goals. Eat healthy. Move away if you can. Have a fresh start. Loads of support is out there. Never give up. Our neighborhood was very nice.

We lived in a northern suburb of Chicago. This all happened from the time I was five to seven. Our neighbors to our right were very close to my family. My parents were friends with them and my brother and I were friends with their daughter who was my brother's age. My mom babysat for their four-year-old Sarah and their baby May every day of the week because their mother worked long hours. They also had a son named Christopher who was 13. He was friends with the neighbors next to their house named JR. Those neighbors were extremely disturbed.

They were Filipino like our neighbor's mom and her husband was Persian. The Filipino neighbors had a son who was Christopher's age named JR and a daughter who was 16 named Cristobela. Christopher was friends with JR until he did something disturbing and horrible to Christopher's mom. One day Maria was changing and noticed JR watching her. She set up cameras and caught him pleasuring himself while watching her. He also relieved himself on her back door a lot. Very strange stuff. Maria and her husband ended up moving because they became afraid he would break in or something. Soon after that my dad's racing bike was stolen by JR. He knew it was JR because he saw him riding

it in front of our house. My dad went over to their house to confront their father and get his bike back. The father threatened my father and denied JR stole anything. My father decided it wasn't worth it because of the threats of violence. He did call the police but nothing came of it. One day JR's father and another man came to our house and started yelling to my dad to come outside. My mom locked the screen door and asked what they wanted. They told her they were going to beat up my dad because JR had been riding my dad's bike back and forth in front of our house and my dad yelled at him. Soon after something horrendous happened. My brother and I had a bunny named Thumper and a

guinea pig named Piglet. We left their cage outside during the day and brought them in at night. My family went out and when we came back, Thumper had been drowned in our kiddie pool and Piglet had been thrown over our fence and into the alley. The vet said Piglet's internal organs were all damaged and she was dying and suffering. We had to have her put to sleep. My brother, my mom, and I were all crying hysterically. My mother knew who did it because the crazy father had threatened our family just because my father confronted him about his son stealing his really expensive bike. My dad yelled at him and then our pets had their lives ended by the

husband and his friend. My mom went to their house and confronted the father. He laughed and said they were just animals and the daughters laughed too. My parents called the police and they said the police were there all the time. My mom can't remember if the husband got in trouble for what him and his friend did. Two years later I was in second grade. I was sleeping in my room with my faithful dog Wrinkles. Suddenly I woke up to her barking and heard a sound coming from my window. Suddenly I heard someone say, I'm gonna come in and have my way with you. I ran into my parents room crying and told them what happened. My dad looked out my window and the screen was ripped. They called the police and they found one of her outside chairs outside my window and shoe prints.

They searched for JR because they knew that his family had been harassing us. They couldn't find him. I was terrified to sleep in my room for a long time and slept in my parents' room for a while. My dog saved me. If she hadn't been sleeping with me in my room, I don time and slept in my parents' room for a while. My dog saved me. If she hadn't been sleeping with me in my room, I don't know what would have happened. Right after it happened, my parents put up motion detector lights by the front door and lights on the ground all the way around the front of our house and the side of our house. They also put another motion detector light in the backyard right above the back door to my

brother's room. Later that year someone knocked on our door and my mom answered and no one was there but on the ground was a plate with rice and a dead crow. My mom is convinced it was a curse from the neighbors. I don't know if it was a last hateful act or a threat. They moved a month later and things went back to normal. JR, we better never meet. I'm only saying that for your benefit because if you and I do meet, I'll destroy everything you love for what your family did to mine. You had no respect for women and you terrorized my neighbors into moving and you terrorized me. I also blame you for my pets. They lost their lives because of you and your psychoticness.

I hope you have the worst life and that karma has come to you and will destroy your family. I work third watch shifts at my job in a neighboring city so I don't get off till 2am. That being said I got off at 2am like I had every other night I get off of work. Nothing out of the ordinary. It takes me about 20 minutes to get home from work so I typically just turn up my music and ignore the other cars while driving home. All went the same as it does every night. This particular night was a Saturday or technically speaking Sunday morning so there were a few other cars on the road as the bars typically close here around the same time that I get off. I make it to the exit that I take to get off the highway back to my house when I start

to get an uneasy feeling in my gut. I see a car behind me get off the highway as well but shake it off as nothing since there was another car next to me and this is a popular exit slash side street that many people take to get home. I make the turn to head towards my neighborhood and this car follows suit. Again, nothing super out of the ordinary since there are a lot of neighborhoods around mine. It wasn't until I got to the street where my neighborhood is located that my gut was telling me, in the strongest way I'd ever felt, that this car was following me. They weren't even particularly close to me or speeding up to catch up to me, but I still felt that something was really wrong. So I turn on the road and speed up to get away from him.

His headlights vanish and I make the turn into my neighborhood and wait at the end of the street to see if he goes past the entrance or not. To my horror, he makes the turn into the entrance and comes towards me. I couldn't let this guy know where I lived and my neighborhood is one giant square so I make sure he's following me. I make a left, he follows. I make another left into a cul-de-sac, or a dead end to those who don't know what that is, and turn around and go back the way I came. He makes every move I make but what almost scares me the most is that when I go straight down the road and past my house, he stops his car directly in front of my house. At no point did I slow down or stop in front of the house so unless he was following me before, there's no way this guy knows where I live.

Now I'm all the way at the end of the long T-shaped road looking behind me watching this guy stopped in front of my house. After a few minutes he starts to come towards me again and I speed off making another left. Again, my neighborhood is two squares put together with connecting streets, and park my car and shut off all my lights on the street that is behind my house. I thought that by blacking out my car he would drive past and not notice amongst the other cars parked on the street, but of course I was wrong. He parks his car behind me and proceeds to get out. This man is a tall,

burly Hispanic male with lots of tattoos. Remember it's 2am and I'm a 23 year old small white girl who forgot to bring any protection with me so I'm completely defenseless besides being in my car. This is the part where I still have a hard time telling my story because I have what I consider survivor's guilt. I feel so stupid for allowing him to even come close to me but I was in full panic mode and froze up for a minute. He comes up to my window standing a few feet away and asks if I know anything about the guy with the big van. My neighbor has a large camper van parked in the driveway next to my house and that's what he was referring to. My window is barely cracked, enough to where he can hear me but not see me.

My windows are super tinted and it's hard to see in them during the day, nonetheless at night luckily. I tell him I know nothing about the people with the van. Of course I'm lying because all that's running through my head is don't let this guy know where you live. He then proceeds to ask me, you're Mexican right? I think this strange question snapped me out of my frozen panic and I immediately put my car in drive and drive around the corner. I find a spot to hide my car again and black it out for the second time. This time I see his car coming around the corner where he proceeds to go sit directly in front of mine and my neighbor's house. At this point I can see his car but he doesn't know where I am and I immediately call the police. As soon as the police turn into

the neighborhood the man drives off, probably seeing them drive down the back road. By the time the police reach me my whole family and fiance are outside at this point as my fiance had woken up my parents to tell them what was going on. I drive up to the three cops to show up and give them my story. Just as the cops were about to leave the man shockingly drives back around and is met with three police officers this time. My mom gets in the car with me and we drive around the corner until my stepdad calls us and tells us the man left and we're okay to come back and talk to the police. After everything was said and done, the cops had no probable cause to arrest him

so all they could do was tell him to never come back here. I actually work for a police department so this doesn't come as a surprise to me, just a disappointment. They did tell us the man was crazy and he made up some nonsense story about how my neighbors owed him $10 and that he was talking to his wife or something along those lines. I don't completely remember his story but it was something stupid that didn't make any sense so whatever. We're really good friends with our neighbors who are in their 60s, retired and happily married. Ever since that experience, my head is constantly on a swivel, and I am always aware of my surroundings. Nothing like that has thankfully ever happened again, but I will never do what I did if it does. Next time, I will drive somewhere well-lit,

like a gas station or a 24-7 store parking lot that's what I was told was best anyways if it happens that late again I have never had a gut feeling like that before and all I know is that if I ever feel that feeling again I'll have my phone ready to dial 9-1-1 immediately always trust your gut. Now keep in mind, nothing like this has ever happened in our house before and nothing since, and I haven't mentioned it to any of my family because they'd think I'm either an idiot or I would spook them. Anyway, now to the meat and potatoes. I was usually the last one to go to bed that summer and I could never shake the feeling that there was something in the house. Something just out of sight wandering the halls in the dark hours of

the night. Never any strange occurrences of note, never any sightings of black figures or apparitions, just this feeling that there was an extra occupant in the house. For a while, this had me nervous. I was losing sleep. I had started to sleep with a small lamp on in my room, just so it wasn't so dark in my room. As the tension escalated, I pulled out my Bible and left it open to the 23rd Psalm while I slept and kept my necklace with the Lord's Prayer engraved on a cross next to me all night. This is at least giving me the peace of mind to sleep. But then, even though it didn't get stronger, the feeling of something being in the house extended into the daylight hours, notably the afternoon. I vividly remember trying to take a

nap on a recliner in the unfinished portion of our basement, kind of a man cave area of the house. No one else likes to hang out there and I kept my guitars and amps there too. It was a sunny afternoon around 2.30 or 3pm on my day off. I was reclined in the chair and half asleep and the feeling came back, but it wasn't as threatening since I wasn't surrounded by darkness, but rather warm sunlight wafting in through the basement window. I could almost visualize a black humanoid figure just floating and wandering around the passages of our house. Not a threatening or malevolent feeling, but definitely kind of creepy. A little history on the house, it's been added onto at least three times.

Twice before we moved in and once by us. Under my bedroom is a crawlspace where the basement did not extend under one of these additions. Around this time, I started to have a reoccurring dream. In the dream, my brother and I would come across a room in the basement that no one knew existed. Upon entering, we noticed the room was just completely trashed and a red, dim, orange light hung in the air. There was also the feeling of a malevolent presence in the room. A few weeks later, I packed up and moved into an apartment in my college town and when I came back home briefly to visit during Christmas and the next summer, nothing. I have never had the overwhelming feeling that something was there or that dream ever

again. What could it have been? Can spirits make temporary residencies? Could my dream have been connected? My mom at one point used to brag about being psychic. I myself wish there was another word to describe my own gifts. I'd prefer discernment. Yet, even that word doesn't cover everything I've experienced in my lifetime.

But the broad spectrum of paranormal seems to cover a lot of aspects. Growing up in my family, I one day realized my mother would test my gifts. One memory of this, I was five years old. I sat on the living room floor playing with my dollhouse. My mother approached me. She asked me if I could locate a wedding ring some family friends had misplaced. My first question was, where was it last? My mother told me it was last seen on the fireplace mantle. I immediately told her it was in the fireplace. She counters by telling me they searched the fireplace already and hadn't found it. Mom, it's in the fireplace. They will have to sift through it or it will be lost forever. This quiets her. She calls up her friends and tells

them exactly what I said. Ironically, someone was coming to clean out their fireplace later that same day. They did sift through the soot and the ring was recovered. In 1986, when the Challenger space shuttle exploded over Florida, our country was rocked. The next day, the picture in all the newspapers were these two clouds of smoke with vapor trails. When my mother picked up the paper, she exclaims, Oh my God! What? I ask. She picks up a sheet of typewriter paper with a picture drawn on it. She holds it next to the newspaper. It was as if though she copied the picture with pencil. They were identical.

That picture my mother had drawn had been on the table for two weeks prior to the Challenger's tragedy. As an adult, my intuition has at times seemed like a curse. I'll be having what I think is a normal conversation only to find out the person I was chatting with thinks I know something about a secret they've been hiding because for some odd reason, I'm talking about subjects that has to do with the issue they're trying to hide. Don't get me wrong, sometimes I don't find out till years later. One time I was invited to stay with some people at their house. Their other roommate was this guy who reminded me of the Addams Family TV show. I'll call him Lurch. I thought he must have narcolepsy. Lurch was always nodding off. He'd fall asleep in the bathroom, snoring on the toilet. Then one day, I don't know why or what possessed me to say this, but I asked, Lurch, it's as if though you're an addict. He treated me with disdain from there on out.

Believe it or not, I didn't find out he was an addict until I had left that house. This gift has actually put my life in danger a few times. What's worse is I haven't a clue why they're upset or why they'd want to hurt me. It reveals itself later. When I was in 6th grade, there was a speech contest at my school. Best advice they gave in giving a speech is to tell what you know. So of course, my speech was on ESP, extrasensory perception. I even won first place.

One day, I'm cornered in the school hallway by three boys. One boy says he knows I have ESP. I say please stop, get real. He doesn't give up. Every example you use in your speech has happened since you gave your speech. There's no way you can prove or disprove your claim, I retort. His face brightens. I know. He points at one of his friends and says,

guess his locker combination. I can't pick random numbers out of my head and get it right. Give me the first and the last number and I'll tell you the middle number. He agrees. The numbers given are 36 and 12. I reply without hesitation, twenty-four. I was right, and those boys never bothered me again. So my family has had a few weird encounters with black-eyed doppelgangers. An example would be that for five years straight on the same day I would see my uncle standing in my doorway staring at me, even when he was on the other side of the country. But that's not the story. This is the most recent incident that happened to my mom, though it was a few years ago. It was my mom's birthday. My cousin and uncle had

come over, we ordered pizza and watched movies. As it got late, my mom went to bed and my cousin and uncle left and I settled into bed as well. I woke up abruptly to my mom standing over me, eyes wide, hunched over, as if though she were examining me. There was fear in her eyes. I was honestly afraid at first, thinking that she was going to hurt me. What? I asked in a confused tone. My mom's eyes softened like she calmed down a bit when she heard my voice. Are you okay? She asked. I replied. I'm fine. Are you okay? She looked out of my door and down the long hallway to her bedroom before whispering, Something was in your room. What do you mean? I asked as I got out of bed. Something was in my room. I was confused but I'd never seen my mom afraid before.

I'd literally seen her fight six foot3 men to defend me and she wasn't afraid of anything, but she was afraid of this. Do you want me to go with you to check it out? Granted, I wouldn't be much help since I was 18 and half her size. She didn't say anything at first. She just stared down the hall with a haunting expression, until finally she said, I'm not sleeping there tonight. I just need to go get my phone and I'll stay in the living room. I nodded and stepped in front of her and we walked down the hall. When we got to her room, the light was off. I flicked it on to reveal nothing. I stepped inside, looked around and stared at her.

Nothing's here. But that same haunted expression stayed on her face. She wouldn't step inside her room. I picked up her phone and handed it to her. We went to the living room and sat in silence for a while before she said, It looked like you. I stared at her with a confused expression. What looked like me? I questioned. Whatever was in my room, it looked like you. I thought, I thought it was you. I spoke to it. But its eyes were black.

I thought it was a sign you were dead. I thought it meant you were gone. She started crying. I said, At least that explains why you were looking at me like that when I woke up. But what happened? This is what she said. She woke up and couldn't really get back to sleep. While she was laying in the silent room, she heard snoring, but it sounded off,

like someone was only pretending to snore. I've had awful night terrors since I was born. It sounds lame, but it wasn't really an outlandish thought for me to go sleep with her when I had one. Thinking it was me she nudged towards the other side of the bed saying to shut up. The snoring however just got louder as she felt faint breath on her neck. Not only that but there was a weight now reaching across her. She started saying my name but realized the snoring had stopped and instead was replaced with the mimicking sound of my name. She turned over to her side only to freeze when she was met face to face with something that looked and sounded exactly like me, but instead had an ear to ear smile and pitch black eyes. It flopped over on her waist like a rag doll,

saying my name over and over again steadily getting closer and closer before it reached her face. She jumped out of bed and ran to the other side of the house to find me in bed asleep. We both stayed in the living room that night watching TV and my mom still hasn't seen the thing that looks like me again. However, I will point out that a week after this incident when my mom had gone to the races with my aunt, I heard the sound of her laugh coming from her bedroom. Hey friends, thanks for listening. Be sure to subscribe and click that notification bell to be alerted of all future narrations. To be continued... and join my Discord to interact with me and other listeners directly. And if you want to support me even more, grab early access to all future narrations for just $1 a month on Patreon,

and maybe even pick up some Let's Read merch on Spreadshirt. And check out the Let's Read podcast, where you can hear all these stories in long compilation form and save huge on data, located on both Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Links in the bio. Thanks so much, friends. And remember, let's rant with no pants.