The Lets Read Podcast - 75: Episode 066 | Road Trip & Mountain Creep Stories | 24 True Scary Horror Stories

Episode Date: July 14, 2020

Welcome to the sixty-sixth 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 Road Trips, Canadian Rocky Creeps & A Phone Call You'll Never Forget... 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 

If it's a flat or a squeal, a wobble or peel, your tread's worn down or you need a new wheel, wherever you go, you can get a pro at Tread Experts. Conquer rugged terrain with on-road comfort. Until June 15th, receive up to $60 on a prepaid MasterCard when you purchase Kumo Road Venture AT52 tires. Find a Kumo Tread Experts dealer near you at treadexperts.ca slash locations. From tires to auto repair, we're always there at treadexperts.ca locations. From tires to auto repair, we're always there, treadexperts.ca. A few years ago, me and a friend were getting pretty sick of the New England weather. We get our fair share of sunshine up here, but only for about three weeks out of 52. So after one particularly washout summer where the sky barely shifted from its regular grey tone,

we decided on a road trip to alleviate the rain-soaked misery. We didn't have a destination in mind as such, just a direction. South. As far south as we could possibly go without having to buy ourselves a Spanish phrasebook. About a fortnight in, we'd made it all the way down to New Mexico. I'd enjoyed the BBQ in South Carolina, relish the peach cobbler in Georgia but nothing compared to the food in New Mexico I thought I'd be eating good Mexican food back home

but I came to realize I'd been eating lies turns out the closer you get to the border the better the food gets Mexican food isn't all about spice either although that is a big part of it, but even then it's not that bear-mace kind of burning hot that we might associate with it. There's tangy, fruity salsa made from pineapples, not to mention the smoky flavor that ancho chili imparts to dishes, but I digress.

We'd been so charmed by New Mexico that, instead of rolling through it into Arizona like we planned, we decided to tour a little more of the state before leaving. This meant we rolled down dusty roads, visiting little cowboy towns and Antahito joints along the way. So at one point, we're still a few hundred miles away from our planned stop and we're getting pretty tired. Driving at night can be disorienting and dangerous so instead of just switching over while the driver sleeps in the back seat we decided just pull over and sleep a few hours until dawn before we get back on the road. The only problem was finding somewhere safe enough to park up. Now when I picture New Mexico I picture the kinds of adobe brown desert scenes made famous by old westerns. But as it turns out, New Mexico has its fair share of snow-capped

mountains and lush green forests. We happened to be driving by one such patch of tall pines when we called our rest stop. So we pull in and turn down a dirt road and wind it among the trees. We're taking it slow, trying to find a turnoff or campground to park up at to get some shut-eye. It took a while, but we found one, parking up and turning off the engine before unpacking our sleeping gear and leaning back the seats. As you can imagine though, New Mexico gets real warm and stays real warm well into the night. So although it'd leave us prey to the mosquitoes, cracking the window to allow some much needed fresh air in was absolutely essential. It was actually kind of nice for a while, lying there, drifting off with the sound of crickets chirping and coyotes yipping in the hills.

It was relaxing listening to the sounds of crickets chirping and coyotes yipping in the hills. It was relaxing listening to the sounds of nature, until I heard a sound that was distinctly unrelaxing. The sound of hushed, human voices. My eyes opened in the darkness as I strained to hear just what these voices are saying, but I can't make out anything specific, just that at least two people are talking amongst themselves in hushed tones. This is a big red flag for me. Sometimes you get people walking past your car when you're trying to sleep, mostly in cities but sometimes out in the sticks too. If they're loud it generally means they're just drunk and headed home. Sure, drunk can be another kind of red flag for danger,

but not nearly as much as actual hushed voices. Whispers mean a person doesn't want to be heard. Whispers mean someone is up to no good. Although we're from a state where legislation has made firearm ownership pretty much next to impossible, we weren't about to roll down the deep south without proper protection. Not so much from the people. All our interactions with people in the southern states were overwhelmingly positive, but there's no reasoning with a bear or a rattlesnake.

So we stopped at the first gun show we found in West Virginia to pick up something small but powerful. A.44 snub-nosed revolver. The moment I heard those hushed, whispering voices, I popped the glove compartment and took it out. After I made sure it was loaded, I leaned over to my buddy and gently shook him awake. Huh? What? What time is it? His eyes were bloodshot, his voice croaky. Listen to me. The fear in my voice had him paying attention. There's someone outside. We talked it over countless times, what we'd do if someone tried to rob or kidnap us.

What was at first a morbid mental exercise had suddenly become all too real. We decided to get out and confront whoever was out there, hoping they'd hear that we are armed, get scared, and take off. It could have just been a few kids hanging around drinking, but it's always better to be safe than sorry. So we get out, me with the flashlight in one hand, the revolver in the other. We're both shining flashlights into the trees but seeing nothing. We haven't heard any voices since we got out of the car and I'm hoping they've just moved on, but like I said, better safe than sorry. Hey, anyone there? My buddy calls out into the darkness. We give a minute or so and no one replies, but that doesn't mean we're feeling safe and sound, so we start walking into the darkness. We give a minute or so and no one replies, but that doesn't mean we're feeling

safe and sound, so we start walking into the trees, trying to find whoever was whispering. I'm expecting to find a handful of thugs who were going to rob us of our car and wallets, but what we found was much, much worse. The thing that hit me first was the smell. The further we got into the trees, the stronger this sickly sweet smell of hot garbage seemed to be. Neither of us had ever smelled anything like it in our lives, so it wasn't like we had anything to compare it to. It wasn't like we recognized it or anything. Then we saw the pit, the shadow of the ground opening up before us. Then we saw the shovels, the plastic sheet stained with something brownish red. Flies were buzzing around the open pit, so loud I could barely hear my own voice when I exclaimed in pure horror at what lay at the bottom.

It was a body, a human body, only it was barely recognizable as one. It had been beaten so badly it looked like a monster, a hideous imitation of the human form. The face was swollen, bloodied and bruised, eyelids swollen shut as huge busted lips still leaked gore onto the neck and chin. We ran, got into our car and got out of there. What followed was probably the most terrifying few minutes of my life. I expected to see another vehicle's lights appear on the road behind us, getting bigger as they got closer, chasing us down to silence us forever. But they didn't. Nothing happened. getting bigger as they got closer, chasing us down to silence us forever.

But they didn't. Nothing happened. The adrenaline had us so wired that we drove all night to the next town, calling in at a local sheriff's department as soon as we arrived. We didn't stay long in that area, so naturally we didn't hear back from the cops regarding what happened to the body or if they found the guys trying to bury it. But I still think about it every now and then and what that poor person could have possibly done to deserve to die in such a way. Me and my friends are grunge freaks. We started out on Nirvana and Soundgarden, eventually discovering more obscure bands like Mudhoney, The Melvins, and The Screaming Trees.

Anyone who knows anything about grunge will tell you that it all started in Seattle. How this spontaneous new genre sprang out of the ashes of post-punk to take the world by storm, and it all happened within like a few square miles. So naturally, Seattle is like a mecca for grunge fans, and after years of planning and false commitment, we finally got our stuff together and went on a road trip to our sacred city. That's how we ended up on the Wyoming interstate. So we're just driving along, singing along to Alice in Chains songs when the next thing I know,

I can see red and blue flashes in my rear view. My buddies in the back seat spin around, seeing the same thing I did, an unmarked vehicle with one of those attachable emergency lights on the top. As I start to pull over, I'm wondering where this cop car came from. We were on this long stretch of open road and could see for miles around us. It was pretty unnerving that it had managed to just creep up on us like that. But you know how it is. Traffic cops tend to stay out of sight in little rest areas or whatever.

They're speedometers at the ready. Now I was well within the speed limit but I was still worried. I'd be lying if I said we didn't have anything on us that we shouldn't have but that was all buried in our bags in the trunk and even then it wasn't exactly enough to charge us with. So I just got my driver's license ready on my lap, and kept my hands at ten and two, like a good little citizen. The cop turns off his lights and then gets out of the unmarked car, walking along the dusty road towards us. He's wearing civilian clothes, a baseball cap,

aviators, sunglasses, and checkered shirt, but I can clearly see the utility belt and badge he's wearing. When he knocks on my window, I promptly roll it down, smiling while I give him my cheerious, good afternoon officer. I'm no bootlicker, but I'm not going to give this guy an excuse to ruin our road trip. What follows probably isn't exactly what was said that day, but it's as best as I can remember. Afternoon, officer. How can I help you? Driver's license and registration. He demands curtly. Sure thing. I take one hand off the steering wheel and hand him my license. He takes a long, careful look,

first at my license, then at me. Detroit, huh? He finally said dismissively. You're a long way from home, son. What's your business in Wyoming? Uh, we're actually on a road trip, sir. Headed out towards Washington, Seattle to be specific. What for? Uh, just because. I guess always wanted to see the west coast. Just because. The cop mockingly interjected. Maybe see some of California? My words broke off. I really didn't like where the whole thing was going. Any weapons in the car? No, sir.

Drugs or alcohol? No, sir. I replied without hesitation. But the answer didn't satisfy him. I could feel his steely gaze from behind his mirrored sunglasses. They made him seem like more of a machine than a man. I'm gonna need y'all to step out of the vehicle. His voice was cold.

What for? Don't make me tell you again, son. I turned to my buddies in the back seat. They looked as worried as I felt. Slowly, we did as we were told and got out of my car, walking over to the side of the road and grouping together near the verge. It was then that I actually got a good look at the unmarked car the cop was driving. It was an old Dodge pickup, I mean really old. It looked like it

might fall apart if the thing drove faster than 40. Something interesting to you about my vehicle, son? Uh, no sir. I lied, thinking that the department must have been seriously underfunded. Deny his front. One of my buddies shot me a look as if to say, what is this guy's deal? But I just shook my head, figuring if we just played along, we'd get out of there faster. I'm going to need to see the passenger's IDs, the cop said suddenly. Mine's in the car, my one friend said. The other said the same. You didn't take out IDs to show a cop at a traffic stop? Are you mentally disabled?

I, uh, no. Then go. Get him. Pair you. Cue more nervous looks amongst us before they start wandering back to the car to get their IDs. Then, to my complete shock, the cop takes his revolver out of his holster hip, flicks off the safety, and points it towards my buddies. One of my friends turns, looks down the barrel of the revolver and freezes in place, pure fear in his eyes. I'm not going to shoot you, but I need to cover myself just in case you pull a pistol out of that back seat.

The cop said with a grin. Gone. Go get him. It was about this point that I decided to make a formal complaint against the cop. I was scared, sure, but I was also really angry too. Whatever backwater county this was, their volunteer sheriff program obviously needed some thorough vetting. I didn't know how much good it'd do, but I had to do something. This idiot had to pay. After he gets my buddy's ID, he takes them back to his truck and starts writing stuff down on a notepad, obviously all our personal information. Then he starts talking to someone, but not on a radio as you'd expect. All he had was a cell phone in his hand.

When he finishes, he gets out then doesn't even walk all the way over to us before just tossing our IDs in the dirt. Gone. Get out of Wyoming. He spat, before getting back into his truck and speeding off into the distance, leaving us choking on a cloud of dirt. Once he's out of sight, we start cursing him out, raging about how we're going to make a formal complaint once we're back home from our trip. Now, cut to about an hour later and we're only about 50 miles further into our journey when another set of red and blue lights appear in my rear view. We just straight up panic at this point and actually debate whether or not to try to outrun this psycho since there's no way his

old truck could keep up. But once we work out that it's an actual marked unit this time, and evidently not some idiot, we pull over and repeat the entire process. Only, it doesn't go quite the same way. I'll just tell you what you need to know. At some point I'm mentioned to this uniformed cop that I've already been stopped like just an hour before. He looks confused and asks where we'd been pulled over. I didn't know any place names by heart but I insisted it was less than a hundred miles back the way we came. When the uniformed cop tells us that that's impossible, it takes all my will not to ask the guy if all Wyoming cops are as incompetent as this, but then he finishes his sentence.

I'm the only highway patrol in the county right now. If it wasn't me who pulled you over, I really don't know who did. We described the guy who pulled us over to the uniformed cop, told him the vehicle type, even the color of this idiot's mustache, but the cop has no clue who we were talking about. Then it hits us. The guy wasn't Highway Patrol.

He wasn't even a volunteer deputy. To this day, we have no idea who it was that pulled us over on that stretch of interstate. Our complaints to the state police went nowhere as far as I know. They never found the guy to charge him with impersonating an officer. The lesson being, even though it might make them mad, always ask for ID from cops who pull you over and be sure to take a darn good look at it. There's some real psychos out there.

Many years ago now my family and I were on a road, going to visit Big Bend National Park down in Texas. This was way before the World Wide Web, mind you. That's important for you to know, and you'll know why in a moment. We were trying to plan where to stay, having picked up several brochures for actual ranch stays in the area at the time. There were only about three or four to begin with. We narrowed them down to two, which appeared to list the very same things. Horseback riding. It's important to note here that when we made reservations, we verified that the horses would be available during our visit when we called. Swimming, rooms with air conditioning, etc. We wanted horseback riding, and there were only about two that actually offered it.

One was $10 cheaper than the other one. The cheaper one, we assumed, was cheaper because it was further out in the country than the other one, which was right in the middle of town. We kind of liked the idea of the quiet desert. Neither brochure had any pictures, so we could only guess about this. Oh my, how we wish we had seen pictures. But first, you know how we selected it because it was further out of town? We had to take a coarsely graveled road to get to the ranch. The road was about 18 miles long and we got an actual flat and not just any flat, we blew a huge hole in

the tire. Sure we had a spare but the point is that we're in the middle of the Texas desert with very little water and it's fast approaching midday. It's actually really dangerous to be out there since you can develop heat stroke literally within about 20 minutes of being exposed to that kind of heat. The size of the hole in the tire meant that a patch was impossible. We also didn't know any numbers for local mechanics, so we're kind of panicking when this other truck comes rolling along. He eyes us up and down, seeing that we're city folk, and you can tell straight away he is nothing but contempt for us. He starts telling us all about how dangerous it is to be stuck out here in the desert,

how quickly rattlesnake venom can kill you dead, how the vultures pick clean the bones of anything that falls victim to the elements out there. That's if the bandits or smugglers didn't find us first. The local guys sold us a new tire for, are you ready for this? $150. Yep, keep in mind that this was about 25 years ago, so imagine how much that would be now. And it wasn't like we couldn't not buy it. We had no choice, it was literally buy the tire or face the consequences. So we paid for the tire and went on our way. When we arrived, we gaped in horror at the scene before us. The place we chose, this cheaper one, wasn't a hotel ranch at all. They were actually trailers sitting on a rocky hill.

I kid you not. I'm talking mobile homes lifted and sitting on tons of rocks on hills. Sure, they were weighted down and there was a graded edge, but you had to actually climb the rocks to get to the trailer or cabin. Rocks. And you had to carefully ascend them. How a place like this ever got a business license nor have a lawsuit filed against them is beyond me. I guess in those days, I suppose, people weren't as sue-happy as they are now, though I do remember it was getting started good, but I digress. When we checked in, in the dining room, we were informed that the horses were not out for the summer yet and this was in May in South Texas where it's summer nearly all year round. This after we had been told that they

would definitely be available on that date. Fine. We ate our dinner in the dining room which was at the bottom of the rock hill. We went to make our way up the hill to the trailer and my foot slipped on a rock and the next thing I knew I was falling off the rocks. My ankle was sprained. Now how in the heck I was supposed to finish climbing up there to get to the room? For that matter, how would I ever go back and forth? So we finally get to the room and I elevate my foot on the bed. I'm hot, I'm tired, and I just want to sit for a few minutes, thanking God that at least this bad day is nearly over. I turn on the TV, hoping to find something relaxing to watch. We were told that the cabins had satellite TV, which was just getting started good. Unfortunately, we could only pick one channel. Was it any surprise then that the one

channel we got was only in Japanese? Are you kidding me? This was the Texas desert. I could see Spanish, but Japanese? I showed my teenage son, but he said it wasn't Japanese text. It was a language he'd never seen before and he's really into Asian cartoons and whatnot. The shower was completely broken. It only drizzled water and that water was scorching hot. Not useful at all. We weren't able to take a shower while we were there and believe me, we needed to. Later, we joked about it saying that we felt like we were in Chevy Chase's National Lampoon's Vacation movie when nothing goes right. It's funny now, though obviously it wasn't back then.

It was those kind of trips that create truly vivid memories. But the first night, we hardly slept. There were weird noises of things moving outside the mobile homes, things sniffing and scratching in the dirt outside. It was horrible. We told ourselves it was just coyotes but I know coyotes and they don't make those noises. The next morning my husband took a walk in the fields around us. When he got back he told us to pack our bags. The horses weren't missing at all, they were all in a field about a mile out from our mobile homes, all laying in a field, flies buzzing around where their corpses lay. As we left for the big bend area, we decided to stop in at the other ranch we had considered. It was nauseating to discover that that place was perfect. The bedrooms were authentic looking,

the beds were old Texas style beds, the kind that are a large box with a mattress on it, the horses were out front, the TV worked and had HBO, they had an amazing shower room and the dining room had ceiling fans. Oh my, what a mistake we had made. It would only have been an extra ten dollars. Needless to say, the lesson we learned was to never, ever book a stay anywhere without first seeing pictures. That seems like duh advice for today, but back then there wasn't much we could do about it. In any case, it was definitely an adventure. A few years back, my friends and I decided to see the country. We'd grown up around Sacramento area, and as much as we loved our native Cali, we knew well that the lower west coast is

hardly a decent representation of the United States. Apparently there's a huge stretch of land between the coasts called America, or at least that's what some would have you believe. But either way, I didn't want to go off to college and into full-time work without having a story or two to tell my dorm mates. So, cut to about three days into the journey. We're on our way to our first real stop in Boise, Idaho. My buddies hooked his iPhone up to the minivan speakers via an auxiliary cable and is in the process of playing every single road trip related song he could possibly find. I might have been annoyed if his music taste wasn't so good. Keep your eyes on the road and your hands upon the wheel. We all roared along with Jim Morrison,

Roadhouse Blues blasting so loud I could barely hear the van's engine. It was so much fun. We dreamed up the ultimate road trip and now we were actually living it. Didn't even need a beer to feel the buzz of it. Just a few miles outside of Boise, we see someone standing by the side of the road in the distance. It's important to remember the frame of mind we're in, romanticizing the road. We were all Jack Kerouac that day. I mean, I'd never normally stop for a hitchhiker.

I've always watched way too many horror films. But since there was four of us packed into that van, a kind of collective bravado had taken over us. So as we pass the dude and see he actually has his thumb out, we collectively flip. I stop the van in the middle of the road and slowly start reversing up towards where this guy stood. Need a ride, dude? He instantly looked elated. He'd obviously had no luck for a few good hours and a van full of teenagers was like a godsend to him. I could kind of see why people might pass him. He looked a little rough with this weird kind of young old vibe going on. Like his clothes were fairly modern but his skin was leathery as all get out. Like he'd spent all day underneath Utah or Nevada sun. They all go on the Boise? He asked in a gravelly voice. Sure are dude, hop in.

So the guy tells us his name is Jimmy and that he's actually from Idaho originally, but has spent a lot of time out of state for work. We ask him what he does for living and he gave us some weird answer about being a contractor. Said his last job was really constrictive and he was really happy to get away from it and was just heading back into Boise to see some old friends. He starts telling us stories from time to time on the road and it sounded like he was something of a wild child in the early 80s, how he went to California looking for work and ended up getting in a few scrapes with the law. At one point, one of my buddies asked Jimmy if he'd spent any time inside. I really don't know

what he expected the answer to be, but all of a sudden, Jimmy's tone changes completely as he shoots my friend a daggered look. No, I don't ever intend to, he replied contemptuously. The atmosphere in the van shifted. It was super awkward for a few miles, but the conversation soon returned to normal with us swapping stories and sharing laughs. After about an hour or so of continuous driving, we were getting closer and closer to Boise, but it was around then that we hit our first serious speed bump. I look in the rearview mirror and see an Idaho State Police cruiser. As it's speeding up behind us, I move over a little to let it pass, only it doesn't. Then, Jimmy saw the cop car and ducks down in the seat.

We started laughing and joking about him being a fugitive or something, only he doesn't join in. He just stays down in the seat and doesn't make a sound. As soon as the cop car's lights turn on and the siren blared across the highway, I knew what was about to happen. It was like I could see the whole thing pan out in my head in slow motion, and I was powerless to do anything to stop it. It was far too late for that. I actually started slowing down to pull over, purely wishful thinking on my part. I expected to hear Jimmy say something and I was right, only it wasn't him that spoke first. What? You have a gun? One of my buddies cries. You keep this thing moving. Don't stop

for nothing. I hear him cock the hammer on his weapon. I didn't even turn around to see what it was. You slow this van down and I'm going to shoot every single one of you, you hear? I'd never been so scared in my entire life. I could hear the cop shouting over his loudspeaker. Driver, pull the vehicle over to the side of the road right now. But I couldn't. We were trapped. It was only about then that I checked the fuel gauge out of habit. It turned out to be a godsend. In our foolish revelry, we'd passed numerous gas stations we really should have stopped at to refuel. Now we only had a few miles worth of gas. All we'd have to do was wait for it to run out. I remember feigning a kind of solidarity with the guy,

assuring him I wouldn't pull over until we'd passed state lines on the other side of Boise. My buddies must have thought I was nuts, but they didn't know what I did. They didn't know that all we had to do was run the clock out. Oh, we're running out of gas. Sorry, dude, I'm going to have to pull over. Your best chance is to just jump out and run. Just run and never look back. Jimmy ate it up. It was an Oscar-winning performance, if I do say so myself. He actually pat me on the shoulder as I slowed the van down and edged over to the roadside. You're a good kid. You'll do all right,

he said. I remember his breath smelling rotten. When I finally pull the car over, one of my buddies slides the van door open and Jimmy hauls it into the trees. One of the cops jumps out, securing us in the van while his partner got this big dog from the backseat of their cruiser and chased the guy through the woods. We were there for an hour or two while the cops searched our van, but we didn't have anything illegal on us. Thank God we finished all the beer we'd managed to wrangle the night before, or we might have actually had something to worry about. Once it was established that the guy was basically holding us hostage, they let us go, and one of the cops actually tells me I did the right thing. They didn't catch him, and as far as I know, they never have.

But whatever the case, I know Jimmy can't have been the dude's real name. No one was hurt, nothing was damaged, but still, I have zero intention of ever picking up a hitchhiker again. What follows is the story of the most terrible night of my entire life so far. I haven't told anyone this story online before and only a handful of my friends and family even know this actually happened. I will try to tell it as best as I can, but if I'm honest, my hands are trembling as I try to recall the events of that night. We live in Delhi, India and it was our first ever road trip which we planned to drive down to Kolkata.

We booked a rental vehicle from a company called Zoomcar, which came with a few problems as the staff on duty didn't seem to know anything about the booking. But eventually, after some complaining, we managed to convince them to rush through some paperwork, with a bribe, and they got us the rental license. Anyhow, we managed to actually get our vehicle without much time wasted and we were very excited to finally be on the way to Kolgat about 60 kilometers away from Howrah which is a suburb of Kolkata. At about nine that evening we acquired the necessary things which was obviously cigarettes and beers that we purchased from a

local bottle shop then would drink them on the way to save some time. We stopped briefly to have our dinners at a roadside restaurant, then carried onward towards Kolkata. A few hours later, closer to midnight, we're rolling along this big Indian highway listening to that Avicii song, I Took a Pill in Ibiza. We were in the car, smoking cigs and listening to the songs. Our playlist was fantastic because everyone was a music lover. There were eight of us in total,

so it was quite the ruckus inside the band. I was sitting in the middle seat at the window behind the driver's seat. I lit a cigarette and I was feeling incredibly relaxed. I'd cracked the window and the cool breeze was touching my face. I was playing songs and was just scrolling Instagram feeds. Everyone was enjoying. It was raining slowly from the evening but around 1.30am it started to rain very very heavily with a few lightning flashes in the distance. We were driving right into a thunderstorm. I'd be lying if I'd said that didn't make me very nervous. Closer to 2am, we closed the windows in the car at a speed of about 80km per hour. It was still raining very heavily. The roads ahead of us were filled with water and at that speed, the water was splashing on the windshield. I became

a little uncomfortable because it was obvious that it was not safe to be driving at these speeds in those conditions but honestly the beers had numbed my better judgments. I wish I could have told him to stop the car. I wish I could have shouted, yelled at him but I was silent, numb, like I was waiting for the accident to happen. I was not open with my insecurities. I buried my fear to look cool and calm. I could have done many things. Always be open with your insecurities.

My friend, whom I trusted the most with the driving, had taken a break from the wheel and was enjoying a few beers in the back seat. He told the friend who was driving to slow down given the slippery conditions, but the one who was driving was enjoying the speed and didn't intend to slow down. We got on a bridge and the bridge was almost in total darkness. The car was at a high speed, the water was splashing on the car. We were astounded. I was frightened to see the darkness and the speed of the car in that heavy rain, but then I tried to look calm, chain-smoking cigarettes to keep from having an anxiety attack.

I wasn't drunk anymore. The fear was sobering me up. I was kind of tensed and bad thoughts were occurring in my mind. On that bridge, all the good feelings were replaced into bad ones. It must have been almost 2.30 in the morning when we got onto the bridge. In a matter of seconds, the car drifted left, and the one who was driving couldn't control it. My friend shouted from the back, What have you done, Ankit?

The car smashed through the metal fence at the side of the road and fell into a deep pond. For some minutes, I was rendered unconscious, but the water level soon stabilized and we looked for the first chance to get to safety. The one who was sitting in the front next to the driver's seat broke the windshield as it was already cracked. We got out and we were drenched in water. I took my phone as it was my phone playing the song, Rich Love by One Republic. Everybody else's phone was nowhere to be found. Nobody was hurt except three of us, three of us including me. I was bleeding in the rain and my light t-shirt was drenched with blood.

I was bleeding from my ears and fingers of my right hands. I couldn't stop the bleeding simultaneously. The one who was driving got hurt in the legs from the accelerator and the one who was sitting next to him got hurt in the ears and nose. I got myself out from that pond taking the support of my friends and the wrecked car. My friends managed to recover two phones, one of which was useless and the other survived because it was an iPhone 7 which acted as a savior to call in emergency services. When we left for the hospital, I was feeling cold from blood loss and the EMT provided me a towel soaked in water to stop the blood which was pouring out from the ear. We called other friends to wait for us near

the hospital in Bawaniper. I got seven stitches in my ears and my friend who was sitting in the front seat got five stitches and the other one who was driving didn't take the treatment. We reported the accident to the zoom car staff. We got the case settled in the police station by paying them of course. We were all released from the hospital around five in the morning, relieved and thankful to God for our safe return to our homes. The thoughts of that night are terrifying and it haunts me sometimes. I didn't get into a car for months and rain scared me for many days when I saw it on the road. I thank God for giving me another chance for living this wonderful life

and to be a part of this enormous world. I am willing to live this life in a more different way and take the chances that I didn't take in that life before the nightmares of the accident. After this accident I went on many trips and we stopped for one time at the spot of the accident and exhaled the trauma out together. It was just for the fear which was deep inside whenever I sat in a car or whenever a rainstorm arrived. It was basically all about feeling good and getting rid of the fear and terrible thoughts of that night. We drive safely now and nothing has happened since, not a scratch after

that night. And I would like to share one more thing which is a little bit shocking. In one of the many trips we got the same red color van which was with us the night on 2am drenched with water and blood. Nobody noticed except for one friend who told us the next day and showed the car number of plates. We were surprised, and there was a silence with a smile on everybody's face. Experiences come from bad experiences. Never stop living, and grow, as part of a large family of Scottish descent. He met his wife Marie in Torrington in the early 1950s, and the couple married just a few years later, eventually moving to St. Albert

in 1964, where they lived ever since. Lyle was employed for most of his life as a long-haul truck driver, making journeys all over Canada and the United States to support Marie and their three children. On the 3rd of July, 2010, Lyle and Marie McCann left their St. Albert home for a vacation they'd been planning, a road trip to be exact. They planned to pick up one of their daughters on the 10th of that month when she landed at the Abbotsford International Airport. On the day of their departure, they were spotted by witnesses at a superstore gas station, filling up the tank of their 1999 Gulfstream motorhome with a green Hyundai Tucson attached via a trailer. It is then believed that the couple drove down the Yellowhead Highway on their way to the airport. However, on the evening of July 5th, Canadian firefighters

received a call from a member of the public informing them that a motorhome was on fire at the Minnow Lake campground, just outside of town in Edson, Alberta. Emergency services rushed to the scene, putting out the fire and searching frantically for any injured victims. No bodies were found, but investigators made a chilling discovery. The motorhome had belonged to Lyle and Marie McCann. Yet strangely, in addition to no bodies being found inside the home, the couple's green Hyundai was missing. Initially, hopes of finding the couple were high, but once the Royal Canadian Mounted Police visited the McCann's home and found no one present, hopes began to dwindle. The McCanns had planned to pick up their daughter, Trudy, from Abbotsford International on the 10th of July, but when the McCanns failed to arrive

at the planned date and time, their daughter, Trudy Holder, began to worry. It wasn't like her parents to be late, and if they were, it went without saying that they'd have notified her in advance. She tried to call her father, Lyle, on a cell phone she'd purchased for the couple to keep in touch, but the phone was turned off. Finally, when it was clear that something was horribly wrong, Trudy notified the Mounties, who immediately released a nationwide missing persons notification. The Mounties soon made the connection between the burned-out motor home and the McCann's disappearance and quickly launched search parties consisting of ground and air elements. On July 16th, a full 11 days after their initial disappearance,

the Royal Canadian Mounted Police located the McCann's Green Hyundai near Highway 16 and Range Road 144, about 18 miles near east of Edson, Alberta. It was clear that the couple's disappearance involved an element of foul play, and it was decided that, although distressing, this new information should be released to the public in the hopes of witnesses coming forward. Around the same time, the Mounties announced they had a person of interest who was wanted for questioning with regards to the McCann's disappearance. 38-year-old Travis Edward Vader, of no fixed address,

had multiple outstanding warrants at the time the couple went missing, as well as a considerable criminal history. Vader had previously been convicted of vehicle theft, possessions of break-in tools and weapons charges as early as 1995, with his latest conviction being that of unauthorized possession of a firearm in June 2010. A few days later, on July 19th, Travis Vader was stopped by police near Knighton Junction in Alberta, where he was arrested on outstanding warrants that were unrelated to the disturbance of the McCanns. On July 27th, Travis's sister, Bobbie Jo Vader, told the media that her brother had stayed with her family in Edmonton on July 4th, a day after the McCanns were last seen, and that he appeared tired, sick, and that he needed to rest. Whilst Vader was being held in custody of the Canadian police, it was officially announced that he was the main suspect in the disappearance of

the elderly couple. Police began searching a property south of Nojack, Alberta that was supposedly Vader's last known residence. They were incredibly thorough, going as far as deploying a dive team to comb through a nearby pond, as well as being given the unenviable job of searching the property's septic tank for any human remains. But still, the search teams found nothing. Yet despite this, Vader was still in police custody almost a year after the initial disappearance, as police believed he still had information regarding the McCanns, or at least had some involvement with them that he was keeping to himself. On July 27th, 2011, a full year after the McCanns seemingly dropped off the face of the earth, a Canadian court issued an order declaring them to be legally deceased.

The official theory within the Royal Canadian Mounted Police was that the couple had been killed and their bodies hidden on the very same day they departed for their vacation. Yet, despite no official charges, the previously released suspect, Travis Vader, remained the most likely to have murdered the McCants. Finally, in April of 2012, despite still having never found their bodies, police officially charged Vader with two counts of first-degree murder relating to the deaths of Lyle and Marie McCann. However, in October of the same year, Vader was still not being taken to trial for the murders and was instead convicted of offenses that included drug trafficking, theft, and weapons charges. It seemed that the Canadian

police simply wanted to keep Vader in custody and convict him of anything they could manage. This was probably born out of fears that Vader would simply flee the country if released, but this obviously represented a clear miscarriage of justice. If Vader could not be directly convicted of the murders, it was extremely morally corrupt to try to imprison him via some kind of legal backdoor. This is duly noted by Vader's defense attorney, who encouraged him to file a lawsuit against the RCMP, accusing them of keeping him in custody until he could be charged with the deaths of the McCanns. This forced the Canadian police's hand. A trial was thrown together, but it didn't go their way. On October 8th, 2014, Travis Edward Vader was found not guilty of all nine charges

unrelated to the disappearance of the McCanns and release from custody shortly afterwards. Upon his release, Vader told the media that the RCMP had probably destroyed my life. They put me in jail for four years to investigate me when there was nothing there to begin with, and that he knew nothing about the McCanns and that his heart goes out to them. It appeared that Vader was an innocent man. But on December 19th, 2014, despite there still being no signs of the McCann's bodies, Vader was arrested in St. Albert yet again in relation to the deaths of the McCann's. On September 15th, 2016, Travis Vader was found not guilty of first-degree murder. He was, however, found guilty of second-degree murder. The verdict attracted immediate criticism from legal experts, who claimed that it relied on a law that had been previously ruled unconstitutional. Not only that, but how can

there be a murder conviction first or second degree when absolutely no human remains have been found? On October 31, 2016, Justice Thomas reversed the original conviction, and Vader was convicted of manslaughter. At his sentencing just a few months later, Vader received a single term of life in prison, with the eligibility of parole in seven years. But the question remains, was Travis Vader actually guilty of the McCann's murders, or did the Canadian state simply scapegoat a quirky but overall innocent man just to satisfy the public's need for justice? Until their bodies are located,

this question might never be fully answered. These days, more and more young people are going traveling. Whether it be gap years from higher education or simply a break from the 9-to-5 grind, people are packing up their belongings into lightweight backpacks and setting off to tour Southeast Asia, namely Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam. Many of these travelers end up in Australia, given that it's much easier to find employment in an English-speaking country. One of these young people was named Peter Falconio. Peter Falconio hailed from West Yorkshire in the United Kingdom, but attended Brighton University with his girlfriend, Joanna Lees.

After the graduation, instead of settling down and getting full-time employment, the couple decided to travel the world. So on the 15th of November in the year 2000, the couple embarked on a trip to Nepal, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Cambodia, and Australia. By the 16th of January 2001, the couple had arrived in Sydney on a working holiday visa. They worked hard for five long months, saving their earnings while they planned a comprehensive tour of the Australian coast. On the 25th of June, they departed on the road trip that would supposedly see them visiting Sydney, Canberra, Melbourne, Adelaide, and Brisbane. On the night of Saturday, the 14th of July, 2001,

Falconeo and Lees were driving their orange camper van along the Stewart Highway in northern Australia, bound for the Devil's Marbles, a wildlife conservation area. Falcania was driving with his girlfriend Joanna sat next to him in the passenger seat. The two had been aware that a car that had been following them since they stopped at a roadhouse in Barrow Creek and were expecting to be overtaken. However, when the white Toyota four-wheel drive drew alongside, the driver made frenzied gestures for them to pull over immediately. Concerned, Falconeo stopped the van and went to speak with the man who had pulled off the road ahead of them. The stranger explained that he had seen sparks shooting out of the van's exhaust and was worried they might be seconds away from some kind of vehicle disaster.

The pair of men went to the rear of the orange camper to investigate, but Joanna Lees remained suspicious of the strange man and moved over the driver's seat should the couple need to leave in a hurry. That's when she heard a loud bang coming from the rear of the van. She turned, but only saw the stranger man standing at the driver's window, a large revolver in his hand. Terrified, not knowing what else to do, Joanne Lees unlocked the doors and allowed the strange man inside their car, where he promptly tied her hands behind her back with the black cable ties that he produced from his pocket. It was horribly obvious that the man had been planning this the entire

time. Lise was paralyzed with fear for a few minutes, but when the man tried to bind her feet and gag her to keep her quiet, she knew there was no turning back from that. She kicked and screamed, wailed and cried, until the man finally gave up trying to restrain her completely and began dragging her back to his Toyota. Lise knew that if this man got her back to wherever he was planning on taking her, it would mean the end of her life. She would be beaten, tortured, and potentially violated. Adrenaline kicked in when Lise saw the man's dog barking at her savagely from the backseat of his vehicle. When the man went to retrieve her boyfriend's lifeless body, she ran into the bush in an attempt to escape. The man searched for her before leaving, passing nearby three times, but she hid before finally flagging down a passing vehicle at 12.35am, who took her back to Barrow Creek. Lees and her rescuer contacted Alice

Springs Police at around 1.30am that same night, who arrived to collect evidence and testimonies at 4.20am. The following morning, they commenced a search for the missing Falconeo, the vehicle, as well as the gunman. When police returned to the scene of the murder and attempted kidnapping, they found a dirt-covered blood pool and the couple's camper van almost 100 meters off the road, hidden among the scrubland. It was not until eight hours after the rescue that roadblocks were put in place on the 12 likely roads exiting the district. Police searches of the area in the following months revealed nothing but Lee's footprints, and although four indigenous aboriginal trackers arrived from a nearby settlement within a few days, not one of them could find evidence of Falconeo or his attacker.

Given the lack of an actual corpse, it took the police some days to appreciate the severity of the crime, but the media were quick to sensationalize Lee's story as one of survival against all odds in an unusually cruel and brutal crime. A reward of 250,000 Australian dollars was posted. Police were desperate for new leads given that the only new evidence in the Falconeo case was an unidentified male DNA trace on Lee's T-shirt and some related DNA on the cable ties and camper van's gear stick. Police were hopeful that the release of the CCTV footage would lead to the person shown coming forward to remove themselves from suspicion. When this did not happen, investigators began to focus on the registered owners of the Toyota Land Cruiser identified, and on the 36 men whom callers had identified in the

footage. Based on these results, police interviewed a man by the name of Bradley John Murdoch. Although Lee's description did not immediately connect Murdoch to the case and no DNA sample was collected from him. The investigating task force uncovered one of Murdoch's dark secrets when they arrested his apparent drug-dealing accomplice, who apparently seemed to know a lot more about the attempted kidnapping and murder than he had any right to. Police then visited Bradley Murdoch's brother and compared DNA samples taken from him to those found at the crime scene. Their findings supported the theory that Murdock was indeed the perpetrator. But then something happened that the police were not expecting at all.

Bradley Murdock simply disappeared. There were no sightings of him up until August of 2002, a full year after Peter Falcano's murder. It just so happened that he was identified by police in South Australia, then arrested on completely unrelated kidnap and assault charges. It seemed Murdoch had a history of violence. The trial began on the 17th of October 2005 at the Supreme Court of the Northern Territory in Darwin. Murdock pleaded not guilty to charges of murdering Falconeo and assaulting and attempting to kidnap Lise. However, Lise had identified Murdock from police photographs shown to her in November of 2002 and finally face to face during the trial on the 18th of October.

Murdoch was found to have left Alice Springs at a time and in a direction that could have led to him being at or around Barrow Creek at the time of the murder. Expert testimony presented at the trial indicated that Murdoch was the man captured in the CCTV footage at the service station at 12.38am. The police found traces of his DNA on a pair of homemade handcuffs that Murdoch had used in the attack. This, combined with the DNA match on Lee's t-shirt, allowed Murdoch to be charged with the murder. The t-shirt DNA was found to be 50 quadrillion times more likely to belong to Murdoch than anyone else. Murdoch was found to be 50 quadrillion times more likely to belong to Murdoch than anyone else. Murdoch was found guilty by a jury in a unanimous verdict, and he was sentenced to life imprisonment with a non-parole period of 28 years.

He was also convicted of other assault-related charges on Lees. Only after the sentencing was it revealed that Murdoch had previously been charged in the quitted of aggravated assault on a mother and daughter in South Australia some years earlier. It seems that it really is impossible for a leopard to change its spots. I live in Alberta, Canada. This story takes place in June of 2015. I was 28 years old and my fiancé was 32. I'll call him K for the story. It was going to be a very hot day for we had just purchased our first car after years of taking public transit and decided to go for an overnight trip to Jasper Park. To anyone who doesn't know,

Jasper Park is a beautiful stretch of highway that runs through the foothills into the Rockies right around there. I'm not sure what it is like in other countries but here in the parks and wooded areas it's not uncommon for people to pull off on the side of the highway and hike into areas for day trips or even to camp to avoid the overcrowded campgrounds. We had been on the road for about four hours and I was starting to feel cramped when we came to an area with a beautiful glacier river running next to the highway. So we decided to pull off the road onto an old maintenance road that ran down what we thought was the train tracks that ran parallel to the road. The road was extremely overgrown and had railroad ties sticking up vertically about two feet out of the ground in an attempt to block the road permanently, but they were spaced apart far enough for a very small vehicle to get through.

While our new car happened to be one of those tiny economy class cars, so we decided to try and fit past the barrier. So Kay got out and directed me through the small opening in between the posts and to my surprise we fit. He decided it would be best for him to walk in front of me and lead me through the overgrown path while I crept the car forward in case there were any rocks or stumps that could damage the very low undercarriage of our new car. After about 15 feet into the road the grass suddenly became taller than my car and the trees thick and brushing against the roof and the path was dark with light at the end that indicated a clearing. Basically, it looked like something out of one of those really corny camping horror movies. But we decided to go forward and came upon a clear cut line.

These lines are cut out by the government as surveyors and gas lines. Anyways, we went about 50 feet into the clearing that was surrounded by thick trees on all sides. After finding a flattish area where we could set up a makeshift camp, Kay decided to go and try to find where the river ran closest so we could go stick our feet in and cool down. I voiced concern about the bears in the area and wanted to keep the bear spray with me so he took his wood axe with him. Side note, people don't have guns other than hunting rifles due to our gun laws and due to this we didn't have anything other than bear spray, pocket knives and an axe for potential defense. I decided to start digging out our tent to look for a spot to set it up for the night.

Kay was gone for about five minutes when I heard what looked like another vehicle close by. I didn't think anything of it at the time thinking who else could possibly fit the car through there. So I brushed it off and continued what I was doing but at the same time moved my can of bear spray out of the backpack to just inside of my trunk where I could grab it in a matter of seconds, just in case. After another minute or so I just happened to look in the direction of the road that led us into the clearing and to my surprise I see a man walking towards me. He looked to be about 35 to 40 years old with a ball cap and dirty blue reflective coveralls on,

you know the ones you see the oil rig guys wear. After the complete shock of seeing someone I started to notice I could not see his face that well but he had on a ball cap in shades with a scruffy beard. He was walking directly towards me with his hands in his pockets. I started to panic a little and immediately called out for Kay and for him to get back here. I hear him yell something but I refuse to take my eyes off the stranger who is now less than 20 feet away from me. Now I should mention that the area is known for hunting but it was not the season. He reaches me and stops about 5 feet away and me being the friendly person I am, I smile and say, Hi, didn't expect to see anyone here. He looks at me from head to toe and stands there for what

feels like forever and says, Um, hello. What brings you here? His tone very blank and not giving anything away. I say, My fiance and i were just looking for a place to pop the tent for the night he freezes at the mention of my fiance he looks around as he hears k coming through the woods to the right of us the stranger still gawking at me does not move as k comes out of the tree line with his axe propped up on his shoulder. Kay looks at me and then the stranger and immediately speedwalks to my side and being the cautious, overly protective guy he is, says, Hey man, is there something I can help you with? No, just checking my trail cams.

The guy then looks at Kay, assessing him and glaring at his axe. I ask him, Oh, so you know the area. Do you know if it's okay for us to camp here for the night? He looks directly at me and says, Yeah, as long as you don't have a fire or anything, and once in a while service trucks come down here to survey. I respond,

Thanks for the heads up. He will not stop looking at me at this point. K sees this and decides he had had it enough and says again, is there something you needed? The guy finally stops looking at me long enough to answer. I was in here checking my trail cams and got a flat on my jeep. He indicates the bumper of his jeep that is just visible through the brush. He continues, I tried to change my spare but I have custom wheels and can't get the nuts off with the tools I have. Now everyone in Alberta knows that guys with custom trucks or go off-roading always carry the proper tools.

Alarm number one. Kay and I walk closer to get a better view of his vehicle and note that it is one of those jacked up off-road jeeps with the engine snorkel and everything. I remember the alarms going off in my head yelling at me that this is weird. Even I carry tools needed to switch out my tires. At this point I notice his jeep was blocking the only entrance into the clearing. I proceed to say, um, sorry, but as you can tell, I only have a small car and my tire iron is only big enough to fit the nuts for my 15 inch wheels in my car. I don't think we'll be able to help you. The guy starts to look annoyed as Kay and I start to move back to our car. The guy follows us back to our car then says, well could she possibly give me a lift to Jasper to get help? I immediately start to panic and say, well my car

is packed to the roof with camping gear. I'm one of those overpackers that has something for every situation. I'm not unloading all my stuff and leaving it here in the woods. The guy starts to get agitated, shifting back and forth in place. He then says, It'll only be a couple of hours and your fiancé can stay here with your stuff then. I'm about to say no when Kay says very plainly, I'm not letting her drive alone with you and leave me here in the woods. The guy looks at Kay and says, please, I just need a ride into town or at least to somewhere where I can get cell reception. Note, there is no reception in most of Jasper Park

unless you have a booster or a satellite phone. Even then, it's patchy service. And the closest town is Jasper itself, which at this point was two hours away. He continues to try to get me to drive him by myself for another five minutes before we both get visibly irritated. Kay then says as calmly as he can, sorry man, you're gonna have to walk out to the road and hail someone down.

Now the guy is mad and takes one last look at me and then turns around and walks towards the road. After he's out of sight I immediately pack up the car and start to turn around and head for the clearing entrance. As we pull up to where his jeep is blocking the access to the road, both Kay and I get out and investigate his jeep. He didn't have a flat. There was nothing wrong with his jeep at all. Kay decides to look in the back seat through the tinted windows. He all of a sudden panics and says we need to get out of here.

I don't question him and get in the driver's seat while Kay takes his axe And clears away the brush on the side where his jeep is blocking the exit After about ten minutes of pulling weeds, branches and rocks We make a space big enough to creep through It takes us an additional five minutes to creep through the overgrown access back out to the highway As we're pulling to the highway. As we're pulling onto the highway, we can see the creep down a ways hitchhiking. Kay says just drive in the opposite direction.

So we drive for about 15 minutes and decide to double back and see if he's still there. As we come up to an access again, we notice he is no longer on the side of the road. So we pull into the access road again where the makeshift barrier was and immediately notice his jeep is gone. K freaks out and we back out of there and drive 45 minutes up the highway to a new spot. We find a nice calm area directly next to the highway where we can access the river. We hang out for a couple of hours while all the time keeping an eye out for the creepy guy. We kept hearing twigs snapping behind us in the overgrowth but due to the events that day decided to err on the side of caution and not go investigate. I finally start to relax a little bit and just enjoy the sweltering heat.

Around 6pm it was starting to get dark because of the mountains blocking the sun so Kay decides it's time to pack up and leave. I remind him that I had a couple of beers while sitting at the river so I needed a nap before we could go anywhere. He agrees and we go and sit in the car which we had parked on a little makeshift rest area. We hunker down and I try to doze off. Suddenly Kay jerks up and says, did you hear that? I'm still somewhat groggily from just passing out respond, no what's going on? Quiet, quiet. But this time it's pitch black all around us. All of a sudden I hear it, the crunch of gravel and twigs as if someone is walking in wide circles around us. We looked at each other and then hear

it again, this time closer to the front of the car. I squint as hard as I can and then immediately turn the key and turn on the lights. To our surprise there is no one there. Without saying anything I decided that I had rested enough and my adrenaline was coursing through me. I turned the engine over and threw the car into reverse and headed back down the highway towards home. After about 20 minutes of nerve-wrenching silence and constantly checking our mirrors to see if anyone was following us, I break the silence and ask the question that has been bugging me. So now that we're out of there, what was in the back seat of his jeep that made you freak out so bad? Kay looks at me, worry etched on his face, not normal for him at all. Takes a deep breath

and says, it's hard to see due to the tint, but I can make out a hunting rifle, which is not out of the ordinary here, but most disturbing was a roll of duct tape, rope, and a tarp. After seeing that, Kay freaked out, realizing this guy wanted more than just a ride from us. I switched up my career in healthcare to follow my dream of learning to work on cars. I was hired this past May at a dealership as a quick service mechanic and fell in love immediately with everything about it and my co-workers. I noticed how cute my trainer was. Not only was he cute, he was very patient with training me. I was so new to working on cars I needed to learn the basics and he was so cute and nice about everything. I'll call him Nick. He was 40 years old, male. Me and Nick had hit it off in every way. He asked me on our first date to go geocaching. Swoon. Nick and I had been side by side since then. I loved everyone I worked with,

always laughing and playing pranks on each other, but also always helping each other and busting our butts to make the customers happy. I should add that my best friend works there and another good friend of ours had gotten hired too. We were a close-knit family in the quick service department. Well, I didn't make it past my probationary period because I was just a bit slower. So Nick has a full mechanic garage at his dad's place and I'd meet him after he got off of work so we could make some side job money. So about a month and a half ago Nick and I decided to get an apartment together and it's been amazing. I've been bringing him to work, grabbing him on lunch break and picking him up which I love because I can also say hey to all of my old co-workers. That being said I should add

that Nick doesn't have any social media and we are together literally all the time except when he's working. And here's where things get crazy. I get a message request on Facebook from some random girl saying I can't believe what I'm seeing. Nick is my man and he's in your profile photo with you. He's been my man for seven months. I immediately went into panic mode, called him at work asking who this girl is and he was just as confused. The more I talked to this girl to try and figure out what is going on, the more she said weirdly specific things about

Nick like the truck he drives. They met at his dad's shop which no one would know about his dad's shop because he never talks about it. She knew his phone number and everything but she could never provide proof, screenshot conversations, photos of the two of them, nothing. We got to a point where it felt like this whole thing was real and that her and I are going to team up but she never answered my calls, only messages. But after Nick and I had a huge talk about it I knew that something wasn't right about this girl. I had to get to the bottom of it. I started getting pretty scared when one day I dropped Nick off after lunch. A minute went by and I get a

message saying dang Nick looks sexy in that hoodie today. This shook me up. I asked what color and she said the correct color. At this point, my first thought is, stalker, like actually watching us. I told Nick about how she knew what he was wearing and he was super creeped out. Then when I pick him up, I usually park by the quiet side of the building where no one really can see me. This time though a work truck drives by me really slowly. I pretend not to notice him because I was in no mood to chat with anyone and I recognized the driver as a former co-worker of mine that I'd only spoken to maybe two times during my time at the dealership, however we were friends on Facebook. Within a minute of him passing me by, the girlfriend messages me saying,

you're waiting for Nick on the other side of the building right now. In that moment I started to freak out. This dude is pretending to be my boyfriend's girlfriend. Then after talking to Nick about it, yeah he's the only one from work that knew Nick's dad had a shop. Nick had worked on this guy's truck before. They aren't friends but they do chat here and there. Well not anymore but I just don't know why. Why was he saying such gross things to me as he was pretending to be my boyfriend's girlfriend? If he's capable of doing this, who knows what else he's capable of? He's also a giant dude in his 40s with children of his own. I have no actual proof other than the fact that anytime this girl

was active, so was he. I see this dude every day and Nick still works with him. He's in a different department than Nick, thank God. So yeah, still not sure what to do about this. But crazy former co-worker pretending to be my boyfriend's girlfriend to get us to break up or something weird. I guess I'll see you tomorrow. Unfortunately. unfortunately. I'm a 14 year old boy from the UK and this event happened to me about three weeks ago. So being a teenager, my friend, who I'll refer to as Jay, wanted to sneak out and meet up with one of our other friends, both girls, who I'll refer to as A and H. So on Friday night, I went and stayed at Jay's house as we'd snuck out before

and his house is relatively easy to sneak out from. So night comes and Jay's parents send us to bed at around 10pm and we stay quiet until about midnight when we know Jay's parents are asleep. We then proceed to slowly open his bedroom door, down the stairs and out the back door, where we use the side gate to escape. Now Jay's house is a short walk from the town center, which we have to go through in order to get to A's house, where we are meeting A and H. Being a Friday night, the town center was alive with clubs and rowdy drunks looking for a good time. Nothing extraordinary happened on our trek through town,

barring a couple of drunks approaching us and slurring utter nonsense. Then we were approached by a fairly good-looking lady trying to entice us into a local strip club, which we both found hilarious. Finally, after a thirty- minute walk in the cold and dark, we finally reached A's house. We spotted A and H climbing out a window trying to be as stealthy as possible, which we also giggled at. Finally, they escaped and we headed back towards the town center in search of 24 hour fried chicken shops. About halfway there, we spotted a hooded man lingering at the entrance of a tunnel that we had to go through. We didn't trust this, so we crossed the road to the opposite

side of the loiterer. Then, out of nowhere, another hooded bloke popped out from an alleyway and called out to the initial hooded bloke, who started to walk over to him. The second man, who had popped out asked if we had any illicit substances. We did our best to ignore him, apart from H, ever the loud mouth who told him some guy called Peter could get him some. He replied with something unsavory as we entered the tunnel. We scolded H and continued walking, giggling and chatting. Then as me and A go on ahead, we hear J shout, Oi! He's chasing us! We turn simultaneously and see the original hooded guy giving chase about a hundred feet behind.

We turn and run for our lives, adrenaline pumping through our veins. We come to a split in the road and shoot left down a dark street. Everyone else continues running. I'm convinced we have lost him so I stop to take a puff of my inhaler. I turn to check and see the guy about 50 feet back gunning for me. Oh no, I think and run, falling as I hop the curb. I return to my feet in record time, soon catching up with the group, panning for dear life. We take a sharp turn in a park or field and run quickly to the other side. From where he was, we would have been invisible to him, but from where we were, we could see him pacing past the local park, looking frantically in. I wheeze and we all stop. Then we look up and see him enter

the park and the chase resumed and in the darkness I smack into a low hanging branch and almost stack it, my inhaler plummeting into the dirt. I make a grab for it and catch up with the rest of the group as we stop, finally having lost him. We make it back to A's house where me and J ordered a cab and say goodbye. As we are in the cab and reach the end of A's road, we see out of the tinted windows our chaser, wielding a large knife looking frantically around, probably looking for us. We make it home and inform A and H of what we had seen and crash to bed. All I can say is that this was the of what we had seen and crash to bed. All I can say is that this was the first time I had truly been scared and to this day I

have chilled at the thought of sneaking out again. It all started when I got my first computer. I was beginning to start showing some responsibility so my parents got me a red Acer. Reminder, I was still very young. I was taught about stranger danger and all that but I never thought anyone on the internet would try to do me harm. This all changed when I found the website Hot Games for Girls. Basically in those days it was a much bigger website with all different types of chat rooms, different topics, groups, and my favorite that I had never experienced before, video calls. I recently got on to check to see if there had been any changes and luckily they removed all chat rooms and from what I can

tell the ability to make individual profiles as well. I remember I was wearing a green tank top with stars on the right top side and loose shorts. It was a weekend and I really wanted to meet people. As an introvert this is obviously very hard in real life especially when you have anxiety. I join a public chat room. It was normal for the most part, teens joking around, talking about topics they were interested in and me trying to fit in. I got a request from a username that is far gone from my memories now but for this story I'll call him Anon1. I clicked on it, curious to see what they had said. We had started talking, telling each other how our days were, how old we were. He said he was a 14 year old boy that wanted to video chat.

Now as I was a self-conscious little girl I said no because I was kind of confused on why a 14 year old would want to talk to me. He slowly convinced me to call though. When I did, I vividly remember the black screen on the left side and me sitting in my bed on the right. I remember saying hello with no one saying anything back. I was about to leave when I had a message pop up. Can't talk, mic's broke, you are very beautiful. I obviously like this comment as gross as it might seem to me today fully understanding the severity of the situation the call was going good until he asked me to lift my shirt I had started stuttering and got really nervous says he kept calling me beautiful and I should share with him I'm so glad I didn't. After I said no for like the fifth time, he got angry with me,

saying he was going to find me, hurt me, and other explicit things. Now he knew my name and the state I lived in. As soon as that was said, I slammed my laptop and put it in my closet under a ton of blankets. Please, watch your children's sights. no matter how safe they may seem, people can and will find loopholes to fulfill their disgusting needs and desires. This happened in 2015 when my husband and I were together. We've since separated and perhaps this story will help you understand why. He and I married that year and he always was a little off, sometimes more off than on. He served in the military and was proud of his time served and I was proud of him too.

However, he had a tendency towards visual hallucinations. I'm not sure if it's the PTSD or his familial history of mental illness but he saw things. Usually it happened while driving. Once he saw an 8 foot spider casing the side of a barn while we were riding along the road. He asked me if I saw it. He was panicking. I didn't see it. Let me paint a picture. My mom lives deep, deep in the rural south. Further down her road are old houses people still live in and use outhouses to this day. They collect rainwater to drink, etc. Before we get to my mom's road, there's a well-kept farmhouse pretty close to the main highway. A highway with its own, um, haunted issues. Ghost cars and such. I'm not kidding.

My sister says she's seen a dozen men walking out in the fields behind that house, dressed immaculately in white suits. I promise everything I'm saying is true to the best of my knowledge. He and I pull onto the highway one night after dusk and are gaining speed as we pass that house. He's driving and I'm in the passenger side, head back, eyes closed, and the farmhouse is on the right of the car. Suddenly my husband swerves and screams, my eyes open. In a blur I see a white human shaped creature running at the car. Pale white, maybe grey skin, crazed, angry eyes. I don't recall that it was wearing clothing, I just remember the flash of white skin and those eyes. Human eyes, unmistakably human with all the rage and wild contempt that only a human being could be capable of. It was running right for my door, but we passed it before it made it to the car.

He screamed, asked if I had seen it. I don't know why, I can't tell you why, but I told him I hadn't. He described it to me and I reiterated that I hadn't seen it. Later on I confessed that I had seen it, so I'm not a complete liar, I hope. I can't let go of the feeling that it wanted to do harm to one of us. It seems I had locked eyes with it, but it was only a split second so I wonder what my mind had filled in to make sense of the situation. Worse, much more strange things happen to my husband and me but I can't talk about those things. I feel safe enough describing this however. For some reason he seemed like a beacon for the unusual and the unexplainable. He and I separated due largely to his decreasing mental health but I'm not so sure what he's been seeing these days.

But I know we both saw something that night. I'm just not sure what it was. I was about seven or eight years old at the time. I only vaguely remember this because I'm 18 now. My grandma and I went to town to go and buy something at this clothing store around the corner from a pharmacy. I didn't much feel like going with my grandma in the first place, but she couldn't leave me alone at home. We made our way out of the car and onto the sidewalk by the strip of shops where the pharmacy was. We entered the clothing store and my grandma started browsing while I stood and watched reluctantly. My grandma found something she liked and went to go try it on. I decided to be an irresponsible little kid and leave the store while she was trying on whatever it was she was trying on. I made my way around the corner into the pharmacy to go and look at toys in the hopes of asking my grandma to buy something when I heard a deep voice behind me say,

hey kid, do you want to come help me with something? I said no of course. I may have been a naughty kid but I didn't simply trust a stranger. He kept asking me to help him with what he called a fun test, or experiment or whatever he called it. I kept saying no and that I wouldn't go with him, but he grabbed my hand and tried to pull me toward the exit of the building. I resisted with all my might, but it didn't work. There of course wasn't anyone else in the store for whatever reason so nobody could help me. This man that was trying to take me was probably in his mid-forties and was a pretty big dude so what happened next doesn't make much sense. My 5'2 grandma walked into that store and shouted at him to leave me alone and he got such a big fright that he almost fell over trying to run away. He could have probably easily

trampled her but for whatever reason she genuinely scared him. I saw it in his eyes. I just thought of this story the other day while I was thinking of my grandma and how she was my hero as a kid. She passed away in 2017 of a heart attack. I know she's in a better place now. Moral of the story is that you should always keep close to your parent or guardian because you never know what kind of people are out there. When I was around 17 years old, I was living on a really high floor in an apartment complex in Southern Asia. On this particular school night, I was feeling really down to the point that I couldn't even fall asleep. So I decided to sit on my window bench seat and look down to the streets and the buildings around me while I was thinking about the things that were happening in my life. While I was looking numbed at the street just remembering an incident that happened hours before I started hearing movement from above me but I didn't pay

much attention to it. I mean someone who lives in an apartment complex is more than used to hearing noises from everywhere but as minutes went by the noise was starting to get louder and more intense. It was weird. The noise sounded like it was coming from outside the window which was really strange since I lived on the 28th floor. And as you can imagine nobody really stands outside a window on the 29th floor. Then I noticed that there was a lady by the window in the building in front of me. The thing that really got my attention is that it was around 3 in the morning by that time and the lady looked obviously very distressed. She looked like she was looking into my floor and I was not understanding why. Then it happened. At the same time I realized what was going on. I saw it. For less than a second I saw the distressed face of a man who had just jumped. I saw his body slowly fall 28 floors to his death. The thing that really shook me was the fact that

it looked like his eyes were staring into mine, like he was surprised to find my eyes staring at him in the last moment of his life. It's been almost eight years since this incident happened. I don't even live in that city anymore but still to this day I never forgot the distressed man's cold and scared eyes looking into me. I will never forget the noise of the impact of his body when it hit the ground. Needless to say that in the two years that I lived in that city after that scarring incident I never sat on that window bench again. This strange thing happened to me when I was about 11 or 12 years old. My school knew it happened, a few of my peers knew, but no one really talked

about it afterwards. No one understood what happened so they didn't tell my family or mention it to me again after that night. I think it just scared them so much that they just wanted to forget it happened, as did I. So this happened when my grade was on a school trip to our country's capital city. It was over a day's drive so the school booked a large dorm of sorts for everyone to sleep in. It was one of those buildings where when you enter the first room is huge, first the lounge room with the television and couches and all, then the back of the large room was the dining area with about 20 of those long fold out tables, then all along the left side,

both on the floor level and second story were the bedrooms which all contained bunk beds. You need to have an idea of the building layout for this story. So the night was relatively normal. We had dinner, played games and went to bed. Now I had a top bunk in a room of 8 girls. We chatted and gossiped as girls that age do before going to sleep. I remember falling asleep. Darkness, no dreams. Which is odd for me as I always have vivid dreams or nightmares but this night nothing. Then I woke up.

Cold, wet, on a hard surface. I open my eyes and I see the stars. I was outside of the building. I sit up and look around. I had been lying in a puddle of water, directly outside of the building's entrance. At first I thought I was dreaming, but then I felt so incredibly cold I knew I couldn't be. I was so confused I just sat there for a few minutes processing everything. Eventually I managed to make myself stand and walk to the door to get back inside. The door was locked. I feel panic creeping up on me and I just start to cry. For some reason I didn't want to wake people to get back inside. Maybe I was scared of getting in trouble. For

about 20 minutes I tried to quietly wake up one of the girls in my room to get back inside. Maybe I was scared of getting in trouble. For about 20 minutes I tried to quietly wake up one of the girls in my room to let me in but eventually a teacher had heard me and rushed to the door. At this point I was borderline hysterical, still trying not to make noise so as to not wake the other students. My teacher was terrified. She asked how I got out of the building but I told her I didn't know. I just woke up out there. She woke up some of the other teachers and draped me in blankets to warm me. As I sit there I can hear her talking to another teacher. She is saying that it would have been impossible for me to get out. The windows don't open. The keys to open all the

doors are still where she hid them exactly where they had been left. Even more concerning, there were about six students asleep on the couches in the living room, as there hadn't been enough beds right next to the entrance I woke up outside of. I couldn't have walked out myself without a key, nor could any other student. If they had, they would have needed to pass the students asleep there and unbolt this heavy noisy door. The teachers spoke to those students in the morning. None of them heard anything or had been awoken by anything. One kid even admitted to being awake most of the night playing a game and hadn't seen me or anyone go outside until a teacher had

retrieved me. The teacher spoke to the girls in my room. They said they too didn't see anyone come in or see me leave. The girl on the bottom of my bunk said she would have been woken up if I had, due to the noisy nature of the bunks. But I did leave that bunk somehow. I did leave that building, and I don't know how. No one did. The school told my mother what happened. I couldn't explain it any more than the school could. She'd never let me go on another school trip again. I'm 25 now and am yet to have another event like this. I still to this day have no idea how I got outside, but just thinking about it

sends shivers up my spine. I met Price when we were both in third grade. He was the quiet kid. He never talked to anyone except me unless he had to. He would get in trouble a lot, usually for small things that the teacher just got annoyed about. Price got bullied a lot for his height and his clothes. One time he backed out of the dare to lick the bathroom floor, which granted him a lot of terrible nicknames. It stuck for a while through elementary school, middle, and high school. He was a raggedy kid, not just his appearance but his attitude.

He made everyone he spoke to feel like they had bathed in mud but despite this, I took a liking to him. I always felt that I needed to protect him no matter what. It wasn't until two years later in fifth grade that he had invited me to his house. He told me that he had lived in a trailer so I assumed that he was in a trailer park, but that assumption was wrong. He told me that we could hang out at his place after school. I asked him if his parents would pick us up, but he told me he lived really close so we could just walk. He led me to the woods behind our school and we started walking. We must have been walking for ten minutes.

By now the trees overhead blocked out the afternoon sun almost completely. We finally reached his home. It was a dirty trailer in the middle of the woods. No clearing, no road, and it seemed to have sunk into the ground. Vines and shrubbery had taken it over, but the door and some windows had been cleared out. Price opened the door and it reeked of ganja, like a freight train. I walked in the dirty carpet, made a wet squishy noise. Price assured me that it was probably just beer his dad had spilled. I had never been inside a trailer before and my house was admittedly much

larger than we needed it to be. It was always so clean and tidy but I tried my best not to show any negative expression despite the fact that I wanted to vomit. Price looked just like his dad, long greasy blonde hair, a permanently upturned nose and the eyes that bulged out of his head. His father seemed to be borderline catatonic due to being so stoned and drunk he didn't even acknowledge my presence and price didn't acknowledge his. He led me to a room at the back of the trailer with just a bed in it. He sat on the bed and pulled out a surprisingly pristine laptop and I sat next to him. He showed me a video game that he made and all the coding that he's done. To my surprise, Price was a bit of a computer genius.

For the next three years I spent a lot of time with him and his trailer, mainly smoking and playing video games on the Xbox I bought him for his birthday in 6th grade. When high school came we started to drift apart. I joined the football team and he wasn't too happy with that. Price got really jealous about my other friends and this is when things really started to go downhill. After not talking for a few months, Price texted me about a problem with his dad. I got to his trailer and from outside I heard drunken screaming from his father. I barged into the trailer to see Price's dad beating him almost to death. I tried to stop him but things got rough

and I pushed his dad into a cabinet. He fell over and busted his head on a corner of the kitchen counter. I drove him to the hospital and left him there so we wouldn't get any trouble for accidentally hurting him but me and Price knew that his dad was more than just hurt. We found out that he had died in the hospital. I thought Price would be relieved to be rid of his abusive father, but he wasn't. We didn't speak after that, and I think he blames me for his father's death, but I think it's really Price's fault. In my sophomore year, six members of the football team went missing.

The only connection they had, other than being on the same team, was that they were the only ones on the team that went to the same elementary and middle school as Price and I. This is the same day that Price went missing. A few days later, a package showed up at my front doorstep. It was in a cardboard box, sloppily sealed in duct tape. Inside was a laptop. It was Price's laptop. I opened it up and it was unlocked and already turned on. On the screen was what appeared to be a title screen for a video game. I couldn't click out of it. I couldn't access Task Manager. I couldn't even turn the computer off. All I could

do was click the red button in the middle of the screen that read start in big bold letters. The game played a bit like Slenderman. If you're not familiar with it, it's a game where you roam the woods searching for pages of a notebook while being chased by a demon in a suit. Except the game Price made was in the high school. In fact, it was an exact replica of the school. And I wasn't being chased by anything to my knowledge, although I constantly felt like I was being watched. I found the first item. It was a well-drawn piece of a photo that had been torn off. It appeared to be an arm. A prompt in the upper right corner of the screen read, one sixth piece is found. The game took me about 20 minutes to finish. Each piece I found was a different body part.

Two legs, two arms, a torso, and lower body. I noticed that in the picture with the lower body the genitals had been ripped off. A new prompt told me to go out to the football field and find the final piece. Lying in the middle of the field was the last piece of the picture. It was the head of one of the missing football players. I put the pieces together and I stared at the completed picture. The picture wasn't drawn. It was a real picture that Price had imported into the game. The whole picture showed a mosaic of different body parts ripped from each missing player that had been sewn together. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. All of a

sudden the game closed out and then the screen showed a picture of me in my room huddled over my desk. The picture had been taken from outside my window. Had Price been stalking me? My breath quaked. I was sitting so still for so long that my back started to hurt. So while I figured out what I should do about this information that had been forced upon me, I leaned back in my chair. One last terrifying realization settled on my shoulders. When I leaned back in my chair, the me that was in the picture leaned back as well. It's not a picture, I thought to myself. It was a live feed from outside my window. I frantically looked outside, but it was too dark to see anything. I was going to go out and try to see where the camera was, but when I looked back at the computer, it just read, no signal.

It's now my senior year in college. The police never found Price or any of the football players. The mosaic of limbs was found right in the middle of the football field where it had been in the video game. I never told anyone about the game or the live feed from outside my window. Every year, three days after the anniversary of Price's disappearance, I get a package in the mail. It's always a laptop with a live video feed of me in my bedroom. They have followed me wherever I move to. I have grown attached to the packages.

I have kept each laptop, none of them work except for the live feed, so I have decided to hang each one on my wall. I never look for the camera, I just sit and smile, knowing that that raggedy kid is still watching over me. Today is the anniversary of his disappearance, so should I expect another laptop in the mail soon? And when I get it, I will repeat my yearly tradition of watching the live feed. I don't feel guilty about what I did. It serves them right for bullying my best friend. Thirty hours ago, I hopped on a late-night flight from New York heading to Los Angeles.

After boarding, I saw that I had an entire row to myself. Takeoff passed without incident, and soon I was stretched out for a nap across the row. I slept for a few hours, I don't know how long, but I woke up to some severe turbulence. It's possible that the lights in the cabin went out for a moment, but I was so disoriented that it's hard to say. I checked my phone to see that it was 4.03am, which I figured gave me about an hour until we landed. When I looked out my window, I was shocked to see nothing but wide open ocean. My jaw dropped. There's obviously no ocean between New York and Los Angeles. I hit the button to call the flight attendant and spent the next few minutes

racking my brain for a lake that could have been possibly big enough to explain what I was seeing. I jumped when the attendant flipped off the light. She was grinning from ear to ear, and tears were pouring down her cheeks. How can I help you, sir? she asked. I froze for a moment at her reaction, before deciding to just ask my question. Where are we? Why does it look like we're flying over an ocean? She wiped her cheeks to clear the tears, still grinning wildly. Sir, we'll be landing in about an hour. I, uh, okay, thank you, I said. After she left, I checked the clock on my phone again.

4.03am blinked back at me. It hadn't changed. I had to have been waiting with my call light on for at least five minutes. How was it possible that it hadn't changed at all? I opened up my laptop and saw that it too displayed 4.03am. I pulled out my phone, started a stopwatch in the app, and spent the next two hours looking back and forth between the clocks, waiting for them to change.

They never did. I tapped the shoulder of an older woman sitting in the row ahead of me. She looked back, an annoyed expression across her face. Yes, she asked. Do you know how long until we land? I asked.

She narrowed her eyes. That flight attendant said it would be about another hour. I shook my head in confusion. That flight attendant? We talked almost two hours ago. We should have landed already. She stared at me as if I was crazy. I was going to continue trying to convince her, but I felt a hand on my shoulder. I spun to see a male flight attendant grinning down at me, tears pinging off his cheeks onto my shoulder.

Sir, I'm going to ask you to calm down, or I'll be calling the captain. I told him that wouldn't be necessary and sat back. He removed his hand and stepped away. The flight attendants continue to stop by every few hours offering meals. My stopwatch continued to tick up and is now telling me that I've been on this plane for more than 30 hours. I've explored all of coach, and tried talking to some other passengers, but they've all told me that they're expecting to land in an hour or so. Around three hours back, I tried getting into first class. I made it past the curtain, but was escorted back by two grinning flight attendants. Their grip on my arms were like iron.

Sir, the seatbelt sign is on, one said. Please remain in your seat with your buckle fastened. We'll be landing in about an hour. I had just about given up hope when a woman came down the aisle dressed in a business suit. She didn't look at me or slow down, but she dropped a piece of paper onto my tray as she made her way to the bathrooms at the back of the plane. I shot a look around before unrolling it. It said, a piece of paper onto my tray as she made her way to the bathrooms at the back of the plane. I shot a look around before unrolling it. It said, Are you stuck too? I pulled out a pen and wrote, Yes, it's been 30 hours.

I folded the scrap of paper up and set it on the tray closest to the aisle. She left the bathroom and picked it up as she passed. It's been 20 minutes since then. I don't know why, but I don't think the flight attendants would like it if they knew we were talking. It doesn't matter. I have to do something. I'll update you all on my channel with whatever happens next. This happened yesterday, and before anyone says anything, yes, I know I'm stupid. I had just gotten home from work around 9pm and had barely had time to get my shoes off when I get a phone call from some number I don't recognize. I'm searching for new jobs and I thought it might be one of the places that I was applying to call me back.

I pick it up and it's some guy who says that he's with some kind of third party detention center, which as he explained it, was for low risk inmates that were sent there whenever the local jails were busy or filled. That should have set off a nice big red flag for me but for whatever reason it just made sense in my tired brain. I'm getting ready to tell this guy I'm not interested in making a donation or anything like that when he asks if this is and then says my full name. I confirm and he says that they're holding my boyfriend at the center saying my boyfriend's full name and giving a dead-on description of him. I ask what's going on since my boyfriend is supposed to be at work right now and the guy on the other end provides an explanation. He says that my boyfriend had

struck a pregnant woman with his car on his way to work and was four times the legal limit for blood alcohol. He said the woman was in critical condition and that my boyfriend had broken a few ribs and his nose in the accident. I'm freaking out at this point and ask if I can speak to my boyfriend which the man obliges. I'm put on hold for a minute or two before my boyfriend picks up the phone. This person on the other end was panicking, saying how it wasn't his fault and begged me not to tell his parents, again using my name. It didn't particularly sound like my boyfriend, but I figured it was because of the broken nose he supposedly had and his tone really helped to sell it, because it all sounded so legitimate. The man from before comes back on the line before I

can ask any questions and explains that they had to sedate my boyfriend since he had began to panic and hyperventilate which I was starting to relate to more and more by the second the man on the other end tells me that I should come right away and that the bail is set at two thousand dollars cash only I stupidly tell him that I don't have that much and that maybe I have half of that. He tells me that it's fine and that I can work something out with the front office once I get there and to just bring what I have and seeming like he's trying to calm me down. He's given me the address and I can barely hold a pen because my hands are shaking so badly

and I'm very poorly trying to hold back tears. All of a sudden, the doors open up and in walks my boyfriend. Completely normal looking, with no broken nose, but more than a little confused as to why I'm crying. I'm still on the phone with the man and ask him what he thinks he's doing, telling him how my boyfriend just walked in and he promptly hangs up. I tried calling back a few times but it went directly to voicemail. Find out the power to the bar my boyfriend works at had gone out so his boss sent everyone home early and I had never been so grateful for a

power outage. My boyfriend slept on the couch to keep watch but unfortunately I still couldn't sleep that night so I decided to look up the name of the organization the man said he worked for. Big surprise, that turned up nothing. I then looked up the address that he had given me on Google Maps and see that it was some random abandoned strip mall in the middle of a sketchy area that was about an hour and a half out of town. What really freaked me out about this whole thing was the guy knew my number, both me and my boyfriend's names, but didn't sound like anyone we had met before. I have no idea what would have been waiting for me there, but I'm counting my lucky stars right now. I was one of those kids you see walking around zoos or amusement parks wearing a leash. Those were already a thing 20 plus years ago but less common and were initially only tied around the wrist. In my case it was a necessity. I would always start

wandering off from the rest of the family no matter what situation. This is one of the stories that led to me earning my leash. It happened when I was about six years old and I went to the zoo with my mom and sisters. Before every family outing my mom made sure to give me the talk about not walking off again nor face the consequences. My mom was a strict parent that made good on her promises. She had to, being a single mother of three. I didn't try to disobey her per se, but I often just didn't pay attention to the world and people around me. No different to this day.

I behaved and followed the group for a while, but then a butterfly garden caught my attention and off I was. When I finally realized I separated myself from my mom and sisters again, I panicked and started walking around the zoo looking for them. Being afraid for my mom's reaction more than anything else. After a while, I somehow got it in my head that if I could just walk out, find our car and wait there, my family would eventually find me. So I did. I got lost within a couple of minutes walking around a strange neighborhood looking for either our car or the way back to the zoo. Nothing looked familiar. I started crying and my mom was going to be so mad. Then this man came up to me, just

normal looking, about 40 years old, asking me if I'm lost. I explained I lost my family when we were visiting the zoo and I'm looking for the way back. I couldn't believe my luck when the man told me he had just come from the zoo and saw a family there standing near the entrance who were waiting for a little girl with blonde hair and a baseball cap. But it was still a few blocks away so he proposed I walk with him to his car and we could drive the rest of the way back. Just the mention of his car finally made me hesitant. I told him I wasn't allowed to get in the car with strangers. My mom would be so mad. He then said something like,

That was true, but I look smart enough to know I could trust someone. Don't remember the exact words, but something along those lines. Also, he added, He spoke to my parents earlier when they were looking for me, so he's not a complete stranger. That didn't seem right. I asked him if he really talked to my dad who had died a year before and when he said he did I broke down crying uncontrollably. I still didn't understand the situation I was in. I was just really confused about everything and scared of how angry my mom was going to be after all this. Finally my crying caught the attention of the security guard of the parking building

we were standing next to, asking if there was something he could help with. The guy stepped aside with the security guard and started explaining the situation, but made it vaguely sound like he was my father and we were looking for his wife. The security guard seemed to believe him, pointing us in the direction right towards the zoo. The man thanks the security guard and proceeds to take my hand and walk away. The security guard takes a last look at me and asks me, in a comforting friendly adult to child kind of way, why I'm still crying. I tell him that my dad is dead.

He looks really confused for a second, then asks if this man is not my dad. I tell him again, no, my dad is dead. In a split second, his whole face and posture changes and he turns to look at the guy, who's trying to explain he never actually said he was my dad, that the security guard must have misunderstood and he was just helping me find my mom. The security guard said he appreciated the man's help but he would take me off his hands now and the guy immediately took off. I don't think there was much else the security guard could have done. I explained the whole situation and after making a phone call he walked me to the entrance of the zoo which was just around the corner from the parking building. From there, we were brought to the security's office where my mom

and sisters were already waiting. I feel extremely lucky for the security guard being at the right place at the right time that day, and very grateful for the extra second of time he took that could have made all the difference. So I had known this woman since before I could remember. She was really good friends with my mom and dad throughout high school so I already knew her before all this. Unfortunately my mother was an alcoholic and pill addict which led to pretty bad neglect for several years when I was very young, a story for another day. After missing most of my third grade year DCS got involved and my dad got custody of me. He was dating my stepmother at the time and at first everything was fairly normal

she was like an older sister a friend it wasn't too long before i noticed things starting to change one day when i was about nine i was sitting in the living room floor playing with my back against the couch stepmother crossed the living room to go down the hallway and as she did seemed to shoulder check the doorway as soon as she did, seemed to shoulder check the doorway. As soon as she did this, she turned around and started yelling at me, accusing me of pushing her. I stared at her, dumbfounded, because I hadn't moved from my spot in the floor. She continued yelling and accusing me as I tried to rationalize it in my head. Maybe I got up and don't remember. But why would I push her?

I really had no negative feelings towards her at this point so it didn't make any sense. But she was an adult and I was a child. Surely she knew what she was talking about. Stepmother was a taller skinny woman with long golden blonde hair, straightened through the length with those poofy 80s bangs on top. She typically wore high-waisted jeans and kept long pristine red nails that would end up being a horrifying symbol to me into my teenage years. Things only got worse as I got older. I would speak to my mom on occasion over the phone or in a letter the first few years, but each time I did, stepmother would become more and more

hostile towards me, claiming that my contact with my mother was making me misbehave. But I was always an introvert. I loved reading in school and I was a bit of a nerd and hated getting into trouble, so this accusation didn't make sense to me even then. But what could I do about it? Before too long I noticed that stepmother looked for an opportunity alone with me to treat me however she wanted. Stepmother quickly became extremely militant. Each morning she woke me up for school by bursting into my room and aggressively jerking the covers from my body. Some mornings even grabbing my feet, digging her nails in and twisting my toes. I was expected to follow a strict schedule on school mornings. 6.15, out of bed. 6.15 to 25 a.m., get dressed for school. 6.25 a.m., breakfast. At this time, I was expected to stand in the exact

center point of the threshold between the kitchen and the dining room ready to take my breakfast and sit in my spot at the table. 6.35 a.m. done with breakfast. 6.35 to 6.45 a.m. finish getting ready for school. 6.45 a.m. be sitting Indian style in the center of the living room waiting on everyone to be ready. If I didn't follow the schedule down to the minute, punishment would be doled out. She would grab my hands, taking my breakfast, twisting one or two fingers out of socket, pulling me close to grit through her teeth at me with glaring, hateful eyes. Sometimes she would step on my feet, grinding her heels into my bare skin, twisting and glaring hate into me. On a few occasions she even broke my wood hairbrushes across my face, leaving busted blood vessels and massive bruises.

When the damage was too obvious she would try to hide me for a day or so, gently waking me the next morning, acting as though I was sick and telling me that I was too ill to go to school, brushing my hair back and telling me to go back to sleep. This treatment rolled over into my days after school and would evolve into other aggressive behaviors. She made sure to conceal any sign of mistreatment from my father, but still, some happened right under his nose. At the dinner table, she would dig her toes into my leg and scrape so hard that it would shave off chunks of skin from my shins with her toenails. Even at church, placing what looked like an affectionate hand on my back, but would proceed by giving me an extremely painful and deep pinch into my back,

leaving huge bruises in their places that no one else would see. I was given an hour and a half after school each day to do my homework. After that I was expected to go to our playroom where I was to entertain her daughter. Stepmother's daughter was between five and seven when things started to get really bad. I was expected to play what she wanted, when she wanted, and abide by any requests made. This was never said but understood and later learned the hard way. One day during the summer, while eating lunch with her daughter in the playroom, she asked me to open her dessert. She had a kid cuisine that she had merely taken all of two bites of. My stepmother would typically

leave the plastic on her dessert as a system to encourage her to eat her dinner first. Of course, when she asked me to open it, I asked her if she was done eating her meal, passively addressing the fact that she had barely touched it. I was about 14 at the time and it seemed like a plausible thing to big sister her about, but when I didn't give her what she wanted, she got up in a huff to go tattle to her mother, as most six-year-olds do. Stepmother was immediately enraged and barreled down the hallway in my direction. I don't even think I was out of view of her daughter when she grabbed me by the hair and started dragging me. I tried to keep up but lost my balance and fell to the floor

as she continued to drag me down the hallway by my hair. Once we reached my bedroom, she started kicking me in the stomach and then pulled me to my feet to face my bed. She then began rummaging through my belt drawer and pulled out my woven leather belt that she had already used more than once and then proceeded to beat me with the belt starting at my shoulder blades all the way down to my ankles. Heaven forbid if I screamed she would beat me more. The abuse also did not stop with physical as she seemed to get a kick out of bullying me. This she wasn't so worried about hiding from my father as she would make it seem light-hearted and jovial when he was around. One evening while having a family dinner

at one of our local go-to sit-downs, she started kicking me under the table, passing me horribly evil glares. After a few minutes of this, she spoke up. You chew like a cow. Why can't you chew right? Doesn't she chew like a cow? My dad chuckled, thinking it was meant lightheartedly, but as he looked down at his meal again, her death glare, staring a hole through me with a tight jaw and grit teeth told me otherwise. This became a new target for her abuse. She did this again later when she noticed that I walked on the inside of my house shoes. One day, kicking me in the back of the knees making me fall to the floor, she began kicking me in the back, knocking the wind out of me, all simply over the way I walked. This became my daily life.

Speaking out seemed ridiculous because all of these punishments just felt so absurd. I didn't tell anyone for a long time, but as I got older, people around me got wiser. When I was in middle school, my dad and stepmother were called in for questioning by the school. Two of my teachers were highly suspicious of my bruises and constant swollen fingers. Stepmother proceeded to put on an act, crying and acting hurt and shocked that they would think she could hurt a child. I changed schools after that year. Things only got worse once I went to high school, as she seemed intimidated by my aging and gaining maturity. Male friends were off limits and my curves were to be hidden in horribly unflattering clothes. I didn't really mind so much as I really had very little interest in boys or displaying my womanhood to any degree.

However, one afternoon while taking a shower, she burst in the bathroom to remind me of my timing. As she whipped the bathtub curtain open, she saw the hair growing below my waist. Before I could react, she grabbed the hair and jerked it down, pulling out a painful handful. She cursed me for not telling her that I had started maturing in that way. I couldn't tell anyone about that for years. After the belt beating, however, stepmother's sister-in-law saw my backside and called my dad at work cursing him and threatening to report it. I started going to her house on the weekends after that. After this I got braver and became less scared. Once I saw people reacting to what little they saw of my stepmother's behavior, I knew I was in the right for sticking up for myself. So I did, in subtle ways at first. I brought jewelry and makeup to school and started

to give myself space to express myself. Then one morning, while running a minute or two behind on breakfast, stepmother came to the kitchen in a rage. Why wasn't I finishing getting ready for school? Before I could turn around from rinsing my dishes, she was rummaging in the utensil drawer and pulled out a fork. She backed me up against the kitchen counter, pressing the fork to my throat. I don't remember what she said to me in those moments, but I remember her hot breath in my ear, hissing through her teeth at me, and I remember the chill of the cold metal prongs on my throat. I was 16. My last day there was a field day of my junior year. I decided to wear a cute outfit

that her sister-in-law had bought me for casual days. It was a cute cap sleeve strip t-shirt cut femininely to suit my curves with long matching shorts. I knew she wouldn't like it, but I also knew that it was completely appropriate for a girl my age, even very conservative in comparison to my other peers. She saw me as I was walking down the hallway towards my bedroom and I saw the rage fill her. She came at me nails first, grabbed my arm and dug her nails in. This is when I snapped and fought her off, shoving her into a wall. Rage filled me as I went to the living room to grab the phone. If you touch me again, I'm going to call the cops. She went pale, and suddenly I wasn't scared for myself anymore. I couldn't control myself and laughed. You're scared, I said, suddenly enlightened. Her face went blank

as she walked towards me. If I have to make your dad choose between you and me, it's not going to be you, she said coldly. I ignored this sentiment because I knew she was delusional to think something like that. I went to my bedroom and packed a bag. She didn't stop me but she did make sure to let me know that if I left, I wasn't welcome back. I ended up spending that summer in Florida with my stepmother's sister-in-law and moved in with my grandmother for the next several years. I only saw stepmother again once in my twenties. She had left my dad by the time I was out of high school for the man that she had been cheating on him with.

She and I spoke briefly over Facebook in that next year and I confronted her about what she put me through and my dad. Her response? I'm sorry if you ever felt unloved. I was just really stressed and you were a pretty rebellious kid. I'm a nanny and had been with my current family for about two years when the oldest started preschool a couple of days a week. I drop him off around nine and pick him up at 12.30 bringing his baby brother along. Now this school was very hoity toity and most of the families who sent their children were very wealthy. Everyone entering the building had to wear badges with their names printed out. Every entrance had a security guard

and metal detector. They employed about 10 security guards around the building that patrolled the place from open till close i became very familiar with several of them because i passed them at their posts on the way in and out most were cops making a few extra hundred dollars on their days off well during the fall of 2017, the older boy moved to a new class on the other side of the school. This entrance was never as populated, so it was just a couple of people going in and out of this door during the day. The security guard was from a private company. He was always extremely polite and friendly. One of the nicer security guards without a doubt he was probably in his late 20s i thought he looked like a young santa claus round jolly face with a permanently red nose and cheeks framed by a thick

brown beard thin framed glasses and curly brown hair that went to about his shoulders i eventually learned that his name was nick which only solidified my comparison. Months passed and we see each other two or three days a week. The boys loved to wave to him and he'd always ask how our day was and we'd respond. In January of 2018, I came down with the flu and missed about two weeks of work. When I returned, I continued our regular schedule of school drop-offs and pick-ups. I was walking past Nick, waved and he stopped me and said he'd noticed I was gone for about two weeks and he hoped I was feeling better. I smiled, thanked him and said it was the sickest that I'd been but I was glad to be back.

I found it a bit odd that he noticed and that he knew I was sick. I assumed my employers had told him when they did drop-offs and pickups while I was gone. I didn't think much of it and continued on but when I went to leave he stopped me again and told me he didn't know that I wasn't the boy's mother. I laughed and basically said people confuse me for their mom because I'm with them all the time and we kind of look similar. He laughed too and then said I was wondering I never saw you with a husband and you don't have a ring on your finger so I thought you were just a single mom. I laughed nervously to this and didn't know what to say so I said, nope, just the nanny.

I wanted to kick myself once I got back in the car. I was caught off guard and I'm generally a bit awkward so tend not to respond the best when put on the spot. I guess I didn't realize he paid that much attention to me. I was a bit uneasy but found it harmless. The next drop off day I said hello and he responded by calling me by name which he had never done before and telling me I look nice which he had definitely never done before and I was very surprised. I started to think he may be interested in me since learning that I'm not actually a single mom. This was weird for me. I'm gay and I look very gay so men very seldom take an interest in me so when they do I'm weirded out. When I left we exchanged a simple goodbye and the rest of the

week was pretty non-eventful. In early February I was doing the drop off yet again when on the way out with a baby strapped to my chest Nick stopped me. He was very courteous but he asked me if I'd be interested in going to dinner with him some weekend. Again I'm incredibly awkward so my response was to laugh and I could see he was immediately offended. I apologized and tried to explain that I was actually engaged and had been in a long-term relationship. This was true. His face changed and he said, Well, where'd you ring?

The way he said this made me uncomfortable. I felt accused and defensive. I told him that I don't really like wearing jewelry to work so only wear it on the weekends. I accidentally scratched the baby with the ring when he was just a newborn and basically decided it wasn't something I'd wear when caring for them. He didn't seem satisfied with that answer but let me go and told me to have a good evening. When I came to pick the older boy up that afternoon Nick seemed agitated. I said hello and no answer. Okay. I was upset but let it go.

I didn't want to hurt this guy's feelings but geez could he not tell I was gay? The constant button ups didn't give him a clue. Did I need an undercut? It wasn't personal. Why was he so angry? When I left, he again ignored me. I just kind of swallowed and thought, oh well, he'll get over it. I put the baby in his seat in the back of the car and was buckling up the three-year-old

when a voice behind me boomed. You don't have to lie to me. I whipped around and Nick was about a foot away from me. I was grabbed between the car, the open door and his body. He no longer looked like this jolly polite young man. He was big, probably about 6 foot 2 and easily 400 pounds. I was scared and I was angry. How dare he come up to me and scare me? How dare he corner me and intimidate me when he knows I'm doing my job? I hurried out of the doorway and shut the door and locked it with keys in my hand. I stood inches away and tried to back up. You didn't need to lie

to me. If you aren't interested in me, just tell me. I don't like liars. I didn't owe this guy anything but explain that I wasn't lying. I set him engaged and it's nothing personal. He was a nice, friendly guy and that I didn't mean to hurt his feelings. He was angry. He huffed and said, Oh, you didn't hurt my feelings. I just don't appreciate dishonesty.

You lied about being their mother so I figured you were lying about this too. I was mad. I never once lied about being their mother. He assumed because I was the one doing drop-offs and pick-ups. Our conversations never got beyond hello, good day and goodbye until recently. I decided this conversation was over. He was talking down to me and accusing me of nonsense. I told him I never lied about this or anything and didn't appreciate his tone. I went around and got in the car and he followed but kept his distance and said, I'm not even sure why I wasted my time on you anyways. I was shocked. He was a completely different person. I avoid altercations at all costs so for someone to speak to me like this was very upsetting. I ended up disclosing the situation to my employers who got very upset. They did not

like how he spoke to me and especially didn't like that he had done this around their children. They ended up contacting the school which I was mortified about. I was terrified to see him again knowing he'd know I had told. That never happened. He was fired and replaced with a retired cop who was incredibly unfriendly and I was grateful. I felt bad. I thought my employers had overreacted but they were prone to overreactions and honestly I was selfishly happy I wouldn't have to see him again. I was worried about how awkward it may be. I let it go and weeks passed and school drop-offs were uneventful. However in May of 2018 that changed. I lived in an enclosed apartment complex in uptown Dallas. Our apartment neighbors a ton of bars so we have some issues with break-ins and vandalism. We've always had

police presence but after an incident where some drunk guy broke into the office through a window the office manager decided to hire security guards. Guess who ended up doing night shifts? Nick. When I first saw him I was checking my mail and he had passed me in his uniform. I froze and he looked at me in the eye and said good evening ma'am. Good. He must have forgotten me I thought. I was shaking as I went up to my apartment and immediately told my fiance who I saw. She was aware of the situation with Nick at the old preschool and being the daughter of a cop was always more suspicious and suspected the absolute worst out of everyone. She did not want him to find out which apartment

was ours so we started taking the back elevator and parking in a different area. He only patrolled the office area of the perimeter of the building so we found it easy to avoid him for a week or so. One day the back elevator was out of order so I had to take the front elevator from the parking garage up to my apartment on the fourth floor. The elevator stopped in the lobby and Nick walks on and I freeze. I guess he could sense I was anxious. He looked at me and said, don't worry, I'm not mad you got me fired, just don't do it again. I didn't even respond. I got off on the fourth floor and then thought, oh god, now he knows which floor I live on. I immediately ran inside and told my fiancecé and she said we should contact the

management. I convinced her that this was a bad idea. It could make him angry and I doubt he'd be let go. He hadn't done anything. But did he follow me here? He knew me. How did he end up here? It seemed like too much of a coincidence. I will say we lived in a panic. We kept our door bolted and installed a camera. I'm not sure how many of us are aware of the story of Jennifer Morey. She was a young lawyer living alone in an apartment similar to mine in Houston. She was stalked and attacked by her apartment's security guard. He had access to her apartment.

She survived but went through a horrible ordeal and we were both terrified this could happen to us. Every noise terrified us. We'd get up to make sure the door was bolted several times before we could go to bed. That summer we were convinced he'd try to do something. Maybe just our overactive, worried minds. We ended up avoiding him for the most part. We saw him occasionally but he didn't seem interested and although we were always wary, we figured he'd got over it and we let our guards down. And he never did bother me again. He never said much of anything to me when I did see him. I decided that maybe he was having a really hard time last fall and he was a really nice guy who

maybe didn't have the best social skills. Fall 2018 rolls around and I'm busy with work and my fiance is out of town often on business meetings. One weekend I'm home alone and it's 3.30pm and I'm walking down to the office to get a package. There are about three squad cars and police all over the lobby and going up the stairs. I'm wondering what happened but like I said we live next to the bars and we've had incidences with drunk idiots so figured someone had an altercation or something or something had gotten stolen. I try to eavesdrop but don't hear much. I go about my day and then receive an email from my apartment complex saying they have a community-wide scheduled meeting to discuss the incident and go over resident safety concerns. I'm wondering what just happened, so of course I go to the meeting and guess what?

A young single girl living in an apartment by herself showed up mid-afternoon to find Nick inside her apartment. She came in and her drawers were in disarray. He was hiding in her closet and came up with an excuse. The security guards don't have keys to any apartment and aren't supposed to be in the resident halls. Later we found out he had been stalking this girl and stole the keys from maintenance and made copies. This has been going on for at least a month if not longer. They found several of her belongings in his vehicle and he was obviously fired and charged. I didn't follow exactly what happened to him but we assume he did some time. It was absolutely terrifying and of course our apartment complex got the pantsuit out of them. I was glad his attention shifted but wondered what could

have happened to this girl. But this wasn't the last time I saw or heard of him. A few weeks ago, over a year since I last saw him, I went into this big fancy mall in my city and guess who was working security? Nick. My first thought was, you've got to be kidding me. My second thought was, how on earth does this guy keep getting his security jobs? Who's dropping the ball here? I saw him and turned around and walked right out the door. Thankfully, I'm moving out of state next month. When I was in high school, I always felt so ugly. I had low self-esteem and anxiety, which was really more of a problem rather than my looks. So if anyone of the opposite gender gave me even a little attention I would start to like them. I was pretty innocent despite

how desperate I was having only kissed one boy. So when I was 17 and a college guy put interest into me I immediately clung to him. I was on this app before Tinder and I met a guy who lives 7 hours from my home city. His name was Brandon and he was gorgeous. Blonde hair, muscular, blue eyes. He played soccer for his university and he was 19 years old. Honestly, he wasn't my usual type. I really like guys with dark hair and eyes. I still do, but he was really handsome and really kind. He would shower me with compliments and talk to me all the time. I lived alone, long story, in an apartment with just my cats so I would get lonely or scared and he always comforted me. A month into talking he started asking for pictures. Not ones in my face but obviously more risque ones. Now this was

nearly six years ago and I didn't have a good concept of stranger danger on the internet. I mean smartphones had only really been around for two or three years at this point at least in my school and with my age group. 17 year old me who was so insecure wanted to make him happy because I couldn't believe I had gotten a guy like him. I was ready to do anything he asked. I never sent anything too illicit, I was too insecure for that but I would send pictures of me and my skivvies. He would shower me with compliments about how beautiful I was and I fell for every word. With time I started to get upset though. I wanted to see him. I would always send him pictures when he asked but he never sent me any. He would show me body pictures of him with his shirt off or things but the pictures were always a bad quality. When I

started getting too persistent he promised that he would start calling me. For some reason this appeased me and we'd talk many times a week. After a couple of months he increasingly became more overt with me, telling me what he wanted to do with me and how badly he wanted me. This made me nervous since I had only ever kissed a boy, but also made me a little excited. It felt good to be wanted by someone I had really grown to like. This was all during the first semester of my senior year of high school and I was going to turn 18 the next semester in late January. As it got to Christmas time, he started to talk about coming to my city to see me for my birthday. This had me really excited since I wanted to see him in person so badly.

We had first talked about me going to him, something he had insisted on, but I chickened out and said I couldn't do the drive alone. An excuse, I really didn't want to go to an older guy's house and stay with him alone. My own house made me feel more safe. We planned on a weekend after my birthday and everything seemed fine. But then one day in my choir class my best friend, an exchange student from Germany, was talking with me about him. I was telling her about him and showing pictures and she got very unsettled. Have you ever seen him on video? I told her no and she gave me a skeptical look. Something doesn't feel right. There is no way he's real. Not that you couldn't

date someone like him, but he's just too perfect. She was very direct and blunt with me about it, something my other friends weren't. So I took her words deeply, and I'm so thankful I did. I immediately asked him for a picture of his face. They made up some excuse about how he couldn't take a picture right then, so I persisted, asking every day. Finally my instincts were kicking in and I was getting scared. I told him I wanted to see him, to video call me. He said no. I fought him on it for hours one night, telling him that if he tells me the truth I won't

get mad. He refused. I put the name he gave me into Facebook determined to find him on my own if he wasn't going to give in. Nothing came up on him. I texted him telling him I couldn't find his Facebook and he gave in, giving me a completely different name and told me that's me. I remember just feeling cold as I read that. I looked up the account and everything he told me was a lie. His name, his face, his age. He was 25, not 19.

I was terrified. I thought I had been talking to someone just two years older than me, which is legal in my state, but he was eight years older. I immediately stopped texting him. That's when he started getting obsessive. He would text me dozens of times a day, calling me over and over again. He would beg me to answer him, to give him a chance. Then he started threatening me to answer. He told me he had saved all of my pictures. He kept them all and told me he would send them to my friends and family on Facebook, showing everyone the illicit pictures of me and show everyone our

text messages and talking about what he would do to me if we met. Looking back, all of that was more damaging to him than me, but I was young and stupid and afraid. I hated my body so much I was terrified of people seeing it, so I started talking to him again, more reserved and cautious this time. The days dinged closer to my birthday and the weekend we had planned. Our messages had become bland and short since I was trying to make him lose interest in me, but he never gave up. If I took too long to message, then he would threaten me again. My birthday fell on a Monday that year and he sent me all kinds of messages. I don't even remember what I did that birthday. I didn't have many friends and I've never liked to celebrate,

so it was probably small. One Friday hit, I got a text from him that morning saying he was driving to my city and that he would pick me up from school. I was terrified. I had lost a lot of friends the semester before, another long story, so they obviously had no clue of my situation. Out of desperation I went to one of my guy friends who I hadn't talked to in a couple of months and spilled everything to him. He was a long time friend so he was sympathetic and promised to follow me home that day. I went straight to my car, ignoring the mass amounts of texts saying, where are you and I'm here. My friend drove behind me all the way to my apartment, which he had no clue I was living in and stayed with me as I cried for a while. I turned my phone off and my friend left later in the night.

Brandon had no clue where I lived but I was still paranoid. What if he somehow found me? Only three people knew where I lived, four now with my guy friend and he didn't come in contact with any of them. When I finally turned my phone on he was threatening me again. I was so exhausted and fed up. I started spam texting him, yelling and venting. I told him how stressed he had made me and what he was doing is wrong. I told him to send pictures and that I didn't care anymore. I started to attack his character, telling him how no one could love him if he hides who he is and treats people like this when they catch him in a lie. Thankfully for me he had had enough care

for me to take my words to heart. He apologized and told me he deleted all of the pictures. He swore to leave me alone as long as we could still talk every once in a while as friends. I agreed even though I knew I was lying. I talked to him for a month, short responses until he finally gave up. Even now at 22 I still see his name appear sometimes. I blocked his number and deleted him on everything but his name still shows up sometimes on my Instagram or Snapchat when he's trying to re-add me. He's the reason I don't give my name or picture out. He isn't the first stalker I experienced. The first was when I was in sixth grade, but yet again, that's a story for another time. How this all began was me, being nice to the people who came to my local community library

as I was a casual worker, although people probably thought I worked part time, as not only was I spotted behind the desk checking in and out books, but also on my laptop abusing the wifi. This guy, nicknamed Chesney, was probably an influencer for the young adults as he mainly skateboarded and did whatever and wasn't alone. He had a few elementary or high schooler kids with him. I'm a natural when it comes to customer service speaking and acting so chances are I must have spoken to Chesney kindly enough he thought I was interested in him or he became infatuated in me. I don't date anyone in or from my community. I explained to many people before that dating here would be full-on Alabama.

Chances are they could be my cousin through marriage or blood. It's disturbing as I am Native American and can't even go west or south to date another Native guy because chances are they might also be a cousin long distance. While my time at the library was long, just to gain work experience, it didn't last when Chesney asked me to hang out. I declined the first time, but it seemed it didn't stop him. One day I believe he asked for my number. I refuse, like the jerk I am. If I don't know you personally, dead or alive, you aren't important to me. I have a low friend count, I'm not close to anyone who isn't my immediate

family, and my family can see through nonsense as soon as it comes into their line of sight. Chesney then asks my supervisor for my number to give to him. How I came to know this is by the end of the day when we were closing up the library. My supervisor tells me that she will keep an eye on him and that I should get home safely. I continue every day as normal, very ignorant to the situation that was now starting to build. One day as I was sitting in my cubbyhole, as the patrons like to call it, I start to notice Chesney would find a spot and sit there where I would be in his line of sight. I ignore this until one day he came up to my cubbyhole and hands me this Magic the Gathering card. He didn't say much, but I was

disturbed. I'll be honest, something about him didn't seem right. The card had an octopus on it and right then and there, I placed the card down and gather up all my things and left. I didn't return to the library for three months, maybe even more than that. This had taken place two years ago. I told my eldest sister about the incident and my family was kind of worried. They wanted to know the guy's name. However, I didn't know his name as I didn't see him as being important to remember. I never saw him again until a year later. I'm doing more casual work at the library.

I basically forgot his face until he came in one day and was working at a computer. I never gave him a second thought as I was reorganizing and restacking the bookshelves until he printed off a paper and came up to me and asked, How do I get a job here at the library? You'll have to speak with my supervisor, was my answer. I overheard my supervisor telling him he couldn't hand his resume in here, that he needs to hand it in over at HR at the band office. I never saw him again, as I had gotten a job elsewhere. Two years later, just about four days ago from now, I'm living my life as normally when my mom texts me, telling about some guy calling for me. She gave me

the caller's ID, but like an idiot, I text her back saying the ID isn't familiar and there's no number to call back from. If someone wanted to speak with me they could call or text through my cell otherwise they aren't important. But what I didn't know was both my mom and eldest sister answered the call. It wasn't until I was sitting at my local Tim's my sister calls me and says you have a stalker. This shocked me for a bit but another part of me was amused since I do have a tendency to think dark thoughts. My sister explained to me my stalker wanted to meet with me, take me out to dinner, that he wanted to hang with me. I didn't know who this guy was and I tried to place a name and face to whomever this person was. Things were starting to get a bit annoying when my mother and eldest sister started to accuse me of giving out my brother's number to a stranger. Why would I do that? I barely have a social life. When I got home

and went over to my brother's, my mom, who was staying there, said he just called. Now my family is on high alert. By reverse number searching, I got an address of where the call is coming from. I wasn't taking this serious. Whoever they were, they lived on the other side of the res. We went to the address and did a drive-by. My sister lightened up the mood by making jokes, pointing out to guys who were walking down the road saying, oh that must be your stalker. No, it must be that one. Just saying, these guys walking down the roads look like the typical druggier tweakers. Once we went back, my amusement ended as the accusations started up again.

Did you give out your big brother's number? My eldest sister asked. No, of course not, I answered. Then how did your stalker get it? Well, he either got it from someone who knows our brother's home phone number or looked in the phone book. This is what I was concluding as I know for sure I never gave out my brother's number. I barely call my brother let alone text. Once we got back to the house I was angry and immediately grabbed my brother's handphone and went outside to call this guy. My sister was talking to my older brother, filling him in on what is going on. It didn't take long for this guy to pick up.

Can anyone guess who it is? Yep, Chesney. Chesney was the one calling my brother's phone and asking for me. I immediately started to tell him my family isn't amused and that I wasn't interested. Even when I said no, he kept trying to ask me to go out with him. I isn't amused and that I wasn't interested. Even when I said no, he kept trying to ask me to go out with him. I got his full name and told my siblings who it finally was. It's my fault for living under a rock. Turns out this guy is an actual addict, if not a complete loser. I told my parents and they told me not to even think of dating him and to just leave him alone Of course mom and dad. I don't date anyone from the rez as you know

but mystery solved I Did do some Facebook research? No kidding. He had to be this wannabe thug Honest about doing hardcore drugs and love that he was German blood saying all these kind of things that he descended from Adolf or something like that. Shake my head. I posted this early on rstories but the reason why I'm here is a couple of hours ago Chesney called my brother's phone again. Getting up I went to my brother's who was home. He was mad. I didn't find the phone on the cradle.

I asked my brother who were the incoming calls. He pressed the number and handed it to me, which I immediately pressed call. And I kid you not, this guy didn't wait to pick up the phone. Chesney? Speaking. I was mad. I was livid to be honest. I didn't use my customer service voice. It was gone. I immediately went for my sea cadet voice. You will cease and desist from calling this number ever again or I'll get the police involved

and you'll consider this a form of harassment. Okay. I hung up, still mad. My mother said something about calling the cops. I already know one thing. He is only calling my brother's phone, not me directly. He hadn't done anything threatening to me or my family. He doesn't know where I work. But still, if he used an old phone book to find my brother's number, which is my grandmother's phone number, he has my brother's address, meaning he also knows where I lived. I'm writing this down

because I called the non-emergency line. My brother needed to just block the number. Fingers crossed, and I won't give this idiot any respect. This happened a year and a half ago. Names have been changed. I used to work in a gas station where this one particular customer was a regular. Throughout interactions with this guy I figured out there was something off about the way he socialized. This guy could ramble for minutes and minutes and minutes at a time until you told him you had to serve someone else. Even if there was a queue he would still ramble. I was the new girl at the station and everyone told me they avoided serving him because he made them uncomfortable. Yet they never trespassed him or asked him to leave. We'll call him Tom. Tom was in his mid-40s and ran some kind of unregistered, probably somewhat illegal lawn mowing company,

where he would mow lawns for people and they would pay him cash. I feel sorry for his customers because I really wouldn't want this guy on my property or knowing where I lived. It started off as relatively harmless, but harmless always gets really freaking tiring. So he used to comment on my smile, how he liked the shape of my face and mouth. Weirdo. He also used to comment on my smile how he liked the shape of my face and mouth weirdo he also used to comment on my hair which i used to dye red it's actually part of the reason i stopped dyeing it he even stroked it a few times i told my site leader that i thought he was weird and he was always commenting on my looks and i was getting sick of it now. She literally said, well none of us kisses but so he leaves us alone now. That really made me mad because I never did any of that. Only politely served him and asked him not to behave certain ways. Secondly, he never left them alone. They used to run into the back

room and make me serve him. One day my co-worker had a heart attack and died suddenly, not at work thankfully. I was really upset because he was practically the only nice co-worker towards me. There were a lot of mean women working at the station who talked about me and made fun of me behind my back even though I was constantly doing their work and pulling double plus shifts regularly. This co-worker was a really wonderful older guy pushing me to talk to my boss about becoming a manager. Naturally I was upset and I cried a couple of times in my shift but once I was alone for the night I had to hold myself together for the customers. Tom came in it was around 8 or 9 or 9pm and we had a policy called controlled door. Basically we

unlock the door for anyone we think won't rob us. After 10pm no customers are allowed in. So yeah, Tom was buying two bottles of coke or something. He let him in because I wasn't that threatened by him at this point and I was a bit off during this shift since my co-worker had just died that day. He approaches the counter and mentions that I look sick or upset and how he heard that so-and-so had passed away. I just said yes and said I was feeling a bit sad. Without warning, he grabbed me by my neck and pulled me across the counter into an awkward and painful hug because my legs were hanging mid-air. I didn't say anything because I was literally so taken aback and frankly scared.

Tom then said, I noticed you had the door locked and then unlocked it for me. That must mean you trust me. I just made some excuse about how I needed to clean the coffee machine now and he needs to leave so I can monitor the cameras. The way he had grabbed me left a sore pain in my neck for literally weeks. The next few days I told my site leader what happened and she told me in a snarky way that I should have made an incident report the night it happened. I told her I forgot because I was shaken up. She said she would get him trespassed.

A couple of nights when I was leaving around 10pm he would be outside around the corner of the building and offering to take me home. I always refused and quickly got to my ride. I told my site leader this and asked when the trespass was happening and she said she was discussing it with her boss. A few more creepy comments and occurrences happened when people finally started asking him to leave. By this point everyone was aware of his behavior towards me and were actively telling him to leave. I got fed up and handed in my resignation since he hadn't been officially trespassed. It took me handing in my resignation for them on that day to go to the police and then have

a sit down with me and try to convince me not to leave. I said my mind was made up. My coworkers were mean people and this guy was harassing me. I wasn't going to put my health on the line for a job at a gas station. In my last couple of weeks they switched me in between two other sites so Tom wouldn't know where I was and to get away from my regular co-workers. My main site at that time was amazing. The co-workers were supportive and super friendly. The site leader was sympathetic and even on more than

one occasion warned me when he was approaching the store, got me into the back room one time and then went off at Tom for looking at me, telling him to leave and that he was calling the police etc etc. I forgot to mention that when I was placed in other sites he would drive to each site every day to ask where I was. Someone from my old site told him I didn't know who it was or why they would do a thing like that even if they disliked me but that's how he found out where I was and would come in. Thankfully I only worked there for a couple more weeks and most of the people were proactive in keeping him away from me. After I left the job I decided I wanted to start going to the same church

my dad goes to. He swore by the church so I read some reviews and literally found a review by Tom that was very recent saying the church was great. I decided to tell dad about Tom and said I was too scared to go to that church. Dad said Tom was harmless and he had Asperger's and didn't mean to be weird about stuff. I told dad that he would wait for me late at night in dark areas beside my work. He would follow me between workplaces. One time I worked half a day at site one and then drove to site 2 for the other half of my shift and he was driving behind me. He made comments about how I looked and how I was just such an amazing person countless and countless times that it just became tiresome and creepy. Dad ended up speaking to the pastor and the pastor told him that he had actually been banned from the church a few days ago for inappropriately hugging the women there. His wife actually came into the church to complain. She did the same thing at my workplace, saying he was innocent

and hadn't done anything wrong. I don't know if she's stupid or just in denial. Anyway, I moved cities away from where I used to live and I'm very thankful that Tom never found out where I lived or hurt me in any way. I look back on those times where he waited for me in the car park at 10pm and literally shudder at the thought. Hey friends, thanks for listening. Be sure to subscribe and click that notification bell to be alerted of all future narrations. If you got a story, be sure to submit them to my subreddit, rletsreadofficial, and give and receive feedback from the community, and maybe even hear your story featured on the next video. And join my Discord to interact with me and other listeners directly.

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