The NoSleep Podcast - NoSleep Podcast S11E12

Episode Date: August 19, 2018

It's episode 12 of Season 11. On this week's show we have five tales about our sinister suffering senses. "A Ride That Never Ends"† written by Lumi Mö and performed by Addison Peacock. (Story starts around 00:02:15) "Scars"¤ written by Keith McDuffee and performed by Mick Wingert & Jesse Cornett & Elie Hirschman & Mary Murphy. (Story starts around 00:28:50) "If I Don’t See Them"† written by S.H. Cooper and performed by Matthew Bradford & Nikolle Doolin & Elie Hirschman. (Story starts around 01:11:45) "Two in a Box"‡ written by R. Sinclair Mills and performed by Jeff Clement & Nikolle Doolin. (Story starts around 01:24:35) "Bedtime at the Coopers"† written by David Hubbard and performed by Jessica McEvoy & Nikolle Doolin & Mike DelGaudio. (Story starts around 01:55:20) Click here to learn more about the voice actors on The NoSleep Podcast   Click here to learn more about Lumi Mö   Click here to learn more about Keith McDuffee   Click here to learn more about S.H. Cooper   Click here to learn more about R. Sinclair Mills   Click here to learn more about David Hubbard   Executive Producer & Host: David Cummings Musical score composed by: Brandon Boone Audio adaptations produced by: Phil Michalski† & Jeff Clement‡ & Jesse Cornett¤ "Scars" illustration courtesy of Naomi Ronke Audio program ©2018 - Creative Reason Media Inc. - All Rights Reserved - No reproduction or use of this content is permitted without the express written consent of Creative Reason Media Inc. The copyrights for each story are held by the respective authors. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This audio program presents horror which is frightening and disturbing. You left us into your mind at your own risk. The sunlight fades to darkness. The frightful tales creep into your mind. It's time to give you to because tonight there will be... Brace yourself for the No Sleep Podcast. It's the No Sleep Podcast. I'm David Cummings.

Thanks for joining us. On the show this week, we have five tales about our sinister suffering senses. We've got a jam-packed show for you this week, so before we jump right in, I want to share a small personal milestone with you. Last week, on August 15th, I marked four years as a full-time podcaster. Four years since I left my full-time software developer job to make this my permanent gig. I wouldn't have made it this far without all the wonderful people I collaborate with. Our team is beyond amazing, and I'm honored to have them by my side, and I thank them for these four years. And of course, to you fantastic listeners, you're the reason we do this.

And although I'm not running for president, I will work hard and hope for at least four more years. And since those years are full of stories, we'd better get this week's roster started. You see, the tape is in the machine. The stories are ready, so let's press play. In our first tale, we meet a woman who is a big fan of haunted theme parks and attractions. And as author Lumi Mour shares, when a new theme park based on classic horror movies gets announced, she can hardly contain herself. That is, until she realizes that the attraction seems to be anything but safe.

Performing this tale is Addison Peacock. So the next time you want some thrills and chills, make sure you don't get on a ride that never ends. There is a place where nightmares are supposed to exist. A magnet of darkness by design, where screams of terror and peals of laughter are meant to intertwine, to complement and contrast one another.

This place would be a mecca for the macabre, an idea born of bringing fear to reality. But some ideas were never meant to come to life. Imagine for a moment a place where every house is haunted, where every patch of grass is an ancient burial ground, where demons and poltergeists are welcomed with open arms, all for a modest entry fee of $4999. It sounds exciting, right? That famous haunted hotel as an attraction you could ride through,

experiencing rooms of blood and hallways stalked by creepy twins. How about boat rides on the lake of a summer camp where the masked murderer floats up to chase you, machete in hand? There would be thrills for the kids, too. Candy apples rotted with gummy worms, a haunted laser tag maze with cartoonish ghosts. It was meant to be a haven for horror lovers, a place where we could celebrate and experience our addictions

to heart-pounding, dread-inducing scares. A place where we could meet our nightmares, face them head on, even get their autographs. Now, imagine all the things that could go wrong, and you'll have a glimpse of what Crimson Rews, Ridge was like during its very brief first and last season. Maybe you even remember it if you were lucky enough to get early tickets. I wanted to write a piece on Crimson Ridge.

Just a listicle, I thought. A fun little post about the mysteries of a doomed horror theme park I'd even visited myself. But what I found was completely beyond what I could even imagine. When I first heard about Crimson Ridge, I remember being pumped, like getting your Hogwarts letter pumped. Prolific horror director Ego Santiago, the twisted mind behind modern classics like Crimson Ridge and Homecoming High, had purchased 80 acres of land to develop a theme park dedicated to the macabre, the horrifying, and the downright eerie. He managed to secure permissions from most of the top horror IPs. and I watched, along with the rest of the world,

as the iconic houses, forests, and monsters from all my favorite movies were brought to life. The Pieste des Resistence, as it were, would be a full reproduction of the high school from Santiago's own Homecoming High series. With actors hired to play students tortured by the spirit of Nora Ray, the wronged homecoming queen

enacting her revenge upon being murdered. In a few words, so freaking cool. The buzz was everywhere when the park hosted its VIP opening weekend, a chance for industry members to see everything in action. I watched the live stream from Santiago's YouTube channel as it took us through the park. The entrance was a small town modeled after Salem, Massachusetts during the witch trials. Every 15 minutes, a witch was burned at the stake in the park. center of the village square, some writhing and painful, horrible deaths, while others would reveal

themselves as witches and fly off into the woods with horrific cackles. The park then unraveled into various areas. There were the haunted houses and hospitals, the hotels and forests. There were the slashers, kids' camps in small towns, dream worlds and teen dances. There were European-inspired horror torture porn destinations, and there was a kid-friendly zone based on a cartoon ghost series. Every feed from every creator and reviewer showcased the brilliant exteriors

and to die for food, but the insides of the buildings were left as mysteries. You had to go to the park to see them, and based on the discussion surrounding the rides, you had to go to the park to experience them. Many a top ten list was crowned that year,

by Crimson Ridge and its horrific wonders. And then something strange happened. Happened isn't even the right word. It was more like it unfolded. A new egg Twitter account, at Homecoming High, began tweeting photos and events from the homecoming exhibit, as if they were living day-to-day life, for real. The first photo was tagged,

ready for some pep. Hashtag go Tomahawks. It featured one girl wearing the green and yellow of homecoming high painted in stripes on her face. She was stunning with a billowing natural afro and cheeks dotted with freckles. In every picture, she was smiling, glowing, happy. But when other students started to show up in her photos, they looked anything but. In posts with captions like English class with my fave girls, they were pale, wide-eyed, with greasy hair and dark under-eye circles.

It was like they were sick insomniacs overshadowed by this golden girl. She called herself Danielle. Most people ignored the account at first, or assumed it was a staged marketing campaign for the park, and maybe, fingers crossed, a new homecoming movie. There were a few threads that popped up on Reddit,

but in the end, no one could find any clues leading to anything consequential. So it fell by the wayside. Crimson Ridge held its official opening weekend to a ton of success. Tickets were sold out for weeks, then months, and Homecoming High the Ride was praised as the most immersive horror experience ever to exist. The ride was more like a museum than anything else, but gave patrons the ability to witness and experience the events of the movie. The iconic school chapel scene.

The bloody cafeteria, the change rooms. The actors were perfect. They simply went through their days, not talking or even acknowledging the customers, except for the leads who held hourly autograph and photo sessions. And everyone wanted selfies with Danielle, who was confirmed as one of the main cast members, a little blue checkmark following on her Twitter account, verified.

She beamed in every photo, holding her fingers out in peace signs and pursing her lips duck face style. She gathered an online following, growing quickly to thousands, then tens of thousands of followers. There was just one thing, though. She didn't have any other accounts, or if she did she hid them well

and she never talked about the real world. It was as if Homecoming High was her real world. Most people, myself included, assumed that Danielle was super dedicated, a method actor, and that we were sure to get another movie soon with her as the star. She was definitely putting in her dues, working pretty much every day the park was open. Her social media presence only great. grew from there. Her photos began to warp, becoming more and more frightening. Her friends all looked

emaciated, gaunt. People started noticing, and the leading online theories shifted from marketing campaign to kidnapped, or a fringe group convinced they were a test group of next-level Androids. Here were the facts. The pictures were all taken at night after park hours, according to the metadata, and Danielle seemed to be the only cast member doing any social media. There was a cast list on the Crimson Ridge website, but none of the actors had their own websites or social media profiles.

There was nothing to prove they even existed beyond the H.H. ride. Around this time, at Sweet Sixteen, I finally convinced my parents to let me go. My love for horror was already strong. In a weird way, I'll admit. When my friends were going to the mall to try on makeup and clothes, I was catching marathons of Nightmare on Elm Street at our local vintage theater. Where my peers were on their phones, texting about boys and girls,

getting drunk and high on weekends, I was reading and watching, voraciously devouring everything King and Coontz wrote, every remake and B movie. I'd even started writing my own stories, scaring myself out of sleep in the process. I was addicted. So Crimson Ridge was like my Disney World. I managed to convince my brothers

to take a weekend off from college partying and take me. I was finally going to take part in the ride. That was the first weekend, Homecoming High was closed. The signs all. all read, due to technical difficulties and for the safety of everyone. Needless to say, I was colossally disappointed. Here I was, finally in the vicinity of my favorite movie world ever, and I couldn't even get a selfie with Danielle. Don't judge me. I wish I could say I found my way

into the school anyway, that I was a badass and wriggled my way through the vents or found a secret passageway, but instead I made my way through the rest of the park, though not without a severe case of FOMO. The ride remained closed the next week, and then the week after that, and then things got really weird, as if they weren't enough already. Despite Homecoming High being shut down, Danielle was still posting updates. What was slightly strange in months previous, Students looking tired and ill, photos only being at night, the inability to pinpoint real-life online habits, transformed into an absolute nightmare.

You see, Ido Santiago had always followed one specific trope with his movies, and in my opinion it's what made his movies so great. In every homecoming high movie, the main character is an unreliable narrator. You'd think that would get boring or predictable after a while, but Santiago always managed to make it exciting and fresh. In the first homecoming high, we follow Nora Ray, as students in her school are viciously murdered. Through Acts 1 to 3, we feel like Nora is the next to be killed, when really, Norma is

already dead. She has always been dead. Her angry spirit has been killing those who wronged her, but we, as the audience, don't realize we're seeing it through that lens until the final act. Then, in Homecoming High 2, the events of the past repeat themselves with the main character, Gia. Near the end, we find out the male lead, Josh, is actually Nora's son she'd had and given up for adoption before the first film. But he's not the one causing the spiritual activity. Gia is.

She does a ritual to bring Nora's spirit back, and even manages to escape her wrath after Nora's ghost unknowingly kills her. her own son. So, as photo after photo kept appearing online, and in each one, the students of the school looked closer to death, the buzz began to travel. Was this Santiago's next film? Was Danielle the successor to the H.H. Throne? Social media is serious business, folks. I tried to get permission to access the ruins of Crimson Ridge, but it was fenced in and boarded up, left to rot after the disaster of what happened. I was told the site was too dangerous to allow anyone in. But I still went for a drive,

stopping beside the decrepit old sign that still boasted, live the horror. We all know what happened next, but there's more to it than what's officially recorded. Isn't there always? Soon after the closure of the ride, reports of Ido Santiago's death swirled the internet. There were accounts that he'd starved to death. So malnourished, it was like

the life was sucked right out of him. Finally, after so many rumors, an official press release confirmed his death as natural causes. He was 52 years old and in fantastic shape, or at least that's how he presented himself online. So what natural causes could have been his demise. Theories abounded on the web. There were entire websites dedicated to Santiago's death, whether it happened, whether it didn't, whether it was murder, whether it was suicide. The message boards were the kinds of places you scrolled through with trepidation, like walking through a cemetery at night. You never knew the kinds of people you would find in there, or the pictures or ideas presented. A lot of it was weird. A lot of it was gross.

Eventually, someone managed to get copies of what ended up being crime scene photos. The media couldn't make sense of them, and they spread online like a virus. The photos were horrifying, atrocious, and yet eerily familiar. Santiago's body was laid out on the floor of one of his loft apartments, naked. His skin was pale and gaunt, darkness seeping under his eyes, blood streaking his face as if he'd cried it out. He looked like he hadn't slept or eaten for weeks. It looked like there were markings on his skin, but the pictures were too blurry to tell. He was a tattoo addict, but this looked like writing on his skin.

There was no follow-up report. His representatives stated publicly that the photos were fake and that the prolific director had suffered a heart attack from stress, overwork, and malnutrition. There would be no further statements. The entire park was closed down for good soon after. Even though the park was independent from the Santiago estate, he'd apparently begun the process of closing Crimson Ridge even before his untimely death. But then, to the ship.

Talked horror of everyone still paying attention, there was another photo. It was of Danielle. It was captioned. Your turn. The cops were called in to break into the school, and what they found would turn the legacy of Homecoming High into a morbid media circus. Bodies. There were lifeless bodies everywhere, drained and empty, just like Santay. Santiago's had been. Grusome story unfolded from there.

It turned out the entire thing was some experiment by Santiago at first. A bunch of people paid to live a false life to give the public an experience. Like a creepy movie zoo. There were rules. Don't talk to the guests. Don't break character. Don't reveal anything. Don't go on social media.

As far as the spokesperson for the park was concerned, The actors went home after the park closed and came back in the morning for another day. But the autopsies showed a different story. The bodies had been there for months. Some of them apparently dead even when the ride had been open. No one ever really figured out what happened after that. Danielle's body was never found. Did she ever really exist?

Did she kill everyone? Who posted it? that last photo. But my trip to the park led to a discovery. Or maybe it was less of a discovery and more an act of fate. Something left for me to find and uncover. Hastily taped to the back of the Crimson Ridge sign was an old newspaper article,

its edges flapping in the cool breeze. The main story reported the death of a local teen, a promising, beautiful, homecoming queen found murdered in the forest off the very highway I was standing on. Chills ran down my spine as the wind seemingly picked up around me. She was beautiful, smart, and talented, and loved by all, especially her younger brother. A photo in the article showed the two of them, opening Christmas presents, giant smiles lighting up their young, innocent faces. The Caption read, Daniela and Ivan Hernandez, Christmas.

My heart pounded. Even as a child, it was impossible not to recognize the intense stare of Ido Santiago. Or should I say, Ivan Hernandez. Daniela Hernandez was a cheerleader and a dancer, and she was looking forward to applying to nursing school after her senior year of high school. She had a boyfriend, a football player, and a gaggle of friends who were always together in yearbook photos. Her murder was a shock to the community. After going missing for two weeks, a period of time chronicled in the local paper by fervent search parties and investigations. She was found in the forest off the highway, naked.

Her limbs tied to different tree trunks, so she hung in eternal suspension. Eventually, the boyfriend was found guilty and sentenced to life in prison for her murder. There were no accomplices, and his family did not seem to want to defend him. It was right there in black and white. Daniela had been Edo's sister, a murdered homecoming queen. She'd been the inspiration for homecoming high, the real life inspiration. How had he kept this hidden? entire life. My body shook as I stood there, wondering if the paper's appearance was happenstance

or if it had been left specifically for me. It seemed ridiculous to even think about, but how else could I explain it to myself? I shuffled back to my car and locked the doors. I whipped out my phone and searched for an online version of the article, for an obituary, anything, but there was nothing. Not a trace of the murder, not a trace of Danielle, or Edo as Yvonne Hernandez. It was like he was a ghost. On the drive home, I couldn't shake this strange feeling from my mind, like a shadow that had gripped my spine and wouldn't leave me. Something was off about all this. When I got back to my apartment, I logged on to my preferred Crimson Ridge Theory message board. My finger hovered over the mouse before submitting a new topic.

Who was Ido Santiago? Immediately, I received a direct message from the admin. My topic had been deleted. Then, my cell phone rang. It was an unknown number. I stared at it for a long time before answering it. Could it be related? Hello?

Lark 2,03, 987 Clark Street, Unit B. It was my name, my age, and my address. Who is this? If you really want to get into this, look. But be aware, once you're in, you're in. I pulled my phone from my ear to find a link texted to me from the same number. I had a choice to make. I could ignore the link, delete it,

Break my phone, throw it away, and pretend this all never happened. I could follow it. And maybe find some answers. This was everything I'd been waiting for my entire life. An answer chosen for me via years of horror and mystery films and books. I clicked the link. There were two photos. Two bodies.

One was labeled Daniela Hernandez. The other. Nido Santiago. Even though the photo of Daniela's body was significantly older, I could make out the strange occult markings that covered her body, as though someone drew them out with soot. I'd never seen anything like them, though they were geometric in nature, but I could feel them, feel the evil intent in them. I could imagine myself in Daniela's body that night. fear that coursed through her as she was chased through the forest, as she was choked to death and strung up by her ankles and wrists. And Edo's, or Yvonne's body, looked exactly the same way. Even the position of the markings was identical I could see now that I'd been supplied a higher resolution photo. There was a finality to it, like a circle had been ended. I pulled up the homecoming high Twitter account and looked through the photos.

There was no doubt about it. Danielle was Daniela Hernandez. Everything about the body in the photo and in the paper and the girl who'd been starring in an alternate reality theme park was the same. Her hair, her freckles, her eyes. The only question that remained in my mind was how he figured it out. How had a teen boy discovered how to sacrifice his sister for power? For his successful career, he hadn't just been inspired by his sister's death.

He'd caused his sister's death. No doubt you're wondering, how do I know? There was one last incredible detail in the photo of Ido's body. There was a cardboard coffee cup in the photo, just fallen from Santiago's hand. On it was hastily scratched. I'm sorry. I looked down at Daniela's last post. It was just a photo of her, and she was smiling.

Based on the look of the room in the background, the pattern of the wallpaper and the tile of the floor, it was the same room where Edo had been killed and her caption read. Most people have to deal with allergies in their life. Some are minor annoyances. Others, life-threatening afflictions. But as we learn from author Keith McDuffie, it's the common allergy to the noxious substance found in poison ivy and poison oak

that will get under your skin. For one man who is hyperalergic and his childhood friend who is mercifully immune, a strange woodland patch of the plants leads both of them to a terrible discovery. Performing this tale are Mick Wingerz, Jesse Cornett, Ellie Hirschman and Mary Murphy. So avoid the plants and stop scratching lest you end up with scars. I don't go into the woods.

There are things in there. Things that drive my anxiety through the roof at the mere thought of coming close to her. A casual hiker may not notice them, lying low and deep within the surrounding foliage. On a windless day, they remain perfectly still. They don't have to make a move. you'll come close soon enough

and then they're all over you you won't know their effect until you're tucked away in your tent or in your bed at home the next day oh boy the next day then you will know and then

it's too late but I see them I can't not see them because they are fucking everywhere when walking down the street at the plague even in my goddamn backyard. Jesus, my palms are richard just thinking about them.

They have become the most frightening living things to me in my little corner of the world. I cannot believe that God had chosen to create these things, for these poison plants are clearly the work of the devil himself. My brother grew up allergic to peanuts. For my sister, it was cashews and pistachios. This was the deadly kind of allergic, where not the slightest whiff of these nuts could pass by their nostrils without cause to whip out the epinephrine shot.

Unlike my siblings, I was lucky enough not to have food allergies of any kind. However, growing up in a household without peanut butter and days before alternatives like almond butter were commonplace, men I had no concept of a good old P.B. and J. Jam and butter? Not even close. Though I was in the clear of food allergies, there was something I did have to stay very far away from. Poison ivy, poison oak, poison sumac, the poison trifecta, I call them. This was not your run-of-the-mill allergy, mind you. While 85% of the population is allergic to these plants,

most would need to come in physical contact with the leaves to have some sort of a reaction. This was not the case for me. A slight breeze off a plant, several feet, feet away would carry enough irushial oil through the air to latch itself onto me. Then came the warm redness later that night. Sometime the next day, came the itching. My God, the itching.

All from walking too close to the side of the road on a windy day. One of the worst episodes I experienced came when I was a boy. While helping my father stack a quart of applewood, he'd cut down that summer. Applewood, as I was told back then, is prime stuff to stoke a stove with in winter. I suppose it must have a sweet burning applesauce smell to it, but what did I know? And what did I care? I was getting paid $10. This was going toward the gaming console I'd been dreaming of for months, the Atari 2,600.

Under a blistering sun, my brother and I hauled split wood onto the bed of my old man's truck, working well past sunset. sweaty and sunburn. We left not knowing the full conditions we'd been working in. The logs had been covered in the immense patches of glistening poison oak that I'd otherwise have stared well clear of had we seen them in the light of day. The next morning, I could not open my eyes. My face was swollen to the point of being unrecognizable.

My hands were bloated sausages covered in liquid-filled skin bubbles. My inflamed feet wouldn't fit in my shoes. My hearing was partially affected because my ears had been so engorged with blisters. I even got them inside my nose and on my scalp. I must have gone through 50 bottles of calamine lotion that summer. That awful smell and pink shit you coat your rash in hopes of relief from the incessant itching. It would do the trick for about an hour if I was lucky. And then I'd be painting more of it on again and again.

I looked like the elephant man covered in concealer. I'd resorted to drastic measures at times to alleviate the swelling. I would take a sewing needle, for instance, dip it in rubbing alcohol, then lance the pustules between my fingers in order to drain them enough that I could bend my fingers to hold onto a fork or even wipe my own ass. And yes, the poison oak got in there too. But that's not the worst spot to get the itch. The souls of your feet, the palms of your hands,

Nothing is worse than that, not even your balls. Calamine lotion doesn't work on souls and palms, and the itch is unending and unbearable. Placing my palms on something hot, however, say a leather seat that had been sitting in the sun all day, somehow provided some brief reprieve. The searing pain was much more tolerable than the itching. In comparison, it was ecstasy.

Overall, not a good summer, but I did get my Atari. Now, Ted, Ted was a different story. There were a few times I'd gotten bad cases of poison ivy plague during the school year. Maybe not so bad as that summer of blisters. But once, bad enough that I was kept out of the sixth grade for several days. My absence did not go unnoticed by Ted. You were out for three days because of poison ivy? The two of us were standing at the edge of the school yard.

during recess. Just because you got a rash? Just a rash. Haven't you ever heard a bad poison ivy before? Ted shook his head. I don't think I ever got it at all. My jaw dropped. Never?

Not even a little? Nope. Well, count yourself lucky. It sucks. As I said this, Ted wore that far away look of his that I'd seen too often. The kind that says there's an idea brewing and within that thick skull it's boiling into action before it's had a healthy seasoning of reason.

A true recipe for disaster that I'd seen all too often. His eyes scanned the ground amongst the dense thicket of brush nearby. What does it look like? It didn't take me long to point them out. I'd been eyeing them since we got there, and I'd known they were there since the school year had started. And I previously stood as close as I was ever willing to get. I pointed to the glistening patch of leaves beneath the crop of trees. There's a bunch of it right there.

Those green leaves with red. A ton of it. Ted didn't hesitate. He was halfway there before I could raise a stink. These right here? His pointing finger was so damn close to the poisonous bouquet. My mind's eyes saw the slip oil drifting through the air and onto his willing exposed skin. And I shivered at the thought of being remotely as close to it as Ted was.

I nodded. I'd get away from it if I were you. Except he wasn't me. The ridiculous idea of his had already bloomed in his mind and he was dead set on seeing it through. He stepped directly into the patch and picked one of the leaves, then another, then a whole bunch. I couldn't breathe.

My own skin began to feel hot at the mere thought of being in Ted's shoes, shoes that might not fit his feet anymore. My God, his hands, I thought. His fingers, his palms, dear Lord, his palms! It was like watching someone bite into the hottest pepper in the world with idiotic, wild abandon. This was worse, much worse. The mouthburn of a Carolina Reaper may feel like the fires of a thousand suns,

but that's an agony that short-lived. Ted was in for days of hell on earth. It was then that I noticed I'd been subconsciously distancing myself from the whole scene, as though Ted's disturbance of the plants would affect me where I stood. In fact, even at ten feet away, for me, that wasn't far from possibility. We got that mad test tomorrow with Miss Sullivan. Yeah, but... Well, I'm not going to be here to take it.

He took the words right out of my mouth. Ted bunched the leaves in his hand, as though what he held were harmless bits of greenery, not the evil carriers of hell oil they were. I knew it was too late for him then. Unless he immediately scrubbed his hands with rubbing alcohol, he was in for it. And I, for one, was going nowhere near him at that point. Best friend be damned. As far as I was concerned, he was a walking plague.

But he didn't stop there. I didn't protest. I couldn't protest. And if I could have, it wouldn't have mattered. At best, my words would have been unintelligible gasps gasps and stammeres. anything worth hearing would have been ignored. All of his chips were pushed to the center now. He was all in.

As one might clean themselves with a bar of soap, Ted began to rub the poison ivy all over his body, arms, legs, face. For good measure, he replenished his supply of leaves when he'd rub some down to bits of pulp, and then did the entire exercise again. Just when I thought he was through. He did the unthinkable. He turned from the rest of the schoolyard as though he were about to sneak a piss,

pulled the front of his jeans out with his empty hand, and jam the other hand in. Then his hand came out empty. It was suicide. I was witnessing my best friend's self-immolation and couldn't move a finger to stop him, for in doing so, I'd surely be dooming myself. I think that'll be enough to get me out of school tomorrow?

What did you do? That's enough to keep you out for like a month. Yes, even better. My eyes didn't leave Ted for the rest of the day. Where he sat, what he touched, what urinal he used. Short of wearing gloves and a mask, I behave like some crazed germaphobe. And as far as I could tell, Ted wore that bunch of leaves down his pants all damn day. Pants that I hoped he'd set fire to come the next day, along with the rest of his clothes.

once he realized the enormous mistake he'd made. Side note about fire and poison ivy. Fire, as it turns out, is not an effective eliminator of Erucule oil. I learned this the hard way, of course, during my junior year of high school, along with a sizable portion of my fellow classmates. One of the rare times I dared enter the woods was for high school parties. It was isolated, difficult for the cops to get to, and had an unlimited selection of places to hide in and make out.

When no parent-free houses were available, it served its purpose well enough. Besides an abundance of cheap alcoholic beverages, a natural ingredient of a party in the woods was a bonfire, and a natural ingredient of a bonfire is wood, or at least a combustible material of any kind. Sometimes a tire, sometimes the back seat ripped out of someone's shipbox, and sometimes random brush. In this case, on this particular evening, brush entangled poison oak, and a byproduct of a bonfire, smoke, and lots of it.

It gets in your lungs, your hair, your clothes, and you bring that all home with you. If you're not completely shit-faced before attempting to crawl into bed, maybe you take a shower, therefore not waking up the next afternoon smelling like a campfire. And if you were somehow thorough enough, perhaps you don't succumbed. come to the full-onset of the poison oak you've been hanging around all night. Like me, everyone, save for a few, spent at least the following few days in hell. From that point, not only would I stay far from the woods, I'd go nowhere near open fire pits, save for ones fueled by gas. Until then, I'd never known what it was like to get poison oak in your mouth.

Or on your dick, everyone's got to take a leak at a raging beer party at some point. And here Ted was, about to get the full experience, his first time. When I finally saw Ted exit the school bus that afternoon, I was sure it was the last I'd be seeing him for a good long time. I wouldn't be paying him a visit anytime soon, that was certain. Except, I didn't have to. The next day, Ted walked on to the morning bus like nothing had happened. In fact, nothing had happened.

Ted, as it turned out, was amongst that meager 15. percent of lucky sons of bitches on the planet who's not affected by Eurasial oil at all. No blisters, no rash, not the slightest itch. And while I was pretty sure he'd taken a shower that morning, I still kept my distance from Ted for that day and the next. I did not want to take the chance. And though Ted felt he was in hell for having to take Miss Sullivan's math test that day, a math test he clearly had no intention of preparing for the night before, in my eyes,

he surely did not understand the massive bullet he dodged. Some have said that it's possible to outgrow an allergy to poisonous plants. There are others still who claim that actually eating one can trigger an immunity. After 30-some-odd years of systematically weaving and dodging my way around the suspect crops of leaves, whether consciously or not, I never had the intention of finding out, most especially not by making a goddamn salad out of it. I've grown accustomed though avoiding that shit My quality of life hasn't suffered at all

Because I didn't go for deep wood hikes to take up camping or trail jogging The memory of my childhood suffering had scarred me for life I was not keen on ever revisiting it And certainly not on purpose Ted and I kept very close for a long time Our wives hung out together our kids went to the same school We attended the same church We even started a business together

a pizza and sub shop, Giuseppe's, that somehow resisted being muscled out by booming franchises. Ted was a real talent behind the place, having developed most of the recipes himself. His pizza sauce was unmatched, which largely accounted for the loyal customer base. I was the business side of things, because if you haven't caught on, Ted was no good with numbers. He couldn't count out proper change for a dollar, and I was lucky if I could make a cheese sandwich. We were called upon to cater the annual St. Ambrose Church picnic. This was last summer, with days hotter than the deepest ring of Hades, and the comet making its lasting streak across a bit of the night sky. Potluck alone was insufficient for the large gathering, and so Giuseppe's filled in.

On the house, of course, it was our parish, after all. Naturally, both of our families were there as well. My wife and son, Ella and Peter, Ted's wife Kim and his daughter Sophie. Truth be told, it was as boring an affair as always. The adults got by with chit-chat and gossip. The kids had to get creative to remain entertained. Ball, frisbee, hide-and-seek, that sort of thing. St. Ambrose owned a large, empty parcel of land adjacent to the church.

Most of it had been cleared years ago to make way for an expansion of the cemetery. The old one having been filled up to capacity. The old mausoleum nearly there as well. No vacancy, I guess you could say. The dead check in, but they don't check out. Nothing unnatural about it, really, just old people getting older and drunk people getting dumber, for the most part. It's so old that some early Scottish immigrants had their name chiseled on stone there.

It was bound to fill up at some point. Sometime just before noon, Sophie came running over to us from the clearing. She wasn't in tears, but she was not happy. Peter lost the frisbee on us, and now it's not fair because he's a... He won't help me find it. I hung my head, exasperated. I cut my hands to my mouth. Peter!

Ted clapped a hand on my back. Hey, hey, don't get too mad at the kid. It's just a frisbee. I shook my head. It's the last opening day frisbee I have. Remember those with the corny phrase you put on it? Besides, that's not the point. And I can only take his 10-year-old attitude so much, you know?

Oh, no. I wouldn't know anything about that. Let's go find your kid and this damn frisbee. And, hey, fly into the Giuseppe's empty, fly out foam. That isn't corny. It's poetry. I had a laugh at that as we dropped what we were doing and headed in the direction Sophie had come.

As we crested the small hill, I caught sight of Peter in the distance, standing just outside the edge of the woods. His back was to us, so he stared into the trees, beyond. Peter! Hey, hey, hey, he's right there. Take the anchor down a notch. I wasn't angry. In fact, so far, my son was doing just what I'd hoped he'd do, just what I'd taught him to do, or rather not do. If you don't know exactly what's ahead of you in the woods, you do not enter. And when did anyone ever know exactly what was in the woods, even ten feet in front of them?

That's right, not ever. Could be ticks or snakes or a covered-up hole atop a vast underground chasm. Or, need I say it, poison ivy. Peter turned his head to us at the sign of my voice. His expression was of concern, though from fear of getting in trouble or what he'd been looking at, I couldn't say. What's up, kiddo? Go on in and get the risby. It's not going to bite you.

I'm pretty sure that's not what he's afraid of. Ted looked to me with a bit of a puzzled expression. I returned it with a raised eyebrow. He knew what I was getting at. Ted shook his head. Oh, for crying out loud. Where is it, Pete? Without turning back around, my son pointed directly into the woods.

In there. Way in there. I can't even see it, but I can see tons of... Tons of poison ivy. Right, right. Your dad's got to... you all worked up about it because he blows up all like a balloon near it. Am I right?

Come on, Ted. Kind of. Only the stuff in there is, like, a lot bigger. And there's something else in there, too. Yeah, the prison. Peter ignored her remark. There's a tomb or something in there next to the huge leaves. Dad, it...

Ted chuckled, though his tone was touched with concern. A tomb? Pete? What are we in Egypt? Ted sometimes had a fine way of making it difficult to discern the adult from the child in his conversations. I don't know what you call it. It's like one of those things in graveyards with a big door on it. Dad, there's sounds coming from inside it. Like voices. What? Like a crypt? What the heck is one of them doing in the woods? They ain't started putting graves out here yet. Look at it.

It's been one big open field for years. Must be something else. Don't let some pile of logs or whatever scare you. Think the old cryptkeeper's colony to come visit? Probably left over from when they started clearing it. Sudden realization seemed to strike Peter then and why he was standing with us explaining himself. So he began to ramble on in one breathless plea.

Don't let them make me go in there, Dad. That thing scares me. And then there's those huge shiny leaves. and you told me to stay away from those. I never touched them, so I shouldn't go in there, and there's voices in there. Really? Please. Okay, okay, take it easy. No one's going in there.

Hell with that, I'm going in. Boys and I've never got me before. Won't get me now. And the creepkeepers are a little shit. Ted pointed an accusatory finger at my son. And you, you should take more responsibility next time. If getting a little inch is what it'll take for you to do the right thing, then so be it.

Before I could argue with Ted's attempt at reparenting Peter, he approached the edge of the forest and parted a mass of low-hanging pine branches. Then stopped. See? You see the tomb in there, right? Ted took a moment to answer as he appeared to survey what he was looking at. Yeah, yeah, it's no pile of logs. Looks like an old crypt all right. Pretty old one by the looks of it. He turned to look at us.

This was an old cemetery before? I shrugged. Not that I've ever heard. I mean, there's no headstones. No other graves. It's just that. In there. Well, that's not creepy at all.

Just leave it, Ted, seriously. Kiddos's right about the leaves, too. Like the signs of elephant ears. Oh, come on. Then those can't be... What did you say? I was saying that those can't be poison ivy. They aren't that large.

No, no. It wasn't you. Here what? Besides the distant commotion from the party we'd left behind, there was nothing. I looked at the kids who were both slowly backing away, shaking their heads in the negative. Ah, ah, there, there you are, you blue bastard. Frisbee's right there. He parted the branches farther apart and stepped deeper into the woods, disappearing from sight.

Sound of breaking branches followed as he marched inward, spattered with more. moments of colorful cursing. After about ten seconds, there was nothing. Did you get it? A few seconds more. Nothing. Hey, Ted! I silently prayed that I wasn't going to have to enter those woods to look for my friend,

but the crack in my voice had said it all. Branch is cracking again. Ted was running now, running for the clearing. He burst through the overhanging branches where he entered, panting, Red-faced and sweating profusely. No Frisbee in sight. Where's it Frisbee? Ted was doubled over. Hands on his knees, catching his breath. Sweat soaked his shirt, his face, his hair, even his shorts. Ted's not exactly in shape, but he's not morbidly obese either.

A ten-second run in Dark Woods shouldn't have exerted him like a marathon. No, Frisbee, sweetie. Like your uncle said, We'll buy a new one But it Sophie, no Just go play with something else We're gonna go home soon anyway She crossed her arms and stormed off

Uncle Teddy What happened in there? Did you hear the noises from the tomb? Ted stood upright and gave me a look That said he wasn't up to talking to a kid about this Pete, go catch up with Sophie We'll probably be leaving soon too Peter did as I asked and disappeared over the hill.

All right, so what did happen in there? He looked like he just came out of a rainforest. Man, that is the spookiest damn thing I've ever seen. What, the crypt? Well, yeah, the crypt, but not just that. The kid wasn't kidding about the sounds from the crypt in there. Like, I don't know, voices. A damn...

Those leaves. All over the thing. They, you wouldn't believe me. All right, you've succeeded in freaking me out. They what? Talk to you? Moved. Not from wind or anything like that.

I marched in the middle of them to get the damn frisbee, and then something just felt off. Like I thought maybe you'd come in behind me. Only, I knew you'd never do that. But it felt like someone else was there. But it was just all of those plants, all around me. And then they moved.

Not for the wind or anything like that. It was like they were turning to, I don't know, to look at me. And, well, I turned and got to ride the fuck out of there and laughed that damn frisbee for those fucking plants to play with. I snorted, and then the chuckle just followed it on out. I couldn't help it if I tried. Oh, okay, I see. So why don't you go in there,

get the thing. Damn zombie plans from the crypt. You'll see. You know, I'd clap you on the back, but you're sweatier than a Ridley Scott movie. Ha, ha, ha. Well, this ain't sweat. It's due from all those leaves in there. I stayed far away from Ted for the rest of the walk back. I told myself as much as Ted did that the leaves were just covered and due. How could all that be a rushial oil? It just couldn't be. But the scars upon the memory of my youth endure. and so I took no chances, even at the expense of Ted's playful jeers. Soon after, each of our families ended the day and went our separate ways. Ted didn't show up at the shop the next day.

He would usually open up the place in the morning in order to get it ready for the lunchtime crowd. I'd stroll in sometime later, before we actually opened for business. Only this time, the doors were locked. Ted hadn't shown up yet. I unlocked the place and went inside to call Ted. After a few rings, Kim answered the phone. She sounded like I'd just woken her up. Hey, John.

Morning. Sorry, did I wake you? No, I'm just... Didn't get much sleep last night. Exhausted. Is Ted there? You didn't show up to the shop today. The place was still buttoned up when I showed up.

Oh, God, I'm sorry. I should have called you. Ted's worse off than me. It was a... tossing and turning all night that kept me up. I eventually had to sleep on the couch. Looks like he caught something at the picnic yesterday. What, like a stomach bug? No, no. Looks like he got too much sun.

Worst sunburn I've ever seen, the poor guy. But I guess it serves him right for not putting on sunscreen. He know how pale he is. Pailer than a beluga whale, yeah. All right, so I guess he's out of his. of commission today. Tell him to call me when he's up and about. I went about making a close sign for the door and directing our phone to a voicemail message stating the same. There was no way I was attempting to run the place without Ted. I left and spent the day doing long-neglected chores around the house. Spending time with Ella that day made me realize that we'd both somehow come out of that

previous day with nary a scant tan, much less evidence of a sunburn. What's more, it was an overcast day. We hadn't worn any lotion. Later that night, my cell phone rang. It was Ted. He sounded as ragged as Kim had that morning. Yeah, sure, don't sweat it. You all right? Jesus. From a sunburn? How bad can it be? It took all I had to keep the phone in my hand as my mouth fell open. I suddenly felt my own skin began to take on that characteristic burn. My palms began to itch. My mind telling my body that it too was once again stricken with the rash. The mention of it was enough like an instinctive cringe. What's more, Ted, of all people, had succumbed to it.

How? I thought you weren't allergic. But I guess. I'm listening, I got a witch. Before I could ask about what we should do about the shop, he hung up. It's not unheard of for someone who'd once had an immunity to something like Poison Ivy. to suddenly lose it over time. Ted suddenly showing signs of a reaction normally wouldn't have surprised me.

In fact, his lack of reaction in all this time was the more surprising thing to me. And more surprising than all of that was how quickly it had taken hold on him. He'd gone from zero to 100 seemingly overnight. There was nothing I could do for Ted. He'd seen firsthand what I'd gone through in the past, what meager remedies I'd resorted to for alleviating the itching and swelling, was all I could do then and all he had now. I faced the fact that it was clear Giuseppe's was staying closed for at least another day.

Depending on how bad off Ted was Tuesday night, I'd have to consider my options, like hiring some temporary help. I wasn't the best cook, but I could at least keep the business afloat. Late the next morning, I gave Ted a call to see how he was faring. He'd likely faced another sleepless night, so I wasn't surprised when Kim picked up. Hey, Kim, how's Teddy doing? Hope you at least got some sleep last night. I slept okay.

Ted didn't sleep in the bed all night. Stayed closed up in the den all yesterday and last night. Didn't want anyone to go near him. Trust me, we didn't want to. He was in a mood, as you can imagine. I woke up a couple of times in the night and heard him downstairs. There's grunting, swearing. It must have been driving him nuts. I guess he must be doing better. I woke up to the smell of him cooking breakfast. Not that he left us any. Just a dirty skillet.

Nice, right? And now he's gone off somewhere. Seriously? He went out? Though I was amazed Ted hadn't gotten worse overnight. I was relieved. Maybe check the shelf? She'd read my mind. When I pulled up to Giuseppe's, I noticed. one of the exhaust vents on the roof billowing smoke, more than usual, in fact. Ted's car was nowhere in sight, which wasn't entirely unusual since he lived only a couple of miles away and sometimes made the walk. I thought this was a good sign, that Ted really was on the mend and getting things prepared for the afternoon customers. Except when I got to the front door, my temporarily closed

sign still hung in the window. I figured Ted hadn't noticed it, so I pulled it down as I entered. The air was already hot with the warming pizza ovens, brittles, and friars. One of the oven doors had been left open, and I could see the remnants of what looked like a pizza mishap smeared upon the oven's fire-brick floor. Pretty early for pizza, I thought, but we served all kinds. Ted? You back there? What happened here? The oven's a mess! Rounded the corner into the kitchen. Ted's back was to me facing the friars. He won nothing but a pair of boxers.

and his skin was like nothing I'd seen before. My sneakers squeaked to a halt as breath caught in my throat. I stumbled backwards, catching myself on a counter. Oosing sores covered half of Ted's back and legs. The other half was covered in blisters the size of golf balls. Ted? I fought back. Of course he didn't react.

Because when I say he was facing the friars, I mean that in a much more... literal sense. His entire face was submerged in the steam in friar oil. Up to the hairline, bought him dead. But a second later, he stood upright. Grease poured down over his shoulders and trickled down his back. More of the blisters withered and broke apart under the oil's heat. And once again, Ted sighed in ecstasy. Ted! But it was meant to be a scream. They're more like a strange whisper. I threw my hand over my mouth,

either due to pure disbelief over what I was seeing, or to stop myself from being sick, or both. He straightened and turned around, my feet instinctively making a slow retreat sideways toward the door. What I was looking at was not dead. Not anymore. This person was unrecognizable as a human being in all but frame. Strips of red smoking flesh peeled away from his forehead and cheeks,

the bare muscle and bone behind glistening with oil. Lips. There were no lips. A set of teeth. It a perpetual, skeletal grin. The tongue behind bloated and red, peeking out behind them. Eyelids hung like useless flaps. His arms, his chest, all bare of scyce.

skin looking like an anatomy poster. His arms blackened and charred. All that seemed to remain intact. It was most of the surface of his legs that I could see blisters there continue to form before my eyes. Fucking. He held up his hands then. Hands that I hesitate to describe

beyond that they were surely not usable appendages anymore. Something fell from what used to be his face onto the. the floor, joining a mass of fried flesh within puddles of spent grease. Jesus, I couldn't stop him. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. He breathed the wet sigh again, somehow peeling away a flap of loose, cooked skin from his forehead with one of his red, bony fingers. He threw it aside like a rotten slice of tomato.

It's almost all gone now. eat so much than the oven he turned back around and held his breath as I held mine when I made it outside I called 911 the police and ambulance arrived moments later I watched as EMT after EMT entered and promptly exited

retching into the flower beds outside before finally composing themselves to enter and save Ted's life I was told if they'd been only a few minutes later, he'd have been gone. In all my life, I'd never seen a reaction to plants like that, let alone experienced it myself. What further floored me was that this had been Ted's reaction to whatever was in those woods, a man who'd been immune to poison ivy for as long as I could remember. What would those things do to someone like me? I talked to my wife and told her she'd have to pick Peter up from choir practice at the church that afternoon.

I also called Kim and she and I spent most of the day at the hospital with Ted. Every inch of him was covered in thick bandages and he lost most of his fingers. The CDC was apparently being called in and we were told Ted was going to be put into an induced coma. I couldn't bring myself to see him like that anymore. and I wasn't sure what to tell Kim about what I saw at the shop. How was I to explain to anyone that he'd done this on purpose? An accident. A pure, unfortunate, unholy accident.

That was enough. I wasn't sure if Ted was going to pull through. There was no doubt that his recovery, if he had one, would be agonizing. At the cost of removing whatever pure hell he'd been experiencing before, Would he say it was worth it? I couldn't fathom. Covered in pure scar tissue and skin grafts for the rest of his life, it's unlikely you'd have to worry about something like poison ivy ever again.

My mind, just as Ted's unfortunate body, would be scarred for life. I called for a car to take me home. I was in no condition at all to drive. As I exited the car at the bottom of the hill, I heard Peter call out from the driveway. I was still days from what had happened earlier and had little time to react. Stars blossomed into darknesses, whatever Peter had thrown, smacked me in the forehead and fell to the ground.

An eye along with it. I put my hand in my throbbing head, pulling back to see blood. Damn. Well, that's going to leave a scar. Peter ran up and squatted beside me, his face reddened with embarrassment. Oh, man, Dad, you okay? I'm so sorry. I thought you'd catch it. Yeah, well, my reaction's not all it used to be.

I reached down beside me to pick up what Peter had thrown. Slowly I read the words upon the circle of blue. Fly into Giuseppe's empty, fly out full. Desperation in my eyes, hoping he'd say something. Tell me he'd found another frisbee somewhere, one we'd overlooked. Instead, he beamed private. Probably. I got it back, Dad. I went in and got it back. We've run out of tape. It's time to press eject and end the show. We thank you for letting us perform for you.

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