The NoSleep Podcast - NoSleep Podcast S12E24

Episode Date: May 26, 2019

It's episode 24 of Season 12. On this week's show we have tales about those things we remember from and of childhood. "Sock Monster" written by Autumn Clay (Story starts around 00:03:50) Produced by: Jeff Clement TRIGGER WARNING! Cast: Narrator – Nichole Goodnight, Mom – Addison Peacock, Derek – David Cummings "The Windows Inside Clementine Mountain" written by Jimmy Juliano (Story starts around 00:18:30) Produced by: Phil Michalski TRIGGER WARNING! Cast: Narrator – Mike DelGaudio, Patrick – Graham Rowat, Sophie – Mary Murphy, Wife – Sarah Thomas, Guy Selling House – Dan Zappulla "The Trampoline" written by Manen Lyset (Story starts around 01:19:25) Produced by: Phil Michalski TRIGGER WARNING! Cast: Narrator – Atticus Jackson "Side Effects" written by Michael J. Nicholson (Story starts around 01:32:15) Produced by: Jesse Cornett TRIGGER WARNING! Cast: Narrator/Voice – David Ault, Ann – Erika Sanderson, Psychiatrist – Jesse Cornett "Every Day" written by Estrella English (Story starts around 02:06:00) Produced by: Phil Michalski Cast: Cara – Jessica McEvoy, Julie – Addison Peacock, Podcast Host – Graham Rowat, Bernadette – Alexis Bristowe, Nosleep Podcast Host – David Cummings Click here to learn more about the voice actors on The NoSleep Podcast   Click here to learn more about Jimmy Juliano   Click here to learn more about Manen Lyset   Click here to learn more about Michael J. Nicholson   Executive Producer & Host: David Cummings Musical score composed by: Brandon Boone "Sock Monster" illustration courtesy of Abby Howard Audio program ©2018-2019 - 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

Welcome to our sleepless sanctuary. You enter at your own risk and choose to be entertained with dark and disturbing horror stories. You have been warned for the dark hours when you dare not click. Tales of horror to frighten and disturb as the sleepless hours tick. Brace yourself for the last. No Sleep Podcast. Welcome to the No Sleep Podcast Sanctuary. I'm David Cummings.

Our service this week features tales about those things we remember from and of childhood. Just a reminder that next week is our big season 12 finale. We have a dozy of a story for you, running around two and a half hours, and it will be free for one and all. After the finale, we'll take two weeks to get ready for season 13. We'll be releasing Season Pass 12 bonus episodes during those weeks, along with two hiatus episodes on our free feed. Season 13 will launch on June 23rd. And as we look ahead to Season 13,

I want to share some of the new changes for Season Pass 13. Our Season Pass program has been running for almost six years now, and we have put out 10 seasons of Season Pass content. And as we all know, over time, the costs associated with producing all that content and the business systems behind it, well, they keep going up. And so for the first time ever, we're going to be bumping up the cost of a season pass to 2499. Now, this applies only to seasons 13 and beyond.

Seasons 3 to 12 will remain at 1999, or even cheaper if you purchase our bundles. But here's the good news. Even though Season Pass 13 will increase by less than a dollar per month, and remember, the price is for the entire season, not per month. We're going to be adding a lot more exclusive bonus content for our members. Not only will you get the fan-favored episodes like Suddenly Shocking Flash Fiction, our old-time radio episode, and special Halloween and or Christmas shows, for Season 13, we're going to be including exclusive bonus mini episodes throughout the

season featuring short stories, bloopers, team interviews, and more. There will even be a Season Pass 13 exclusive Facebook fan page. So while rising costs are an inevitable part of life, we want you to know that we are committed to providing you with as much bang for your buck as we can. Season Pass 13 is going to be a lot of fun, and we know you'll enjoy what we have planned for you. We'll keep all the details updated on our website. But finale's and new seasons are in our future. It's the present, and we have a present for you. You see, it's time for our service to begin.

Bow your heads and hear our words. In our first tale, we are proud to present a new author who sent us a story about a 13-year-old girl. And that's no coincidence because the author herself is a soon-to-be, 13-year-old girl. Author Autumn Clay has crafted a story in her favorite genre, horror, and she shows us that some young girls deal with monsters a lot less imaginary than you might expect. Performing this tale are Nicole Goodnight and Addison Peacock. So while young girls are said to be made of sugar and spice and everything nice, I think you'll

agree they are until they're forced to confront. The sock monster. The noise brought me out of my sleepy trance. I turned towards the sound and jumped. I'd been alone when I had come up to my room, but now there was another person in the space. A tall figure dressed in what looked like a white robe stood near my dresser. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness,

I noticed that the white robe had loosened buckles and belts dangling from its arms. While I'd never seen one in person, it was hard to mistake the item for anything but what it was. The stranger was wearing a straight jacket. I kept my breathing quiet. I didn't want the intruder to notice me. Luckily, he was distracted. His attention was turned towards the contents of my dresser.

Even though I was only 13 years old, I knew an opportunity when I saw it. I inched my way out of bed and soundlessly exited the room. A weapon is what I needed, and I knew just where to find one. Mom kept a collection of chef knives just inside the kitchen. If I could reach the knives, I would feel better about protecting myself. I slowly made my way down the hall. After what felt like an eternity, I reached my goal. The moonlight illuminated the kitchen and made it easier to locate the knife rack.

But something was wrong. I walked closer, wanting to make sure that what I had noticed was true, and not just a trick of my eyes. The empty slot where the sharpest knife should have been verified my suspicion. A knife was missing. A scraping noise behind me caused my blood to run cold. I didn't want to turn around. I didn't want to confront whatever was making the sound.

But my body insisted, and I slowly turned to find the stranger from my room sitting on the floor, pressing the missing knife deep into the hardwood. The moonbeams shone on the ground. The carving he was working on wasn't finished, but I could make out a face in the scratches. My face. He stared at me with a smile, his head cocked creepily to the side. He didn't move at all and held his position like a statue. The staring and smiling made me want to scream, but my terror wouldn't let me.

The man raised his arm and brought the knife down with a thump. He drove the knife into the carving again and again, his joy growing louder with every movement. Each stab pierced the carving that looked too much like me. Get out of our house! The shout brought me out of my shock. My mother. If you don't leave now, I'm calling the police. She stared at the man almost daring him with her demand.

The stranger didn't move so true to her word, Mom dialed 911. Her voice was strangely calm as she spoke into the phone. After the call was over, Mom said, sat down at the table waiting for help to arrive. I stayed where I was and wondered how my mom could be so calm in such an awful situation. It wasn't long before sirens could be heard in the distance. This noise caused the man to finally move. He stood up straight, almost filling the kitchen doorway.

His steps were heavy as he made his way towards me. I made myself as small as I could, but it did no good. The stranger towered over me like a giant, but his height, didn't stop me from noticing the grin that was still on his face. He leaned down, crouching to my level. He whispered words that made me shiver. There's no... He was so close that I could feel his breath on my ear.

I tried to back away, but the kitchen wall stopped me. I was trapped. He reached out, picked me up, and ran towards the back door. His grip was strong, but I could feel something soft between his fingers. It brushed against the back of my door. my leg. I wiggled around grabbing for the item in his hand. My movement caught him off guard and he stumbled. The object I was reaching for fell to the ground. The white fabric stood out against the grass. The shape of a sock was visible in the cloud this night. The man quickly reached down and

snagged the sock, placing it in one of his pockets. During this pause, the sirens got closer, but as he started running again, their volume got lower and lower. When we entered the woods behind my house, I stopped hearing them completely. My heart was pounding out of pure fright. I couldn't believe this was happening to me. His footsteps came to a halt. I looked around and noticed a small building tucked into the trees. The wooden cabin looked abandoned, like no one had been to it in many years.

The smell of rotten wood filled my nose as I was carried inside. It was dark, but I could make out an ancient-looking rug in the center of the room. This rug wasn't just for decoration, because the man lifted it up to reveal a wooden door. The planks looked newer than the rest of the cabin, and there was a lock that secured the door. As the man entered a code into the lock, he carried me down a short ladder that ended in a dirt floor. He pulled a dangling string and an exposed light bulb lit up the room. He finally released me when we reached a match. in the corner of the secret room.

Rust-colored stains covered its surface. I tried to ignore them as I looked around. The room was small, so it didn't take much time to see the whole thing. A map on one of the crumbling walls caught my attention. The map was of my town. I recognized the street names and landmarks. The strangest part of the map was the socks pinned all around it. There were red socks, green socks,

white socks. Some socks were close to my size, but some were so small that they could put on a newborn baby. One of the garments stood out because it was covered in a familiar pattern. Tiny pizzas stood out against a blue background. It was my friend Jacob's sock. But Jacob had been missing for months, and the last time I saw him, he had been wearing these very socks. I turned towards the man. What do you want from me? He didn't answer. Please let me go. He shook his head and charged at me smiling the whole time.

I gathered all the strength I had left and screamed as loud as I could. The sound made him pause. I reached to the floor and grabbed the item that was closest to me. My aim was right on and the rock hit him in the cheek. The smile finally left his face as blood trickled down, dripping onto the dirt. I leapt from the mattress grabbing the light string as I landed. Darkness filled the room, but I was still able to find my way to the ladder.

I scrambled up moving more quickly than I ever had before. A howl burst out of the secret room, but I didn't look back. I just ran. Red and blue lights greeted me when I got home. Several officers were in my driveway, and they rushed towards me asking questions the whole time. After I told them the details of my escape, they searched the woods, until they found the rundown cabin. They explored the building and found the sock-covered map.

The officers also discovered a pile of bones underneath the mattress. Bones that they determined were human remains. But the most disturbing discovery was a backpack full of Polaroid pictures. Every shot was of a sleeping child. There were even some of me. One picture stood out from the others. It was of my mom. She was smiling into the camera, and a red heart was drawn around the frame.

While the officers were distracted, I crept into the woods and headed home to talk to my mother. She hadn't moved from her spot at the dining room table. Her eyes met mine when I walked in front of her. Mom, why was your picture in the man's backpack? I did my best to sound less afraid than I was. Which man? Not me! A warm smile filled her face. Oh, him.

That's my friend. I told him to do that. He always listens to me. I couldn't believe what I had just heard. Mom, why would you do that? Do you want to play a game? I didn't know what she meant, and I wasn't sure if I wanted to find out. Mom, you're scaring me.

Her grin stretched wider. That's the point, dear. Now, let's play. She stood up and her arms dropped to her side. Now I could see her hands. The knife she was holding told me more than I needed to know. Her next words finally got me to move. Ready, set?

She lunged across my way. I backed into the living room, still shocked that this was happening. The front door was right by. behind me. I knew I was going to make it outside. A pounding knock stopped me in my tracks. Open up. It's the police. We're here to help. I couldn't believe my look. I flung open the door, grateful for my saviors. Instead, I saw him standing there. He was dressed in an officer's uniform, and he was holding a gun. Where did you get that? Oh, this old thing?

I had to do some dirty work to get it. What kind of dirty work? Those officers in the woods were messing with my collection. So I did what I had to do. I shot them all, got rid of them with their own guns. He looked down at the stolen clothes he was wearing. I borrowed an outfit, too. Figured it would help me finish the job.

And I was right. It sure fooled you. I backed away on shaking legs. Why are you doing this? I was so focused on what was happening on the front porch that I didn't notice the person behind me until it was too late. I felt strong arms wrap around my body. My mom answered my question. You can tell her, Derek.

She won't live long enough to tell anyone else. Her voice sounded happy. My mother was enjoying this. Whatever you say, Julie. He nodded at her before he turned his eyes to me. Don't you know that your mother hates you? I shook my head slowly. Well, that's why she helped me get out of that home they had me locked up in.

She thinks you're the reason your father left. She also thinks you take up too much of her. of her time. I could see the excitement on his face. And now it's time to get rid of you. He raised the gun in my direction. Mom pushed me towards the monster. I closed my eyes waiting for the end.

My own mother didn't love me. I couldn't believe it. The moment I heard the gun go off was the moment I tripped over my shoelace. The pain I thought I would feel never came. Instead, I heard a thumb. I looked behind me and noticed my mom on the ground. I didn't understand what happened until I spotted the blood coming from her stomach.

The bullet had found its target. Derek dropped the weapon and ran towards her. No, no, no, Julie, Julie, Julie. He collapsed at her side, saying her name over and over. No one was watching. watching me as I walked to the edge of the porch. No one turned around as I lifted the gun. No one protested as I pulled the trigger.

After I was sure they were both dead, I walked towards Derek. He had changed clothes, but I was guessing that he had kept his treasure with him. I searched each of his pockets until I felt what I was looking for. The white fabric was stained with red, but there was no way I was letting the sock monster keep my property. Childhood memories aren't always clear. They can be hazy, misremembered,

with things seeming much better or worse than they were. But for the man in this tale, shared with us by author Jimmy Giuliano, he deals with the idea of something happening and then being completely erased from the mind. Performing this tale

are Mike Delgado, Graham Rowett, Mary Murphy, Sarah Thomas, and Dan Zapula. So take care when you delve into your recollections and don't peer too closely into the past, or you might find yourself looking through the windows inside Clementine Mountain. Clementine Mountain wasn't really a mountain at all.

It was just a dirt hill, but it loomed over us kids. To three childhood friends, it was a Swiss Alps. The hill stood on an empty lot in our subdivision that was waiting to be developed. During the six years I lived on Fordham Street, that development never happened. So the place we called Clementine Mountain was ours. We flew down the sides on cheap plastic sleds, gliding at breakneck speeds. We played King of the Hill. We smacked tennis balls from one side to the other.

It was our own private playground. I think it was Sophie, who first discovered the windows. She'd been digging a hole on the top of the hill just to see how far she could go. When she hit a large piece of glass, she shouted over to me and Patrick. We dug a bit more and pushed aside mounds of dirt. I remember my blackened hands and the rain clouds gathering in the sky as we stood over what we discovered. It was a triangular-shaped window. We kept digging and eventually unearthed two more.

The three windows were surrounded by red frames and connected at the vertex by an iron ball. It formed something of a glass pyramid. about two feet from end to end. We tried to keep digging, but we couldn't go any further. It was like we hit bedrock. We didn't know what to make of it. We stood over those three windows, curiously studying our discovery. The glass itself was cloudy with a thick haze,

almost resembling a spider's web. We tried to wipe it off before realizing the grime was on the inside. We pressed our faces against the glass, desperately wanting to see in. Three friends? three windows, one face on each slab of glass. None of us could see past the film. Rain drops began to fall and we resolved to try and get inside the next day. When we came back the following morning, the windows were again, married. It was like we were never there. That was decades ago. I'm 37 years old now, and that childhood adventure as 10-year-old

friends was so far recessed into my brain that it had nearly vanished entirely. I had completely forgotten about it, along with any memory of Patrick or Sophie. A social media friend request from Patrick more than 25 years later began the awakening. When the notification appeared one night on my computer screen a few months ago, I immediately remembered my old friends and those mysterious windows. And I felt a rush of nostalgia, but also something else. I felt pain and worry. and fear. I couldn't explain it. I slogged through my memories, but they were all so murky.

That's when the memory of us digging up those windows came back to me. I thought a little bit harder, and something else emerged. Moments flashed in my head. I saw glass shattering. I heard a petrified scream, and then it was snuffed out. The memories dissipated as quickly as they appeared. There was nothing more. I sat at my kitchen table just sort of staring at the computer screen. This strange sensation of uncertainty and terror in my belly swelled, but it wasn't enough to stop me. I hovered over Patrick's friend request, and I clicked accept. My journey back to Clementine Mountain had begun.

Patrick, Sophie, and I were best friends when we were kids, and then at some point we weren't friends anymore. We all moved away from Fordham Street. Parents were transferred, grandparents got sick, you know, life happened. But life has a way of veering you back on an old course of zigging and zagging you back to starting points. After connecting online, I didn't immediately ask Patrick if he remembered the windows. It seemed like a strange thing to lead off with after 25 years. Besides, I didn't actually trust my own fragment in memory. Instead, I sent Patrick the wrote,

how's it going, message. But Clementine Mountain was already on Patrick's mind. Goddamn Fordham Street, three musketeers. We had some fun times, didn't we? I haven't thought about you and Sophie in forever. Those Nerf Battle Royals in my basement were legendary. Oh, and do you remember that hill? Clementine Mountain, right?

Jesus, that thing was big. Or it could just be my memory. It was probably more the size of a postage stamp, you know? Didn't you or Sophie draw some picture book about the hill? Man, those memories are just rushing back to me. I didn't remember a book, but Patrick's message made me wonder. I went through some old things in my basement, and I found a brown cardboard box with some of my childhood things.

The box was small. I hadn't kept much after. cleaning out my parents' house after cancer took my mother and father 15 months apart. I opened the flaps. Inside were some dingy stuffed animals, a grass-stained baseball, and a viewfinder toy with an old photo reel jammed into the inside. At the bottom of the box was the picture book. Patrick was right. I couldn't tell which of us three had drawn the book. decades and a broken pipe had taken its toll on the strung-together cardboard paper. Pages were missing and dark stains obscured most of the crayon drawings.

The book was moist and nearly fell apart in my hands. The cover page was mostly intact, although portions of the top of the page had been destroyed. I smiled at the title, three friends. The book's cover illustration held my attention. Three stick figures standing on a black hill. arms linked and faces smiling. Sophie wore a blue dress with yellow stars. Patrick and I wore green shirts.

And beneath the surface of the place we called Clementine Mountain, scribbled in red crayon, were three triangles. The windows. I wondered why I hadn't thought about those windows in decades. And I wondered if I'd ever actually gotten inside. Quite frankly, I didn't want to know. The memories of the windows felt forbidden, like a big no-trustpassing sign was hanging in my brain. I brushed aside the picture book and tried to steer my online conversation with Patrick to the more mundane.

And it worked for a bit. We talked to jobs and families. Patrick's three kids were his whole world, he wrote. Nine, six, and four. Everything he did, he did because of them and for them. Patrick's online photo albums painted the picture of a perfect happy family. But I knew there was a different story. Maybe Patrick was living my story.

My photos were filled with grins and laughter, but they didn't show the other side. They didn't capture the strain of a marriage when your cancer-ridden parents came to live with you. Or the look of abject horror on my wife's face when I accidentally took my daughter swimming at a beach that was closed due to E. coli. Or the sadness in my six-year-old daughter's eyes when I was let go from my job, and we moved across the state so Daddy could find work. Patrick and I didn't discuss any of that. We kept those skeletons in the closet.

Things couldn't be better, I wrote. The cordial game of catch-up with Patrick was being played to a draw. And then, out of the blue, Patrick mentioned triangles. This might sound odd, and I hate to sound like a stalker because I swear I'm not. But I was looking at that picture of you and your family in Boston from back in July. Like I know that was months ago, I'm not a creep, I promise. That's definitely Newbury Street, right? I can't help but ask, why are all of the windows triangles?

Literally every single window running down that street is a triangle. My family and I were on Newbury Street a few years ago, and I'm positive it didn't look like that. I checked our own photos and even Google it to make me. sure. No triangles. There wasn't some massive remodel or something, was there? You know, it's the damnedest thing. It's almost like those triangle windows triggered something. Like I remember something like those windows from my past, but I don't. You ever have that feeling? Like you've seen it before, but you know you haven't. Does that make sense? Anyway, sorry for the late-night email. Those windows have been eating away at me. I just can't let them go. Hope you and yours are doing well.

Patrick. I pulled up the picture in question. There were no triangular windows. Newbury Street was, well, Newbury Street. I thought maybe Patrick had been referring to a different picture, but that didn't make any sense. He'd been so specific. I thought he was completely mad,

and I wanted to tell him that. But there was also this voice scraping away at the base of my skull, telling me that something was happening, something important that we couldn't ignore any longer. I decided to tell Patrick about my memories of the windows inside Clementine Mountain. In an email, I wrote the story of that rainy afternoon where we felt like 10-year-old archaeologists. He must have remembered Sophie digging that hole on top of Clementine Mountain. It certainly didn't explain why he'd seen triangular windows that weren't actually there in a photograph decades later,

but at least there was an origin to his psychosis. Still, I worried for my old friend. At the end of my email to Patrick, I attempted to rationalize his spotting of triangular windows. Maybe it's a nostalgia thing. Like, you think you see them because all these memories about me and Sophie are there, but you haven't totally uncovered them yet? I haven't thought about those windows in years, and I honestly just remembered them. What you're describing seems normal to me. Brains are funny that way.

I wouldn't be surprised if I think I see trying to be. triangle somewhere too. Again, totally normal. I knew it wasn't normal, but I wrote it anyway. But nothing that was unfolding was normal at all. It was the furthest thing from normal. A small part of me held out hope that this would be the end of it, that my messages with Patrick would revert to the humdrum, that we would become friends in the social media aspect only, just a name on a list. We'd click like on each other's pictures and post. the obligatory happy birthday message once a year. Patrick's next email changed all that.

I've been thinking about everything a lot. My wife thinks I have a bladder problem because I'm up all the time, in and out of bed. But I've just been thinking about Fordham Street, and you and Sophie. I remember a few more things, but not the windows we dug up. Is it weird that I can't remember any of that? I'm not writing so you can confirm or deny

when I'm about to tell you, or that you can tell me that everything is going to be okay. because it might not be. I could be writing this just for me to make sense of things. Or maybe it feels nice to write to an old friend. It's like slipping on an old sweatshirt. I just like the way it feels.

You don't have to write me back. Just promise me that you'll keep reading. When you're done, all I'm hoping is that you think, I understand. That's all I need. Have I mentioned that I have a phobia about looking at mirrors? I'll spare you the details.

I've never spent much time thinking about why. Therapy is expensive, and I've got three college tuitions to save four. But after reconnecting with you, it's like revelations are seeping through, like doors are opening that were locked a long time ago. I remember being a kid and living on Fordham Street, and my parents took me to a play or an opera or something like that. A matinee, I think. It's intermission, and this theater.

is huge, a whole bunch of levels and corridors, and I wander off and go exploring them. In my head right now, this place is like a labyrinth of hallways. I'm like a rat in a maze. I stumble across a bathroom, and I really have to pee, and so I go inside and find a urinal. And my memory of this bathroom is that it's absolutely huge, like dozens and dozens of stalls and toilets, maybe hundreds. It feels infinite, and I'm the only one in there. I'm at the urinal, and I hear the door to the bathroom open and shut. I hear footsteps, and I look over, and no one is there. But I feel someone else is in the room.

I'm peeing and just looking straight ahead, and this place is full of mirrors, like wall to wall, and these lights are buzzing over me, and I feel like a mosquito heading for a zapper. I finish my business, and I'm working on the zipper, and of course the damn thing is stuck, and I just want to get out of there. But I feel someone standing right behind me. I'm sure of it.

It couldn't have been more than a few inches. Like if I rocked back too far, I'd hit a body, and I don't know what to do. So I think, play it cool, play it cool. But I hear this person breathing in and out, and I'm just waiting for arms to reach out and grab me. My hands are trembling, and I'm just fumbling with my zipper. I finally yank it up and do this little,

sidestep and start briskly walking towards the door, which in my memory feels like it was a hundred feet away. I'm walking faster and faster. Then I hear these footsteps behind me keeping pace, and I'm practically running through this tight space of Florida ceiling mirrors, and I see this figure. It's behind me, following me, moving so smooth it's almost floating. But I hear the footsteps, so I know it's not floating. And I don't know who it is, because I don't look for very long. they can't remember if it was big or small. I start sprinting, and my eyes flickered to the side again, and this figure is still there, and it's catching up.

I run and run, and I hear my sneakers squeaking on the tile, and I reach the door, and I just throw it open and charge through. And that's it. That's all I remember. I called my dad this morning and asked if he remembered this. If he remembered me getting lost in a theater and being stalked by someone in a bathroom, and he didn't remember any of it.

He never recalled even taking me to a play. Honestly, I have no idea where this comes from. But I suppose the mirror phobia makes sense now. I want to dive more into this. But there's another part of me that just says, stop, don't go any further. You don't need this. Your kids don't need this.

It's probably a really unhealthy thing that I'm doing. But I'm just done. I'm not sure what else is inside. of me right now, or what else happened when we lived on Fordham Street, and I'm not sure I want to find out. And maybe you remember me telling you about the mirror thing as kids. Maybe you comforted me one night. Maybe you told me everything was going to be okay. And if you did, you were right. I have three kids, who I love more than anything. I have a good life, a great life. My kids don't need their father digging up ghosts and seeing windows that aren't actually there. Some memories of

mine are hazier than others, but I know we were good friends once. That much is clear to me. I just want to say thanks. I read every word of Patrick's email three times. I navigated to his profile and I paged through his pictures. There were thousands and each just radiated with joy. I smiled at Patrick's youngest son's grinning face covered in ice cream. His eldest, waving at a camera while patrolling right field in a lit-league game. His daughter's determined look during a horse riding lesson, and all three kids squeezed into the back row of Patrick's sedan. Patrick wasn't in any of the pictures.

No selfies. He was always pointing the camera outwards. I clicked reply on Patrick's email. In the text field, I wrote, I understand. Then I unfriended him. You do remember why we call him. called at Clementine Mountain, right? You know what? I honestly have no idea.

And I haven't thought about it. Is that weird? Not really. Sophie and I were speaking over the phone. It was the first time I'd heard her voice in decades. I was moderately surprised to hear the voice of a woman in her late 30s. I half expected her to have still been 10 years old. It's like the hill always existed, and it was always called Clementine Mountain. And everyone knows that, but nobody knows.

knows why. Does that make sense? Like, someone dumped the dirt and it was called Clementine Mountain, because it was supposed to be. God, that's so deep. You're going to be really disappointed when I tell you. Okay, so tell me. Because I love to eat Clementines, and I always left the peels everywhere. And since we were always playing on that hill, it was always covered with orange peels. So we called it Clementine Mountain. Wait, really? I called my mom this morning, and she confirmed it. I'm oddly disappointed.

I knew it. It was nice to catch up with Sophie. She still had that same spunk she had when she raced down Fordham Street on her bicycle, real thin arms stretched over her head, pig tails blowing in the wind. When she got peddling, she was impossible to catch. Adult Sophie wasn't hard to track down. She never married, so she still had the same last name I remember. remembered. A quick scroll through her profile page painted the picture of a nomad. Sophie was constantly

all over the world. Buenos Aires, one month, Mozambique, the next, then a quick jaunt down to New Zealand. Cliff diving, hiking, ziplining, camping here, a hustled air, always exploring, never settling. Just hearing Sophie's voice put me at ease. After my interactions with Patrick, I had this dreadful feeling that Sophie was dead, that she'd been having visions of the windows and something terrible ensued, that the stuffed out scream that flashed through my head had actually been hers. I needed her to be okay, because I wasn't. I felt incomplete, like pieces of me were missing. It pained me that I couldn't put everything together. But there were other problems, more sinister ones. When I used the bathroom at work, I felt watched.

I had to check every stall to make sure I was alone. And most nights, I'd awakened to the sound of shattering glass. I'd run, panicked to my daughter's room and then check every window in the house. But it was always just in my head. Always. Then there was the orange tint. It crept in around the edges of my eyesight until my entire vision was filled with orange. There was no rhyme or reason.

and behind it. It would randomly appear throughout the day. I'd pinch my eyes closed and it would go away. But it kept happening. And I wasn't the only one seeing things. My daughter joined the party. I'd find her standing in her bedroom late at night in her pajamas just staring out the window. She swore she saw something creeping around our backyard. It would duck behind bushes and hide behind trees, she said. Sometimes it would flicker and vanish. It wasn't getting closer. It was just circling the house. I never saw it. It's not ready yet, she told me. I asked her what she meant by that. She kind of shrugged. It was something from a cartoon, she said. My life, she blamed me for all of it. She didn't tell me outright, but I could feel it. Her embraces with me felt colder, and the hug she gave

our daughter looked a little tighter, a little more protective. Those hugs screamed, I won't let daddy hurt us. I didn't know what to do. Being around my wife or daughter felt like I was spreading a disease. So I stayed at the office a little longer during the week, slept in on weekends, and went on long bike rides by myself. I was a ghost in my own home, and I knew I had to get better. I read dozens and dozens of online articles and consulted a professional, and the message was clear. Face your fears. To conquer my demons, I needed to track them down and vanquish them. But the shape or face of my demons alluded me.

My memories weren't complete, and I needed someone else to fill in the gaps. Someone who was with me all those years ago on Fordham Street. I needed to contact Sophie. Sophie and I messaged a few times online, and then she phoned me from some hotel in Rome. It was the middle of the night my time when the phone rang. Our conversation helped, at least at first. I told Sophie what I remembered about Fordham Street and digging up to windows.

She jogged my memory about why we called at Clementine Mountain. And then I told her Patrick's story about the figure in the bathroom and him seeing triangular windows in my photograph. And then Sophie told me more. He just unfriended him? I think he wanted me to. Me coming back into his life was only causing him pain. It was the right thing to do, right?

I think Patrick not having access to your photo albums anymore is probably a good idea. I mean, he was seeing things. You haven't seen triangles in my photos? I can honestly say I haven't. Does that put your mind at ease a little bit? Man, makes me worry more about Patrick. He can't be well. But it kind of makes sense, doesn't it?

About the windows and Clementine Mountain, it was always playing tricks on us. What do you mean? The whole, are the windows there? Are they not there? Why can't other people see them, thing? I don't know what you're talking about. We all saw them.

We dug them up. We were there, all three of us. You remember that, right? I do remember that, yeah. Before the storm. But there were other times. too. What are you talking about? We went back. We kept going back

with shovels and my mother's garden tools. We kept digging them back up. I think... Yeah, okay, that's right. Yeah, your mom's trowel with the green handle? I can picture it. We would always dig them up. And then we'd leave to get our parents and show them. But we'd come back, and the dirt was always back on top of the windows.

and sometimes the piles we made were still there, but the holes were filled up. Like new dirt just appeared there. Oh my God, you're right. I remember that now. And then we started staying in shifts. Right. We'd dig them up. Then two of us would stay, and one of us would go get our parents.

But when one of us got back, the other two that were guarding the windows were gone. And the windows were covered up again. Kip, that happened a few times. One time I came back with my mom to show her what we'd found, but you and Patrick had split, and there was nothing there but dirt. Jesus, our parents must have thought we were nuts. And when I went and found you two back at your house,

you didn't remember leaving. You didn't even remember being on the hill that day. How did I forget all of this? We were 10 years old. you probably have like less than a dozen memories of being ten. Don't you think this is a little strange or like really strange? Now that we're saying all of this out loud, yeah, it's a little odd. But we were kids, and it was so long ago.

I don't think we're remembering things exactly as they happened. It has a permanent kid lens attached to it. You know what I mean? I think something happened. to the three of us. Something on Clementine Mountain. Like, something was inside those windows. And it got out or... I don't know. But we all grew up. We're all fine. Well, relatively fine. Patrick doesn't sound so hot, poor guy. I need you to think, is there anything strange you remember about living on Fordham Street?

Did anything happen to you? He means besides magical dirt and temporary marriage? memory loss? I'm telling you, it's kid lens. You know what? I don't think that it is. Please, just humor me. Let's see. I haven't thought about Fordham Street in forever. There was a digging, I guess. And that's it. Really, that's all that was strange. Please, Sophie, anything, something that scared you. Okay, well, how about the... I guess there was a night I watched some hard. a movie on TV. It was on real late after my parents had gone to sleep. And I was really, really freaked out. I can't remember what movie it was. God, why would I watch a movie like that alone? Anyway, I went to

bed and, wow, I haven't thought about this in forever. It's okay. What else do you remember? I woke up in the middle of the night and I heard this, like a real deep breathing. And I felt cold, just totally chilled. And colder, in colder, and I thought, why is this happening? That's when I realized my covers were being slowly pulled down. Someone else was in my room. What did you do? I got the hell out of there.

I took off, ran to my parents' bedroom. And I was just so relieved when I saw them. I literally dove headfirst into their bed. That's right. I remember that now. And what was in your room? There was nothing there. My dad and I checked in the morning, but the window was wide open.

Do you think someone escaped out of the window? Is that what you're saying? I don't know what I'm saying, but the curtains were fluttering. And I remember thinking those curtains looked like a picture I'd seen in some storybook. Or maybe it was from a song, like a woman walking through a graveyard, and her veil is kind of dancing in this howling wind. So you don't know if anyone else had been in the room with you? I don't know. I don't really remember the epilogue to this story, or whatever you want to call it. Maybe I got hot and opened to the window in the middle of the night. It doesn't really matter.

It does matter. It really doesn't. We were kids. Just kids. I'm going to ask you something kind of weird. Is that okay? God, do I really want to hear this? Humor me.

That's all I'm asking. Fine. Go ahead. Do you ever feel like something is coming for you? Jesus, this is getting weird now. Don't you think it's okay to leave the past in the past? I just have this terrible feeling in the pit of my stomach. It's impossible to explain, but I guess, look, I've been seeing orange.

It crosses my vision, like spilled milk, I guess. Have you seen a doctor? It's not, I think it's something out there, and we can't see it. We can't. But it's there, and it's coming from Clementine Mountain. It's, I don't know, crouching behind a corner, or it's folded up in a drawer somewhere. hiding in a closet, whatever. But if we find out what it is, it can't get us anymore.

You know, face your fears or whatever. I don't know what to say. Look, if you remember more about us being kids, will you call me? Sure, sure. I didn't anticipate hearing from Sophie again. She'd go off on another adventure and I'd be forgotten. I was simply someone she was friends with a really long time ago, A hazy memory destined to eventually disappear.

It was probably for the best. Clementine Mountain didn't seem to gnaw at Sophie the same way and gnawed at me. It was like having something on the tip of your tongue for every second of every day. It was torturous. And I wasn't content with burying my head in the sand or chalking everything up to. We were just kids. There was something more, something polluting me from the inside out. something causing me to worry for the well-being of my family, for the safety of my daughter.

Out of Fordham Street friends and, short of tracking down their elderly parents, I knew I had only one recourse to find the answers I was seeking. I had to go back to Clementine Mountain. It struck me on the quiet late afternoon drive to my hometown, since moving away from Fordham Street all those years ago. I'd been constantly inching my way back closer, ever since. My parents and I first moved two states away, then one state away, and now my family and I lived only four hours away. It was like I had zigged and zagged my way back towards Fordham Street, back to Clementine Mountain, back to my starting point. My wife and daughter didn't come with me. This was no occasion for a joyous family road trip, and things between me and my wife had only fractured

further. She barely took her eyes away from the computer screen as I stood in the den doorway, car keys in my hand. I just feel like you aren't being totally honest with me. The accusatory words just hung there, and I let them fall away. I just left. The sun was nearly setting when I arrived. My first thought when I turned my car into my old subdivision was how it looked like time had stood still. I remembered every single home. The upkeep. was there, but they were all dated. A few kids raced past them on bikes, and I worried for them. You shouldn't be here. It was a paranoid thought, but I couldn't help but think it. I turned on to Fordham Street, the hung sign slightly crooked. And why shouldn't it be? Some

things just aren't right. They're destined to always be off kilter. I stopped the car in front of my old house. I didn't remember having blue shutters. Did we have blue shutters? shutters? And I wondered how many families had lived in my old place over the years. It felt wrong moving into someone else's house. That was someone else's home. A place where new babies were rocked to sleep, where Christmas presents were open. Families had forged memories there, and then those memories were lost. Past my place were the old homes of Patrick and Sophie. I pictured them as kids sprinting across their yards, and for a moment I could see them. I shook it off, silly.

And across from our three homes was the place we called Clementine Mountain. Only, the mountain was no longer there. There was a two-story brick house, and it was for sale. I got out of my car and walked across the street to where the hill once rose. The brick house that stood in the hill's absence looked out of place amongst the vinyl siding homes that ran up and down the street. The design was boxy and simple. almost like an old schoolhouse. The brick chimney on the house's east side seemed too large and poked too high into the sky, as if it was originally fitted for an industrial factory.

I knocked on the door. A man answered, and he asked me if I was here to see the house. I smiled and told him that I was. He showed me around. The place was tidy, but it looked only half lived in, like things were missing. Kids' toys were everywhere, in every room, but they were neatly arranged. The tile in the kitchen shined. The lines on the family room carpet left by the vacuum cleaner looked meticulously placed. We've lowered the price twice. Maybe I shouldn't be telling you that, but all that information's online anyway. We went upstairs and walked down the hallway, and I felt compelled to stop. I looked up at a small cord hanging from the attic door. It gave me pause. I reached up for it, but I couldn't remember choosing. I couldn't remember choosing

to actually do that. It was like something was guiding my hand there. And then those memory flashes came back, except there were more this time. I was standing on the hill and someone was with me. I felt a cold wind on my bare arms. I saw piles of dirt in the window. We were hammering it with rocks until a hand on my shoulder made me jump and I snapped out of it. I was back in the house that stood where Clementine Mountain once stood. And I was sweating. Hey, I'm really sorry. I know touching people you don't know is kind of weird, but are you okay? The man took his hand off my shoulder. It wasn't weird. It was what I needed. Sorry about that. I'm fine. I do that sometimes. You know, zone out. You do know that it's obvious.

You aren't interested in buying this house. How could you tell? But you've been here before, haven't you? Yeah, a long time ago. So, you know, right? You know that something isn't right about this place. The man told me everything, that he bought this house just over a year ago. He lived here with his wife and two kids. Everything was fine for the first few months, until his kids started hearing things, noises in the attic, things moving around, and not scurrying like rodents, but something heavier, like large things climbing over one another. And then there was the thumping, the knocking, the scratching. Well, I didn't pay it a lot of mind at first.

You know kids, right? But they kept hearing it and hearing it, telling me they felt watched at night that something was there. And there was no calming them down. If I told you how many tears they'd shed or how many times they pleaded with me to leave this place forever, I... Do you know what's up there?

It's been so long, but I remember windows, three of them, actually, shaped like triangles. They formed a pyramid. The man nodded like he was thinking about something. Are they up there? Triangular windows? Yeah. No, there's nothing like that up there. There's just the chimney along the east side, and that's where the kids swore up and down the noises were coming from.

Did you look inside? He seemed perplexed by this question. and he considered it for a few moments. I did look. I took my tools up there, but there was nothing inside the chimney that was out of place. I fixed it back up and I thought that would be the end of it, that we'd ride this thing out and things would become normal, but then I learned about the missing girl.

The missing girl? My body tensed up and I couldn't speak. The man removed papers from his back pocket and he handed me one. Here, keep it. It helps. I didn't even look at it. I just shoved the piece of paper in my pocket. I mumbled something and left. I got into my car and pulled out the sheet of paper. It was a microfilm printout of a newspaper article. The article was dated 27 years ago, back when I was a boy and living on Fordham Street.

My hands trembled as my eyes moved across the page. That's when I learned the truth, that there were never just three of us. It wasn't three friends. There were four of us. A seven-year-old girl went missing from our neighborhood when I lived on Fordham Street. Her name was Allison, and she lived directly behind me on a different street. Her disappearance went like this. On the night, Allison went missing. Her parents were out of town.

That afternoon, Allison had gone to play downtown with Patrick and his family. Then she stayed at Sophie's house, where she simply vanished. Allison had been sleeping in Sophie's bed, and then she wasn't there the next morning. But the window to Sophie's bedroom was wide open. I just stared at the piece of paper. There was a black and white photograph of Allison in the article. It looked like a school picture. Her beaming little face only gut-punched me further.

I focused intently on the photograph, shuffling through memories in my head. I couldn't find the one I was looking for I couldn't remember her I'm not sure of how long I sat there I eventually pulled out my phone and dialed the number of that hotel in Rome against all logic I connected with the city and country hopping Sophie

and I accosted her with information about the missing girl I sputtered like a madman barely coming up for air you were there with Alice in the night she vanished there were four of us Sophie not three four We made our memories of that girl disappear. Sophie tried to get words in, but I kept cutting her off.

Finally, she exploded. Stop. I did. Please, I don't want to hear this. I don't want to remember any of this. I begged her to reconsider. And then she finally came clean. I'm sorry.

I don't consider myself a liar, but I lied to you about a couple of things. Like when I said I didn't see the triangle windows like Patrick. did. That's not the truth. What are you talking about? I saw them. You saw them. What does that mean? Triangles. They were in your photos. In every picture where there should have been a regular window, it was a triangle, okay?

Yes, I didn't want to admit I was going crazy. Maybe I am. I didn't know what to say. I told Sophie that everything was going to be okay, that if we stuck together, we'd get through this. she should come back. You don't get it. It's like there's this ocean and I'm on this boat and I can't steer it. And the wind is blowing me in every direction. And I just pray it doesn't blow me back towards Fordham Street because I can't go home.

I just can't. Not ever. Maybe we really shouldn't talk for another 25 years, you know? Sophie, do you remember that thing you told me about you? eating Clementines, and you kept dropping the peels everywhere. Is that really why we called it Clementine Mountain? Made up that story about why we called the hill. I'm not sure why I lied about that, too. It was just easier, I guess. So, you don't know why? I have no idea why we called it Clementine Mountain. But you know what? Anyway, later, Kimo Sabi. With that, Sophie hung up. all I cracked a smile. Kemosabi. That's right. Sophie used to call me that. It was about the only memory

of being a kid that wasn't foggy and terrible. I sat in my car on Fordham Street for a while. It was getting dark. I just kind of stared at where Clementine Mountain once towered over us kids. I watched the man from the house drive off in his minivan, presumably to return to his family. I wanted to do the same. I accelerated away. I was anxious to put Fordham Street in my rearview mirror. I thought only of walking through my front door, hugging my wife and daughter, and burying my memories of Clementine Mountain all over again.

I wanted to drive away and never come back. But I couldn't do it. I drove a few miles outside of my hometown, and then I inexplicably pulled the U-turn. It was like the wind was blowing me back to Fordham Street. I just drove for a while, sort of numb to my surroundings. It began to rain, a sprinkle at first, but a downpour soon followed.

The squeak of my windshield wipers was almost hypnotic as I attempted to make sense of the last few weeks of my life. The puzzle pieces floated around in my head, and I couldn't quite fit them all together. The man's experience inside the house, Sophie's lies, Patrick's struggles, and, of course, a fourth friend, that we all forgot about Allison's mere existence was mortifying to me, that we bended our memories to make her go away. I clenched the steering wheel, and the orange began to creep in around the margins. I pulled off onto the side of the road, pinching my eyes closed as tightly as possible until the color dissipated.

Rain fell harder as I pulled out my cell phone and dialed my wife. She answered, and I told her everything. She just listened. A few uh-has were scattered about. But it was almost as if her thoughts were elsewhere. The revelation about the missing girl barely seemed to register with her. I asked her what was the matter, why she was being so standoffish. And she told me,

Honey, I don't get it. You've known about that missing girl for weeks. You're on the computer every night reading about her. It's all right there. I saw your search history. It didn't make sense. I had no memory of doing any of that. I thought back as hard as I could, and there was nothing.

I grew angrier and angrier. First, at myself, and then at my wife, thinking she was putting me on, or that she was keeping something for me. I'd had it. I said some things I shouldn't have, and I hung up. My wife called me right back, when I turned my phone off. I was out of patience, out of answers, out of ideas. and out of old friends.

I went back, back to the house, back to Clementine Mountain. It was my only recourse. I feared being pursued forever, chased by the ghost of the past and by whatever was inside those triangular windows. I feared what they might do to my family. I needed to face them just once, just to see if it was all just kid lens. Under the cover of darkness,

and in a heavy rainstorm, I broke into the house on Fordham Street. I crept cautiously up the stairs, grimacing at every creek, fearful about awakening something that lurked inside of the house. I reached the attic cord, feeling that same pull that grabbed a hold of me a few hours earlier. I gave the cord a yank, and the ladder came sliding down. I slowly ascended each step, reached inside and felt around for the light cord. I pulled it and I poked my head inside. A few boxes lay scattered about.

An old doll and a pink dress rested on its side. To my right was the brick chimney. Laying at the base of the chimney was a collection of tools. A crowbar, chisel, mallet, and sledgehammer. The man had just left them there. The bricks looked like they'd never been touched. I slowly approached. And when I did, I felt younger.

I looked down at my hands and they morphed before my very eyes. They shrank into the hands of a child, and a flashlight appeared in my right hand. I was wearing my green and white little-leet jersey and flannel pajama bottoms. I was 10 years old again. The house seemed to vanish around me, melting like wax. The rain stopped. There I was, at the top of Clementine Mountain, when it was just a hill. small mounds of dirt were piled around me.

It was nighttime. And to my right, on her knees and bashing a triangular window with a rock, was Allison. I recognized her instantly. She was the spitting image of her school picture from the news article. Allison was barefoot, and the bottoms of her orange pajamas were stained with dirt. Her eyes squinted with determination. I didn't think. I just got down next to her, grabbed her.

rock of my own and started bashing the window right alongside her. We smacked and smacked until the window shattered. We both jumped up, surprised we were able to do it. I stooped down and looked inside the window, and to my surprise, there was an iron ladder. Allison wanted to go first, so I lowered her inside. I watched her descend the ladder into darkness, rung by rung. I lowered my leg inside to climb down, but I pulled it right back out. I couldn't follow her. I didn't want to go down there. I was scared.

I shined the flashlight down on Allison instead. My hand trembled and the beam quivered. Allison looked like she was about eight or ten feet below me, and she was standing in what appeared to be a cavern or room. The beam of my flashlight moved around like a spotlight. The floor was rocky and just looked old, ancient even. Allison shouted to me to climb down, but it was like I couldn't move. This permeating fear made me feel heavy, and it rooted me to my position of safety high above her.

It's huge, Allison shouted up to me. I heard her voice echo, and I believed her. And maybe it was just my nerves, but this place Allison had descended into seemed to move. and pulse like it was alive. My flashlight caught a piece of movement to Allison's left. There was a hole in the ground, no bigger than a shower drain. And I didn't so much see something inside that hole as I sensed it. Allison must have sensed it too because she stooped down to get a look.

I yelled at her to get back, to climb back up, that she shouldn't be down there. Something reached through the hole and grabbed Allison by the throat. It pulled her closer to the hole, and then Allison's body began to fold up. Her body seemed to shift and move upon itself, the skin and bones turning to body. Allison and her orange pajamas were pulled inside through the hole to the other side of the floor. Absolute quiet was more deafening than Allison's petrified shrieks moments earlier. I leaned down and frantically pointed the flashlight in every direction. It was like she was never there.

I heard a noise and quickly realized that the window glass was reforming around me. I jumped back and fell onto the dirt, almost getting decapitated by the fresh glass that now fully occupied the triangular frame. I flopped backward onto my back and looked up at the sky, wiping tears from my eyes. There was no sky. I only saw wooden rafters. I was back in the attic, and it was morning. sunlight streamed in the attic windows and it took a few moments to get my bearings the vision or whatever it was bounced around my head like the remnants of a dream i already felt it breaking away and disappearing and i desperately tried to hold on

i looked at my hands and they were my familiar adult hands it was me again i sat up and i just stared at the brick chimney it seemed to pulse like the place from my vision. I wondered how any of this was possible, how someone could hallucinate something so vivid and then pass out for eight hours. I wondered if that horrible, impossible place below the iron ladder actually existed and who allowed it to exist in the first place.

I wondered if the windows were still here. Who had bricks them up and if they told anyone about what they'd found? But mainly I wondered, was any of this real? I climbed to my feet and I shook off my thoughts. No, this is absolutely crazy, just completely nuts. The vision receded further and it already didn't seem real. Did that poor girl actually get sucked into a supernatural hole and vanish forever?

And was I really with her the night she disappeared? And I'm believing all this? because some bricks took me on a magical voyage that transcended all rules of reality? I was losing my mind. I walked to the chimney and I stuck out my hand. I ran my fingers over the rough edges of the bricks. They seemed to shift beneath my fingertips and only for a second I thought I heard the faint screams of someone trapped inside the bricks, inside the windows. It sounded like pounding, like clawing, like desperation.

The moment ended. The pulsing and screaming stopped. And that's when I decided that this struggle, this battle of determining what was real and what wasn't real, it was exactly what Clementine Mountain wanted. It's what Sophie said about the windows and that awful hill. It was always playing tricks on us. This was all months ago. I'd like to say my story ended that morning,

that I drove straight home, hugged my daughter, and patched things up with my wife. I'd like to say that I reached back out to Patrick and Sophie, and that we are all coping together. That facing down your demons is all you need to do to get better. But I can't say those things. Because sometimes your demons face you down. They come for you and they don't.

Stop. And other times, your demons come for those you love. My demons came for my wife, and now she's gone. I did drive straight home from Clementine Mountain that morning. I called my wife a dozen times, and she didn't pick up, not once. When I walked into my house, I found my daughter there all alone, just watching television. Mommy left last night, my daughter told me. She left. She left. left with the girl in the orange pajamas, the girl with a face like Play-Doh and arms like spaghetti. The Clementine girl, my daughter called her, small and soft and orange and mushy. The girl flickered to life in the kitchen, my daughter said. She took Mommy by the hand and they walked outside. Then Mommy and the Clementine girl drove off. My wife hasn't been seen since.

Her car was found, though. It was on Fordham Street. I never saw her. Our paths did not cross. If she tiptoed past me in the attic with a Clementine girl and somehow got sucked into the bricks and into the triangular windows, I have no memory of it. Fitting.

And so I carry on. People think that I did it, that I caused my wife's disappearance. and they technically aren't wrong? I am responsible. I'm pretty sure she was transported into the impossible place beyond the bricks and windows and that I led her straight there.

For years, evil had been slowly bubbling below the surface and my mere presence at Clementine Mountain turned up the heat. The mountain sent someone out and brought someone new in. I know. That sounds insane. I know that. But my daughter saw the Clementine girl in the orange pajamas, so it can't just be in my head. Clementine Mountain followed me my whole life, and it finally took someone else close to me. I awoke it from its slumber, and I gave it someone else. I am its ferryman in a way. I think about Fordham Street and Clementine Mountain a lot. I don't try to forget anymore.

My thoughts inevitably drift towards Patrick and Sophie, and I hope they're happy. I'm pretty sure that they are. After all, they only saw the triangles in my photos. Clementine Mountain was only ever hurting me, not them. I tell them that, but it's not worth it. If they're reburying everything, there's no sense in hopping in with a shovel and digging it all back up.

My daughter is already starting to forget. I've already had to jog her memory about the Clementine girl. Oh yeah, she says. Then she'll have a tea party with a stuffed rabbit or curl up with a picture book. I have my own picture book that I keep by my side, the one drawn by Allison, the fourth friend. I'm determined not to forget this time, to not let Clementine Mountain keep tricking me over and over again.

And now I know the book's real title. The one Allison drew on the cover before water damage destroyed a single word. Jammed inside of my childhood viewfinder was not one of those circular 3D photo reels. It was an old Polaroid picture of the four of us kids. There's Patrick, Sophie, and me all flashing toothy grins. and then there's Allison clad in an orange dress always orange

always a little Clementine and she's holding her illustrated book towards the camera my three friends it was called I hope that by staring at that book something will happen I'm not sure what

maybe maybe something will jog my memory maybe another missing peace will emerge maybe my wife will come back something anything I take the book with me whenever I go back to Fordham Street

and I keep the news article about Allison folded inside the crumbling pages I go back often now I sneak into the house that stood where Clementine Mountain once stood and I ascend the ladder into the attic I think I can hear my wife's cries for help

trapped beyond the chimney bricks behind the triangular windows and inside the embankular windows and inside the impossible place. And then I attack those bricks with every tool at my disposal. I swing and smash eliminating brick after brick. But more and more keep appearing. I hammer away until I'm simply too exhausted to sit up.

There are pieces of brown clay all around me, and always every single time I fall asleep. And when I wake up, everything is back the way it was before. The chimney is whole and the debris is gone. The bricks are pristine. It looks like they haven't been touched. And for a few minutes, I'll stare at the bricks, dumbfounded. Because I can't remember what I'm doing there.

As our service concludes, we send you away with our blessings. If you would like to find out how you can hear the full-length versions of our audio program, please visit the no-sleepbodcast.com to learn about our season pass program. Over 60 hours of content for only 1999. On behalf of everyone at the No Sleep Podcast, we thank you for listening. Join us again next week. in our sleepless sanctuary. This audio production is copyright 2018-2019 by Creative Reason Media, Inc.

All blessed rights reserved. The copyrights for each story are held by the respective authors. No duplication or reproduction of this audio program is permitted without the written consent of Creative Reason Media.