The NoSleep Podcast - NoSleep Podcast S14E01

Episode Date: February 16, 2020

It's Episode 01 of Season 14. This week we conjure spells for you about drawing forth the hidden entities from the darkness. “The Mystery of the Sound-Side Hotel” written by Charlotte Ledville (Story starts around 00:05:30) Produced by: Phil Michalski Cast: Narrator – Jessica McEvoy , Kathy – Addison Peacock , Jack – Dan Zappula , Child – Erika Sanderson , Charlie – David Cummings, Judy – Erin Lillis, Woman – Mary Murphy “The Voices Underneath Us” written by C.K. Walker (Stor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Yes, I finally moved to a neighborhood that's specifically ghostproof. The entire street is surrounded by a protection spell. Every house has salt mixed into the pane around the doorways, and there's a filtration system that pumps burning sage into every property at hourly intervals. There's even a security guard who doubles as a trained exorcist. It's absolutely perfect. Ever since I was a small boy of 23, I've been harangued by ghosts, Headless horsemen chasing me, pale girls crawling out of my TV,

Rakuw Olivia, spirits born in the grip of a powerful rage, the list just goes on. And I've never found a way to be safe. But now, at number 13, Ghostbuster Street, I finally got a home where I'm no longer at risk of anything at all. Ah, the postman. Not some spectral hag peering through my letterbox like I'm used to. Ooh, a pamphlet.

Let's see what it says. Every night, local police departments across America receive hundreds of calls from burglar alarms. The vast majority of the time, they have no idea whether the alarm is real. Is there really a crime going on or not? All the alarm company can tell them is the motion sensor went off. Simply safe home security is different. Well, I don't need home security with all the anti-ghost stuff around here. Wait a minute.

This place is so focused on scaring off spirits, that they've overlooked the potential for actual human criminals. No, it's real people I have to worry about. Quick, I'd better read on. If there's a break-in, Simply Safe uses real video evidence to give police an eyewitness account of the crime. That means police dispatch up to 350% faster than for a normal burglar alarm. You get comprehensive protection for your entire house.

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You've got nothing to lose. Go now. and be sure you go to simply save.com slash no sleep so they know our show sent you. That's simply save.com slash no sleep. And done. Now I'm safe from ghosts and people. Nothing can hurt me now, short of a meteorite landing directly on my house. But what are the odds of that happening?

Remember that's simply safe.com slash no sleep. In our world, there is. magic in the darkness. Sorcery and incantations which bring us closer to the essence of the night. Come enter our black magic shop where we will conjure up tales to frighten and disturb. This journey will be spellbinding. Brace yourself for the No Sleep Podcast. Welcome, visitors, to the No Sleep Magic Shop. I'm your proprietor, David Cummings.

This week, we conjure spells for you about drawing forth the hidden entities from the darkness. Welcome to the 14th season of the No Sleep podcast. It's wonderful to be back. But, of course, we weren't actually gone at all. Thanks to the stellar work of Olivia White and Jessica McAvoy, we were able to share the new decade with you. A huge dollop of thanks to those ladies and the entire No Sleep team. for making that series so wonderfully creepy.

We appreciate all your positive comments about it. And for our European fans, we can't thank you enough for coming out to the Euro 2020 live shows. It was so wonderful to see the support of our fans from across the pond. You made us feel so loved. It was an amazing experience, so on behalf of the live team, we thank you for making it so special.

And so, a new season is upon us. We have a great new theme, composed by the maestro Brandon Boone and wonderfully produced by Phil Mikulski and we're all excited to cast our spells upon you now close your eyes and embrace the magic in our first tale we discover a long lost episode of a podcast not our podcast of course but here we meet a woman whose sister ran a local history podcast unlikely to feature any cursed content you'd assume? But in this tale, shared with us by author Charlotte Leadville, we find out that even mundane small-town lore can hold sinister secrets. Performing this tale are Jessica McAvoy,

Addison Peacock, Dan Zupula, Erica Sanderson, Aaron Lillis, and Mary Murphy. So don't worry about the missing guests. There's bound to be a rational explanation. These are all totally normal occurrences when you're investigating the mystery of the Soundside Hotel. My sister used to have a history podcast in her mid-20s. She gave it up to go the family way, or so she said. In truth, it wasn't a very successful show. It was a show about interesting historical places in North Carolina, so by nature it didn't really appeal to many people outside of our community.

and I'll never tell her this, but the show was kind of bland. The thing is, I think she may have had a completely different reason for quitting the show, one that didn't have to do with her having kids or how completely boring it was. So I inherited my sister's old laptop when I started college last fall. We're not a wealthy family, so when my parents learned my sister's old MacBook was still kicking around and she was willing to give it to me, they saw no reason to get me my own. I was cleaning all of her old files off of the computer.

She told me she had everything she wanted backed up and I could just delete everything. I found an audio file for an episode of her podcast I'd never heard. Even though I found her show boring, I listened to all of it to be supportive. But this appeared to be an unreleased Halloween special. It was the last episode she ever recorded. and it never aired.

I thought it was strange she'd never mentioned this episode. She always talked to me about what she was working on. I listened to it, thinking that she would have deleted anything she wanted to keep private. After all, it was my computer now, and anything on there was fair game, right? I don't regret listening to it, but the recording is very strange and you'll see why. No one in the recording seems to be aware of any of the strange sounds. They just keep talking like nothing is happening. My sister ended up getting married to Jack, the manual here in the recording.

Both of them maintained that they never heard anything strange when they listened to the audio. When I pressed them, my sister asked why I didn't just delete it if it bothered me so much, and then change the subject. I'm going to play the audio for you now. I think this is a completely unedited recording, so it may be a little disjointed and messy. So, we are here on Halloween night, folks. Well, for us, it's a few weeks before Halloween,

but we'll be releasing this episode on the big day. This is a special bonus episode where we will actually be spending the night in the Soundside Hotel. The hotel is, you guessed it, a sound front resort on the Outer Banks that was built in 19, and only remained in operation for about 20 years before it was abandoned under mysterious circumstances in the 50s.

The hotel had... Shit. Where are my notes? How many rooms does it have? Now I've messed up. That's fine. Just fix it in the edit. Okay. The hotel had 115 rooms, a pool, a restaurant, and in the...

inside dining area, and an outside beachfront dining area. The average price for a room in 1950 was about $12 per night, which translates to roughly $130 in 2018. Now I know what you're thinking. Wait, did you just say it was abandoned under mysterious circumstances? Yes, I did. And we're going to go to Jack to dig a little bit deeper into that. Hello folks and happy Halloween, so yes, this hotel was abandoned overnight in December of 1953.

Guests say they were woken up by the hotel staff in the middle of the night stating that the hotel had to be evacuated. Several people who stayed there that night say that hotel staff told them it was due to a small fire in the basement. However, they also claim they didn't see any fire trucks or emergency vehicles. They were put up in another hotel a few miles away where they spent the remainder of their vacations. They weren't allowed to return to the sound side to collect any forgotten belongings. And that's it, right?

That's the story. That wraps up the show? Not exactly. Some of the guests that were there that night never returned home. That's right, people. These guests simply vanished. There were five families sleeping on the second floor.

It was December on the beach, so it still wasn't very busy at this time. None of those people ever returned home. However, records show that they all checked out the day before, which was anywhere from a day to three days before their checkout date. One of the families had even arrived that day. And they supposedly just up and left before even spending one night? According to the paperwork, yes. So what happened?

After that, pretty much nothing. There was little to no criminal investigation by local police into the disappearances. The owner just sort of disappeared from society, and all of the staff were let go and business stopped. The building fell into disrepair until it came under new ownership in the 60s. Right. And at that point, people started claiming it was haunted, and it really didn't do great business under the new ownership. Rumor has it that it was poorly maintained, the service was bad, the food was bad, like literally bad, several people reported food poisoning. According to the owners at the time, this was because they had a hard time hiring and keeping staff, because no one in town wanted to work there.

Or if they did work there, they never stayed longer than a few weeks. I'm trying to sleep. Because it was haunted. Exactly. So the hotel closed down again and remained unused until the late 70s when it was sold again. The new owners didn't open it as a hotel, though. They hosted ghost tours here, and it's also a popular filming location. So they kind of took advantage of the situation, and to this day, it remains under that ownership,

and you can still come here for ghost tours or if you want to shoot a movie. Or a podcast. Or a podcast. On today's episode, we'll be interviewing hotel staff and management, as well as recording any experiences we have here during the night. We're excited to get started. Just let me sleep. Jack and I are here in the downstairs lounge with Judy, the current manager of the hotel.

So, are you guys paranormal investigators? We get a lot of those. Not usually, no. I have a podcast about North Carolina history. And we're recording this for our Halloween episode. Oh, wonderful. We have been getting a lot of podcasters here more recently. Seems to be the medium of choice these days.

I guess I'll ask the most obvious question first. Have you ever had a paranormal experience here? I hear footsteps and knocking all the time, but I pretty much tune it out at this point. I've had one significant experience. but not as many as some other people. I sort of hoped it'd be more exciting when I started this job, but I am a little grateful they've decided to leave me alone for the most part.

What was your experience? Okay, so I was in the old laundry room one night. It's a storage room now. And I remember reaching for the door handle to leave, and the next thing I know, I'm at the top of the hallway stairs. I don't remember opening the door or walking up the stairs, and I just stood there bewildered. And then I heard a voice say, I'm so sorry.

Can you show us the place had happened? Sure, let's go. So, we're standing here at the top of the staircase where Judy had her experience. I've kind of got the chills. What about you, Jack? If I start hearing voices, I might just abandon this whole thing. You know, oddly, it wasn't very skis. Gary. I was spooked. I called out to figure out who it was, but I was the only one working that day.

I didn't find anyone else in the building. But I really didn't get the sense that it wanted to hurt me. It sounded genuinely sorry. I'm not sure for what. If it's listening, I would want it to know it doesn't have to be sorry for anything. Now I'm just kind of sad. What do you think happened here, Judy? It didn't happen in my lifetime, so it's hard for me to be. speculate, but a lot of people in the community and in my family think there was some kind of cover-up. Something happened to those people, and they didn't want it to affect tourism. Unfortunately, the only physical evidence we still have are those checkout records, which don't

tell us much. Then why abandon the hotel? Why would the owner disappear? I'm really not sure. I guess there are plenty of other hotels. Do you think the police were involved in the cover-up? I think they would have had to be. It's a small town. We still don't have a very big police force. And back then it was probably even smaller.

And if tourism dropped off, livelihood would be at stake. We were finally bouncing back from the world and wanted to give up the money. We're sitting in the dining room with Charlie Nelson, one of the tour guides at the hotel. Hey, folks. Charlie, tell us about the tours you do.

Well, we go around the whole building, but most of the focus and education, is on the second floor and the families who disappeared there. And do people actually experience paranormal phenomena on these tours? Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't. We're purely authentic, so that means there's no one behind the walls pulling any strings. If the ghosts don't come out, they don't come out. I'd say nine out of ten tours, nothing happens.

Honestly, the people who report strange experiences the most are the filmmakers who come here. they see stuff all the time. Like what? Well, my favorite one was when this film student came to work on a project. The interesting part about this is that he wasn't making anything scary. He was collaborating with a musician to make a music video. Anyway, they went out to hit up the bars in town, and when he got back, his camera was hanging from the ceiling fan by the power cord.

Well, he was pretty livid about it because it was a very expensive camera. but Judy showed him the security footage. No one went into his room. What floor was he on? Could someone have come in through the window? Or maybe he did it himself as a hoax? He was on the first floor, but none of the outside security cameras picked anything up either.

And that's not even the weirdest part. The camera turned on and started recording during the whole thing. As it's hoisted up and swings from the ceiling, you can't see anyone in the room. You know, you'd see someone. If they were tying it to the ceiling fan, it just seems to fly up on its own. It was my room. That's weird.

You're not messing with me, right? You can see it for yourself. He posted about it all online. I will concede that he's a film student and probably knows plenty of fancy camera tricks, but it's the most compelling evidence I've seen so far. Let's watch the video. Oh yeah, yeah, of course. I have it bookmarked, actually.

Let me pull it up. Let's pause the recording and just link in the show notes. Yeah, yeah, good idea. So we just took a look at the film students video online and also compared it to the hotel security footage. And I have to say, it was one of the creepiest things I've ever seen. The camera really does look like it floated up on its own.

The weirdest part is that the video is timestamped for after the student left and before he came back. We theorized for a bit after watching that if the student had manipulated the time zone on the camera, he could have hypothetically filmed the whole thing earlier and made it look like it was happening after he left if he timed his return to the hotel just right. But we're here to document, not to debunk.

Continuing my interview with Charlie in three, two, Okay, Charlie, the big question. Have you had any personal experiences here in the hotel? Well, I'm going to be honest. This was just a job to me when I first started, but I've seen some weird shit. Oh, I'm sorry. Am I allowed to swear? We'll beep it out. It's fine. Swear away.

Yeah, we love beeping. Yeah. Well, I mean, the usual shadows, voices. But the weirdest thing is the second floor painting. Painting? Well, there's these really cheap paintings. The new owners put it up just to decorate the place when they bought it. And there's this one.

Well, I'm in the middle of a tour, and it just jumps off the wall, lands in the middle of the floor, and I nearly crap my pants in front of all these people, who obviously start accusing the whole thing of being fake. Everyone wants to go on a ghost tour until actual scary shit, happens. It's not fun anymore. Now every time I walk by that painting, it falls to the floor. And it's just me, too. Can we go up there and test it out? Yeah, let's go. So we've been walking around on the second floor for about 20 minutes now, and nothing weird has happened with any of the

paintings. Charlie, I swear, we still believe you. Oh, it's fine. I had a feeling they would make me look like an idiot. Well, what do you think happened here? back then, Charlie? I don't know. Obviously something bad that the owners didn't want getting out. I don't know if one of the guests got violent and hurt some other people

or if it was like a gas leak kind of thing. So, Jack and I have settled in for the evening. We're going to leave one of our recorders going for the night to see if we pick anything up. But so far, it's been kind of quiet. We booked one of the infamous second floor rooms, so if there's any ghosts here, Please be nice to us.

As far as ghosts in the afterlife go, what are your beliefs? Real, not real? I think if you want to believe something hard enough, you can manifest it. Or you can misinterpret everyday things for something paranormal, if there's enough adrenaline pumping through your system. I think death is permanent, and most experiences people have are just products of their imagination. Wow. What? I gave you an honest answer.

What a bummer. I can't believe I'm marrying you. So, if I die before you, you don't want me to visit you? You're allowed to visit me. You're the only ghost allowed to visit me. I don't have time for any other hauntings. Got myself a romantic, folks. I'm cutting this all out, I swear.

I don't ever have to leave now. About you? So, I'm convinced my grandpa's spirit is still in our garage. There's just weird stuff that happens. I remember I used to hear him out there on his workbench banging away at something, and sometimes I still do, even when I'm the only one there. That's sweet. It really is.

Maybe ghosts just don't bother with me. I mean, why would they? After everything you just said? Okay, stop. The rest of the audio is my son. sister wrapping up the episode, and nothing strange happens. Again, my sister won't admit that there's anything off about the audio. But again, this was the last episode she ever recorded. I have no idea what to make of it. I believe it's possible that she recorded it as a prank to her listeners,

but got so swept up in her marriage and being a new mom that this episode never aired, and she forgot she ever did it. It's strange that there aren't any other versions of the audio on the computer, though. The other possibility is that she's pranking me. If she is, I guess I'll find out. And I suppose we can't rule out that she really did record something unexplainable in that hotel without realizing it and just isn't comfortable talking about it. If history is to be believed, those people were never found, and the original owner was never heard from again. I'll let you draw your own conclusions.

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well, creepy. But maybe there's something more going on than a child's flight of fancy. In this tale, shared with us by author C.K. Walker, we find out that the terror is more than just a world of imagination. Performing this tale are Mike Delgado, Nicole Goodnight, Nicole Goodnight, Nicole. Joel Doolin, Jeff Clement, Jessica McAvoy, Aaron Lillis, Atticus Jackson, and Alexis Bristow. So don't worry about the voices around us or the voices above us. Just worry about the voices underneath us.

119 Sabre Lane, I was 13, and my little sister was 5. She was the first one to hear the voices. Dad left our family for a co-worker, and 119, saber was all my mom could afford. It was an older house in a very rural neighborhood and a bit rundown, but there was a room for each of us, and Mom did her best. Because the house was small, all of Letty's toys were moved into the basement. I didn't like it much down there, concrete floor, cement walls, and a smell that can only be described as wet. Mom put some fun rugs down there for Lettie to play on, and unlike me, my sister loved it. She called it her

second bedroom. About a month after we moved in, my sister turned six. We were further away from her school, and Mom had a hard time getting anyone to make the drive for her birthday party. We threw her one anyway, a little party, just the three of us. Lettie smiled and clapped her hands, but I could tell that she was sad that none of her friends had showed up. A few weeks later, Lettie started talking about new friends that lived in the basement. Mom told me I always had imaginary friends at that age too and not to bother Letty about them. But I thought it was weird that hers only lived in the basement. So I decided to ask her about them anyway. I waited until a Saturday when mom was working, which wasn't hard because she worked most Saturdays. I found Lettie in the

basement, as usual, sitting on a green and purple rug, racing her toy horses around a track. Hey. Hey. She smiled at me. She had a cute little. old cherub smile, big dimples, and a toothy grin. I remember that. Are you playing with your friends? She shook her head, black curls swinging around her shoulders. No, they're not here. Oh. I sat down next to her and picked up one of her little horses. Do they play horses with you? No, Andy, don't be dumb. Why can't they play horses with you? Because they live underneath us. I frowned at her and set the horse down.

She picked it up immediately and began brushing its hair. Underneath the floor? Yeah. I hear them sometimes, especially at night. My eyes fell to the concrete. You can hear voices underneath this floor. Yeah. You could too if you wanted to play down here with me.

I stood up and slowly walked around the room, looking for vents or something that could be filtered. the noise from the TV down there. But there was nothing. Nothing but a drain in the floor. Oh, do the voices come through this drain? Lettie shrugged, but didn't look at me. What do the voices say?

At that, she finally paid attention, jumping up from the floor and then jumping around the room as if she'd been waiting for this question for years. All sorts of things. They say hello? They say don't. They say, I didn't. didn't. Sometimes they even say bad words. Bad words? Like what? She giggled and then did a spin and sat back down.

I can't say I'm not allowed. Is it, is it more than one voice? Like different voices? Yeah, a lot of different ones. What else do they say? But she had lost interest in the conversation. All sorts of stuff. Do you want to play with me? No. I don't. I'm going to go watch TV. I stood up. Mom always finds out when you watch bad movies. Hey, Mom is my problem. Listen, will you come get me when you hear the voices again?

Yeah, okay. She shrugged. I started up the stairs. We're confused than ever. Did Mom need to know about this? Was Lettie okay? I decided to Google it as I reached the top of the stairs. Andy!

I walked a few steps back down, then bent my head under the railing so I could see her. What? Do you want me to come tell you if they're just screaming, but not saying words? Sometimes they just scream? Yeah, sometimes. Yeah. Tell me next time you hear anything.

The following Tuesday afternoon started pretty normally. I had pretty much forgotten about Lettie's friends, and middle school was going to be over in a couple of weeks. That day I saw mom as soon as I got home from school, she was on her way out the door to her second job. God, I couldn't wait until I was 16 so I could work. I wanted to help my mom and my sister, but mom said I could do that just by keeping my grades up and staying out of trouble. But I wanted to do more. As soon as the door to her car slammed shut, Lettie came running down the stairs. Andy, you missed them. They were talking while you were at school. I dropped my bag on the kitchen

table. What were they saying? Some were saying bad words, but I heard a lady saying, I had to do it. You weren't here. What else? What else did they say? I heard a loud noise, like banging. Like a gun? No, like a thump. Thump, thump, thump. And then what did you hear? A man saying no a lot. He sounded sad. I didn't like it. Anything else? Ledy shrugged. I don't know. I can't remember. Next time you hear anything, Lettie, you come and get me. She frowned. You were at school.

Then you get Mom. Lettie looked at the floor and she shook her head. I don't want to get Mom. I took her by the shoulders. Lettie, look at me. She did. It's very important that we figure out if other people besides you can hear the voices. The people under the floor can hear each other.

Yeah, but can anyone else up here hear them? Or is it just you? They're my friends. Maybe they don't want to talk to you. Just promise me you'll come get one of us. Lettie? She pulled away from me. Fine, I promise. That night I made Lettie dino nuggets for dinner and then put her to bed at eight. Mom wouldn't be home from work until almost one, so I decided to do some investigation on my own. The things Lettie said she was hearing,

didn't seem to be from the mind of a six-year-old. I knew in my gut that she was hearing something. I just needed to figure out what and where it was coming from. I decided to do some gaming since it would be boring down there sitting in the basement for hours, so I brought the laptop down. The Wi-Fi strength was pretty weak, but it was better than nothing. All was quiet. I decided it must be a TV she was hearing, you know, filtering down from the upstairs somehow,

because all the TVs were off now, and it was silent, no voices or anything. So silent, in fact, that I fell asleep on the beanbag chair. Sometime around one, I was awoken by the sound of someone stomping down the basement stairs. Mom? She appeared at the bottom of the steps, a small but mighty woman. I sure never messed with her. Andy, what are you doing up so? late. And who are you talking to? I sat up and rubbed my eyes, letting the laptop slide to the floor.

Nobody. I fell asleep. Yes, you were. Do you have a phone I don't know about? Oh, I told you. I was sleeping. She raised an eyebrow at me. You've never been a sleep talker. You heard a voice? I heard you. I heard talking as soon as I opened the door to the basement. What did I say? I jumped up off the beanbag. She sighed, leaning her body back against the railing, a bearing of pure exhaustion. I don't know.

It was too quiet. Now please go to bed. I gotta be up at seven. Okay. I laid awake the rest of the night thinking one thing. Mom had heard them too. The night I finally caught them, was a month later. I'd been down in the basement occasionally and still hadn't heard shit,

but Letty did, but it always seemed to be while I was at school, until one day it wasn't. My sister shook me awake at 2.37 in the morning. Her eyes were wide and her cheeks were pink with excitement. Come on, they're talking. I was out of bed and running, as quietly as I could, down the stairs to the basement door. As soon as I shot the door behind us, I turned, to Lettie on the stairs. What were you doing in the basement in the middle of the night? She frowned at me, pulling her cute little eyebrows together. Friends are awake.

They're not your friends. Yeah, they are. Come on, come down the stairs. She took my hand and led me to the bottom. Her toys were spread out everywhere, as if she had indeed been playing down there at two in the morning. You shouldn't be out of bed in the middle of the night. How often do you do this? When I don't want to be alone and I want to be around my friends?

When you're lonely? Shh. You have to be quiet if you want to hear them. She pulled me to the center of one of her rugs, and we sat down cross-legged and facing each other. What were they saying? They were talking about their babies. They have babies?

Lettie nodded. Sometimes I hear the babies cry. We sat in the silence for a few moments. Letty, did they ever talk back to you? She looked at me and frowned. Sometimes. Does it ever seem like they can hear you? I don't think they can.

Then she put her little finger to her lips. I didn't have to wait very long. It came up through the floor beneath, just like she said, a long, slow wail, and not as quiet as I would have thought. It was the keening of something suffering. What is that? I jumped up from the floor and Lettie grabbed onto my hand, pulling me back down. I waited again.

There was nothing until I could make out a woman's voice. She was hysterical. He's dead. Then a man's voice, flat and uninterested. It is dead. Lettie picked up one of her Barbies and began changing its clothes, as if she'd heard this shit every day or something. I listened for a few more minutes.

but there was nothing. Another hour, but all silence. Letty had already fallen asleep on the rug beside me. I carried her to bed, then tried to fall asleep in mine. But all I could think was, there were people living under our house. I hemmed and hawed about telling Mom, she was under a lot of stress dealing with so much and on no sleep. I didn't want her to worry until I had evidence to back up my claims. I spent all my nights in the basement. And she noticed, my grades started to slip. I barely acknowledged my own 14th birthday. And when I did, it was to ask for something, even though I knew it was hard for her. I begged mom to get me a cell phone for my birthday that year. And she picked up extra shifts to get it, but I got it. I felt awful for my mom. But I needed something

that I could record with. And over three weeks, I collected the following recordings, screaming. Lots and lots of screaming. I started to think that maybe there was a tunnel under the house. Like maybe people used the tunnels to cross our rural area. I asked our neighbors and my teachers, but everyone said there were no underground tunnels. I thought I could hear the voices best through the drain, but I recorded from a few different corners of the room and it didn't seem to matter. They were all just coming up through the floor.

And then, one night, I heard someone die. I know that's what I heard. I heard. I wasn't recording at the time, but I still remember every word. Please, please, no, let me beg. I'm the only one, and you're several. You can't. He kept yelling it the whole time, but I guess they could. I don't know what they did to him, but he went from yelling to moaning, to what I would later understand was a death rattle. A few minutes later, a man said,

He's back. I was scared. I was confused. And suddenly I realized I was screaming, stop at the top of my lungs. The basement door banged open. and my mom came running down the stairs in her pajamas. She shook me like she thought she was rousing me from a nightmare. And I kept screaming. Stop! Just before she picked me up off the floor, I heard two words come from underneath the cement. Two words that started everything. Two words that I would hear

in my nightmares for the rest of my life. Words that don't really mean a whole lot to obey. basement floor. Her mom left the next morning. I took Letty by her tiny shoulders, looked her in the eyes, and made her promise not to talk to the people underneath the basement anymore. I told her that they were bad people who would hurt her. She nodded, watery eyes blinking rapidly and then promised she wouldn't. Even if they talk to you or try to get your attention, you don't talk back, okay? Okay, I promise. I'll be your friend. You don't need them. Will you play with me?

I'll play with you. And I'll start taking you to the park so you can meet some kids your own age. The park is too far away. Mom has to drive us. Then I'll carry you. Just promise you won't talk to them anymore. And no more going into the basement in the middle of the night. Okay? But it didn't matter what she said. because two days later mom came home and wanted to talk to me about something. She made good points, but I argued anyway. It's just temporary.

No, I won't live with him. Just until the end of the school year. No, letty needs me here, and so do you. And what about what you need? All the nightmares, the screaming. Your grade's a horrible, Andy. Maybe being at dads for a few weeks will help center you. His new place is much closer to your school,

and you can see your friends more. It won't be so bad, right? Mom! This isn't up for discussion, Andrew. I'm worried about you. She rose from the kitchen table as if that was it. We were done. No way in hell.

I am not leaving you guys here alone. Mom, there are people living under our basement. I've heard them to the floor. Lettie's heard them too. Oh, stop it, Andy. Don't bring your sister into this. It's true. I have recordings.

The other night when you heard me screaming, that wasn't a nightmare. They were killing someone down there. That's enough. Listen, if you just, if you listen, you'll hear it. Wait, let me get my phone. I said that's enough. Just listen, Mom, please. She said nothing, but she didn't move either.

so I ran to get my phone from my room. I played her the recordings, all of them. She told me they were clearly from a gangster movie on TV or a crime show. She accused me of trying to trick her, to scare her, to scare my little sister. Please, Mom, just ask Lettie. She'll tell you, I'm telling the truth. And your version of the truth is that there are people living in a room underneath our house. I hesitated.

It might be more like a tunnel or something. My God. Why won't you believe that? Maybe it's left over from the Underground Railroad. Andy, that is not what the Underground Railroad is. How do you know? And this is Oregon. Mom, please.

Next time I hear them I'll come get you. Mom sighed. And in that relaxation of her face, I saw her collapse a little inside, her sadness, her desperation to take care of us. Oh, please, Mom, don't make me go live with them. Lauren is nice. Lauren is a bitch. Andrew.

I saw her try to find the swell of energy she needed to yell at me for what I'd said, but her reserves were gone. And after letting my name linger limply in the air for a moment, she closed the argument. Go pack. Why? Go. Your dad will be here in an hour or so. Out of sheer pettiness, I packed as little as I could get away with. Dad's house wasn't my home, and I didn't plan to stay long.

I would beg him. And he didn't really want me or Letty around anyway. It wouldn't take much. I knew it wouldn't. I looked up for my bag of boxers and T-shirts to find Letty hanging in the doorway. To Dad's, just for a little while. Am I going to? I licked my lips.

How could I tell her I was leaving her alone when I just promised not to? I'll be back really soon, Lettie. Tears filled her brown eyes. You did go. I walked over to the doorway and knelt down to give her a hug. Do you remember your promises? She nodded her head fervently and buried her head in her stuffed dinosaur. And never at night, right?

Okay. Mom said I'm coming back this weekend to stay over on Saturday night so she can work. So I'll see you on Saturday night, okay? Okay. My dad's, he paid no attention to me, which was fine, but Lauren kept trying to engage me. She was younger than my dad and her desperate attempt to play mom was obvious. I ignored her, like I ignored everything in that house. I called Letty, or she called me, every day.

But I knew she was getting lonely out there. Mom had to hire a sitter for when she worked nights, and Letty didn't like her much. I worried a lot about my sister. But to be honest, it was nice to be so close to my friends again. Sometimes I forgot about Lettie and the people under the basement. To this day, I can't remember what I was doing that was so much more important. The first Saturday back, Lettie gave me the biggest hug her little arms could manage.

She wouldn't leave my side, even when Mom tried to make her so that she could show me something. I asked our landlord for the most recent survey of this property. She gave it to me, and I want you to look at this, Andy. Mom turned to the laptop toward me. I had no idea what I was looking at. What does all this say? It says that there's nothing underneath our house. There are no rooms or tunnels, just dirt.

But, Mom! I showed you this in the hopes that you would drop your prank. Do you really want to scare your little sister? I'm not scared. They're my friends. They are not your friends. She pushed away from me, and her chin started to wobble. They said you're not my friend. They said you left me, and they never would.

I had to leave you. Mom and Dad made me! Are you seriously talking to them? Did you break your promise, Lettie? I'm all alone all the time. You're mean to me and take away my friends. Stop! Both of you!

Now, I don't know who started this, but I want it to end. We have a two-year lease here, and we have to manage. If you two are scared of the basement... I'm not scared! Mom gave her a cutting look. If you two are scared of the basement, then we can board it up. Move all of Lettie's toys to her room. But there's no room.

We'll make room, Lettie. Now go outside, both of you. Fine. Come on, Lettie. Lettie had a stash of plastic fairies in the dying garden. No one had time to take care of. I hated being outside there. We were surrounded by forest, but it was sparse and brown and ugly.

I walked into it anyway. I remembered when we first moved here. I'd wanted to explore it, see if there were any secret caves or treehouses or clubhouses or old abandoned cars or crashed planes. I'd never found one interesting thing, though. As I walked around swatting flies and sharp tree branches out of my face, I began to feel like someone was out here with me. It was just something I felt.

Our neighbors were far away, but the voices under the house belonged to someone. and I didn't know who or why or where they were or how they got in. I'd done my research, you know. I decided maybe it was like a secret tunnel for kidnappings or human trafficking, whatever that meant. Secret, illegal slavery, I think. I could hear the things they said and the things they did. These were bad people.

And now it sounded like they were talking to my sister, like they were now aware of her. The girl came out of nowhere. One minute I was walking and talking to myself, and then I looked up, and she was there. She was older than me, maybe in her early twenties, and she was filthy. Oh. Are you lost? No.

Are you? Of course not. I live here. In the forest? No, idiot, down the path. I looked to where she was pointing. That's a path? She shrugged.

It is to me. I looked her over again, torn muddy jeans, ripped sweatshirt, a rat's nest on her head that had once been strawberry blonde hair. Why are you so dirty? She shrugged again. I like to dig. Aren't you too old to be playing in the woods? Aren't you too young to be alone in them?

I watched her sit down and, honest to God, start digging a hole in the dirt with her hands. What are you digging for? Treasure, I guess. You ever find anything? Nope. She just kept digging. If she wasn't answering my questions, I'd have thought she was oblivious to me,

truly, in her own world. Then why keep looking? Denao. Something to do. I kicked at her little pile of dirt. Don't you want, like, a shovel or something? You could dig a lot deeper. At that, she looked up. I pulled my foot away from the dirt pile.

I'm sorry. You don't want to go digging too deep around here. I raised an eyebrow. Why not? Because you might fall through. She went back to her digging. Are you sure you don't want like a stick or something? Why would I need a stick?

Okay. What could you fall through too? She didn't answer. You know, we're rent in 119 Saber Lane. She nodded violently, kept digging. Of course I knew that. There's voices under the basement sometimes. She nodded.

There's voices under a lot of basements. Don't talk to them. They can't hear you unless you talk to them. They don't even know you're there. Well, they already... Well, I think they already know about my sister and me. She stopped digging, but didn't look up at me. You talked to them?

I thought I heard... Then I realized I was screaming through the floor at them. My sister said they're talking to her now, telling her things, telling her lies. The girl started pushing all the dirt back into her hole. Then she turned sideways and started digging a new hole. Who are they? Lost people.

They seem like bad people. You would be too if you were down there as long as them. Why can't they come out? She snapped her eyes to mine. Who said they couldn't? Where? The earth is thin here. Don't go too deep.

What do you mean? They're not for you to hear. It's unnatural. I stepped back from her. You're crazy. The girl stood up, wiped her hands off on her dirty jeans. No, I'm not, but it doesn't matter what you think. Yes, it does.

No, it doesn't. Why not? Because if they want to get out, they have to pull someone in, and maybe it'll be you. But... You showed them where the earth is thin. You shouldn't have done that. What will they do? Dig into my basement? They don't have to. They can pull you down.

One for one. They'll be up here, and you'll be down there. Forever. I don't believe you. I don't care. I have to go. I left the digging girl there and ran, and I mean, sprinted back to my house. Mom was in the kitchen making Letty lunch. I fell into a chair beside her. Lettie, look at me.

She did. No more going into the basement ever, okay? You can keep all your toys in my room. Play with them. Will you do that? Never ever? I think your brother's right, honey. I want you to stay out of the basement.

We will. Right, Lettie? I'm my friends. They're not your friends, okay? They tell you nice things, but they don't mean them. She stared at her mac and cheese, kicking her feet back and forth under the table. No one. You'll have me?

You promise to call me every day? Yes. Pinky promise? Pinky promise. Now you. You promise not to go in the basement? Pinky promise. Letty and I had never broken a pinky promise in our lives. We would both break this one. I was at dads for another two weeks, and I was good to my word. I talked to Lettie every morning and every night. And then, just before middle school graduation, and the weekend I would be coming home, I forgot to call Letty.

Jason was having a party at his parents' house. It was my first, you know, cool party since parents wouldn't be home. Dad didn't care, so I didn't mention it. I had my first beer and my first kiss that night. I got high, and I forgot about our call. I had no idea what it would cost, Lettie. The next morning, a little hungover, I packed up my things excited to go.

home to my mom and sister. Dad said she was picking me up at noon. But she didn't show up. Dad was annoyed I could tell, and then he got mad, and he blew up her phone. And then finally, finally, she called him back. Lettie was missing. Dad drove me over there looking both afraid and irritated. I'd never seen him care about anything enough to be scared. That made me more scared. As soon as we got there, Dad sent me to my room so he could talk to the cops with Mom. I tried to listen, but an officer spotted me and took me to my room to interview me. He asked me a bunch of questions, and I was honest. I didn't tell him about the voices.

There was yelling. I could hear Dad yelling at Mom about how this was her fault. The cops tried to calm him down and threatened to arrest him. I heard him yell that now all his plans for the day were shot. I never liked my dad very much. Most of the cops left to interview the neighbors. Dad went home. Mom sat in the kitchen, crying.

The officer that had interviewed me told me what he knew. Lettie didn't know anyone in this area, didn't like to leave the house. I already knew that. Lettie had bugged my mom about using the phone to call me. Mom had led her, but I didn't pick up. Lettie went to bed sad. Lettie was not in bed the next morning.

morning. Nothing was out of place. No one seems to have broken in. He didn't say it, but I knew what they thought. Lettie missed me and had left to go find me. But I knew it was worse than that. She hadn't left the house. She was under it. As soon as he left, I pulled out my cell. One missed. You said you would call every day and you promise. Today is a day and you didn't call and I have no one to talk to. Can you call me? Mom went to bed or at least went to her room around midnight. I crept down the stairs across the main floor and into the basement.

The cops had been down there. They dusted and photographed looking for anything, any clue, any answer. But the answers were beneath the floor. I laid down on the concrete and waited, but there were no voices that night. Letty? I called to her many times throughout the night, but she never answered. I was dead inside. I slept in the basement.

Mom was beyond caring. And the voices were back, but I no longer recorded them. I yelled at them to ask about Lettie, but they never heard me, and I never heard her. So then I wondered, maybe she had run away to find me. Maybe some nice family took her in and she's still too scared to tell them her real name. Maybe, maybe, maybe. I saw the digging girl again. About a month later, mom had gone numb and I hated being at the house with her.

She wasn't even sad. She was just empty. So I had to get out. I went out into the woods because I'd been thinking. about what the digging girl had said, that the earth was thin here. Don't dig too deep. Well, maybe I wanted to dig deep. Maybe I wanted to fall through. Just like last time, I found her digging. Took a couple of days, but I found her. My sister's gone. I know. From the news.

My friend told me. How do I get her back? She laughed. I noticed the hole she was digging was much deeper than before. You can't get her back. Well, then maybe I'll dig a hole deeper than yours. Dig until I fall through, and then I'll find her. Even if you fell down there, you would never find her. Why not? Because that's the point, dummy.

I watched her for a moment. What is that place? She stopped digging and looked up at me thoughtfully. It's sort of like hell, I guess. If you're lost or angry, you go there. What does it look like? I don't know. It's hard to see. Like a cave system, maybe.

Really dark and cold. And it's a terrible labyrinth. You never know where you are and if you've been there before. How do you know all of this? And the souls down there with you. They're lost too. Sometimes they're cruel. Sometimes they're indifferent.

It's much better up here. I swallowed. Were you wise? One of them? She started giggling. It was a hysterical sound. I backed away from her, turned when I had enough distance, and started running away. But I heard what she called after me, just before the winds took it.

Don't talk to the man in the woods. He doesn't know where he is yet. But I didn't see any man in the woods. Two months later, our landlord gave mom permission to break the lease. She couldn't be there anymore. in that house, but we were in town because mom wanted to keep close. Everybody understood. The town had been through it before. Someone else went missing a few years back. Everyone knew what had happened at 119 Sabre Lane, so no one rented it. I snuck out of our

apartment at night sometimes and walked there. I did start to see a man in the woods, but his back was always to me, and he was never moving, just, standing, looking at something, I avoided him. It was almost a year before I finally heard Letty through the basement floor. I was laying on the concrete, empty of rugs and creature comforts now, strumming my guitar on my stomach. I'd learned Ledy's favorite song. I put her name in the lyrics. It was nearly 4 a.m. and I was strumming lazily, singing her name, nodding off. Andy? My eyes snapped open and I pushed the guitar off my stomach and flipped over.

Letty, Lettie? Andy. Andy, where are you? I can't see you. I'm in the basement. I'm above you. Can you hear me? Lettie.

Yes, there's nothing above me. Lettie. Are you okay? Are you hurt? I don't know. I'm very, very lost and I can't see anything and it's cold. And I don't know what time it is. Are you moving home?

Christ. She had no idea how long she'd been gone. Lettie, how long have you been down there? I don't know. I might die and get confused. Every time you die? Yeah, I die a lot. Fall down the holes a lot.

Something follows me like an animal. I stay away from people now. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, Lettie. Why did you go down into the basement? You promised! I'm sorry. I got lonely, you didn't call me you. Pinky promise that you would. Listen, the earth is thin here. Can you feel that? Can you pull yourself up? Or pull me down there?

There was silence for a moment. How do I do that? I don't know, but you have to try. Listen to my voice. Pull me down. Nothing. Lettie? There's something coming. Then she was gone. And then everything was silent.

I didn't hear her again for a while. The house eventually got rented, and I couldn't sneak in anymore. I looked for the digging girl a lot, but she was rarely around and barely answered my questions before breaking into insane laughter. The man in the woods started to face me. He started moving. He even tried smiling eventually.

When I turned 18, I rented 119 Sabre Lane. When I turned 25, I bought it. But I never had a family or even a girlfriend. I spent most of my time in the basement, talking to the floor. I wanted someone to hear me, to pull me down there. But the earth didn't seem as thin anymore. They never heard me, and no one pulled me through. My mom got remarried when I was 30.

I was happy for her, but I skipped the wedding. Instead, I stayed home with expensive digging equipment I'd rented that weekend. I turned up the earth. I dug as deep as I could on my property. But it was just dirt and more dirt. The digging girl showed up the second day on the edge of my property watching me, interested in the dig, I suppose. She was older now, almost 40, but still dirty.

When I told her what I was doing, she laughed. That's not how you fall through. I never did figure out how you fall through when the digging girl eventually moved on. The man in the woods left too. I talked to Lettie about four times over 30 years. I lived for those days, and they were so few. She was always six years old, and she was always confused.

She never stayed underneath the basement, because she said bad things live up here. Every time I talked to her, it was harder to hear her. The earth was thickening. The veil was closing. Our last conversation was the saddest one. I was almost 50, and Lettie thought I was our dad. I told her how much I loved her and missed her,

but she just kept asking for Andy. She wouldn't believe that I was Andy. She thought I was lying to her, tricking her. She started crying. She told me that Andy must have abandoned her. And if he didn't love her anymore, that she was never coming back. And she said some things I couldn't understand because she was crying too hard. And her voice was so faint.

And she was right. She never did come back. And within a year, the voices were gone altogether. I guess if there is a lot of them. lesson here, it's this. If you hear voices under the floor, don't talk to them. Board up the house and move away. I live in an apartment in Portland now, far from the thin earth of the countryside. I still wake up sometimes to screams, but they're always mine. The spells are wearing off for now, but the magic will linger. The shop will be open again next week.

with more spells to enchant you. If you would like to find out how you can hear the full-length versions of our audio program, please visit the no-sleeppodcast.com to learn about our season past program. On behalf of everyone at the No Sleep podcast, we thank you for listening. This audio production is copyright 2020 by Creative Reason Media, Inc. All rights reserved. The copyrights for each. story are held by the respective authors.

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