The NoSleep Podcast - NoSleep Podcast S7E01

Episode Date: April 10, 2016

It's episode 1 - the Season Premiere of Season 7. We kick off our new season with five tales about punishing pursuits, shocking slumber, and morbid memories."The Earth, the Air, and You" written by M.J. Pack and production, main narration, and score by Jeff Clement. Featuring performances by Nikolle Doolin, Erika Sanderson, Jessica McEvoy, and Corinne Sanders. (Story starts at 00:03:40)"The Mary Hillenbrand Cassette" written by Jimmy Juliano and read by Peter Lewis & Jessica McEvoy & Nikolle Doolin & Dan Zappulla. (Story starts at 00:29:30)"The Nightmare" written by Harlan Guthrie and read by Brian Mansi & Erika Sanderson. (Story starts at 01:06:20)"Have You Seen This Girl?" written by Alex Green and read by Jessica McEvoy & Erika Sanderson. (Story starts at 01:19:00)"The Tall Dog" written by Elias Witherow and read by David Ault & Erika Sanderson. (Story starts at 01:34:20)Click here to learn more about the voice actors on The NoSleep Podcast Click here to hear "Part 1 - Soft White Damn," the first tale on episode S5E18 (starts at 04:20) Click here to hear "Part 2 - Sure to Follow," the first tale on episode S6E08 (starts at 04:45) Click here to hear "Part 3 - The Earth, the Air, and You," the first tale on episode S6E25 (starts at 04:10) Click here to learn more about M.J. Pack Click here to learn more about Jimmy Juliano Click here to learn more about Harlan Guthrie Click here to learn more about Elias Witherow Podcast produced by: David CummingsMusic & Sound Design by: Brandon Boone & David Cummings"The Tall Dog" illustration courtesy of Charlie CodyAudio program ©2016 - 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

Be forewarned, this is a horror fiction podcast. By listening to our stories you are choosing to be frightened and disturbed for your entertainment, you do so at your own risk. Brace yourself for the No Sleep Podcast. Episode 1, Good When is that? The Nightmare. Have you seen this girl? The Tall Dog.

It's the No Sleep Podcast. I'm David Cummings. Thanks for joining us. On this week's show, we have five tales about punishing pursuits, shocking slumber, and morbid memories. We're glad you're with us as we kick off our seventh season. We have lots of great stuff planned for season seven, especially because we'll be celebrating our fifth anniversary in a couple of months. We'll have a special bonus episode and maybe some other treats in store for you as we prepare to put five candles on our cake. We want to send out a huge thank you to all the season past members who pre-ordered their season past seven during our break. You folks are very special to us. And for those of you who are waiting until now to get your own season past seven, you can head over to the no sleeppodcast.com and grab yours today with our sincere thanks. So what do we have in? store for you this week. Well, we welcome back voice actor Brian Manzi to the show. Brian performed a number of stories back in season four, and we're glad he's back with us again.

Brian hails from the UK, so between him, David, Erica, and James, it feels like another British invasion all over again. Those of us in the colonies better watch out, or at least be extra grateful to have such wonderful voice actors from across the pond. And just before we kick off this week's show, I want to give you an update on our ongoing presentation of Jeff Clements' production of the Danny series from author MJ Pack. There is one more installment left in the series, the gripping finale, and it will be featured very soon in season seven. In fact, so soon that it will be our very first story on this episode. So if you haven't had a chance to hear the first three parts,

respectively titled Soft White Dam, Sure to Follow, and Every Leaf is a Flower, just check the show notes in your podcast app or on our website to get links to those installments. After you're caught up on those parts, you can take the plunge into the finale. Seems a little odd, doesn't it? A finale, concluding a series as the first story of our season's premiere episode. Well, dear listeners, our break is over. We're back into our new season, and Danny awaits. Let's wait no further and start the show.

In our first tale, we rejoin Danny as he desperately attempts to get away from whatever is pursuing him. In the conclusion of MJ Pack's unnerving series, Danny returns to a familiar location, sure that the final showdown will go in his favor. Narrated and produced by Jeff Clement, this tale also features the performances of Nicole Doolin, Erica Sanderson, Jessica McAvoy, and Corinne Sanders. And now, the final installment, entitled The Earth, the Air. I went back to Arizona, to my dad's old place.

Like I said, I've got places all over, but most of them are mine. This one was my dad's. This one was my favorite. It took a few days to get my sleep schedule back on track, to get ready. Because after the snow, the mud, the leaves, I knew there was no escaping it. Best I could do was go back to the only place I considered home. My dad bought the place. A modest little bungalow plopped out in the middle of the desert.

Remote, private, you bet, after Ma filed for divorce. She found out what he'd been up to and finally found herself a spine. I don't think my dad much cared, to be honest. He didn't fight her. didn't screw her out of what she asked for either, gave her a fair amount of money and jetted down to sunny Arizona. Almost like he was relieved. I spent my teenage years bouncing back and forth between Ma's Place and my dad's.

It wasn't so bad. When I wasn't in school, my dad let me drink with him. He'd be in his armchair, the same bulky armchair that sits in my living room now, like a dozing brown bear. Nothing wrong with the little Jack Daniels between men, he'd say. What he didn't say was that even though I saw what he was doing in that strange house, I never told Ma, even though he belted me good when we got home that night.

I think that made him respect me. I didn't ask questions either when he left for long periods of time. My dad had always been private, and even though I was older, I had no doubt I'd get the belt again if I went snooping. When he got drunk, he could get mean, and sometimes he'd come back stinking plastered looking for a chore to keep him busy. No snow in Arizona, no walk to shovel. So every now and then I'd hear him out in the backyard, digging. He was the kind of man who had to keep his hands busy. Couldn't fault him for that, I guess.

Once I was back to normal, feeling like maybe I could stay up pretty late, I bought myself a bottle of Jack and settled in the living room, sank into my dad's old armchair. I turned on the television and began flipping channels. Sadly enough, I couldn't find overboard on anywhere. I drank my whiskey, kind of a lot of whiskey. And sure enough, after about an hour, it started. I switched off the television, finished my drink, poured another one.

I hear you out there, I called. Didn't take you too long this time, did it? What's it going to be? Huh? I demanded. Jack had made me brave, braver than before, so I slammed another swig back and felt the warmth spread through my stomach. Are you my dad? Are you me? Gonna yell at me for not shoveling the walk?

Ha ha. No snow out there, asshole. And no rain neither. We don't get any rain in these parts. Not that often. Just sand? and sun on one window, the one on the porch. Then I heard it in the kitchen, too,

and towards the back of the house, in the mudroom, tapping on all the windows. There were more this time. And when it spoke, that's when I knew I'd made a mistake, that I'd missed the whole, God damn point that I was absolutely utterly fucked. Not my dad, not me, not even the wordless babbling. Worse, much, much worse.

Danny, oh, Danny. It said in a sweet, feminine voice. A voice I didn't really recognize, but also sort of did. Danny. Oh, Danny. We're out here, Danny. We're here. You thought we couldn't find you, but we did. No. There was no way. I'd made sure. I'd been so careful. Danny. Danny. Danny Oh, Danny Danny

It crooned again And there was nothing wrong with the voice, really Just sounded like a normal lady Someone I might meet on one of my nights out Someone I almost certainly did Danny Oh, Danny You thought we couldn't get to you

But we did we're here come outside say hello oh Danny don't you like us anymore you liked us so much too much didn't you

I felt like my mouth had been stuffed full of leaves again my stomach wasn't warm anymore it lurched like I'd swallowed a gallon of cold thick Mud. Danny. Oh, Danny.

You just did what your daddy taught you. We're not angry, Danny. We're not mad. Those were our friends we sent before. We couldn't get to you first. So we sent them along. And they were the old ones. They were the angry ones.

But we are fresh and new. And we want to know. know why you left us, Danny. I gripped the glass of whiskey so tight I thought it might shatter. You can't be out there, I said, when I could move my tongue again. None of you. I made sure you couldn't walk. I made sure they shouldn't have been able to get out of the basement. I learned that. I learned from my dad If you let them stay mobile They can almost get away

That lady in the house that night Almost got away Because I distracted him At the window She bolted But my dad was faster And he took her down But I'm not that fast

So it was always just Easier To cut off their feet Oh Danny We figured it out We're smart girls, Danny. Did you know if you try hard enough, you can walk on your hands? It sounded so nice, like it wasn't mad at all, not like the others.

But, oh God, I wasn't sure it was telling the truth. It took us longer, the lot of us. Oh, Danny, it took us a while to try hard. enough, but we did. We can do it now, just like our friends, our angry friends. Oh, Danny, did you know when you're angry, you try much harder? Yeah, that I knew. When you think your dad is the best guy in the world, but really he's just a bully. He thinks he's so much better than you and hits you with the buckle end of his belt for just being a kid when it was him who was being bad.

Him who was in there strangling some woman who probably was going to tell Ma about what they'd been up to. When he punishes you again and again for doing things you didn't mean to do, like for getting to shovel the walk, for getting mud on the porch, for not getting all the leaves, leaves in the yard bagged just right.

Yeah, you get angry, and you try much harder. To be better than him. I think he only did the one, I mused, finally lifting the glass to my lips with a trembling hand. I think it was just the one, if I had to guess. But Danny. It said, and it sounded aroused. Like it was getting hot or something.

Danny, Danny, you did so much more, didn't you? At all, the windows. How were they tapping? If they walked on their hands, how are they tapping? Oh, God, as if any of this made any sense at all. How many of them were out there? Some of them? Dear God, all of them?

You left me in the basement, Danny. It said, sad now, pouty, a girlfriend who's not getting her way. You came back, oh, Danny, yes, you did. But I was so smelly by then. And when you left, I hadn't even gone yet. I was still there. Still alive. And my feet.

Oh, Danny. Why did you cut off my feet? It hurt Danny. Oh, Danny, you hurt me so. You hurt us so. Unbelievably, I heard more tapping. But this tapping was rain. It's fucking raining.

Again. You were all so easy, I said, wiping a thin sheen of sweat from my upper lip with the back of my hand. Buy you a few drinks, bring you home, knock you out. Maybe if it hadn't been so easy. Oh, Danny, don't lie. Don't be a little liar. You did it to show your daddy, didn't you? and you showed your daddy.

Oh, Danny, we know that now. We know what you did. Your daddy is awful mad at you for what you did. The rain fell harder, harder, like a fucking monsoon. I couldn't hear the tapping on the windows anymore, but I knew they were out there. All of them, because why not all of them? On the porch, something began running back and forth, back and forth. I thought I heard a little kid laugh, but couldn't be sure.

I felt like I was losing my mind. Thoughts were slippery and escaping from me. They were all. Are you sitting in his sleep? chair, Danny? It said, louder now to be heard over the downpour. Oh, Danny, are you sitting in the chair where you did it? He told us about it, Danny. He's awful mad at you. Oh, Danny. Oh, Danny. I had to wait till I got big enough, I murmured. Strong enough. I had to do it with my own hands, just like he did.

Danny, oh, Danny. You wrapped your big, strong hands around his neck, and you showed your daddy didn't you? Fifteen years ago, oh, Danny, oh, yes, Dan. Annie, that's what you did. We know what you did. Your daddy wants you to get what's coming to you. And now it's raining.

And now we're done talking. And now we are coming inside. And now you're going to be so sorry. The front door first opened. I heard windows. Windows in other rooms. All the windows, shattering. And there they were.

The blonde I'd brought home in Texas. The redhead with the huge tits I scored in Minnesota. The mousy little brunette I'd settled for in New Orleans. The one I'd left in the basement, the whatever on the porch came through the window. Scores of them. All of them. Have there really been that many?

Crawling through the broken glass, unaware of the way their rotten skin was being shredded to ribbons. A few were dragging themselves forward by their elbows, trailing bloody stumps where their feet had once been. Most, though, were walking on their hands. And God damn were they fast. They must have been angrier. than they let on. I dropped my drink and scrambled to the back of the house, to the kitchen where the

phone was. I tried to handle this myself and it was out of my hands. I had to get help. I had to get someone out here to help. Oh God, why had I moved to this godforsaken place in the middle of nowhere? Outside the rain poured buckets of it. When I got to the kitchen, I fumbled with the phone. on the cradle, nearly dropping it in my panic, and I looked behind me. They had me surrounded. My house stunk of decaying flesh. Some of the older ones, their jaws hung crookedly from their skulls. But they were just waiting. The ones on their elbows were crouched, tense, ready to pounce. The ones on their hands swayed in an eerie expert balance. Slowly, unaware if they could see me now that I was still.

Many of them had no eyes, after all, just gaping dark holes in their heads. I punched 9-1-1. I brought the phone to my ear. As the dead women watched, I told them. told the operator that I was being attacked and needed help. They said help was on the way. I wondered if it would be soon enough and replaced the phone on the hook.

The brunette, the mousy one from New Orleans, shifted back and forth, back and forth on her hands, like an excited little kid. Danny, oh, Danny, you're going to be so sorry. Sorry. She squealed through decaying lips. I wasn't even sure how she could make sounds with those lips.

A tittering spread through the crowd. A slurpy sort of giggling that almost couldn't be heard over the heavy rain. And he said in drum in unison. Shut up. Leave me alone. Stop. I put my hands over my ears. Stop!

I screamed. You were stupid slots! You were just like the one my dad did. You got what was coming to you. Oh, Danny. The brunette cried, as the rest of them kept saying my name. Oh, Danny. You showed your daddy.

You showed us. We're going to be so sorry. Now you're going to see your daddy again. You'll be like us. You'll get what's coming to you. Yes, you will. Oh. This said my name over and over.

It began to sound like a song. I rocked back and forth. back and forth, shouting nonsense at them, trying to drown out the rain and the chorus of dead women, crooning my name. I backed up against the sink, hands clamped over my ears. I don't know how long I was like that, but they got louder, louder, louder, until I cried out, triumphant, and opened my eyes to look at the 37 rotting bodies that filled the house where I'd murdered my father.

You hear that, you dumb bitches? That's the police! They're coming. They're going to save me. Indeed, the women had stopped singing, and through the rain I heard the distinctive wail of a cop-car's siren. but they were smiling. Oh, Danny, sighed the brunette from New Orleans. Look in the backyard.

My blood ran cold. No. There was no way. I turned and looked out the window that oversaw the backyard. The backyard of dry, packed, desert dirt. The backyard where my dad used to dig and where I eventually did my own digging too. He liked Arizona because it was dry, because it never rained. But tonight it rained, turns out, I was wrong.

He'd done more than one just like me. In the backyard, the tightly packed desert dirt was mostly gone. Under the downpour it had become a thin, murky soup. In it floated swollen, bloated carcasses. Bones stripped of flesh, a few heads that still had wispy hair on them, even as the skull gleamed beneath it. I knew they weren't all mine. Not that many bones.

But that didn't much matter. The siren was louder. now, right outside. It didn't take long for me to put the pieces together. They would see the bodies. They would check my other places. They would find out what I'd done with my big, strong hands. All because I couldn't wait in the car. I turned back to the living room and was unsurprised to find it empty. No rotting women. Those were in the backyard.

The interior of my house suddenly began to flash blue, red, blue. What is it they say about the sins of the father? It doesn't much matter. Because I lied. I'm not sorry. If you're old enough, you'll have... fond memories of those old audio cassette tapes. Mixed tapes, home recordings, no matter how you use them, cassettes played a big part in our lives. But if you ask author Jimmy Giuliano, his memories

might not be as fond. He explains how a high school reunion stirs memories of a mysterious audio tape which was rumored to be more than just an urban legend. A series of phone interviews with old friends shed some light on the darkness the tape held. Performing this tale are Peter Lewis, Jessica McAvoy, Nicole Doolin, and Dan Zapula. So have a look through your old tapes and make sure you don't have a copy of the Mary Hillenbrand cassette. Once that when we're scared, our skin emits chemicals that our noses can detect. This factoid pops into my head from time to time, and when it does, my thoughts inevitably drift back to high school. I'm right back in Sherry Miller's bedroom, sitting cross-legged and staring at the gray cassette tape in Sherry's trembling hand.

There's many distinct details about that cassette tape. The torn label, the faded MH initials. The chipping plastic at the corners, it just screamed ancient. But it's not those details that I remember most vividly, no. It's my twitching nose that sticks out in my mind, and the strange and foreign odor that climbed through my pores. It wasn't the usual teenage stank or my chronically under-deodorized, armpits which cranked into high gear when I was within five feet of Sherry Miller.

It was something different. It was pure, unadulterated fear. Those chemical, never in a thousand lifetimes did I think the Mary Hillenbrand cassette was real. Right in front of me, in the hand of my unrequited high school crush. And she wanted me to listen with her, begging me to. She couldn't do it alone. That was 20 years ago, which feels close to a thousand lifetimes. I hadn't spoken to anyone from high school pretty much since we threw our graduation caps into the June sky on the football field.

But with my 20-year reunion approaching, I guess I was feeling nostalgic. My reunion had a theme, artifact or fiction, which sounds pretty dumb, but that's what happens when people who weren't so clever to begin with try exceptionally hard to be clever to all of their old classmates. The premise of the theme, bring along artifacts from high school that you can't. can't believe are real, but yep, they do exist. So pretty much a show and tell for people in their late 30s showcasing somewhat embarrassing stuff from their teenage years.

A little sad, but so is the passage of time, I suppose. I expected most people to bring along Zubaz pants, maybe a Carmen Elektra CD or two. perhaps an old notebook with ridiculous doodles of stars, hearts, or animals. But for the life of me, I could only think of one artifact I wanted to showcase. The Mary Hillenbrand cassette. The only problem was I didn't have it. It was lost to time, or at least I thought it was.

I never did listen to it that night. in Sherry's bedroom. She gave it to me the spring of our senior year. I said I'd hold on to it, and I threw the damn thing in the trash instead. Stomped on it first, actually, watched it crack into dozens of pieces, and then I threw the pieces and the cassette reel in the trash. The fear I felt that day was real, and I remember. it clearly but time has this strange habit of making horrible things okay of dulling the senses in a way I was ready to revisit the story of the Mary Hillenbrand cassette tape and I was ready to reconnect with my forgotten friends of

the past I thought compiling an oral history of the cassette would be a neat addition to artifact or fiction. I pictured the reunion in my head. A former classmate slips on a pair of headphones and she listens to the oral history of the Mary Hillenbrand cassette. Her eyes twinkle with recognition. She smiles and nods as the voices of old friends dive deep into an urban legend from our childhoods. Everyone would get a kick out of it. It would be a kick out of it. It would fit right in with the football jerseys and goth clothes from Hot Topic. Wow, the Mary Helm brand cassette. I'd forgotten all about that. Man, I can't believe we thought that was real. Thanks for doing that. But like I said, time has this strange habit of dulling the senses.

That doesn't mean the fear wasn't real. As I discovered, as I discovered. it was still there. It just needed a little coaxing to crawl out of its cage. I phoned four friends I hadn't spoken to since high school. I told them about my little oral history project, and they each agreed to be interviewed and recorded over the phone. All of my interviews were conducted on an individual basis. In fact, I didn't tell.

any of my participants who else I was interviewing. I assumed it would get the whole tale as unfiltered and honest as possible. I've edited snippets of my interviews together here in a natural order which I believe tells the story from beginning to end. This voice is Sherry Miller. A Hillenbrand cassette. I haven't thought about that in ages. We have all this catching up to do, and you want to talk about that? And this guy is Jake, Jake Fredericks. Here's Trevor Hightower. I'm actually not thinking.

I know exactly what you're talking about. I just thought I'd sound crazy smart if I repeated it all slow and thoughtful-like. You can't see it right now, but I'm scratching my chin, like a professor. And the final voice is from Kathy Way. Sure, I remember the cassette. Was that legend about the woman in the lake? There was this lake a few miles outside of town, down some dirt roads. It was shaped like an X.

You know with the channels. If you looked at a map, it kind of looked like an X. I can't remember the name of it. Everyone called it Lake X. I lost my virginity there. That's what we should be talking about. The original name was Lake X-rated, named after yours truly. But they shortened it to Lake X because, you know, family values and whatnot.

And there was this island in the middle of it. Just a small, tiny island covered with evergreens. I think it was back in the 60s. Some kids got drunk out there and tipped their canoe coming home. They all drowned. Three of them, I think. It wasn't about the kids or kids. staying outlaid or drinking and canoeing without life jackets or anything like that.

It was something else. People said that island was unholy, cursed, or something like that. The Devil's Island. You just didn't go to the island. And if you did, you were absolutely nuts. Was this woman, Mary Hillenbrand. She was kind of a kooky old lady, lived alone, really into guise. I think. More crucifixes than the Vatican-type person.

And then one day, she goes missing. It was late winter right before the break of the spring, right before the ice on the lake broke. The police couldn't find her. No damn clue. The old bag vanished without a trace. They found Mary a year and a half. Police had gotten a tip from a hiker that some kids were having a bonfire on the island. The cop rode out there to check it out. He didn't find any kids, but he found some human remains. She had walked across the lake right before two before it thawed completely soon. Her body was there for almost two years. Can you believe that?

And I'm sure she had family somewhere. It's just so sad. Did she know what she was doing? Like, did she go out there to die? God, I'm getting goosebumps just thinking about it. It was me. I admit it. I'm the murderer. The perfect crime, right? Oh, sorry, this is incriminating. Can you clip that part out? You weren't using all of this, are you? But they found more than just the body. She had it with her.

It was buried, wasn't it? She buried it before she died, I think. But here's where the story gets really interesting. The tape recorder was empty. No cassette. Who brings a tape recorder? with no tape. She wasn't well. Everyone knew that. So there were a couple of scenarios.

Maybe Mary recorded something and threw the tape in the lake. I'll entertain that, sure. Not a lot of exercise opportunities out there, so tape throwing was a good way to work the old pitching arm. What's the other scenario? That she buried an empty tape recorder, croaked, and decomposed on top of it just to mess with every one. I like mysteries and all, but to have the foresight to pull a posthumous prank like that would be pretty remarkable.

And, wait, can you hear that? No, no, seriously, I hear laughing from beyond the grave. Oh, I stand corrected. Bravo, Mary Hillenbrand, Bravo! There were two questions everyone wanted to know. Where was the tape? It was cursed. That's what everyone said,

that the cassette had been touched by the devil himself. He had crossed over and hit the record button. And he was sitting there as Mary Hillenbrand went insane on the island. And there were rules for the tape, like it was some horror movie. Just don't listen to the damn thing. End of story. The legend said you were inviting a presence to latch on to you, and it would never leave.

There were fakes everywhere. It was a pretty popular prank around Halloween time. I used to pass out M.H. cassettes to trick-or-treaters. I'd like to think I was the number one cause of night terrors in the area. I heard no one goes to the lake anymore. Not just the island, but the lake itself. There were two shoreside cabins up there, and now they're totally abandoned. One of them belonged to Trevor's family, I think.

But people started seeing this red figure floating across the lake. There were a lot of sightings. Either Mary's ghost or the devil himself. That's what my dad told me a few years back. Not that I believe in this stuff, I think he just wants to keep his grandkids away from the lake. I doubt he really believes any of it either. But there's so many stories, it's just best to keep your distance.

You never know who you might run into up there. I've ever heard the real tape. Never seen it? Never heard it. Trevor was the first one to get the tape. At least he said he did. And she found it in the woods. Not the woods on the island, but the woods in the forest preserve. I mean, really?

Did the cassette fairy drop it there? It was 90 minutes long. Double-sided, so 45 minutes per side. The first side was mainly breathing, these long, labored breath. That part of the story always nagged up. Mary flipped over the tape to record more. It's just troubling to me in some weird way. I can't explain it. Trevor either passed it on or tried to get rid of it. You'd have to ask him. I wanted no part of it. Or she listened to something, I guess. I saw her one morning before Home Room and she looked like

absolute hell. All red-eyed, not made up. I made some jab about her. looking worse than usual, and for some reason she didn't slap me across the face. She said she'd been up all night listening to the Mary Hillenbrand cassette. She was obsessed with it. Couldn't stop. Side two? There was someone else there when Mary recorded that. There just had to be. I guess Side 2 is just Mary mumbling and screaming the whole time.

But if you listen closely, you heard Branches Snows. and breaking all around her. And if you turn the volume all the way up, there was something else. It was a second voice. Someone else on the island. It was just barely above a whisper. Very faint, but it was there. Something dark is how Kathy described it.

She and Jake had the tape first before they gave it to me. But I never listened. I just couldn't do it alone. Do you remember that night in my bedroom? I'm so glad I gave it to you. Hell no, I never had the cassette. And I wouldn't be crazy enough to listen to it, even if I did have it. I would have destroyed it, I guarantee you that.

I don't care if it was real or not. I just wanted to get rid of it. It just didn't feel right. Look, Kathy and Jake had a cassette with crazy stuff on it. Was it the cassette? Don't be stupid. It doesn't exist. It's kid stuff, spook stories, and I don't know what they did with their tape. You'd have to ask one of them, but I don't recommend it. The story was that you couldn't get rid of the Mary Hillenbrand cassette. It would always come back. It didn't matter if you crushed it or threw it in the ocean and watched it sink. It would return. It was just evil.

and it did terrible things to you if you listened. You don't believe any of this stuff, do you? It's pure fantasy. Urban legend rubbish. Yeah, Kathy said she didn't sleep and was obsessively listening to it. But her and Jake probably just got high and were up all night fooling around. Then they decided to mess with everyone in the morning. Have you talked to either of them recently?

Things aren't looking up for either of them. surprised if they're able to crawl out of the gutter to make it to the reunion. I'm doing well, thanks. And spent my time being a mommy and working. I'm looking forward to seeing everyone. Kathy went crazy. I heard through the grapevine that the state won't even let her see her kids anymore. She took them on some high-speed chase from nothing and almost drove them into a ravine.

Kathy said she was being followed, but the cops could never figure out who. And you know why? She imagines things. Has for a while. Fifty shades of messed up. I'm telling you. Ten miles from her kids is too damn close. Mommy crazy.

Have you heard from Jake? Jake isn't doing any better. A few years back, he drank a fifth of Jack and tried to poke his eyes out with a pair of scissors. Seriously. My sister heard the whole story. Apparently, he was always seeing something out of the corners of his eyes. It drove him nuts, so he got his MD and self-sizzar eye surgery.

His parents paid for plastic, so he looks better. But now the guy lives at mommy and daddies. Hasn't seen natural light in a while. It is a vampire. Kathy broke up back in the day. Made for each other. Freaking loony tunes, man. I tell you.

I freelance in computer programming. My dad isn't doing so well, so I moved back home to help my mom take care of him. That's life, you know? Oh, I keep busy. I do copy editing for the university. Get to meet a lot of interesting people. It's fun. I'm a nine-to-fiver, office drone.

You know that moment this morning when you opened up your bathroom drawer and took out your toothbrush, that scintillating moment, that's 100 times more interesting than what I do. I know it was all stories. I know that. And that tape I gave you that night in my bedroom wasn't the real thing. I'm pretty sure of that. Jake and Kathy were just fooling around, right? I'm just glad I never found out for sure, aren't you? Four friends. Four very friends. Four very people. different stories. I knew I couldn't present this at the reunion. It was too personal, too accusatory, too slanderous. I edited it together for myself to try and arrange the pieces. I was still baffled. I transcribed it to give it a more thorough examination, but the truth

still eluded me. One of them, or all of them, were lying. But why? I dug deeper. I did some Googling, checked social media profiles and groups and pieces of the stories, checked out, at least according to former classmates. Trevor wasn't the only person talking about Jake and Kathy's respective breakdowns. It was a common topic of conversation online amongst my old classmates.

Although I couldn't find any actual proof of the breakdowns being real, but everyone loved to talk and speculate. I found no evidence of the drowned teenagers, and as far as I knew, Mary Hillenbrand wasn't a real person. I couldn't confirm that she even existed in the first place, and that didn't surprise me. It was an urban legend, after all. The reunion was a week away, and that's when the emails came flying in. First Jake, then Kathy, both pleading with me not to do anything with their interviews.

I'm sure Trevor told someone about what he'd told me and it got back to them. People talk. I promised Jake and Kathy I wasn't going to be using the interviews. I was canceling the project. Sherry emailed me, apologizing for even talking about the Mary Hillenbrand cassette at all. She had never wanted to talk about it again, and she wasn't sure why she did. It was a mistake, and it was wrong, and word must have gotten back to her of who I interviewed. I shouldn't include anything from Trevor at all.

He's been strung out for years, she said, couch surfing his way through life and spewing nothing but lies and hate. The nightmare arrived the night before the reunion. In my dream, I was on Devil's Island, on Lake X, floating above my four former friends as they sat around a fire, smoking weed and passing around a bottle. The rest of the dream was just snapshots. Trevor's arm around Sherry pulling her close.

Naked limbs intertwine. Me floating and shouting, no one hears me. Screams, moans, Sherry looks up at the sky. Her eyes roll. into the back of her head. A hand digging into the dirt. The tape recorder. The cassette. Smoke billows upwards. It fills my lungs and I start gagging. Float away from the nightmare still choking on the smoke. I came to and I reached to my nightstand to grab my phone. My hand clasped away. My hand clasped. I clasped something else instead.

A cassette tape with M.H. emblazoned on a faded, torn white label. I turned it in my hand. It was unequivocally the same one from 20 years ago in Sherry Miller's bedroom. My nose twists smell of chemicals. And I'm not sure. I'm not sure what terrified me more. The fact that I was literally palming an urban legend,

something that I'd destroyed many years ago. Or the fact that someone was in my bedroom while I slept for the truth of the matter, desperate to discover if pieces of the stories my friends had told me were true. I dug out an old tape player from my basement, inserted the cassette tape, and my finger hovered over the play button, and the nightmare wore off. I felt silly for being fearful of a cassette tape. It was a fake, I reasoned, but I still couldn't listen. And after all that, I attended the reunion anyway. I'd come that far, and I was determined to get answers. Face to face, the truth would come out.

I had a few loosen-up drinks before I even left my home, and I arrived to a lively and bustling scene. Dance music pumped through the speakers, and artifacts from 30 years ago littered the banquet hall. Yearbooks, cheerleading outfits, old posters. People mingled, and everyone looked sparkling and beautiful. You drinking. One.

I spotted Jake, but he wouldn't even look at me. His polo shirts looked recently pressed. He laughed and smiled with classmates whose names I could not remember. I eaves dropped on a conversation Kathy was having with two guys. I remember being on the basketball team. She tossed her head. and told them stories about her kids and she couldn't believe how fast they were growing up. They were perfect, she said, and they loved their mommy, seven drinks.

Sherry was across the hall. More perfect than ever had the nerve to ask her out in high school, and I couldn't even approach her now. Phone calls were one thing. Eye contact was another. I remembered our fingers brushing as she handed me the Mary Hillenbrand cassette all those years ago. And I wanted our fingers to brush again to intertwine fully this time. A handsome man locked up beside her and put his arm around her.

Sherry looked up. smiled and he whispered something into her ear. She laughed at the joke that only they share. I slumped against the wall and I threw back the last of my drink. A figure sidled out next to me. I turned to my head which caused a slight bout of dizziness. My vision was blurred, but I recognized the features. It was two decades older, but it was Trevor's face.

He nodded over a cherry, leaned in and said softly. Did you know she's had like six abortions? That guy is about to make Lucky Number Seven. And they're not accidents. It's because she likes it. I wobbled and almost fell on to Trevor. He hoisted me back up. Dude, easy.

Yeah, everyone thinks Sherry is such a good girl. But trust me, she never was. She's full of shit. Just like everyone else here. They're all full of shit. Trevor walked towards the bathroom, and I slurred some words in his direction. Did you break into my house?

last night. Trevor stopped and he looked at me confused. What the hell is wrong with you? You don't look so hot. You should exfoliate more. He walked into the bathroom. As the door swung closed, I watched him remove the syringe from his pocket. A phone to cab and I stumbled into my house 50 minutes later. It was barely 10 p.m. when I hit the play button on the take player, alone in my bedroom. The Mary Hillenbrand cassette came to life. And like my nightmare of the previous evening, the details arrived in snippets, labored breathing, giggling.

Screaming and more screaming. Twigs cracking and breaking. A deep whisp. I could barely get out of bed in the morning. My head threatened to split wide open and spill my brains onto the floor. I lurched to my feet and yanked the cassette tape from the player, not sure if I had listened to it, or if it was all just a dream. With the cassette in one hand, I shuffled outside and dragged my garbage can to the curb. The morning sun was bright, and I squinted my eyes. The neighborhood bustled with activity. Kids played a game of tag.

A woman walked her dog. Mr. Everley's lawnmower grumbled through his lawn. The garbage can screeched to a stop. at the end of my driveway. I tossed the Mary Hillenbrand cassette onto the ground, and I stomped on it with all of my might. I kept stomping and pounding the pavement with my foot, and the cassette tape shattered into dozens,

and then hundreds of pieces. All activity in the neighborhood halted. Mr. Everly's mower spluttered to a stop. The heads of about ten children all turned at once, and they just stared. Even the dog was enraptured. I got down on the ground, scooped up the splintered pieces, and dropped them into the garbage can. I ambled back up my driveway, and I felt them. Every single. A single eye in the neighborhood was on me. My chest tightened. Something didn't feel right.

I hurried inside, drew every curtain and shut every blind, and I peaked outside through my front window. The kids ran happily through the yard. The mower roared back to life. The dog wagged its tail. and happily trotted down the street. But the moment I turned around, I knew everyone was watching.

Their gazes followed me. I saw them corners of my whole presentation. Now it's time to drift off into your own. 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. 25 episodes, each over two hours long, and three exclusive bonus episodes, all for only 1999. On behalf of everyone at the No Sleep Podcast, we thank you for listening.

Join us again next week. We'll have more stories for you and whatever that is standing right behind. you. This audio production is copyright 2016 by Creative Reason Media, Inc. All 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, Inc.