The NoSleep Podcast - NoSleep Podcast S9E24

Episode Date: October 22, 2017

It's episode 24 of Season 9. On this week's show we have four tales about local legends and discovering devils. "The Limping Woman"† written by S.H. Cooper and performed by Addison Peacock & Nichole Goodnight & Erika Sanderson. (Story starts around 00:04:00) "Making Deals With Devils"† written by A.A. Peterson and performed by Jessica McEvoy & Atticus Jackson & Erin Lillis & Erika Sanderson & Jesse Cornett. (Story starts around 00:20:00) "Copper Mouths"‡ written by Jackson Laughlin and performed by Elie Hirschman & Matthew Bradford & Kyle Akers. (Story starts around 01:17:00) "A Tiller of the Ground"¤ written by William Dalphin and performed by Mike DelGaudio & Erin Lillis & Dan Zappulla & Erika Sanderson. (Story starts around 01:41:50) Click here to learn more about the voice actors on The NoSleep Podcast   Click here to learn more about Horror-Rama Toronto   Click here to learn more about S.H. Cooper   Click here to learn more about A.A. Peterson   Click here to learn more about William Dalphin   Executive Producer & Host: David Cummings Musical score composed by: Brandon Boone Audio adaptations produced by: Phil Michalski† & Jeff Clement‡ & Jesse Cornett¤ "A Tiller of the Ground" illustration courtesy of Naomi Ronke Audio program ©2017 - Creative Reason Media Inc. - All Rights Reserved - No reproduction or use of this content is permitted without the express written consent of Creative Reason Media Inc. The copyrights for each story are held by the respective authors.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is a horror storytelling podcast. Our tales are dark and disturbing, intended to shake you up. Listen at your own risk. We are all around you. And tonight's there will be, brace yourself for the No Sleep Podcast. It's the No Sleep Podcast. I'm David Cummings. Thanks for joining us.

On this week's show, we have four tales about local legends. and discovering devils. As the end of season nine is in sight, I want to let you know what our schedule is going to look like over the next few weeks. Next week is our season nine finale. We have a great tale for the entire two-hour episode, which will be available to one and all.

And of course, next Sunday is also our Halloween live in Toronto show. Then on Tuesday the 31st, Halloween itself, We'll release both our full-length free Halloween show and our season-pass bonus Halloween show. Both of those episodes will be close to two and a half hours long, so your ears will be overflowing with Halloween stories that day and night. The following weekend, November 4 and 5, there will be a couple of cool things happening. We'll feature an in-between seasons episode to tide everyone over as we take a bit of a break. Sunday, November 5th, will also be the same thing.

the start of pre-orders for our triumphant season past 10. And if you're in Toronto on the weekend of November 4 and 5, or still hanging around after the live show the weekend before, why not consider coming down to Horror Rama, Toronto's only all-horror convention? There will be a lot of great guests and exhibitors there, and the No Sleep podcast will be represented. I'll be there along with Nicole Goodnight, and Jeff Clement and Matthew Bradford will also show up to greet you.

We'd love to meet you down there. We'll have free postcards to sign. We'll take selfies, give hugs, and other intimate acts, and we may even have posters and t-shirts left over from our Halloween live show. Check the show notes to learn all about Toronto's horror rama and plan to come meet us and delve into all things horror. And finally, I'm proud to announce the winner of our show. special Halloween live in Toronto contest. The person who, along with their guest, will be joining

the cast for dinner and the ghostwalk, as well as attending the live show, is Laura Simonelli. Congratulations, Laura. We're looking forward to having a deeply disturbing time with you next weekend. I mean, I don't expect you to deeply disturb us, more like the other way around, but we'll try to at least chew with our mouths closed. And so, there's a lot of great stuff in the coming weeks, but let's not get ahead of ourselves. We have four tales just waiting to be heard, so let's get started and kick off this week's show. In our first tale, we meet a young woman who is level-headed and rational. And according to author S.H. Cooper, that means she doesn't believe in the local urban legend. But when her friend dares her to go

to the supposedly haunted location, well, let's just say she becomes a lot less Rational. Performing this tale are Addison Peacock, Nicole Goodnight, and Erica Sanderson. So make sure you know what to say if you ever encounter the limping woman. You hear the uneven footsteps first. That's how you know. She's behind you. The heel is broken off of her left shoe, and she drags it along the ground with every step. A sharp contrast to the step. steady click of her still-in-tact pump.

It's an urgent, anguished. Please, I'm hurt. Help me. That's when she gets you. Don't run. She still gets you. But this time, she's going to make it hurt. At least, that's the rumor anyway.

Every small town has at least one. A local urban legend that everyone knows and swears is true because their sister's best friends, cousins, neighbors, grandson knew a fellow who actually encountered it. Ours was the limping woman, so named for her aforementioned distinct gate. It was said that she was a teacher at the elementary school some decades before, young, beautiful, and the victim of a terrible murder. She had been walking home to the house she shared with her parents one night after school.

when she realized she was being followed. She sped up, and so did her pursuer, until both were running down this dark country lane with only open farmland on either side. Her heel broke, and her ankle snapped, and she fell, and her pursuer became her murderer. It was a slow, torturous affair that left her beaten and covered in stab wounds,

And, when the killer was done, he just left her to bleed out beside the road. She wasn't found until the next morning. And by then, all anyone could do was search for the person responsible. While some believe the man was caught and dealt with not long after, others think he or she is still at large. And the limping woman, as the victim came to be known, won't rest until her killer is caught. I was always skeptical at best of the story. I'd passed the spot where she was supposed to appear a hundred times without incident,

as did everyone else I knew. If a murderous ghost lived there, I was pretty sure I'd have seen her. I said as much to my friend Steffie when she brought up that a friend of a friend of a friend had met the limping woman during lunch at school one day. It's true. She was out on the old highway a couple of times. nights ago and saw her. If she actually saw her, wouldn't she be dead? I thought you weren't supposed to turn around. Heard her. Whatever. You know what I mean, Rina. Sure. It always frustrated,

Steffi, that I didn't share her willingness to believe the unbelievable. So how'd she get away? She said the words? Duh. Oh, right. The woman's last words. Last words we all somehow know without ever having caught the one person who would have heard them. Yeah, we know them because the real killer was never caught. He told people who told other people. And we all just magically knew to use them to ward off being killed? Steffie frowned. She loved all things spooky and supernatural

and had spent a lot of time researching our local legends, especially the limping woman. It's not magic. It just reminds her of her own mother and she gets distracted by her grief. and leaves you alone. Okay, okay. I hoped that would be enough

to put an end to the topic. It was an argument neither of us would win, and I didn't feel like getting into it again over whether or not a ghost was real. At 15, it was starting to feel silly. Steffie, however, wasn't going to let me off so easily.

They say she remains because they got the wrong guy and she's angry about it. Like, everyone knew it, but no one cared because they wanted to blame someone. Don't you feel at least a little bad for her? She's still waiting for justice after all this time.

Steffie... She only goes after people who don't believe in her, you know. I didn't like the way Steffie said that. Like she had an idea forming that I wouldn't approve of. And I shook my head. Whatever it is, no. We could go out there. Out to the spot she haunts?

No, don't be dumb. You don't believe anyway. So what's the best? big deal. I've walked past there a lot, okay? Nothing's ever happened. Have you gone after dark? Steffie had started to smile. No. So what? That's when she's active. Going in the day doesn't count. This is dumb. We'll go tonight. Every argument I had was met with questions of whether I was too afraid and Steffie mocking me for being chicken. She kept it up for the rest of lunch. Through our shared science class, and then passed me notes in the halls between classes after that. By the time the final

bell rang, she had worn me down. But not because I believe she's there. I'm just going so you shut up. The sun set just after five that evening. At seven, we met up on our bikes in front of my neighborhood. Her parents thought she was doing a project at mine. Mine thought I was at hers, and we had two hours to get out to the farm where the limping woman was said to haunt. and get back before they started trading phone calls. We peddled hard and fast, leaving behind the glow from windows and street lamps until darkness swallowed up the world around us,

with only moonlight to guide us. We wove our way across town and passed into the outskirts, where the insects were louder, the stars brighter, and the safety that came from feeling like you were surrounded by other people fell away. It was hard not to feel entirely exposed out on that old road, where flat fields rolled off into the distance on either side. There was the occasional barn or farmhouse set a ways off down long, dusty drives,

but otherwise, it really was just us and our bikes in the night. Up ahead, see the cross? That's the marker for her. We skid to a stop, a few yards away from it, and exchanged a glance, almost lost in the shadows. Scared? No. It was an honest enough answer.

I was nervous, sure. But who wouldn't be when you're outside after dark? Steffie spoke. Remember, if you turn around, she gets you. If you try to run, she makes it worse. Just stand still when she's close by and say the words. So seriously that I had to stifle a giggle. It was ridiculous.

I kept trying to tell that to all the butterflies stirring in my stomach, but it didn't do much good. We climbed off our bikes and set them on their kickstand. Steffie groped about for my hand and entwined her fingers with mine. She was shaking. Ready? Let's just get it over with. We walked up to where the cross was placed and paused.

Steffie squeezed my hand and took in a slow, shuddering breath. Her fear was starting to have an effect on me, quickening my heartbeat. But I squared my shoulders and clenched my jaw and took a step forward. We crept along the roadside, careful to keep our eyes pointed straight ahead. Steffie kept reminding me in a trembling whisper that looking anywhere else could lead to trouble. A minute or two passed. It couldn't have been long. despite feeling like it, and nothing seemed to happen. My fear began to ebb, replaced by an admittedly relieved giddiness that I had been right, and I almost turned to Steffie to say, I told you so.

And then I realized how quiet it was. All the insects that had been singing loudly when we arrived had gone silent. There were no distant calls from nightbirds, no prudence, no pranks. breeze passing over us? Nothing. Just the sound of our own breathing. To my surprise, Steffi sighed, disappointed. I wondered if she realized how quiet everything had become. How could she not feel how claustrophobic it had become out on that open road, how closed off we were in the dark and the silence? I wanted to ask her, but the question was like a knot in my throat. that I couldn't untangle. Behind us, grass rustled,

followed by the crunch of loose gravel underfoot, like someone was pulling themselves slowly out of the field and onto the road. Every hair on my body stood up at once. Rina? I hadn't realized that my grip on Steffie's hand had tightened so much. I could feel her eyes. on me, but couldn't bring myself to look at her. From somewhere over my shoulder, a woman started

to sob softly. Instead of being scared, Steffy snorted. Real funny, I get it, okay? The limping woman is just made up. I'm convinced now, you don't have to rub it in. The unmistakable sound of someone inching toward us. Slowly, painfully. crying out with each step. I'm hurt and he's still out there. Seffi, she's coming. There must have been something in my voice, a tightness that only true terror could cause

that convinced my friend that I wasn't just pretending. She grabbed my forearm with her other hand and clutched it until her nails were digging into my skin. She only goes after people who don't believe that must be why she left. Left me alone. What do I do? My entire body was screaming to run,

to get away from that thing that was getting closer and closer. But Steffie's firm grasp and my own mounting dread held me in place. Please turn around. Help me. The words. You have to say the words when she's right behind you. What words? I wanted to scream, but I couldn't speak or think.

I could only hear her. Legend said you'd hear her uneven footsteps and be forced to listen to her please, but no one ever mentioned the smell. The stench of rot and earth and blood oozed through the air, slowly surrounding me, and wrapping itself around me like tentacles, smothering me. I gagged and pressed my free hand over my mouth and shook my hands. head violently, trying to clear it, trying to make sense of things. Steffie was jerking on my arm and saying something to me over and over again,

but I could barely hear her over the limping woman's cries. The smell was getting so strong, making my stomach pitch and heave until I thought I'd be sick. I leaned heavily on Steffie, and she pulled me in close so that her lips were beside my ear. Through the veil of panic and nausea, I heard her scream. Say the words! The limping woman was so close behind us now that I could feel the chill radiating off of her to say the words. It just reminds her of her own mother and she gets distracted by her grief and leaves you alone. I heard Steffie's voice from the previous day echo in my head. Her mother. The words remind her of

her mother, a limping woman's last words. Please, my mother's waiting for me. The footsteps stopped and were replaced by a high-pitched, heart-wrenching keen. From somewhere off in the night, a dog started to howl. Insects began to sing again. The wind whistled across the field. Sounds of normalcy of life. The limping woman continued to screech, and, while I found my legs again, and with Steffie and tow, tore back to the bikes.

I never once looked up from the ground. The only thing I saw as we darted by was a pair of feet in torn stockings and pumps, the heel of one of which was missing. We didn't stop riding until we made it back to my lawn, and when we got there, I raced to the bushes on the side of the house and vomit. Sheffy claims she didn't hear or see anything that night, but she believes that I did. She believes that I encountered the limping woman. I tried to come up with some kind of rationalization for it, like power of suggestion or something. But when I think back to those footsteps and those sobs and that final scream, I know that there's only one explanation. And now I too believe in the limping woman.

There are traumas and trials in our real lives which can haunt us with hellish nightmares. But in this tale from author A.A. Peterson, we meet a woman who is trying to get her life back on track after being injured in the war. But she soon realizes that hellish nightmares also exist in the supernatural realm and they must be dealt with. Performing this tale are Jessica McAvoy, Atticus Jackson, Aaron Lillis, Erica Sanderson, and Jesse Cornett. So no matter what you've gone through in your life, don't go making deals with devils. Everything feels like horseshit. Everything. I'm adrift in an ocean of horseshit. Turn on the news? Hors shit. Listen to people talking in restaurants?

Horse shit. I called up my brother the other day. We both saw action overseas. If anyone could understand what I'd been going through, he would. I was right there at the tip of my tongue, all the terrible stuff I'd been through. You know what we wound up talking about instead? The fucking weather. What kind of horseshit is that?

I've been trying to find a way to talk about it for six months. I got drunk. That was easy. Didn't work, of course. I even took some bananas, abula's mushrooms, and videotape myself. Didn't work, though it did scare the hell out of me. Nothing I could do to my brain made it any easier to talk about. Gave up on talking altogether when I found myself trying to yodel what had happened, and I started laughing so hard I thought I'd go nuts. There's other ways to. to communicate than talking. Morse code didn't work. Neither did braille or sign language. I got to wondering if I maybe sort of accidentally did flag semaphore near a naval base without intending for anybody to see it, if that might work. As soon as I felt that someone was watching, the flags kept slipping out of my fingers.

I can write it a bit. Them. That's the most I can write. Them, them, them. I saw one of them six months ago. I feel like I'll give myself a seizure if I say more. Nana Zabula said her sister didn't give up trying to speak. One day they found her in bed with blood gushing out of her ears, and she never woke up.

I can talk about not being able to talk about it just fine. If I try to say more, my whole throat sort of seizes up, or I think I'm saying something, and it turns out I'm saying something else. I hate the idea that the words I end up speaking come from them. It's like they're back and fucking with me all over again. It's easy to see why they have been able to stay hidden for so long. You can't fucking talk about them. Maybe I found a trick, though.

I'm going to give it a shot. God and see, every contract, even magical ones, have got to have a loophole. I'm going to write about what I saw six months ago, but maybe it's just a story. Maybe it's not. If I say that, then I think I can write it. Maybe this is all just a story. Maybe it's not. Maybe this is real and dangerous, and you need to prepare.

I'm so tired of living with this that I want to puke it out of me so that the rest of my life doesn't feel like horseshit anymore. But who cares? Lots of people say they care about a lot of shit, but I always get the feeling if you hook them up to a lie detector and asked, do you actually give a fuck that try as they might? They couldn't stop those tiny needles from doing a spider dance.

No one cares about devils. Not until they've seen one. You shooting slicker than shit, like always, Abby. I set the rifle back across my lap, trying not to prine too much that I'd barely even had to line up the sights. Target must have been a good 50 yards out. I hadn't held a gun since the shrapnel got put in my hip, but my fingers still know what to do.

Rusty, you could charm a swamp water witch into a fairy tale princess. Rusty and I had been shooting bottles since his aunt had guilted us about killing the nutria in the bog behind her house. She did that every summer, when all creatures under the sun were creations of God. Every winter, when the creations of God started crawling into her house, she'd change her mind and declare them rat devils. Then Rusty and me'd go back to sipping beers on the porch

with our rifles on our laps, waiting for something to stir in the muck. They should have kept you on, girl. Doesn't matter about your leg. Nobody on this mountain shoot like you. I coughed and nodded. Sit my beer and looked away. Shut up and shoot, Rusty.

You can't walk in that muck any better than I can if I win, and you have to set up new targets. He shut up and took his time lining up a shot. An empty corona bottle blasted apart. The glass sounded like the tinkling of wind chimes through my earplugs. Rusty was a good guy. The best of men to my way. way of thinking. Poor, and everyone but me said he was stupid as fuck, but a good guy. We'd known

each other since grade school. I'd been a rich kid. He was that kid that came to school every day and matching sweatpants and sweatshirts. Once, I swear, he had the same piece of pepperoni stuck to his back for a month. In second grade, my mom twisted my arm and I invited him to my birthday party. Pity inviting all that. People, Cole-shouldered him, so he wandered off after a spell. Found him in the kitchen by himself. You know what that goofy fuck was eaten? Cinnamon toast crunch in ranch dressing.

I shit you not. I about puked, but he kept chomping it down, even sort of grumbled in contentment. He was the kind of thin you don't get to be by exercising, if you take my meaning. I'd sat down across from him. amazed. Maybe it was because of the influence of my grandma, old Zabula, but I'd never been like the other rich kids. I liked spectacle and movement and difference.

I liked knowing there were parts of the world I hadn't seen before. And I'd never seen a body of cinnamon toast crunch in ranch dressing. I wanted to know what he'd eat next. Herring and blueberries with ketchup? Yup. Tuna and wiseries. whipped cream? Not a problem. He told me that peanut butter, pickle, and mayonnaise sandwiches weren't half bad, and I'd gasped when he dared me to eat one. We made one together. Took a bite.

It wasn't bad at all. We laughed. The other guests heard and came in. They laughed too. But they weren't laughing with Rusty. They were laughing at him. I'd hated that. Pretty Soon they started putting things in front of him and calling him names when he said he was full, and it wasn't fun at all no more. I hadn't meant to be cruel. I'd been amazed by that boy. The next day, when Rusty came to my house with a couple of pistols and asked if I wanted to help clear his aunt's field, I decided even if he couldn't tell his letters from numbers, he could tell someone laughing with him from someone laughing at him. And that was the kind of mind almost nobody had. We'd spent damn near every day together after that.

Me and my pigtails and the fancy dresses my parents kept trying to put on me whenever they could tear me out of my jeans, and a rusty in his threadbare clothes and second-hand shoes. It had been that way, right until he hadn't been able to pass the basic skills test to join the Army. He couldn't read much at all, and he had no head for numbers, but he was only stupid in those very particular senses. He'd wished me well when I got on the bus to leave for boot camp, and he'd picked me up from the airport when I got back.

Some of the smartest folks I know wouldn't have had the mind to do that. Let's see if I can't put a slug through that can out there in the cook of that tree. No scope. He snorted. That's got to be 120 yards. Half the fun of the game was drunkenly stumbling through his aunt's bog, setting up targets. I'd promised myself when I got back home, I'd do that again. I took aim, found my calm center, and squeezed the trigger.

I felt my leg spasmed. You hear there's going to be a knifshel coming through town? I'd missed. I tried not to be offended that Rusty wasn't trying to offend me, or when Rusty handed me another beer from the ice chest just outside of my reach. He'd been doing all kinds of little things like that, Try not to let me let on. Anyone told old Zabula yet?

He missed his next shot. I think he did it on purpose. Couldn't do his timetables. Couldn't tell you much about history. But he had hard enough for a hundred men. I only heard it this morning. Ain't no one had time to go up there and tell her, probably. In the end, the contest was a draw,

which meant we went out in the field together. Rusty knew, I think, that leaving me be in my chair while he set targets would have been the worst thing he could do. So we went out into the field together to set new targets, and we both fell on our asses and laughed. Nothing like good old West Virginia mud to get you out of your misery. See, when we laughed, my leg didn't hurt so bad. He was only dumb in book ways. I miss him so. Oh, God damn much.

Olzabula wasn't exactly a witch, but she also wasn't exactly like everybody else. She believed in the Almighty and would slap your mouth if you suggested otherwise. But she also wasn't exactly adverse to a decaturic cards, lighting candles, and all other manner of hexes and jinxes. Her cabin was about a mile further up the mountain than her nearest neighbor, and getting to her nearest neighbor required driving on dirt roads for at least 20 minutes. But there was a knife show, and old Zabula was always to be told about knife shows. No one knew why. She was peculiar. I wish I'd thought to suspect. I had no way of knowing

she was caught in the same predicament in which I'd later find myself. Though half the population of West Virginia was likely to call her Nana Zabula, she actually had given birth to my father, though he didn't like to acknowledge it much except on holidays. You can't wear suits and practice the law if folks know your mother's off somewhere rattling chicken bones around in a cup. She'd had 14 children. Three of them were doctors. Five of them were lawyers. One was an archaeologist and the rest did stuff too crazy.

easy to believe. Child! She answered the door. We hadn't seen each other for three years. You look hungry. She hugged me and ruffled my hair and asked after my health, all the while putting her finger in my mouth to better examine my teeth and plucking out a few strands of my hair. It was only a part of her being her.

As always, Rusty stood by the door, looking at his feet. "'Man?' "'I'd allowed that I was fine as a body could be, when deprived of her cooking, "'and if she had any fresh pies, I'd be happy to tuck them away for her.' She laughed at this. There were definitely trepidations to Zabula's kitchen. While Rusty had lost none of his appetite and didn't mind eating the occasional opossum pop pie, I'd have grown accustomed to MREs and more conventional fare in the last three years.

While the woman could make up a mean pie And no one with a tongue in their head would dispute it I was in a minority of people Not generally willing to brave meats of unknown age and origin To achieve such sweet desserts There's a knife show in town, Zabula We heard plates drop and clatter in the kitchen Luckily nothing broke

Because all of Zabula's plates were microwavable plastic affairs With the faces of presidents on them I sighed. If my mom's mother had lived close, or for that matter, been alive, I'd be having a much more conventional conversation about my experiences overseas and what I'd seen and what my plans were. But with Zabula, you sort of had to deal with her eccentricities up front, or else she'd stay sore to you for months.

Where at, when? She came out of her kitchen. She had a hex bag clutched. in her bony old hands, probably full of tobacco and lizard bones. I'd opened one up when I was a kid, and it still made my stomach turn to think about it. I looked to Rusty. Tomorrow at the church, around noon, I think. He still woulda make eye contact with Olzabula.

Most folks thought she was a haint. Seeing what I've seen, I don't know that they were far off. I also wonder now if maybe Rusty had a nubula. notion of what had driven Zabula Batty. Big companies? Gerber? United Killery? No.

Seems more like an independently run thing. I got a bit of multiculturalism in the Army. Or least enough to know that not everyone takes the same things for granted. For those of you who don't know, a knife show is like... A bunch of people get a bunch of knives and put them on tables, basically. You walk around and you can buy them. I won if you want. When I was 12, I'd gone to a knife show and bought a 16-inch buoy knife and a leather sheath with a picture of a deer on it for $15. While Lee Greenwood was singing,

God bless the USA on the church speakers. The seller hooked me when he explained that I was getting more than an inch of knife from my dollar, although the damned thing broke a week later. It's a normal thing if you live in West Virginia, okay? You'll drive me tomorrow. I must prepare my things. Rusty, I have some pickled hogs knuckles for you. It's getting late. Sleep here. Rusty and I helped ourselves to Zabula's foodstuffs. She didn't have a refrigerator, although my father kept trying to buy her one, so she had a tendency to have a lot of things that needed eaten up. Zabula had never had a regular job, so far as I know, so she traded in favors and food, and she always had plenty of both held in reserve. Seeing how I

Why was her grandchild? I got my fair share of each. An opportunity like this where you could pick and choose without her forcing some kind of snapping turtle something or other on you was a sacred event. Rusty heated up something that looked like a bucket full of snod in the oven. Zabula had given in and let my father buy her one of those when she got too old to split wood for her Franklin stove. I took a jar full of snickerdoodles and some pie. Well, at least you didn't ask about your leg. We'd been concerned on the drive over that she'd make me strip in her living room and say chance over me. I think my mom may have come out and let her know she wasn't supposed to talk about it.

Rusty spooned what I'm pretty sure may have been part of an eyeball into his mouth and nodded. That's right. It's not something to be talked about. Much better to leave it inside making a mummock in your head. Show you're tough. His sarcasm wasn't hard to catch. Another few days, I think, but you won't tell no one. Do you understand? Rusty nodded, grumbling in contentment with his stew the same way he'd done all those years ago. I'd been home three days, and that was as close as Rusty had come to asking me about what put the shrapnel in my hip, even though I'd promised him, I'd tell. My leg started to spasm, but I ignored it.

The same way I ignored how it flared up and twitched when I walked, so I wouldn't have to use it. a cane. Denial is a powerful thing. Not as powerful as what devil's do to shut people up about them, but powerful just the same. Strong enough that I can force out this next part without my head hurting. It's all just a story. It's all made up. Or maybe it isn't. Maybe you need to keep your eyes open and look out. When I went to say goodnight to Nana Zabula, she was reading out one of her diaries. Up top, there were three lines with bigger writing than the lines below. They said, little people, haints, boogers. I like calling them boogers most, because a booger is something you can pick out and flick away. The knife show happened to coincide with a farmer's

market, which was an occasion that brought outsiders into our town. I had stopped thinking of them as city folks since my stint overseas, but I kept up appearances for Rusty's sake. See that guy over there with the melons? The one pretending to know what he's doing when he's tapping him? Four stalls back, I saw him Googling how to test melons on his iPhone. Not five minutes ago. Rusty laughed. It wasn't a cruel laugh, but rather one that seemed to swallow the whole world and find its silliness delicious.

He had an infuriating lack of vindictiveness, given how quick people were to point out his shortcomings. I looped my arm through his and couldn't wipe the grin from my face as we perused another few stalls. I never thought those would be the last times I ever smiled, but I couldn't have grinned harder if I knew. Zabula had wandered off and found her gaggle of peculiar old ladies. Lots of folks thought they were a culler. oven. For once, they all seemed to be having a difficult time talking. I happened over here a few bits and pieces. Been reading lots of old stories, the ones about the things that steal children's footprints and shadows. That was old Miss Annie. Everyone called her tater-eyed Annie

on account of her squint. Yep, me too. Been thinking maybe if we need to, we can rub tobacco on the back to our palms and say the old prayer. I'd never seen Zabula look more determined than when she said. When devils enter our world, they do so under certain rules and conditions and contracts. They obey the rules of their form. Those contracts are strong, but God's word is stronger still. The gaggle of peculiar old ladies nodded. I should have stopped right there.

I should have gotten the truck with Rusty and driven away. But it weren't no more peculiar than what I'd heard her say a hundred times before. They disappeared into the knife show. Reckon we should follow and make sure they don't get into no trouble? My rusty, my trusty rusty, who never betrayed me, who never ever lost faith in me for one minute that the second I was out of the army, I'd come back. Even when I stopped believing it, who was friends with a tomboy,

every other man in town made fun of him for it. Rusty, who didn't have the internet, but went to the library and got someone to help him set up Skype, so he could talk to me every week without fail when I was overseas. Rusty, who kept trying when I was in recovery to talk to me, even when I didn't want to see nobody. I'd never done nothing to deserve that good a friend. Yep, reckon we should.

She's been arrested enough times. as it is. I killed him. Good Lord, I killed him and didn't even know it. The thing about danger, real, true, terrible danger is that you can never really believe you're in it, at least not for the first few moments. Danger don't match the pattern of the rest of your life, or else it wouldn't be danger. A moment you're driving down a road, trying to win hearts and minds, going to a place you've been a thousand times before. The next, your jeeps flipped over and you can't hear nothing and you're bleeding, and there's a hole in your leg and you're shooting at people whose language you don't speak.

They're shooting back at you and all you can think about is protecting all those other people you don't even know are already dead. It's hard being alive and facing danger. You've got all these evils in your head and you've thought over all the things you do to fight those evils. Except those aren't the evils that ever got brung up before you. Life shows you evils you weren't even expected. I can't help but think I should have had some premonition of what happened next.

But my experiences in the army had not prepared me any more than Zabula's hex bags prepared her. We spotted Zabula at a booth far in the corner of the church. sectioned off from everything else but what I reckoned were Navajo blankets. Those were a strange sight in these parts, but lots of folks even here couldn't tell tribes apart. Zabula was rubbing tobacco on the back of her hands, obviously upset and trying to shout, but no words would come out of her mouth. Her hands flailed all over the place. The gaggle of peculiar old women was fair and no better. Some number of them were crying.

There were children over there, too. Their eyes were wide open and staring, too shocked to be scared. Oh, hell, what's she gone and done now? Better go break it up before the sheriff does. Getting closer, I recognized Jimbo Helms, Buck Bell, and Tandy Pliler among the children. I'd read a bit about them in the paper. They'd taken our local elementary school math team to state this year in one second place. For a town the size of ours, that was miraculous.

I'd later find the other children were Cheyenne Hunt, and that she used to paint and Mary Oxendine, and that she used to dance. Matthew Tice was there too, and he used to write. Six kids in total, and all of them talented. All of them used to do things. They don't do those things anymore. I have a hard time, Even in a story saying what the man behind the Navajo blankets looked like.

Nana's a boola. What's going on over here? She turned to me, her eyes wide, and she opened her mouth. She flapped it open and closed a few times like a fish. She said nothing. Miss Annie, come away from there. I'll see to it, whatever it is. I have a hard time describing.

Hell, it's a story. I can tell a story. It's just a story. Maybe. The man behind the Navajo blankets was short. Not so short as to be a condition, but short enough you wouldn't want to comment on it for fear of being rude. His hair was slipped back flat against his head and came to his shoulders.

and for all the multiculturalism I'd been exposed to in the army, I didn't have a clue as to what box he'd tick for his ethnicity on a job application. I wouldn't recall until later that all his fingers, but his thumbs and pinkies, were the exact same length. His eyes were piss yellow. Would you like to buy a knife? I have traditional tribal blades here. Very reasonable prices.

Even some period pieces if you're a collector. His lips turned up as if it were a joke. I cleared my throat. Felt suddenly faint and lightheaded, and I staggered when the pain in my hip flared. I'm sorry for my grandma, sir. She gets herself worked up sometimes. I'm sure it wasn't anything personal.

The man behind the counter smiled. His teeth were long and sharp. I saw blue fire in his throat. Blue fire in his throat. The witch woman? The one who seeks to send me back by the terms of my own contract? The bitch who dares dream she has the will to banish me? I stood there, shocked, not knowing.

what to say or do. The only thought in my head was, a blanket. A blanket was the only thing keeping 200 other eyes from seeing what was happening. How could a simple blanket do such a thing?

He held up his hands, palms up, and fingers flat. Then he crooked his fingers and all of us stepped forward until we were hidden by the blankets. I felt the pull of him in my stomach. It wasn't right. It wasn't right that he could do such a thing

when every part of my brain was screaming at me to grab those children and run. Here are the only laws of my contract, woman. The man behind the curtain snarled at Zabula. What I want, I take. What I have, I keep. And it's only for you to see. Stay silent.

I remembered, because I'd always known. And maybe it was like I had chosen not to remember that the gaggle of peculiar old women, all of them had sons and daughters who died. My brother had an even older brother, but he'd killed himself when he was young. Why hadn't I remembered that till now? Miss Annie's daughter, who had sung so beautiful,

had gone mute and withered away when she was barely ten. All the peculiar old ladies. All of them. The man behind the curtain put his hands on the heads of Jimbo, Buck, and Tandy. You love your sciences, don't you children? I do not like science. Too many rules. Now there is a thing of beauty.

True magic takes what it wants. I take your joy from you. I take your talents. I take your love of life. Those strangely even fingers pointed to the other children. I take your love of sight. I take your love of words. I take your love of dance.

I take all your loves. I name them mine. I... Rusty peaked into the stall. I couldn't turn my head, but I could smell him, the smell of the earth and the bog and hard work, the smell of my joy and my better nature and my love of mankind. I remember Rusty, I remember Rusty, I remember Rusty. Oh, you, I'd begun to believe you were just a nightmare.

Rusty stepped forward. He had a knife of his own. A small one he kept for the kind of things you do when you're poor and have to make do. Three inches of steel, shimmering like all the hope in the world. The pressure holding me still, the sickness in the pit of my stomach, eased the slightest bit. The man behind the counter stopped. His teeth bared. His throat flashed with fire.

Grown to a man. And little one, I must have left something inside of you. Here's my... The man behind the curtain, the booger, raised his hands at Rusty. Rusty didn't stop. Rusty couldn't be stopped. He was yelling. And from the look on his face, you could tell it was a yell he'd been waiting to yell for a long, long time.

It was the yell of the slave throwing off his chains and conquering his master. It was the yell of the beaten and abused saying, no more. Enough. It was the song of the caged bird spreading its wings to fly. The fact that in the face of such righteousness, the booger didn't fall over and die was the evilest thing about it. I dug through Rusty's childhood things after. There wasn't a lot because his parents died when he was very young,

and his aunt wasn't the son. sentimental type. But there was enough to tell that before Rusty turned seven, he was a genius. His parents had taken him up to a college because the regular intelligence test they could administer in school didn't come close to measuring his aptitude. His IQ had been over six standard deviations above normal. I'd had to look up what that meant, because Rusty had been so smart that you had to to read books to understand how smart he'd been. But basically, it meant Rusty had literally been one in a million. Sometime after he turned seven, he stopped being able to read and write.

He stopped being able to do even simple math. Those gifts had been stolen from him. The bugger picked up a knife from the counter and flung it into Rusty's chest. Made a soft sound as it sunk right into his heart. Rusty staggered a few steps. But even with all the courage in him, he couldn't do more than that. He said three words to me before he died. Not the three words you'd expect for what was between us.

I knew those words without him having to say them. I hope he knew the same. No. Rusty said the three words I needed to hear the most. Remember, the fireflies. The booger clapped his hands and laughed with his mouth full of blue fire. Oh, it's been too long. A true hero. I admit I actually was afraid enough to feel one of my own emotions for a moment.

It's been century since. that's happened. How was it that a simple blanket hid the side of that monster cutting open Rusty's chest and eating his heart? This day will be a rock inside your throat. You cannot speak of it without wanting to choke. It'll be too big to move out of you. You will be silent.

The booger raised. his fists, then opened them and extended his fingers, and sent us on our dumb and stumbling ways. I stayed in the convention hall, sitting silently at a bench, wanting to shout or holler or do something other than nothing. I couldn't even cry. Crying is a form of speaking. Zabula and the others had long since fled.

I stayed until the tables were packed up. It made my nose bleed to do it, but I'd bought a gun. I held it in my hands, trying to prepare, but only being able to admire it. I stayed until, at last, the booger took down his blankets and wrapped him up. A dozen people walked by Rusty's body, and none of them seemed to see it. They flowed around it as naturally. as a river flows around a stone. It wasn't that they couldn't tell it was there.

They unsaw it, same way people always unsee horror. The booger looked at me before leaving, embracingly stomped on Rusty's head, smashing it like an overripe melon. The gun trembled in my hands. Blood poured from my ears. No one saw.

I only take from children, bitch. Take your old sour loves and go away. Don't bother me no more. I couldn't scream. I couldn't cry. I just sat there. And the only words I could make come to my mouth were horse shit. I read a lot of books in recovery after I got hurt in the war.

Action books, hero books, books where people shot a lot of people. I used to like those books, but all those books made me do in recovery was screw up my face and cry. It wasn't the shooting people. I'd kill every one of those insurgent pieces of shit again. It was the way the people who did the shooting and the books got lauded as heroes after their friends died. They'd given me six medals. Six. Without intending to, they'd given me a medal for each of my dead friends.

I think I would have spent my life in a wheelchair if a chaplain hadn't set me straight about heroes. She explained to me that heroes don't look like you expect them to. Real-life heroism isn't something that comes on you by accident. That almost only ever happens to regular people. In real life, being a hero is seeing the danger you never expected and reacting to it with humanity and decency and doing the right thing so quick you don't even have time to think about it.

It didn't matter that I couldn't save the other people on my team. It was sad they were gone. It was right for me to miss them. But I'd tried. I'd made a racket. I'd done everything I could and refused to die. That had saved three other teams from coming under fire. I decided to stop feeling sorry for myself.

That hurt more than getting blown up. It hurt more than knowing all those people were dead, and I hadn't been able to save them. And it hurt worse than people telling me how great I was, for what I felt was my greatest failure. I got up out of my hospital bed. I learned to walk again. I talked to Rusty.

There'd always been something between us. I think maybe he used to hope without ever saying anything. He never put his hands on me. There'd always be that beat, that pause when I told him I was going out with somebody. He'd always be friendly with my boyfriends. never showing any signs of jealousy. He was good to his core.

One night, puddled in my bed after the agony of physical therapy, he told me that something very bad had happened to him long ago. I said he could tell me anything. He said he couldn't ever find words for what happened. Sometimes he felt it had all been a bad dream, but he knew the perfect words to say, To help me get over what happened to me. I wanted to die.

I wanted to curl up in a ball and never do anything again. It hurt so bad. It felt like everything good in me had been taken. It felt like I was a wicked burden on the whole world. I couldn't believe that. I couldn't believe that of Rusty. So one day, I was going to chop wood for my aunt. She was mad at me about school.

He said I wasn't trying hard enough. How could I explain I was trying as hard as I could, and none of it made sense. It was night time, so I had to bring a flashlight. You know how when you're a child, you like to whip the light back and forth really fast to make the shadows go away? A noddy. Well, at first I thought it was like the light fought the shadows. That was a very good and helpful thing for me to think. I needed to feel like there was something in the world strong enough to fight the shadows.

But then, that made me sense. sad because why should the light let the dark be its purpose? Why should the light have no purpose but to send the dark away? I felt the black come to swallow me up then. There was nothing left. I could run away no more and now I knew fighting was still letting the dark inside control me. Then, far off, I saw fireflies dance, dozens of them dancing in the night. I watched for hours. They shifted in patterns, signaling each other. What do fireflies care for darkness? I have no head for science, but I remembered that the dark isn't really there.

Dark is an absence, not a substance. Light wins. But light does not win by defeating the dark. Light wins because it's light. Light doesn't need nothing except to be. I cry. For someone everyone thought of it. as a fucking idiot. Rusty sure knew a lot. I decided to live. I decided I would not be defined by

what I had lost. I still had life left in me that I could enjoy. So I resolved that I would enjoy it. I remember, Rusty. I remember the fireflies. Old Zabula couldn't cry. The gaggle of peculiar old women couldn't cry neither. I came into the cabin and my face was was white as a sheet, and I couldn't speak without choking. And you know what they said? They asked if it was PTSD from the war. It wasn't the question they wanted to ask. They knew better. We all knew better. I could see it in their eyes. Some of them mentioned things about old stories. They mentioned boogers and haints and the little folk. But no sooner would they say these things than their mouths clapped shut, because I could tell they wanted to say more.

And did it matter? What did horseshit legends matter? Because if that booger had truly been alive for centuries, hadn't the people who had written those legends been under the same restrictions as us? Old Zabula came out with her little book and pressed it into my hands. I can't tell you how discouraging that was. That little book was 300-page. in cramped riding, and Zabula had been working on it for 20 years and hadn't been able to find a way to do anything about it.

And that was awful because I needed vengeance. I thirsted for murder. They'd killed my Rusty. Rusty, who should have been there by my side when I died. Rusty, who should have been there to make the whole world bigger and better. Rusty, who ate disgusting things and laughed with me about it, because his soul was bigger than the ocean of horseshit people used to fill up their idle hours. Six months now.

It's been six months. I can't talk about the one thing on my mind. I read old Zabula's book. She has a theory that demons like the bugger enter our world under certain grounds. contracts and conditions. They are summoned here, and when they are summoned, demons are bound by the form they take. They have to follow the rules of that form. To banish a demon, you follow the rules of its contract, which you track down in legend and destroy it. We couldn't talk about it openly, but I have reason to believe she believes the thing she wrote down and has evidence

to support them as being true. But you know what? Light doesn't care about the rules of darkness. I remember Rusty running toward that booger. Light doesn't need anything except to be light. I remember the demon being puzzled that its powers held no sway over Rusty. I'm going to find that demon. I'm going to kill it. I won't follow evil contracts. I don't make deals with devils. I choose the light. I couldn't tell anyone what I was doing. I got all of Rusty's things out of his house. His aunt barely noticed I was taking anything. She just wanted to know why a stranger kept coming in and out of her house pretending to carry armfuls of nothing. She hollered a lot, but I pulled my gun on her and told her to sit down and tied her to a chair.

I was barely even thinking at that point. I think maybe old Zabula explained to her later on that I was crazy from PTSD or something. Rusty couldn't write. Rusty couldn't read. That was my biggest frustration when going through his things. None of his possession struck me as particularly magical. I kept getting the sense he'd remembered the booger from when it had stolen his intellect. I got the sense that he'd figured a way to beat its power. But all he had were beautiful things, things he liked for themselves.

I went back to the church. Took me two days to find the courage. His body stunk, not that anybody else could smell it. I'd known it from the war, of course. But I still couldn't believe how short. Strongly, people could not see something if they weren't supposed to see it. Even though nobody else could see the body, I had to wait for a quiet moment to go in and take it out and clean up the mess.

Wouldn't do for everyone to see me puking for no reason. I hated cleaning up the mess because it made me feel like I was complicit with the demon. But I couldn't leave Rust either. I dug his grave on a little island way out back in the bog behind his aunt's house. We'd played there together as kids. I dug deep. I brought stones to keep the earth undisturbed. He'd rest in peace.

Before I buried him, I searched his body for some clue as to how he'd broken the demon's power. Found an MP3 player in his pocket. There was still some power. Rusty didn't have much music. Mostly he had books on tape and some. poems. Put it in my pocket. There wasn't a prayer good enough for Rusty, but I tried. It took me six months to find the booger. Follow knife shows. It's a hard thing to look for a man you can't describe to someone who couldn't ever acknowledge that description. I started by

looking at women, at mothers, though sometimes fathers had seen as well. Their faces were enough. I spent time around schools looking for children who had given up. Children, everyone did their best not to notice. I followed intuition. I tracked broken dreams and lost hope and vacant expressions. I walked into a knife show in Tennessee. I saw some Navajo blankets.

I saw children there, terrified, but not yet assaulted and broken. I took Rusty's MP3 player out of my pocket and put in the earbuds. Rusty's voice was on this track. My eyes had teared up to remember what world's audio had re-opened to Rusty. I'd shown him books on tape in high school. He'd reacted like a man giving back limbs. I wish I'd known why. It was these poems that had finally taught me the secret.

I walked past the stalls, hearing nothing but Rusty's voice as I moved beyond the barrier of the blanket. Rusty reciting Ulysses by Tennyson. Though much is taken, much abides, and though we are not now that strength which in old days moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are. One equal temper of heroic hearts, made weak by time and fate, but strong. strong and will to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield. The booger bared its fangs at me and said, I know not what. I didn't care. I don't live for boogers. I live for the strength of a seven-year-old boy who could be stripped of everything

and still choose to live. I live for the meticulous habits and strange cooking of a peculiar old woman who tried her best even though she failed. I live for love and warmth and light. I do not live to fight or run away from shadows. My life needs nothing except to be my life. Darkness does not control me because darkness does not define me. And that is the secret. I felt the boogers power again in my stomach, trying to take my will.

But I felt it slide away and around me. No power from hell can take away our choice to keep living. I do not live in fear of darkness. But when I am confronted by darkness, I will be myself. And part of being me is that I destroy darkness. Thank you, Rusty. Thank you, my love. I remember the fireflies?

The booger fumbled for its knives as I pulled the gun out of my jacket. Contracts, forms, rules. Monsters always want you to believe in rules. Monsters steal and lie and kill and demand charity and honesty and healing. Are those your rules? Did you choose them? Do you find them fair? Here's a rule.

Force equals mass times acceleration. I found my calm center. My leg spasmed, but I let the feeling pass through me. I pulled the trigger of my gun. I shot the bugger in the heart. I pulled the trigger again and hit it in the head. It fell. Bleeding eye core the color of midnight because even a demonic body needs a heart to pump blood.

That's a rule no one can break. I emptied a clip into its chest and reloaded. It wasn't moving, but I wasn't taking any chances. I shot out its eyes until I could see through its head. Demons do follow the rules of forms. Bones once ossified can be broken. Flesh once rendered can be smashed Joints once joined can be severed

Excuse me What are you doing? I took out the earphones and turned over my shoulder The children and other people who had been in the booth with the demon had fled This was only a passerby, a stranger My hands were covered in blood I had six trash bags stuffed with the different parts of dead demon. Oh, uh, stretches.

Exercise. Figured I'd clean a bit too. I know the guy who runs this booth and he had to leave unexpectedly. The booger's chest was open before me. The desiccated remnants of his heart were at my feet. Okay, just, uh, be careful with that knife. We'll do. I left the demon in six days.

different states in six newly poured parking lots. Zabula and I can even say booger out loud now. The pressure on us is less. I still can't acknowledge this happened as a fact. If I try to delete or cross out those sections, my head hurts so much I think I'll die. Maybe this is all just a story. I think that's what the people who wrote and told those first booger stories were doing, preparing people for later, saying what they couldn't say as fact in a story. I cannot believe there was only one such demon wandering the earth and that I stumbled upon it by chance. Danger comes. It's not the danger you are ready for, but you've got to fight it.

Remember the firefly. And a thought occurs to me sometimes late at night. It feels so good that I'm more afraid to write it down than any of these other memories. I saw those kids again, the kids from the Knife Show. I saw them dreary, lifeless, hopeless. I saw them gray and ignored. I also saw them eating strange foods like Rusty did. I saw them eating things that no one that young has any business eating.

I think back to the night I buried the booger's head. Touched its tongue on accident, and I felt the spell on me ease the slightest bit. I'd been in a days when I'd done that bloody business. Now I'm settled some, and I've been watching those kids. It makes me wonder. There hadn't been a food rusty loved more. than tongue. There's a burrito place in town that will use tongue if you ask. I wonder if I might test out my idea tomorrow. Bring those kids lunch at school. I wonder if maybe the body has a way of

telling you what it means to heal. I still remember where I buried the head after all. And so another episode has drawn to a close and our nightmares dissolve. to the ether. 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 when our dark tales will envelop you in a little bit.

and nightmarish, swirling, bog. This audio production is copyright 2017 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.