The NoSleep Podcast - S18 Ep21: NoSleep Podcast S18E21

Episode Date: November 20, 2022

Tune in to Episode 21 of Season 18 for terrifying towns.“Tabula Rasa City” written by Lisel Jones (Story starts around 00:00:00)Produced by: Phil MichalskiCast: Mr. Paul – Andy Cresswell, Concierge – Ash Millman, Heather – Penny Scott-Andrews“Happy Thoughts” written by Samuel McQuail (Story starts around 00:05:55)TRIGGER WARNING!Produced by: Phil MichalskiCast: Narrator – David Ault“Angelton” written by C.M. Scandreth (Story starts around 00:14:45)Produced by: Jeff ClementCast: Mikey – Jeff Clement, Mr. Moroni – Graham Rowat, Mother – Kristen DiMercurio, Father – Mick Wingert“Something Bad” Davin Ireland (Story starts around 00:42:30)TRIGGER WARNING!Produced by: Phil MichalskiCast: Lou – Jesse Cornett, Ned – Mick Wingert“The Old Plot” written by Charlie Davenport (Story starts around 01:14:10)Produced by: Phil MichalskiCast: Bernie – Linsay Rousseau, Sully – Atticus Jackson, Grandpa – David Cummings, Ma – Sarah Ruth Thomas“A Long December” written by Stephanie Scissom (Story starts around 01:31:10)TRIGGER WARNING!Produced by: Jesse CornettCast: Abel – Peter Lewis, Rae – Erin Lillis, Billy – Matthew Bradford, Helen – Nikolle Doolin, Charlie – Dan Zappulla, Janine – Mary Murphy, Tyler – Kyle Akers, Prison Guard #1 – Graham Rowat, Prison Guard #2 – Atticus Jackson, Receptionist – Nichole Goodnight, Jordan – Elie Hirschman, Teen Girl – Sarah Thomas, Mrs. King – Kristen DiMercurio, Cop – Jeff Clement, Police dispatcher – Jesse CornettThis episode is sponsored by:Quip - Quip is the good habits company for oral health. With their leading-edge electric smart toothbrush combined with dentist-recommend scheduled replacement plans for brush heads, toothpaste, floss, chewing gum, and mouthwash - Quip makes oral care easy and affordable. And if you go to getquip.com/nosleep right now you'll get your first refill FREEClick here to learn more about The NoSleep Podcast teamClick here for the Season Pass Black Friday Week saleExecutive Producer & Host: David CummingsMusical score composed by: Brandon Boone“Happy Thoughts” illustration courtesy of JörnAudio program ©2022 – 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

Hello, Mr. Paul, I am so pleased to welcome you to your new home in Tabula Rasa, the city where Carefree is a way of life, your way. That's exactly what I need after the year I've just had. The divorce, selling my business, turning 40, it's me time from now on. Daddy, you're on the superhero ride. Soon, honey. Daddy's just got to finish a little business first. Typical. And you said you'd change.

after retiring. We do find that many of our residents move here after reaching a turning point, a need for a life reset. I think you'll feel right at home amongst our exclusive clientele, living their best life with no compromise. Can't wait. Let me just install your access app. There you go, this will give full access

to your all-inclusive facilities. Luxury furnished penthouse, the supercar garage, daily designer wardrobe and gourmet menu handpicked just for you by our team of experts. Fantastic. Your calendar's also packed with fun events with values-matched peers. And of course, me and my fellow concierges are available 24-7 to fulfill your requests. And my, uh, interiority editing appointment?

Uh, the clinic is confirmed for this evening. Personality traits retuned to maximum agreeableness for our community. Regrets and bad decisions wiped away like they never happened. Perfect. Soon, Heather. So that just leaves the final payment. Is it okay to collect now? Yes. Yes, please. Take her. Come along, Heather. Be frightened. We desire a glimpse into the darkness.

We conjure creatures and monsters, all the while knowing deep in our souls. The terror is out there. Brace yourself for the No Sleep podcast. High-tech luxury living is the wave of the future. All those amazing amenities are worth a small sacrifice. That's what we learned from author Lissell Jones, from the tale which was this episode's cold open. Tabula Rasa City, performed by Ash Millman, Andy Cresswell,

and Penny Scott Andrews. We welcome you into the 1990s, our final decade of the season as we work our way through the themes of old-time television. I know many of you were born in the 90s, so I apologize for making you feel old when we talk about that decade in the same breath as old-time television. But what a time it was for television. Near the end of the decade, a new fad called High- Definition TV started. And if you wanted creepy chills, you could watch. Goosebumps? Are You Afraid of the Dark? And weird shows like Twin Peaks and that spooky alien show. What was it called again? I can't remember. Something to do with a fox and a scully, if I recall.

Ah, well, I'm sure someone knows the true name of it. After all, they say the truth is out there. And as we work our way toward the end of season 18, we're also nearing the end of 2022. The holiday season is upon us, and I've decided to get into the spirit of that most glorious and festive time of year. That's right. I'm talking about Black Friday sales. So, starting Monday, November 21st, right through to the end of Black Friday, we'll be selling season passes 13 through 18 for only $20 each. That's 20% off for the entire week. We're not selling any bundles at the moment, but if you're missing a recent season or

want to jump in and experience well over 66.6 hours of content per season, plus those exclusive bonus episodes, now's the time to do it. Just go to season pass dot the no sleep podcast.com and find the season, or seasons you want to get for only $20 each. The No Sleep Podcast, Black Friday sale, only from November 21st through the 25th. And now our stories are starting. leave. Our tales are quite true if you want to believe. In our first tale, we meet a man who wants nothing but the best for people. Wouldn't it be wonderful to have such a positive person around you? Well, in this tale, shared with us by author Samuel McQuail, we discover the man's unique ability to remove negative thoughts from people if only everyone was willing to be so positive.

Performing this tale is David Alt. So don't be a negative Nelly. Let this man help you feel better. You just have to think, happy thoughts. I can see them, you know. Every time I step onto the street, I see the little black curls of smoke polluting everyone's minds. Squirming, floating, writhing their way through otherwise pristine thoughts. He worries about his loans. She fears for her mother's health. They try to choose between saving their crumbling relationship. or finding another. Everything smoke touches turns a little darker until soon an entire lobe of grubby grey has blossomed into sight. I can't stand it. Who could? Knowing all the nasty things that make smiles droop and tears fall, I can't stand to see them suffer like that. So I pluck the smoke out.

It doesn't hurt. I would never do something if it really hurt. I just reach forward with my mind and pull out the wispy worms before they can dig too deep. Sometimes they still leave a little grey behind, but it always clears. And then the smiles are back. Those big, beautiful grins I love so much. It only takes a few minutes, and it makes me so warm to help everyone in I don't think they know. People love being around me. I used to think it might be because I take their bad thoughts away that they were being selfish. I had to pluck that thought out of myself. How could I make anyone happy if I wasn't happy? And I am happy now. Very. And everyone loves being with me because I make them happy too. Isn't that what friends are for? But, Sometimes I find people who've caught on, who know, new residents, out-of-town guests, or those rare ones born with my gift. I can tell they're like me because their heads are full of nasty things, less like smoke and more like... Oil, thick and viscous with everyone's thoughts inside their head.

I try my best to pick away at their troubles to... To let them know it's okay to have a gift like this, that they should make people happy. But it's so hard with some of them. They think the black smoke is important, that people should worry and be afraid, and it's wrong to never be sad. It takes me a long time to pluck that feeling out of their heads. It's such a deep-seated, nasty little thought, isn't it? So insidious and corruptive.

But it's okay. I understand how hard it is to get rid of something like that yourself. How it can infest everything until your brain is full to the brim. That's why I'm here. I help them to be happy and to see why they need to make everyone else happy too. You understand that, right? You're not like her, are you? She was a nice young woman for many months.

ago, she had so many reasons to be happy. A loving girlfriend, a beautiful house, a nice job. But she wasn't. No, not at all. Her mind was ugly. Filled with oily thoughts and wrong ideas. Ideas like how strange it was no one else in town had the same black smoke she'd seen before. She thought everyone was wrong.

thought we were all scary and strange. Us being happy made her unhappy. That wasn't so bad. I'd seen it before, you know. Gifted people are always scared of what I do when they find out. But I pluck away the fear, and they become just as happy as me. Not her. No.

It was bad enough she wasn't happy. Bad enough, it took me days to risk. wriggle through her mind and pull the darkness away, only to find an even blacker pitch inside. Imagine that. How truly, desperately unhappy did you have to be to hide it so? No, no, no, no, no, no. Bad enough one person a hundred thinks such thoughts, but for her to put those thoughts in others. My apologies, let me just... There we go. The anger is all gone. now. But you see, how horrible it is, even I became unhappy with her. Morris was happy. He didn't

need to mourn his wife anymore. And the Joneses' stillbirth was so hard on them, I simply had to take that away. And let's not forget, poor little Timmy being scared of his uncle, he's such a nice, happy man with good, happy thoughts. The boy needed to focus on the silver linings, you know, but not with her around. No, she just had to slip in all the negative thoughts, to make the Joneses cry, make Morris lonely, make Timmy. It took me days to sort them all out again, let me tell you. I couldn't stay quiet. I had to confront her. I had to. But she wouldn't listen. She knew what I could do, and she hated that I did it. I never found out why, you know. She was screaming such nonsense about right and wrong and freedom.

Honestly, she was far too far gone. There was nothing but roiling pitch in her head. She couldn't see, no matter how hard I tried. I do free people. I free them from the nasty thoughts, from the burden of unpleasantness. I kept trying to pluck hers away, but more and more kept forming until everyone's eyes were honest, filling with the same insidious thoughts. I made it quick. I really did. It took me quite some time

to clear away the thoughts she'd left behind, little worms squirming inside the deepest reaches of everyone's minds. I understand. It wasn't something you could be happy about. Even I wasn't happy until I plucked the guilt from my head. But now I am, and so are they, and so are they, and And even though she was never happy, I do wish she could have been. If only she'd accepted me. Oh dear, I've made a few little curls appear in your mind, haven't I? I suppose it is to be expected, all this talk of unhappiness. If you'll just let me reach inside for a moment.

Ooh, there. Of course, you'd remember what I said. I never took that away. We remember everything. it'd be so cruel to take the memories away. And I'm not a cruel person. I just want everyone to be happy, you see? I'm sure everyone has stories about the town in which they grew up,

the unique people, the quirky locations, the local legends. But in this tale, shared with us by author C.M. Scandroth, we meet a man who grew up in a town unlike any other, a town full of angels. Performing this tale are Jeff Clement, Graham Rowett, Kristen Di MacIro, and Mick Wingerd. So whether you believe in them or not makes no difference, you just have to live on a wing and a prayer when you grow up in Angelton.

I was raised by a town full of angels. I know that's an outrageous claim, but please let me explain. This isn't something divulged lightly, as it recounts a hard-won truth that I've wrestled with for the bulk of my adult life. I can see now that the evidence was always there, right in front of me. But I wanted to deny it so that I could carry on thinking that heaven and hell were just pleasant abstractions. Something to only really think about once I'd stumbled past midlife and into old age. Maybe even the psychiatrists knew it was something more. They explained my delusions were the result of trauma,

but that didn't explain why I had such complete and vivid memories of my time in that town. That perfect little place, so unironically named Angelton. Eventually, the drugs dulled my recollections, blurred my fading memories to white, until they mingled with the pale painted walls of the psychiatric institute, until I couldn't tell what was real and what was fantasy. But long after they deemed me sane enough to be released, I managed to pick it all apart again. I managed to tease out my real childhood experiences

from the fragile tapestry of sterile bleached-out strands and piece together a picture of what happened to me in that town. The story that follows is woven from the threads that I managed to salvage. My first memory is from age five, my own birthday party. It seemed like the whole town had come to our house. There were so many folks in our yard. I couldn't know it at the time, but it's more than likely the entire town was in our street that day.

Come to celebrate the birthday of little Mikey. There were so many presents that they filled the living room like a giant Christmas tree made of cardboard and colored paper. I spent hours unwrapping them. All the friends of my family clustered around, their bright smiles urging me to keep going, long after my child's mind and body grew weary of the task. I don't remember my mother picking me up and taking me to bed after I fell asleep in the middle of eating a slice of the three-tier cake. But she told that story so often that it became a part of my memories anyway. It's hard to pinpoint exactly when I became aware that I was different.

But I think the first stirrings of it began at school. I had no idea that the school had opened just for me, that until I arrived, it had lain unused since it was built some 40 years before. Everything was brand new, but it was. I thought that's just how things were, just like the schools on television. My first teacher, Mrs. Cassiel, seemed new to things too, not quite knowing how to fill up all the hours of the school day. She read to us a lot, from Reader's Digest and Encyclopedia Britannica, stuff far above our age level. The rest of the time, she let us play and paint, while she watched over her little lambs, her angelic,

mile suitably doting. The other children weren't like me either. I recall they were strange, serious little things who always seemed to take their cues from me, from little Mikey. If I did something, so did they, incorporating it into their growing lexicon of behaviors, as though adding pages to their primers on how to be a child.

At the time I didn't process this. I couldn't. Only with the benefit of hindsight can I look back and see how odd it was. Something I did notice at the time was that my school didn't seem to work quite like the ones on television. With each birthday, I moved up a class, but my little lemming peers did not come with me. Each new year meant a new teacher that was normal enough, but it also brought a completely new set of students. As I grew up, I became increasingly aware of the rest of the town. It was an idyllic place, as perfect as any little town could ever be. All of it locked permanently somewhere in the

late 1950s. After school, my friends and I rode our brightly painted bicycles to the ice cream parlor, then took our dripping, colorful cones to the neatly manicured park to watch women and pretty floral frocks walk their pedigree dogs. On weekends, the fathers of the families in our street would wash their cars until they gleamed, then cut their lawns and trimmed their hedges,

while the wives made lemonade and cookies. I don't even remember any rainy days. In retrospect, it was an eerie paradise, and I had no idea this was not how the rest of the world in 19. 1978 operated. To me, it was completely normal. Television ruled the evenings in Angelton, with every family gathering in their near-identical living rooms to watch the broadcasts from the local station. There were only two channels, and they both played variations of the same shows,

mostly I Love Lucy, Dennis the Menace, My Little Margie, and Leave It to Beaver. TV time was practically sacred in the town. And whenever there was a new innovation in TV technology, trucks would roll through the streets, delivering the latest color, remote-controlled sets. And those delivery days were pretty much the only time I saw anyone from outside of Angleton. All the rest of the town supplies went through Muriel's department store,

or Wormwood's groceries. I'd asked about the rest of the world, of course. Like any kid my age, except apparently the ones in my class, I was curious, and I had many questions. My teacher at the time, Mr. Moroni, seemed to answer as best he could at first. But on the day I grew particularly persistent and shrill, childishly pushing against his reticence and inability to answer my more burning questions, I earned my first true taste of who and what the residents of Angleton were. But how can the president still be Eisenhower? I asked, petulant and defiant.

A president can't serve more than eight years. It says so in the encyclopedia at home. I looked it up. Mr. Moroni, a short, swarthy man of Italian descent, shook his head and took several short paces toward my desk. Your encyclopedia is wrong. But it can't be. Mrs. Cassiel said everything in it was true. Everything except that.

There was an unfamiliar, resonant note in his voice that made the hairs on my arms lift with unseen static. I think you're lying. I told him, growing bolder now, oddly thrilled by the sensation and the effect I was having. I think you're just a stupid, lying old man, and you don't really know anything. I'd registered that the other children in class were staring at me, but only now did I realize that they were all standing. And Mr. Moroni no longer seemed a short and affable idiot.

Suddenly he appeared huge and threatening. His facial features carved from some exotic wood as he loomed over my desk. Why are you being like this? His fists clenched, walnut knuckles on my desk. Why won't you just behave like a normal boy? The tears started before I could stop them, Right as I realized I'd gone too far. His lips were wrong, barely moving at all.

You stop crying right now. The imperative in his voice stimulated something right at the back of my skull, flooding my brain with fear that paralyzed my limbs. I'd never felt anything like this before. But the tears did not stop. Instead, they flowed faster, and a sucking, ugly sob tore from my throat, an animal sound that only served to enrage my teacher further. The desk splintered under the weight of pale fists as Mr. Moroni changed. For half a heartbeat, I saw him true.

He was someone else. Something. A creature of white and gold, all crescent fangs and pale eyes, the silhouette of extra disjointed limbs tearing free from its shoulders. The voice blared in my ears like a thousand trumpets. And in my stupefied state of trembling terror, my bladder let go. And I complied. I never questioned him again after that.

I never asked anyone in Angleton about the outside world. I wasn't sure why, but some primitive part of me knew instinctively that my teacher wasn't the only one with this power. Beneath the carefully curated smiles and innocuous personalities of the townsfolk lay dormant the same frightening thing that my mild-mannered teacher had become. So shockingly glimpsed in that singular moment. moment of unbridled fury. I was living amongst monsters. It was like unlatching barn doors in a storm. Once open, there was no way of closing them again, the cyclone of truth too powerful to push against. With my new knowledge, everything was thrown into stark relief, and I began to really see how strange my town

was, and how perfectly everyone emulated the TV shows they were all so enamored with. Even though I was desperate to believe that I'd only imagined the incident in my class, it was impossible to ignore the weirdness surrounding me. In those moments I was alone, in those precious windows of time when my mother was picking out laundry, and my father tinkered with his car in the driveway, I learned to tune the TV to stations broadcasting from outside Angelton. Though the pictures were snowy and the sound crackled with static, I began to find out that the place I lived in wasn't just odd.

It was absolutely fucked. The image that assaulted my eager eyes and ears were of a place that was totally out of time with us. It was a completely different world out there. How we had remained so insulated, I wasn't sure, but I knew it had something to do with what I had seen Mr. Moroni become. Obviously, there was only one thing I could do, one course of action that seemed rational and sane. I had to go to the edge of the town and leave it.

I had to see the outside world for myself. I packed food into a tartan square of cloth, then tied it to a stick, just like the children I'd seen in books and on TV. practically rule one of how to run away. It was a fair hike to the low stone wall that encircled the town, and by the time I'd got there, I'd already eaten a cheese sandwich and sucked down half of my bottle of lemonade. The wall was built of curious, chalky, white stone, and was only about a foot high.

It seems pointless, with more than a boundary marker, as even the smallest child could climb over it easily. But a strange trepidation warmed through me as I walked toward it. My gut heavy and cold, like I'd drunk too much ice water, too fast. This is wrong, some inner thought caution. You shouldn't be doing this. But I was stubborn, set on my course, and I couldn't turn back now.

None of the kids on TV would have given up because of a stupid voice. voice in their head. As I lifted my leg over the white boundary, I felt a feathery, pleasant sensation tickle across my flesh. Then as I placed my other foot down on the outside of the wall, I began to wonder what I was doing there, why I had a bindle over one shoulder. What was behind me seemed utterly unimportant, not even interesting enough to turn around and look at. So, I wandered onward, away from the fast fading memories behind me, and out into the real world. My mother found me curled up under a hedgerow, a few miles out from Angelton, and carried me back asleep. When I awoke, my head was full of fog. Confusion reigned for a long time before my drowned memories began to resolve themselves.

You've done a terrible thing. My mother stood with my father at my bedside. A terrible, terrible thing. I'd never seen her look so disappointed in me, and it hurt. But I don't understand. My father looked angry, but not at me. His simmering rage was directed at my mother. He isn't a miracle.

He isn't born of our union, is he? If he was born of us, the ward wouldn't have stripped his mind, wouldn't have made him forget. Genuine emotion racked my mother's perfect 30-year-old features, tears striping her cheeks. I realized I'd never seen her cry real tears before. I realized I'd never seen anyone. cry real tears. Apart from myself, that day in the classroom. I just wanted a baby. I wanted to know what it was like to be a real mother, to raise a real child, not just pretend. She spat that last word as though it were a bitter draft, poisoning

her tongue. My father took a step away from her, plainly disturbed by my mother's candid display. His movements were stiff. His eyes, an actor, peering through slits in a mask. I've told the mayor, the police will be here soon to take you and this boy away. Tucked in my bed, blankets under my chin, I tried to process what was happening. Fear coiled in my bowels. My bladder threatening to rebel and embarrass me all over again. What will happen to us?

My mother wiped at her tears with the back of her hand, then stared at the damp shine on her skin. You'll both be destroyed. When he breached the barrier, he put the whole town at risk. Your scent will be the wind fallen alike to sniff out. Although I sensed the threat they held, the words themselves meant nothing to me. We didn't pray in this town.

There was no God in our lives. There was a pretty church, since there were churches on TV. But only bake sales and plays happened there. I'd never seen anyone pray or preach. Mama? For one last moment, she was still my mother. Her smile was warm, genuine, nothing but love. and I knew without a single doubt that she truly did love me.

Even though the rest of the town were actors in their own survival play, performing a perverse pantomime and feeling nothing, this one woman, this one angel, had fallen and risen all at once by managing to truly fall in love with a little boy. Then she was a blur of white and gold, eight feet of feathered wings filling my bedroom as she tore at my father. She tore off his skin and clawed through his breastbone until the cowboy and Indian wallpaper of my room was painted with golden Icar. We didn't make it far.

Before we even saw the wall of stones that encircled the town, we were intercepted. All pretense of humanity had fled the town now. White wings thundered all about the houses and fields. Alien faces of guilt and alabaster bared feline fangs and came for us. I wish that we had been caught and killed by them, just as the town folk had planned. I wish they had managed to snuff us out before the winds had betrayed us to the enemies of the town. But that was not to be how things played out.

The sky darkened and black feathers rained down, each longer than my arm. My beautiful, terrible mother, cradling me in her angel arms, folded her great wings about me to shield me from the chaos unfolding around. us. Though I saw little, I heard

much. Voices like orchestras of woodwind and grass clashed in air, the sounds of breaking bone and rending flesh like the crack and roll of concussion and the biblical cacophon surrounding us.

I felt my mother shuddered beneath many blows. Her resolute stride faltering. Golden blood, pattering down to flood my winged Kikoon. And then, as suddenly as it had all begun, it was over. The citizens of Angelton were no more, reduced to macerated piles of gold-streaked feathers by the rageful might of heaven and hell combined, for daring to exist outside of either paradigm. But my existence

was forgotten. I was not truly part of either world. And so, when the bodies turned to white ash with the rising sun, the hosts of dark and light had long since gone, leaving me to stumble through the empty, smut-covered fields where Angelton had once stood. I was found many days later, dehydrated and delirious, by a farmer driving into the next town over. bundled with a blanket and driven to the police station, I sat with a can of Coca-Cola in the sheriff's office, trying to explain what had happened to me. Of course, I was assumed to be gravely ill, both mentally and physically. So I was taken to the city hospital and dosed with a cornucopia of modern pharmaceuticals until a kind of foggy equilibrium emerged inside my tortured mind. It was strange when I was well enough to talk to other patients, visitors. Some people claimed they had heard of Angelton,

but they couldn't tell me where it was, when they'd visited it, or even hold that thread of a conversation for more than a minute. As far as I could fathom, I was the only person who could remember anything about the place. And as my time in the psychiatric ward lengthened from weeks to months, I began to forget it too. I've been back there to the place where it should be.

I've traced the boundaries on the maps, but found only acres of farmland all accounted for, all owned by ordinary people. It is as though the fabric of the earth itself pulled tight to fill the void where my town had been, erasing it completely. It was a place, that shouldn't have existed, a relic of the war in heaven, I think. A hidden place created by the

pacifists among the angels, lost to the eyes of God in his brood. Somewhere even angels could try to just exist. But it was all undone by that one angel who wanted, needed to be more human than the others. that one angel who snatched the child of a delivery driver, who told the rest of the town that she had birthed a miracle, sparking vigor and hope in lifeless and dreary people, reinvigorating a dead town. But I am no miracle. I find little peace in this life,

even knowing without a doubt that heaven and hell are real. I don't know which of those two realms will be my final resting place. I don't know which I will deserve. But wherever my soul is bound, I do know that I will spend the rest of eternity surrounded by the creatures that murdered my mother, the one being in this terrifying existence who truly loved me. Although it cost her more than anyone.

could ever imagine. I know about angels we've heard on high, but not one's heard way down low. Ah, well, let's take a quick break as we head into the season where angels are often sung about. Yes, the holiday season is upon us. That means you'll likely be spending more time face-to-face with family and friends. And when there's mistletoe around, you want to make sure your oral hygiene is as heavenly as possible. That's why you should make quip the foundation of your dental routine.

You've heard me talk about Quip and their smart electric toothbrush, with time sonic vibrations with 30-second pulses to guide a dentist-recommended two-minute clean. It has a lightweight and sleek design for adults and kids, with no wires or bulky chargers to weigh you down. So if you're traveling this holiday season, Quip can easily come along with you. Good for cleaning your choppers after consuming copious amounts of sticky, sweet Christmas cake. And when it comes to Quip, you don't just have to take my word for it. has over 26,000 five-star reviews, and it was awarded one of Time Magazine's 25 best inventions.

On top of your brushing, you can upgrade your quip with a smart motor to track and improve your brushing with the free Quip app. Earn amazing rewards like free refills, products, Target, gift cards, and more. With stylish and affordable electric brushes starting at just $25, you won't be paying through the teeth for better oral health. Trust me, you've got to try it. Go to get quip.com slash no sleep right now for your first refill free. Plus shop quip's lowest prices of the year this holiday season. That's G-E-T-Q-U-I-P dot com slash no sleep. Quip, the Good Habits Company.

And now that I've talked about quip and shared something really good, let's get back to the horror. This time we've got something really not so good. These days we have apps to keep us informed about storms coming our way. We don't need to wait to see the dark clouds on the horizon. But in this tale, shared with us by author Davin Ireland, we meet some residents of a town preparing for a different kind of storm. One no app can prepare you for.

Performing this tale are Jesse Cornett and Mick Wingert. So if you know this one is coming, you'd better be ready, and, dare I say, fully braced. It's the only way to make it when what's coming is something bad. I'll tell you this. Something bad was coming to Ardenville. The people of the town felt it in the air that grade the skies above its factories and fields, and in the swirling clouds of grit that blew the length of its baking summer streets.

They felt it in living rooms where children stared blank-eyed at darkened TV screens. At the intersection of Partridge and Fifth where the corner girls plied their timeless trade in parks and malls that had shut down early for the day. Mama Zorowski felt it more than most. She sat on the walk-up of her crumbling second-hand clothes store on Denver Avenue, smoking one cigarette after another. A taste like old pennies at the back of her throat. Gonna be a bad one this year, she decided.

wincing as a loose page from one of the dailies floated past on the strengthening breeze. Mama knew from experience that the final days of summer in Ardenville could be a bitch. Only this year, the bitch had teeth, what she wouldn't do for a fast car and someplace nice to go. There were plenty of people who shared that sentiment. Those of us old enough to remember the last time such heat descended on the top. town weren't looking forward to more of the same. Take old Ned Dyson. When I dropped off the man when Ned's place that morning, he was already out in the front yard, lurking below the headline with a pair of shears in hand and acting for all the world like a trespasser on his own

property. He popped up in my sight line and snapped the blades at a stray leaf. You just about surprised the hell out of me. The smile that accompanied the This statement was sheepish enough for me not to call him a goddamn liar, which is exactly what he was. We both knew the old Coot had been waiting on me since before sunrise. Morning to you, Ned. I told him, affecting the same glib attitude I always do around this time of year. All ready for the big one? Oh, just a few last minute adjustments.

Nothing I can't handle. He angled a glance at the boarded over windows of his front. porch, the door with the reinforced frame, the extra coat of fire-retardant paint we'd slapped on the previous weekend. Close by, his old BB gun rested comfortably in the shade of the drinks cooler. I'd still like some help if you can spare it, though. Drink? And when I'm done with ease, I padded the three-quarter full mailbag slung across my back.

But I appreciate the offer. Well, that's one of the same. I said. If truth be told, Ned's been fixing his own lemonade from the recipe his late wife left him a couple years back, and though I hate to speak ill of the living or the dead at a time like this, I swear to God the stuff tastes more like horse piss every time I drink it. And that's with the extra sugar added. Anyway, after spotting the catapult in the well-stuffed pouch of marbles resting on top of Ned's mailbox. The old coot always did have a sense of humor. I contemplated the scene developing across the road. There weren't that many of them gathered over

there yet. Drifters, thieves, winos, crackheads, maybe a couple of underage hookers thrown in for good measure. If past experience is anything to go by, their numbers would swell as the day progressed. and with them the nature of the disturbances. It doesn't matter. The names change from year to year, but the inexorable need to congregate on the steps of Ardenville Public Library on Labor Day remains as strong now as it ever was. It's a relative thing.

You spend your life ridden with shame and self-loathing in the midst of such a hard-working, God-fearing community as this. It must be kind of nice to visit a place where, the streets run vile with darkness and corruption for a few short hours each year. Helps take the pressure off, I guess. Uh, pity they'll never see any of it. Ned, who'd been wound tighter than a carriage clock for most of the week, was too busy to take any notice.

What's you mumbling down there, Lou? Ian exchanged his shears for a ladder and was clamoring steadily towards the weather-beaten star-spangled banner that's been flamping from the roof of his porch ever since that awful day back in September of 2001. I swear to Christ, he'll kill himself bringing that flag down one of these days. I said to make sure you're being careful up there. I felt my heart flipped like an undercooked pancake when his foot missed a wrung and dangled in free air for what seemed like an age. I knew right then that this wasn't going to be our day. And a second or two later.

I was proved right. Before Ned could steady himself, an abrasive squeal issued from the direction of the library. For the briefest moment, I thought the expulsion had started early, and apparently so did my friend. He tottered uncertainly onto his stumpy old legs, flagpole and hand, the stars and stripes flowing gracefully about his head and shoulders in the early morning breeze. Losing your balance at Ned's age is one thing. Losing it when you're temporarily blinded and 15 feet off the ground is another proposition. Convinced this could only and badly, I dropped my mailbag and barged through the front gate knowing only too well that if anything happened to Ned Dyson on today of all days, plenty of people would suffer the consequences.

It didn't come to that by some bizarre quirk of fate, or maybe it was plain old dumb luck, I don't know. Ned regained his balance and descended the ladder, cussing and wheezing like he always does, but still holding on to that damn flagpole. Once he was all the way down, we contemplated the source of the interruption together. Must be on account of that inferno over at the tire factory last year. Ned scowled at a point just above the dust-whitened elms. I had to agree with that. A year ago to the day, a company that manufactured and tested wet weather tires for the Japanese motorcycle industry was raised to the ground by what the insurance people like to call a fire of unknown origin.

Folk had been preparing for the next one ever since. And if things didn't speed up over at the library pretty soon, I knew just where it'd be. Still, you'd have thought they'd have gotten around to it before now. I added, and for the first time, wondered just how bad this year's expulsion was going to be. The thing that gained our attention was a pair of workmen suspended on one of those winched platform window cleaners used to get at the glass on really tall buildings. They were screwing steel shutters to window frames across the entire width of the library's second floor. And boy, were they in a hurry.

The petulant squeal was the sound of the platform's winch working, overtime every time it relocated to the next window along. Below the platform, two dozen gray-faced indigence stirred, but failed to raise a protest. There'd be another two dozen of them by noon, and maybe as many again an hour later. By that time, of course, they'd have a whole lot more to complain about. The library wouldn't get as much as a look in. They might break the record too while they're at it. After taking a moment to digest this, Ned scooped the catapult from the mailbox and slotted it into his shirt pocket. With the other hand, he retrieved the pouch of marbles and hefted it experimentally.

In that case, you better get that mail route over with. Gonna be awful busy around here soon, and I don't want to be left hanging around when it matters. Keep your hair on. I retrieved my mailbag from the sidewalk. Some of us still had day jobs to contend with impending catastrophe or no. Hom seen, Miss Straal, the Santa Ana winds. Different people use different names, though it really all comes down to the same thing. A hot desert wind that blows up out of nowhere. But we don't get many of them in this neck of the woods.

And when we do, people don't take a whole lot of notice. In the regulated, sanitized, air-conditioned environment we call the United States a fair percentage of the population still refuses to consider the elements as something to be feared. I just don't understand that. When you're on the wrong side of 60 and have lived your entire life in Ardenville, you fear plenty and with good reason. This year's demonstration of why must have started proper around 11 o'clock that, morning, just as I was entering Gilligan's hardware with my final batch of mail. The experience isn't easy to describe. It's as if the air thins out and heats up all at the same time, causing you to paint instead of breathe easily. Pretty soon, you've got your eyes closed

and your head bent into a wind that feels like it's blowing straight out of a convection oven. Superheated gusts buff at you from one side of the street to the other, stealing your balance and threatening to put you on your can at every turn. It must have caught me off guard at least once, because as I turned into Gilligan's, I blundered straight into some fellow standing idly in the doorway. I was about to give him a peace of my mind when I noticed. He wasn't alone.

There were five or six of them all wedged in there together, and they were doing more than just standing. They were lining up. Only not to return that air conditioning unit they were in it back, at the end of June or to buy a new rake in advance of the fall. No, sir, they were there for one reason and one reason only. Tools to fight the expulsion with,

the belated acquisition thereof. I couldn't say much to that, so I shouldered my way to the counter and passed Erb Gilligan his letters. Herb managed a harried grin, but it was a close-run thing. He had a young family to think about, and a handful of flyers and periodicals delivered by yours truly was hardly competition. Things started moving a little quicker after that. Cars streaked from one end of Maine to the other, tires barking, horns honking,

headlights on full blast. The store is emptied soon after. Scuffles broke out on the sidewalk. I was relieved to be near the tail end of my route instead of somewhere in the middle. Otherwise, I might not have made it at all. And then, just like that, everything deteriorated. Different folks sensed it in different ways, although everybody feels something. And what we were feeling right about then was the expulsion bearing down on us ahead of schedule.

The time had come for everybody still on the street to get the hell off the street and right quick. The tortured, moaning filtering between the buildings confirmed this beyond any doubt. Even people who hear that strange noise for the first time rarely mistake it for a moaning sound. This isn't like moaning. It is moaning. And the whole town resonates with it, the way a bell vibrates long after being struck by a hammer. Good thing, too. Maine was emptying out by the time I turned back on to Denver Avenue.

Security screens descended on businesses that were hastily shutting up shop for the day. I waved to Mama Zerowski, who raised a hand in return before slipping inside her second-hand clothes store. The first dark portents revealed themselves in her absence. Telephone wires whipsawed in the wind, twanging like out-of-tune piano wires. The sky darkened in rapid stages to the color of bruised fruit, and although I've been trying my damnedest to forget it ever since, I swear to God. A stray dog standing beneath the owning of an ice cream parlor not 50 feet from me just collapsed where it stood. Stone did. I began to get frightened after that.

Really frightened. Emergency services are scarce around these parts at the best. of times, and the nearest sheriff is 20 miles to the west of here. The last time I saw Charlie Kinwright out this way, it was to pick up a teenage runaway from his own patch, and he didn't hang around for too long even then. Ned sim-a-fored me from his front yard as I labored up Denver Avenue, with my empty satchel slung over one's shoulder, and my lungs heaving under their burden of baking, dust-laden air. He looked about as flustered as I felt. I didn't blame the poor guy one bit.

The change had come over Ardenville a lot quicker than in previous years. We were all playing catch-up at a time we should have been erecting our defenses. Clouds of dust blew in from the plains with growing intensity, piling little drifts against the curbsides and the bases of walls. Screen doors crashed. Children cried. And just about everything that wasn't nailed down, tarp, garden umbrellas, even a hand-lettered sign advertising a September yard sale,

floated away over the rooftops and out of sight. Louis Jardell, where the jumped-up Jesus Christ you been? You unreliable old Coot? You were supposed to be here at lunchtime. Lunch ain't for a half hour yet. But my words were drowned by the escalating roar. I could tell by the look on Ned's face that the power was already off. Even if he could have gotten that old wireless of his to work,

all we'd get it be static, right across the dial. Tossing my bag into the crawl space beneath the house, I joined my friend on the porch from where we both stared out at the horizon. It looked like nothing at all, really. A puff of dust floating above the skyline, the kind of fan tale a jeep throws up in its wake. Only it was traveling too fast for that. And it was growing, expanding in all directions like a miniature mushroom cloud.

I only watched it for a little while. That burgeoning crowd of no hopers on the library steps had swollen to maybe 80 or 90 souls by that time. And although they didn't know it yet, they were in mortal danger. restless and jumpy. They milled back and forth in the dust-darkening street, probably still unsure what they were waiting for, or why, but driven by some ungovernable, malignant need. We had work to do. This can turn nasty in a hurry. I observed and loosened my tie.

Ned didn't have anything to say to that, so we descended the steps to the front of lawn where we donned plastic goggles and paper dust masks in preparation for the task ahead. The wind snapped at his words like a hungry dog. He was practically screaming, so I grabbed the catapult and installed myself behind the hedge. After coughing into his fist a few times, Ned unshouldered his air rifle and joined me. Since parting company this morning, he'd used those old shears of his to snip two vertical gashes into his laurel hedge, gashes that that resembled arrow slits in the battlements of an old castle. From back here, we could launch our assault without fear of discovery.

I was grateful for that. Better a kid with a mouthful of broken teeth on my conscience than a dead one, Ned always says. He first used that line back in 1964 when some drunken teenagers standing in the back of a Camaro refused to budge, even with the full weight of the expulsion bearing down on him. Not being a complete fool, Ned realized he'd only get one shot at saving the kid's life, so he made it count. Well, young Mr. Hotrod, his real name was Randy Kessler,

but nobody mentions that anymore. Ended up losing an eye as a consequence, and poor old Ned Dyson finished the day behind bars over in Grover County. although the case for the prosecution lasted about as long as it took for Charlie Kenwright's paw, who was the chief of police back then, to interview his first witness. So it's happened before, and it'll happen again, which is more or less why me and old Ned didn't stand on ceremony. We both just let rip with what we had,

not bothering to wait until the first volley hit home. We simply reloaded and fired again, and again, and again. Lead pellets and glass marbles cracked off the library steps, pinged off those newly installed metal shutters, trashed the windshield of a nearby car. I won't say we took a whole lot of notice. One year's mayhem ain't much different than another's, and when you've got a seething mass of primordial rage bearing down on you, details get lost in the mix. I remember a girl in a suede skirt and broken-heeled pumps frantically rubbing her upper arm, a sallow-faced biker clutching in his neck and howling in agony, but then I got distracted.

The expulsion was so close now that it loomed over the intersection of Maine and Denver like a wrathful god. And for a moment there, I nearly lost my nerve. I still don't know how I managed to hold it long enough to warn Ned that the game was up, but I did. With the full force of the dust storm whipping my hair and collars every which way, I screamed his name above the bellowing of the wind. He responded by emptying a sack full of cherry bombs onto the lawn and signaling me to lend a hand.

I went against my better judgment and did what I was told. The resulting explosions finally got the stragglers moving, but only just. Back since the 4th of July. Kind of had a feeling that'd come in handy. By the time he finished relaying this, we were across the porch and into his parlor. After that, the world went into overdrive. We heaved the door shut and barricaded it with furniture. The goggles, we exchanged for polarized sunglasses.

As the last vestiges of the crowd headed for the shelter of alleyways, dumpsters, and shop doorways, we slapped on high-factor sun-ten lotion and crowded around the one window in the entire street that was unboarded over. There was a reason for that, and the reason was Ned's late wife. Just before Nancy died, which wasn't all that long after she'd given her husband the secret recipe for that got-off a lemonade we keep drinking. She admitted that her one great regret in life was never having seen the expulsion up close. When Ned told her hush with the crazy talk, she offered him a wan smile and pointed out in the politest of tones that this was her. her deathbed, and she'd say whatever she'd damn well pleased. Well, we lost Nancy not long after that. Exactly how long, I don't recall. What I do know is that by the time she went, there was no

mistaking the look on Ned's face. It took him a couple more months to work up the nerve, but I knew he'd get there in the end. So when he came to me in the late spring of that year and told me he was going to look the expulsion right in the eye, just as he promised. I flashed on Nancy's withered form, curled up on that hospital bed, and swore I'd be right there next to him, which is exactly where I was. Naturally, the window in front of us was in any old window. It was fitted with an extra pane of smoke glass to cut down on the glare for one thing. An old canvas sack had been nailed to the inside frame for much the same reason. Finally, with the exception of two tiny peepholes situated at head height, one for me, one for Ned, the glass was emulsioned over. It was crude and

hastily constructed, and about as far removed from government standard as you can get. But with our shades on and the sunblock liberally slathered over our skin, we figured we'd be okay, which was more than could be said for whoever might be left standing out in the open. Everything beyond the front gate floated in a lake of soupy yellow fog. Trees shook. Birds fell from the skies, chimney pots hooted in protest at the debris-ridden gale. And then, there it was, floating right in front of the house, the biggest, blackest cloud of depression in Earth's history,

an airborne tumor moustacizing on the four winds, the specter of mortality, the harbinger of death. The hairs on the back of my neck didn't so much stand up as writhe around like worms on a hot plate. All of the hate and the cruelty in the world, all of the guilt and the regret, the sorrow, sadness, revulsion, and disgust, all of the callous indifference to the suffering of others. Every last bit of selfishness, ire, and cruelty that still resided in the human heart was compacted together in one pulsating cloud of supercharged bad feeling. Because that's all the expulsion really is.

Negative human emotion released at the time of passing. Turns out that feelings such as jealousy, bitterness, and shame don't stay buried in our hearts forever. or fade away when we die. No, they have to go somewhere to be expelled properly. And good old Ardenville just happens to be that place. A blinding flash of light issued from the street followed by a groan as deep and resonant as that made by tectonic plates,

grinding together beneath the ocean floor. Blue tendrils of electricity wiggled across the pavement, crisping the weeds that grew between the cracks and the flagstones and blistering the whitewash on a nearby picket fence. Then the screaming started. The screaming of whatever was caught up inside that indignant seething cloud. Me and Ned pulled back straight off, but it was too late. We'd peered into the polluted core of the expulsion and seen what resided there. And now the memory would stay with us forever.

Another scream cut the air. Only this one was immediate and more real. So, help me God, I put my eye to that hole again and experienced what no man should experience in a thousand lifetimes. The kid could have been no older than Randy Kessler when he lost that eye. And judging by the open door of the station wagon parked across the road, He'd either been hiding in the back or sleeping off a hangover since before the sun came up. Now, he crawled on all fours towards the gutter on our side of the street.

Hair standing on end, head bowed like some eyeless beetle feeling its way across a cave floor. I could tell right away that he wasn't going to make it. Above him, the expanding cloud of filth boiled with the faces of those that had passed over the course of a previous year, 60 million of them on average, and they were all there. No exceptions. Sixty million pairs of eyes foamed skywards and earthwards and outwards like bubbles on a raging surf. 60 million mouths yawned wide in an agonized scream. 60 million hearts yammered with fear and anxiety. Teeth snapped. Nostrils flared, voices begged and chattered.

And the boy, the teenager crawling into the shadow of the elm nearest the house, had just enough time to look up at me, right at me. Before the awesome power of the expulsion unleashed itself upon him. It was like watching a cartoon character zapped with high-voltage electricity. I saw his skeleton clearly delineated beneath his skin. before the flesh disintegrated and fell away from the bones. For a moment, that exposed skeleton knelt in the gutter like an exhibit in a museum. Then, with no tendons or connective tissue to hold it together, it collapsed into the gutter.

That's when I pulled back from the window. Face blasted crimson from the heat I was later to find out. I suffered from blisters and running sores for weeks after that. I think I must have stumbled and fallen backward over the couch about then because the next thing I knew, I was lying flat on my back and staring at the wall as two bright streams of light, light emitted by those eye-level peepholes of ours, burned twin lights of soot into the wallpaper across the room. Well, if I'd been a younger man, I may have flipped over to get a look at where the source of that light, light was headed, but that part of the story, I already knew. The expulsion was heading for the

upper stratosphere, where it would disperse like so much summer mist. So, instead, I took a peek at Ned. He looked to be in a bad way. Seated at the table and rubbing his eyes with the heel of his palms, he looked lost. It made sense. The poor guy had taken the brunt of the initial flash full in the face, and the force of it had temporarily blinded him. I know it sounds kind of crazy, but I almost envied him for that. After all, he could have had the negative images of 60 million tormented souls scorched into his reteness, not to mention his own wife's tormented screaming face. Instead, I was the one burdened with that hellish after image, and it plagued my mind even after the world grayed out around me, and I fainted. It usually takes the townsfolk, even the older ones who've seen it, or most of it, all before, about an hour to emerge from their fortified homes and businesses.

Most of them just stand around blinking uncertainly in the afternoon light, like sleepers emerging from dreams that remain blessedly out of reach upon waking. By then, the emergency services are usually on their way in from Grover County. Ten to one, the heat from the expulsion has set off a brushfire somewhere or ignited somebody's trash, and it's best to get these things dealt with immediately. Today was no exception. After making brave old Ned as comfortable as I could on that break-back couch of his, I grabbed a dustpan and brush in an empty box from the pantry and nipped outside.

The air still reeked of ozone and adrenaline and carbonized human flesh. All around me a ring of singed leaves, melted tires, and scorched. Asphalt showed there was work to be done. But almost all of my attention was drawn to an elongated heap of bones and ash that lay in a diagonal across the gutter. Once upon a time, that heap had a name, and a family, and maybe even a steady girl. Now, it was nothing more than a pile of smoking cinders. It was sickening. I don't mind admitting I shed a tear or two.

as I swept the charred remains into the dustpan and deposited into a box, not because I felt bad for the kid. I was so numb from shock that I scarcely felt the pain radiating from my own roasted flesh, let alone sympathy for my fellow man. But because of what I had seen at the epicenter of the storm, granted, it was ugly, yet in a strange way it was beautiful. Two, because it was us. It was ours. And as separate and dividing as we have become as a species, and will probably remain till the end of days. In that one awful moment, we were united. If only to wallow in shared misery and regret, still reeling. I knocked the brush out on the nearest curb and went inside to fix myself and Ned, a glass of that shitty tasting lemonade.

I think I must have experienced a rare moment of inside about then, what the educated folk call an epiphany. Nancy hadn't played a trick on us or ridden the recipe down wrong at all. The reason the lemonade tasted so bitter was because she wasn't there to share it with us, and no amount of sugar was going to solve that. We were just going to have to get used to drinking it on our own. Who knows? I told myself,

well, with all the fuss, maybe we'll switch to Kool-Aid next year, which is exactly what we plan to do. Fick tales are what we compile. They're all right here on the No Sleep Files. The No Sleep Podcast is presented by Creative Reason Media. The musical score was composed by Brandon Boone. Our production team is Phil Mikulski, Jeff Clement, and Jesse Cornett.

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