Let's Not Meet: Abusive Boyfriend

First, the backstory: Growing up, my parents were incredibly strict and overprotective. No sleepovers, no boys, no going anywhere without their explicit approval after taking down who I was with, their phone numbers, their parents' phone numbers, and exactly what time I was expected back. And definitely no dates. I rarely even went out with friends; going to see a movie on a Saturday was a special occasion. The only place I could get around my parents' rigid rules was online, where, because they didn't know how to use the computer, they never monitored me. That's why, in high school, I rebelled the only way I knew how - I started a blog. Yep. I was 17, and I ran an erotic blog.

No, not porn. More like, photos of myself wearing very little clothing, in bed, everything just so covered. For the purpose of anonymity (because as incredibly dumb and naive as I was back then, I had at least an iota of common sense), none of the photos showed my entire face. Just my mouth, or my jawline, the arch of my neck. Never my eyes.

Interspersed with the photos were the blog entries, the life of my amorously blessed alter-ego, Claire. Claire was completely fictional, and therefore, she was a lot of things I wasn't - primarily, social and sexually active. I would fabricate stories of dates, affairs, sexual experimentation, just dumb romance novel type stuff, living vicariously through this confident, beautiful, made-up girl. I fancied myself an alright writer back then, but looking back, it's pretty funny now, because it was probably mostly just drivel. But I enjoyed running it, and my readers seemed to like it. You'd think it would've just been dirty old men, but I had quite a few women readers too, who told me how I was helping them become more confident as well. There was something just so exhilarating about having people be drawn to you online when you're so lonely and cloistered in real life.

Anyway, fast forward three years. By now I was halfway across the country in college, out from under my parents' rule. I had a few good friends, and I was doing pretty well. I still had trouble being very social because I was so unused to it, but at least I wasn't so lonely anymore. I hadn't updated the blog in over two years and, honestly, had mostly forgotten all about it.
I also had a boyfriend! His name was David and we met in a history seminar fall my sophomore year. He was tall, lovely and kind, and had, quite improbably, stuck past our awkward first date when I, shy and still mostly petrified of social interaction, could barely string together ten complete sentences.

But he seemed to like that I was so shy. He was, in contrast, outgoing and forward, making friends wherever we went. He would constantly tell me it was cute that I blushed when people talked to me, or say how I should be glad that he was with me to facilitate conversation with other people. One time he told me I was lucky that he had stuck around because no other guy would've bothered. I was so affection-starved that I was convinced he was right.

One day about three months into the relationship, over Christmas break, I got a call from him at home. When I picked up, the first thing he said was, "Who's Claire?"

It took a second, but when I realized what he must have been referring to, my entire body went cold. How was this possible? How could he have found out? "W-what?" I said.

"Claire. www. claireblog.com. Is this you?" (Obviously not the real web address, sorry.)

My heart pounded; my mind raced. I had no idea how he had found the blog. Could I possibly deny it? There was nothing on that entire website that linked back to my real name or real email address, I had made sure of that. None of the photos showed my face. But they showed enough that if you knew me in real life, you could probably be able to tell it was me. Feeling cornered, I told him I would talk to him later, and hung up.

I spent that whole day on the verge of a panic attack. Finally I realized I had to just admit it. (For some reason, at the time it seemed like the end of the world that my boyfriend had found my stupid blog from high school. I mean, nowadays I would be like, yeah, I ran a blog and posted hot pics of myself, so the fuck what? It was all just fiction anyway. But of course I'm older and wiser now, and I was a fucking naive idiot back then.)

So I called him back, told him while crying all over the place about all the reasons I had written and maintained this blog, and eventually, he said, "It's okay, I think I understand." At some point I asked him how he had found it, and he told me that an ex-girlfriend of his had seen posts on Facebook of us together, went on Google to search for me, and somehow turned up this blog, the link to which she then sent to David. "Sorry," he told me, "I don't talk to her anymore, she just still bothers me all the time. She's kind of a psycho."

I was a little upset at that, but I didn't want to annoy him further, so I didn't press the issue. Things went mostly back to normal.
Then the emails started.

I woke up to the first one about a week later. It had been sent at 3:00am, and was from some blatantly fake address, "claire_the_wh0re_6969 @hotmail.com" or something like that. All it said was, "You're disgusting."

I realized it must've been from David's psycho ex. I was a little unnerved, but I just deleted and ignored it.

But the emails didn't stop. They kept coming, at least one, sometimes two a night. Always from a new fake email (clairetheslut72993, claire_cocksucker, etc. etc.), always time stamped exactly 3:00 or 4:00am. The contents of the emails began to increase in the level of vitriol. First it was more of the same, variations of "you are so gross" or "you're fucked up". Then she would send me copies of the photos from my blog (which I had deleted right after David had confronted me about it, so she must have saved the entries somewhere) - with horrible things written across them, like FAT SLUT or DIE WHORE, KILL YOURSELF, etc.

I showed David the emails and asked if he could make her stop, but he just shrugged and said it was out of his control.

It kept escalating. She started mentioning my friends names in the emails. Things like "I showed Rachel and Alex your sick website, they're disgusted by you." Or "I told Evan and James - they act like they're your friends but behind your back they all think you're disgusting." Sometimes she would pretend to be one of my friends, and write things like "I said hi to you on campus yesterday and you think I like hanging out with you but I know what you really are - you're just a whore." Once, she copied and pasted an entire blog entry into the body of an email.

It was nonstop, night after night. I would wake up in the morning terrified of seeing another email from her in my inbox. I stopped opening them. I was constantly stressed. I never knew for sure if she had actually sent my photos around to everyone I knew. I lost sleep; I lost weight. I begged David to make her stop but he kept saying there was nothing he could do.

Things with David were deteriorating as well. He was annoyed that I kept bringing up the emails; he began to make it sound as though it were all my fault. He said it was hard to believe that I hadn't actually done all those sexual things I had written about. This was the kicker: His ex was from my hometown, he said, and she had told him stories that she'd heard from people I went to high school with about all the dirty things I "used to do". Orgies, bondage, hard drugs. How could I lie to him and trick him into believing I was a shy virgin, he wanted to know.

I told him none of those things were true. "She's obviously making it up. Do you really believe her over me?" I asked.

"I don't know what to believe," he said. He told me I had become untrustworthy. As twisted as it was, I started to believe that too. I apologized to him over and over, until finally he forgave me and told me it was alright, that he believed me, that I was lucky he understood and would stay with me, because who else would? I had never been so relieved. I was lucky. I was so lucky. Wasn't I?
We had been taking things really slow, physically, because I actually was a virgin, and regardless of make-believe Claire's make-believe sexcapades, anything sex-related still made me incredibly nervous. But after that, I had sex with David for the first time because I felt like I owed him. He had stayed with me. I was so lucky.

I didn't enjoy it. Afterwards, he whispered, "I believe you. You really have never had sex before." It felt, sickly, like winning.

Eventually, after about two months, the ex must've gotten bored, because the emails slowed, and then they stopped. David broke up with me shortly after, cruelly and unkindly, the day after my 21st birthday. I was a complete wreck for a while, but hey, life goes on.

Three months or so after that, I got another email from "claire-bear-69 @hotmail.com" at 3:00am: "I can't believe you haven't killed yourself, you should."

For the first time, I responded. "We're not even dating anymore. You're pathetic. Get a fucking life."

That was the last I ever heard from her. To this day, I don't know her name, I don't know how she found my blog, or how she knew the names of my friends, or why she was so hell bent on making me miserable for so long. Even now, when I get Facebook messages or emails from people I don't know, my first reaction is panic.

Of course I have since realized that I was NOT at all lucky in my relationship, nor was David the sweet guy that I thought he was at the time. I understand now that it hadn't been my fault. I owed him nothing. It's been five years - but I haven't been in a relationship since. I don't know if I could.

I think the worst is this. I used to enjoy writing. At one time, I was proud of my blog, because as small and insignificant as it was, it was something I had created. Even though it was make believe, it was still mine. They had taken something I had been proud of and turned it into a source of shame. I don't like to write anymore. Even now I get angry at how they've taken that from me. At how easily I was fooled. How stupid. How naive.

Endnote: Eventually I got the story of their relationship and how they broke up, and why she was so psycho. The details are irrelevant but suffice it to say it turns out he had been even more awful to her than he had been to me. But instead of staying far far away like I have done, all she wanted was for him to take her back.

edit: To clarify, none of those were the real email addresses she used to email me - it was just always something blatantly fake and throw-away like that.



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via: reddit.com/r/letsnotmeet

Let's Not Meet: Stalker Wife

This happened about 4 years ago.

I had just started working at a university hospital in the US as nursing care tech. At the time, I was planning on going to nursing school (I've since changed my major and graduated), and thought working in a hospital would be a great starting place for experience, and it would get me a better chance at getting into nursing school at that university.

Anyways, I was always a very outgoing and friendly person (I still am) and I am not a stranger to anyone. I had no issues making new friends at my new job. I worked day shift (7a-730p) 3 days a week. Our shifts always overlapped with night shift in order to give a full report to them about the patients they would be caring for that evening. Sometimes I would have to give report to a night shift employee by the name of "Mark." Mark was always funny and outgoing, and we seemed to hit it off pretty well. I was dating someone at the time, and Mark was married, but I always just felt like he was a cool friend to hang out with.

We had previously discussed stories of going out to bars. One night when I was getting off work, I had mentioned I was planning on going out to a bar the next night with a group of friends and invited him along. He was more than happy to join us. The entire time we were out there, we had a great time and he hit it off with everyone there despite not knowing anyone in my friends group. He never blatantly hit on me or gave any once of indication he was attracted to me. I just saw him as a friend and it had always felt that way, and I felt the feeling was mutual with him.

I arrived home around 2 am, and woke up maybe around 9 or 10 am. I checked my phone to find an unreasonable amount of text messages from an unknown number. This was several years ago, and i no longer have the messages, but it was something along the lines of this: "I know you went out with my husband last night. I know you have a boyfriend, but you must be attracted to my husband. Otherwise, why else would you invite him out to a bar without my presence, and without your boyfriend? I know my husband is attractive, and i don't always appreciate him going out with other women..." blah blah blah i don't remember the next 4 paragraphs she sent me, but the one that stuck out, was when she asked, "So... are you a team player? wink emoticon"

I kindly informed her that I do have a trusting boyfriend who did not mind if i went out with male friends, and I was in no way attracted to her husband (he was not attractive whatsoever, but i didn't say that). I also told her that while I understand and respect that they have an open relationship, I am not interested in experimenting with other couples, and I prefer my relationship to be monogamous. She was completely understanding, and even offered to meet up for drinks with her and her husband in the future. Now, I don't care if my new friend is a swinger. Not my personal lifestyle, but hey, I don't judge. I was willing to forget the whole ordeal and look past it. Big mistake.

Myself and Mark made plans to go on a double date with my boyfriend and his wife ("Helen") at a dance club. All was well and we all had a lot of fun bar hopping and dancing. She seemed cool enough, and I learned she was a school teacher in the neighboring town. By the end of the evening, we all had our friendly goodbyes and retreated home.

Again, the next morning, I woke up to a whole new set of a million text messages sent from his wife. This time not so friendly. She was upset and went off on me claiming that I was a home wrecker, and that I had destroyed their marriage. She claimed that I had grabbed his hand on the way to the dance floor and put his hand on my ass (which never happened), then claimed I grabbed his ass (which never happened), then changed her story a third time and claimed i grabbed his ass (which, again, never happened either). I kindly explained to her that none of these event ever occurred.

She said I obviously didn't remember any of it because I was too drunk to remember, and she said my boyfriend had to carry me out of the bar. Now, I had only had 2 drinks over the 3 hours we were out. I was never drunk, or "black out" as she had put it, and I left the bar walking on my own with my boyfriend at the time, and had myself a good nights sleep that night. Either way, she wasn't having my side of the story. I decided to let it go and stop trying to convince her otherwise, and I was planning on having a talk with Mark regarding the misconstrued issue.

The next day, she posted on Facebook about how her marriage was wrecked because of me (she used my name in her Facebook status), and said she was going to show up at my house and settle it. She also said she never slept, and hadn't slept in days and it was all my fault, and she placed the blame for her failing marriage on me. The words she used describing how she was going to "settle" it weren't so kind or mature. She had no idea where I lived so I wasn't too worried about it.

She told everyone (and left me a wonderful voice mail) about how she planned on pressing charges against me for molesting her husband that night. A few hours later she left me another voicemail sobbing and apologizing to me, telling me how horrible Mark was, and how he's a jerk and really mean to her, and told me she was sorry he ever got in the way of our friendship, and she would never allow him to interfere with our friendship ever again. I hardly knew her, and I had only met her once in person! I promptly deleted and blocked her on Facebook, and my boyfriend did as well. I never returned her calls. Nor did I worry about having charges pressed, because that never happened, and her husband had agreed with me prior.

Although I had stopped responding and ceased contact with her, the phone calls started. She would call me all all hours of the day. Anywhere from 6 am - midnight, but i never answered. Any time she was awake. I had no issues leaving my phone on silent so i just ignored them thinking she would give up. She lightened up after a few days.

The next time i was at work, i decided to pull him aside into the storage room to have a talk with him privately because I didn't want coworkers to hear or get involved. I didn't think it was a big issue. I told him the issue i was having with his wife, and he apologized about it and told me he would have a talk with her, and told me he would get her to stop. Great!

Until... he dropped this bombshell that would make all of this make a tad more sense (but still doesn't excuse her behavior). Nearing the end of the conversation, he bluntly told me "Look, Im sorry about everything that has happened with her, but I have to be honest with you... I want to fuck you. I told my wife I wanted to fuck you. She had an affair a few years ago, and recently I've just wanted some strange. She wasn't okay with it at first, but she said if it was a threesome she would be willing to settle with that.
Initially she was alright with it, but as time passed since I told her that, she got upset about it. Sorry she's been so crazy."

I was a little stunned, but it made everything come together a bit about why she's been so upset. I told him i wasn't interested in him, and i also told him I didn't want to go out with him alone anymore, and I didn't want any more double dates, and that was that.

Fast forward a week or so and everything had calmed down. I thought it was over and I was beginning to forget about the whole ordeal. One night I was in bed about to go to sleep, until I got a text message from a number I didn't know. All it says was "what's up? smile emoticon" I asked who it was, and whoever it was completely avoided the question.

"I miss you!"

"Where are you living now? Can I come by?"

"Hey girl, wanna to hang out tonight?"

"We haven't seen each other in forever and it's been too long! Let me come over tonight and let's have a drink and catch up!"

"Im on Winchester road coming into town and I heard you live around here. Where are you? I can stop by on my way into town!"

"Hey girl! I miss you and I love you! xoxo When are we going to see each other?"

I stopped answering because he/she would never tell me who they were. The texting was constant, and the calls were even worse. The calls would come in at 2 am, every 10-15 minutes or so, and they would not stop until about 8 am. This went on for 3-4 days.

Around this same time, my boyfriend got a friend request from someone with no mutual friends, and she had messaged him privately over Facebook along with this request. She explained she was a new nursing student coming to the university we went to, and she was on Facebook to make new friends before she moved here from Indiana, and was researching students at our university in order to make friends before she arrived. He thought it was innocent enough.

My boyfriend was middle-eastern and did not have a common first or last name whatsoever. He also had nothing to do with the College of Nursing at the university. He added her and they had casual conversations over Facebook about similar interests in hobbies, sports, and fun places to go around our town. All was fine and well until she started asking him inappropriate questions like "what's your girlfriend like?" "Do you think im pretty? I think i'm prettier than her!" I don't remember what else she sent him but they eventually turned into sexual advances. My boyfriend wasn't comfortable with it all and considered blocking her, and let me read it because he wasn't sure what to do.

I read through all of the messages, and the first thing out of my mouth was "That's Helen!!" He didn't believe me at first, but the way she described herself and her interests here exactly like her. Once I explained all of this to him, he was convinced. She had made a fake profile with fake friends which she had made in order for it to look real, and used Facebook pictures of one of her relatives.

He confronted her about it, and she completely lost it. She started cursing at him, threatening him, telling him how she has no idea who it is he is talking about, and went on a long rant about how her husband beats her and she's pregnant (i guess for sympathy). Helen was never pregnant and Mark never beat her (as far as I could tell). He told her he was sorry she was in that position and he eventually just gave up and blocked her.
Somehow she managed to get his gmail and university email, and once she found that, the emails started (Keep in mind, I was getting constant phone calls at the same time throughout the nights when this was happening. I mean, i was getting something like 200+ missed calls when I woke up the next morning).

Initially, the emails were threatening, then later moved to emails looking for sympathy for a made up pregnancy and her abusive husband and all of the horrible things he did to her, then finally moved on to a confession about how she really was Helen, and she was sorry. He never responded to any of them. Because he never send a response to her apology email, along came once again another angry, threatening email. He didn't respond to that one either.

At this point, I had had enough and I was just worn out on the entire thing. It became exhausting, and i was so tired of dealing with it. I good friend of mine is an officer in our city, and I called him and told him everything that was happening, and how bad it was escalating. I showed him all of the emails, texts, messages, and phone calls. The first thing he did was call the number who had been harassing me to have them stop. She admitted it was her (Helen), and agreed to stop contact with me, but told my friend ("officer Walton") that she will be pressing charges against me for molestation.

He explained to her that it is not possible, and no such thing as pressing charges for molestation for grabbing a grown man's ass. She was displeased, but I think having an officer call her to cease contact with myself and my boyfriend was enough to make her stop. I never heard from her since.

Months went by and everything finally went back to normal. I had transferred to a different department within the hospital so I would not have to work with Mark anymore. I never told anyone at work about it, but I did not wish to have any more contact with him, but I was still on the same floor despite being on a different unit. I passed through his hall one night leaving work (I had to in order to go home). He was off work that night, but I stopped in the nurses station to say hi and bye to some of the nurses i used to work with. There was a large note hanging in the nurses station with the extension to security. I laughed about it and asked what in the world could have happened to need their extension in such large, bold letters??

"Nadia" told me that apparently Mark had left his wife while she was at work. He packed up all of his belongings and moved to an apartment in town without any notice to her, and he was planning on divorcing her. This did not settle well with Helen. For a few days, she came up to the unit he was working on looking for him in order to confront him about. She only showed up on his off days for a few days until she finally found him. She never told any of the staff who she was. She just kept coming around asking about him. They would just tell her he was off work and she would leave.

After 9 or 10 pm, all visitors have to check in with security with a state-issued ID in order to enter the hospital. Helen had found an old pair of scrubs that belonged to Mark, and when she came up to the entrance, she told security that she had left her badge at home and she wasn't able to access the building because of it. Surprisingly, they just let her in. She went up to the unit he was working at and she began screaming, crying, and begging him to come home. One of the nurses called security because she was making a huge scene. When security arrived to escort her out, she threatened suicide if he didn't come home. She ended up being admitted to the mental facility a few miles down the road. The staff had left a note up in case she showed up looking for him again.

Several months later, he divorced her, graduated from nursing school, and moved back to Indiana once he found a nursing job from his hometown. I never heard from Mark or Helen again.

Fast forward a year, i went out with my friend officer Walton to just hang out and catch up, as we hadn't seen each other in a while. He mentions out of the blue, "You will never, ever guess who left me a voice mail just a few days ago... Helen!" I was dumbfounded. What the hell did she want? She still had her number for over a year? He had only called her once, but I guess she kept it for over a year and a half. He let me listen to the voice mail. She told him she was trying to divorce Mark because he was abusive, and she needed to serve him a restraining order. She told him I was helping her out with it (Fuck no, i was not). She said the courts had told her she needed to find an officer on her own in order to do so. My friend officer Walton never called her back.
He laughed and said that it was highly unlikely she had a restraining order, because once one is in place, the county finds their own employees to take care of the matter. They do not leave it to victims to ask around and find an officer to take care of it for them. Regardless, he never called her back and we never heard from her again. So Helen, please for the love of humanity, let's not meet. I don't want to deal with your shit again.

TL;DR - Made friends with a married guy at work and invited him out. Wife didn't like it and offered a threesome. I declined, and she continued to stalk and harass me over the period of 6 months until she was finally admitted to a mental care facility. My officer friend saved the day.

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via: reddit.com/r/letsnotmeet

Let's Not Meet: Why I Don't Go to Parties

Okay, let me start by saying that I'm a female college student. My school is known for being a big party school, but I'm not really into that. I never have been, even in high school--I never saw the point in it all--but after my last party, I have even more reason not to be.

It was my first semester of freshman year. I'm a chemistry major, and met a lot of my friends through various labs and lectures. There have also been a fair share of creeps. I'm really not used to being the center of anybody's attention, as I never have been before, and don't really see a reason why I should be. I liked having only a few friends and keeping my circle close. I liked being by myself, in the background. But still, new state, new rules, and there were creeps.

Anyway, one such creep was named Tom. He was in my chemistry lecture, and from day one, he just seemed to fixate on me. At first, I'd just catch him staring at me when I looked over my shoulder at the clock--he always made sure to sit behind me. I'd smile politely and turn back around, slightly creeped but nothing super bad. Then, after a couple weeks, he got up the nerve to talk to me. I was raised to never be rude or just ignore people talking to me, so I played nice, even though I wasn't interested. I don't know why I was so against him at first--he seemed nice enough when we talked--but something in my gut told me it was off.

Anyway, I started seeing him everywhere, even when I knew he was supposed to be in class. I tried everything for him to get the hint. I tried avoiding him, moving seats in lecture, shutting down his attempted conversations... Unfortunately, I'm not a very confrontational person, and couldn't find a way to just tell him to leave me alone. And he didn't seem to get the hint. My friends always teased me that I had an admirer, and I'd laugh along, but it unnerved me. He just started inserting himself into my life, and I didn't know what to do.

One time, just after Thanksgiving break, I was studying outside at a picnic table, and, lo and behold, Tom shows up. He starts asking how my break was, how my family was, if I was happy to be back...and then he asked how Bruno and Rylee were.
Bruno and Rylee are my dogs, and while I love to show them off, I knew for a fact that I had never talked about them with him or showed him any pictures. The rational part of my mind reminded me that Rylee was the lock screen on my phone, so he could have at least seen her when I checked the time or something, and Bruno was my wallpaper, so he might have seen him at some point, but how did he know their names? When I asked him, he got nervous and tried to convince me that I'd told him, but when I insisted that I didn't, he made some excuse and walked off. I should have done something then, maybe talked to security or something, but I didn't. I regret to say that I didn't want to; I thought I could handle it myself. I never have been good at asking for help.

So, fast forward a little. Tom started getting weird. He kept asking for my number, asking me out, trying to get me to invite him back to my dorm...he got really aggressive. Eventually I got to the point where my instinctual, well-learned manners went out the window, and I flat out told him, directly yet gently, as I'm not in the habit of hurting people's feelings, that I was not interested in having a relationship with him (or anyone) right now. He got angry, yelled at me for leading him on, called me names like "slut" and "bitch" and "whore," and then just stormed off. He started texting me non-stop, telling me how much he hated me and how I deserved to die. I still don't know how he got my number.

I know what you're thinking. "Now, she must have gone to the police or security or something, right?" Nope. I was an idiot. I'm not a very confident person as it is, and some tiny part of me felt guilty, like I actually had led him on. I didn't even tell anyone about the texts; I just deleted them all, convinced that if I just ignored him long enough, he'd give up and go away. I was a stupid, naive little 18-year-old, and I just...let it happen.

Okay, fast forward about a month or so. It's near the end of the semester, close to time for us all to head home for winter break. My friend Anna had just broken up with her boyfriend, and she and my other friend, Tori, wanted to go out and drink to take her mind off things. Tori and Anna are both very petite girls, and, naturally, are incredible lightweights. They've been known to make some terrible choices after just a few beers, so they asked me to come with them and keep an eye on them. I agreed, and brought my own water bottle with me so that I wouldn't have to drink anything there--even the water at these parties made me suspicious. The three of us went to the party, and while Tori and Anna went and got to drinking, I just sat on the couch in the corner and kept an eye on them, taking sips from my water.

We'd been there for about three hours, and then someone sat down beside me. I look over, and--you guessed it--there's Tom. He seems totally hammered already, and he starts talking to me, telling me almost incoherently how sorry he is, how much he misses me, how he overreacted, how he wishes he could take it all back, and asking if we could hang out later. I refused and told him to leave me alone, but still, he persisted. After another ten minutes, I saw Anna across the room--stumbling drunk--about to walk off with some guy.

I got up from the couch after telling Tom yet again to leave me alone, and went over to Anna. I seperated her from her, ahem, new friend--who was not nearly as drunk as her and clearly wanted to take advantage of her--and got her and Tori back together. I tried to tell them that we should leave, but they begged me to let them stay a little longer, just so they could dance some more, and there's really no arguing with those two when they're drunk, so I let them. When I went back to the couch, Tom was gone.

Please note that most of the rest of this story I only pieced together after the fact, as some of my memories are vague at best, and most are just missing altogether.

I must have left my water bottle on the couch when I went to save Anna. After I took a few drinks, I started to feel weird. I was super dizzy and shaky, so I decided it was time to go home. I grabbed Anna and Tori, and we left, taking the bus back to the dorm (or, at least, we must have). When I woke up, I was in my bed, still in my clothes from the night before, and I had the worst headache. I couldn't remember anything at all after I started to feel weird. My roommate told me that I came home around two and stumbled into bed and passed out, mumbling something about not feeling well. She was surprised, as she knew I didn't drink, but just figured I decided to let go a little and had a little too much. I started to realize what happened: Tom drugged my water.

I felt sick; I knew Tom was a weirdo, but I never thought he'd be quite so...driven. It sent shivers down my spine to think about what he planned to do. As if to confirm my suspicions, when I checked my phone, I had a new text from Tom. It said, "Why'd you leave early last night? I had such a night planned for you."

I didn't go out much after that. Not just to parties, but to class, either. I told my friends and professors I was sick, and got the last week's notes from them. After finals and break, I came back and found out that while Tom was stalking me, he was neglecting his classes, and, as a result, had flunked out. I haven't seen him since, but still, I haven't gone to a party since then, either. So, Tom, you are one sick bastard; let's never meet again.

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via: reddit.com/r/letsnotmeet

Comes the Test

Long gone are the days of wrestling with road maps, searching desperately for certain road signs, and sheepishly swallowing your pride to ask locals for directions. Today, in the modern world of technology and convenience, you rely on a GPS to get you where you need to be.

 You trust its direction to lead you through foreign territory to your ultimate destination, and back home promptly. It tells you to go left, you go left. It tells you to go right, you go right. It tells you to exit the highway, you do. The threat of taking a wrong turn and prolonging your journey prevents you from defying the device, regardless of what your intuition tells you.

 But you still question it sometimes.

 Like now. Your destination is just as irrelevant as who you’re meeting or why you’re going there. All that matters is that, without your GPS, you would have no idea where you are. You’ve been driving for a couple hours now, but you’ve only covered a fraction of the total distance.

 As the sun begins to fall, you watch the scenery pass with skepticism. You don’t know much about where you are going, but it certainly isn’t suburban. Regardless, the population seems to be drastically thinning with each passing mile. Turn right. Drive straight for three miles. Take another right. Skepticism slowly blooms into nervousness as the cow-town gives way to a full-fledged forest.

Night has fallen. You knew you wouldn’t reach your destination until the early morning hours, but that hadn’t troubled you. You had expected an endless highway, the path ahead marked brightly with a spattering of streetlights and the taillights. Reality brought none of that. Even the gentle moonlight that had lent a softer impact to the towns you’ve passed has been completely blocked by the withered leaves dangling from interlocking tree cover above.

 The darkness is stifling, growing an almost menacing edge as you follow the gently twisting, unlit road further into the brush. The windows are closed and the heat is blasting, but goose bumps still prickle across your arms in an effort to fight an inexplicable chill. Even the comforting familiarity of the shitty pop songs playing on the radio doesn’t dampen the fear settling in the pit of your stomach.

 Just keep going straight for eleven miles, your GPS says. Then you’ll be turning onto an eastward-bound highway. Then everything will be okay. Right?

 Judging by your white-knuckle grip of the steering wheel, you aren’t very convinced of that. You’re considering turning back. Strongly considering it. But that would require stopping, and while it feels like a million eyes are glaring daggers at you from the brush, you like to think that you’re safe while you’re moving. Your headlights slice through the darkness blanketing the road ahead, but leave everything else draped in an impenetrable blackness. Even with your high beams on, visibility of anything beyond the immediate is minimal. With four miles to go, you are pushing your car into each turn with nerve-wracking speed, but somehow your fear of crashing seems to be less important than your need to get out.

 Then your GPS goes black.

 The sudden darkness is jarring. Your eyes fly to the device, dearly hoping that it lost its signal (why would it go black?) or was turned off (by whom?) or it just needed to be plugged in (who unplugged it?) or—

 You tear your eyes from the machine long enough to catch a shock of blonde hair, a boyish face stretched by surprise, and wide, clear blue eyes. It lasts only a second. Then your frame, your car, your world is shaken by a sickening thump. You slam on the brakes on reflex, tires screaming to a stop.

 This is where it gets dangerous.

 This is where you have a choice.

 On the one hand, you could choose to disregard the lessons that every horror movie has taught you, swallow your fears rooted in the darkness thriving all around you, and ignore the voice in your head screaming at you to get the fuck out of there and open your car door. On the other hand, you could take the other option offered by that crucial moment. You can listen to that voice in your head, put your fear for your own life before the one that you may have inadvertently ended, heed the words that you’ve screamed at numerous television screens in the past and don’t fucking go out there.

 You gather all the courage you can muster and take option one.

 As you step from the perceived safety of your vehicle, you feel an inexplicable calm wash over you. With each step you take from the driver’s seat to the back of the car, you feel the knots of uneasiness firmly tied in your stomach dissipate. By the time you peer beyond the trunk of your car, any malice you thought you felt is completely gone, replaced with the gentle tranquility of a mid-fall night.

 When you are greeted by the sight of an empty road, you laugh quietly to yourself. It must have been a bump in the road, you decide, and your paranoid mind just conjured the imaginary boy as a reason for it. What would a boy even be doing in the woods alone at this hour?

 You marvel at how silly you’ve been acting as you sit back in your car, noting with relief that your GPS is happily displaying your route again, and shifting into drive and continuing the journey. The darkness of the woods has lost its menacing edge. Instead, there is just the comfortable ambiance of the thriving forest’s wildlife calling into the night.

 You find your way out of the forest and onto the highway without complaint. You move at an unhurried pace, but it you cover the distance much faster than you would expect. You arrive at your destination sooner than anyone, including yourself, thought possible.

 When you try to return home, your GPS routs an entirely different course that takes hours longer, but it insists that it is the fastest. Even when you try to consult a map, you simply cannot figure out how you got there so quickly.

 The event will be a bit of a mystery, but not worth the energy that would be spent by continuing to wonder about it.

But what happens if you take the second option?

 You prepare to find out when, instead of opening the door, you speed away from the scene, heart hammering in your chest because holy hell what just happened.

 When you glance into your rear-view mirror and see a pair of clear, blue eyes staring back at you, you begin to realize that perhaps you’ve made a horrible mistake. Or maybe that you should have fled without that second of hesitation, because seriously what the fuck was that. Your breath is coming in labored puffs as you begin to hyperventilate. The radio cuts off from the generic love song that was playing, replacing it with a deafening silence. Tears are prickling at your eyes because what the fuck when your GPS blinks back to life. You release a sobbing cry of relief, thanking every deity you can think of for– oh Christ.

 “Left turn to The End in three miles.”

 The tinny, halting voice of the GPS cut through your hope that this was over. You grab the machine, praying with all your heart that you heard it wrong, but no. There it is, bland print firmly displayed on the screen. Your stomach drops like a stone.

 You want to turn around. You really, really do. But then you would definitely run into whatever-that-was again. You watch the tree line for an opening big enough for your car, but it’s just too dense. Even if you got passed the outer ring, the forest would definitely be too thick within. Driving straight ahead is your only option, and you hate it.

 “Left turn to The End in two miles.”

 Tears are rolling down your cheeks unabated and gasping sobs wrack your frame. Your radio crackles back to life, releasing a torrent of whispering voices from your speakers. Among the nondescript voices, the loudest is that of a young boy. You can hear tears in his voice, but he’s laughing. It’s wobbly and feeble, but grows in strength as you continue forward.

 “Left turn to The End in one mile.”

 You start seeing him. You barely catch a glimpse of him each time, nearly hidden amongst the brush as he is. Every couple of seconds, your frantically darting eyes will fall upon his clear blue ones as he watches you from the trees. It’s the boy you hit.

 The first time you spotted him, he just stared at you, completely expressionless and ordinary. You know you’ve stopped breathing, but you’ve forgotten how to start again. Each time you see him, he’s a step closer to the road, and his face is slowly contorting into a manic grin. Bile rises in your throat, forcing your lungs back to work with a gagging cough of an exhale. The laughter from your speakers is deafening. He’s in the road now. He just stands there, appearing closer to the middle each time. You don’t have to swerve to avoid him yet,  but you feel like that won’t last long.

 “Left turn to The End in zero-point-one mile.”

Your headlights go out. You almost feel relieved. You won’t have to see those eyes anymore. On reflex, your foot jams on the brakes, only to find them useless. When the accelerator compresses itself fully, you start laughing. This is the end, isn’t it? Took long enough to get here.

 But then you remember that you don’t want to die. With each wispy chuckle comes a gasping sob. As the dim lighting offered by your car’s position lights reveals a tree in your path, that brief moment of acceptance resolves into defiance. You snap the wheel hard to the left, pulling your car into a diagonal skid. Impact is inevitable, but when you hear that terrible crunch, your momentum pulls you to the passenger seat instead of the windshield, saving your head, but tearing at your abdomen.

 Your world becomes pain and a cacophony of squealing metal. Your seatbelt is cutting a line of fire across your chest and whiplash leaves your head spinning. A metallic taste is slowly filling your mouth and everything hurts. But when the wreckage of your car settles, you are alive. You’ve won. It’s over. You laugh. You laugh and laugh until your lungs hurt (which, admittedly, isn’t very long).

 You struggle to regain your breath, but it catches in your throat. Your heart stops. Dread rises in your gut. You still hear laughter crackling over the radio. The whispering has stopped, and the boy is quieter than before, not as tinny, but definitely still there.

 Your heart stops when you realize it isn’t coming from the radio.

 He’s there, with you, in the car now. Behind you. Your eyes fly to your rear-view mirror and are caught by blue. His eyes pin you where you sit. You see pain and madness in them. Despite the smile contorting his features, his cheeks are wet with tears.

 You feel his bony fingers on your face. As they reach for your eyes and press down, your body takes pity on you. You fall unconscious before you feel the pain.

It takes six hours for your body to be found. It will be right where you left it, strapped into the wreckage of your car, discovered in the wee hours of the morning by a well-meaning hunter. The disused road on which it is found is hundreds of miles away from anywhere you had any business being.

Your injuries are just as curious. Some are understandable fractured ribs, subsequent internal bleeding, and maybe hemorrhaging in the brain from the crash. Your eyes, however, are gone, inexplicably gouged from your head, nowhere to be found. Upon inspection, none of your injuries caused your death. Your heart simply stopped beating.

 Your death is a mystery to police. They treat it as a possible homicide, but ultimately it gets tossed into the cold case bin. The report does take note of something strange, though. From when you are first discovered until the lead detective shouts for someone to shut the infernal thing off, your GPS is on, caught repeating the same phrase over and over.

 “You have arrived”

—
Credits to: K Beans

1,000 Vultures Series: Footsteps

This is long, so I apologize for that. I’ve never had to tell this story with enough detail to actually explain it all the way, but it is true and it happened when I was about 6 years old.

In a quiet room if you press your ear against a pillow you can hear your heartbeat. As a kid, the muffled, rhythmic beats sounded like soft footsteps on a carpeted floor, and so as a kid almost every night – just as I was about to drift off to sleep – I would hear these footsteps and I would be ripped back to consciousness, terrified.

For my entire childhood I lived with my mother in a fairly nice neighborhood that was in a transitional phase – people of lower economic means were gradually moving in, and my mother and I were two of these people. We lived in the kind of house you see being transported in two pieces on the interstate, but my mom took good care of it. There were a lot of woods surrounding the neighborhood that I would play in and explore during the day, but at night – as things often do to a kid – they took on a more sinister feeling. This coupled with the fact that, due to the nature of our house, there was a fairly large crawlspace underneath filled my mind with imaginary monsters and inescapable scenarios which would consume my thoughts when I was awoken by the footsteps.

I told my mom about the footsteps and she said that I was just imagining things; I persisted enough that she blasted my ears with water from a turkey baster once just to placate me, since I thought that would help. Of course it didn’t. Despite all the creepiness and footsteps the only weird thing that ever happened was that every now and then I would wake up on the bottom bunk despite having gone to sleep on the top, but this wasn’t really weird since I’d sometimes get up to piss or get something to drink and could remember just going back to sleep on the bottom bunk (I’m an only child so it didn’t matter). This would happen once or twice a week, but waking up on the bottom bunk wasn’t too terrifying. But one night I didn’t wake up on the bottom bunk.

I had heard the footsteps but was too far gone to be woken up by them, and when I was awoken it wasn’t from the sound of footsteps or a nightmare, but because I was cold. Really cold. When I opened my eyes I saw stars. I was in the woods. I sat up immediately and tried to figure out what was going on. I thought I was dreaming, but that didn’t seem right, though neither did me being in the woods. There was a deflated pool float right in front of me – one of those ones shaped like a shark. This only added to the surreal feeling, but after a while it seemed like I just wasn’t going to wake up because I wasn’t asleep. I stood up to orient myself, but I didn’t recognize these woods. I played in the woods by my house all the time and so I knew them really well, but if these weren’t the same woods then how could I get out? I took a step and felt a shooting pain in my foot which knocked me back to where I had just been laying. I had stepped on a thorn. By the light of the moon I could see that they were everywhere. I looked at my other foot but it was fine, and as a matter of fact so was the rest of me. I didn’t have another scratch on me and I wasn’t even that dirty. I cried for a little bit and then stood back up.

I didn’t know which way to go so I just picked a direction. I resisted the urge to call out since I wasn’t sure I wanted to be found by who or what might be out there

I walked for what seemed like hours.

I tried to walk in a straight line, and tried to course-correct when I had to take detours, but I was a kid and I was afraid. There weren’t any howls or screams, and only once did I hear any noise that scared me. It sounded like a crying baby. I think now that it was just a cat, but I panicked. I ran veering in different directions to avoid big thicks of bushes and collapsed trees. And I was paying close attention to where I stepped because by that point my feet were in pretty bad shape. I paid too much attention to where I was stepping and not enough to where those steps were leading because not long after hearing the cry I saw something that filled me with a kind of despair I haven’t experienced since. It was the pool float.
I was only 10 feet from where I had woken up.

This wasn’t magic or some supernatural space-bending. I was lost. Up until that moment I thought more about getting out of the woods than how I got in, but being back at the beginning caused my mind to swim. I wasn’t evensure that these were my woods; I had only been hoping that they were. Had I run in a huge circle around that spot, or did I just get turned around and start making my way back? How was I going to get out? At the time I thought the north star was just the brightest star, and so I looked and found the brightest one and followed it.

Eventually things started to look more familiar and when I saw “the ditch” (a dirt ditch my friends and I would have dirt-clod wars in) I knew I had made it out. By that point I was walking really slowly because my feet hurt so much, but I was so happy to be so close to home that I broke into a light jog. When I actually saw the roof of my house over a neighboring, lower-set house I let out a light sob and ran faster. I just wanted to be home. I had already decided that I wouldn’t say anything because I had no idea what I could possibly say. I would get back in the house somehow, clean up, and get in bed. My heart sunk as I rounded the corner and my house came fully into view.

Every light in the house was on.

I knew my mom was up, and I knew I would have to explain (or try to explain) where I had been, and I couldn’t even figure out where to start. My run became a jog which became a walk. I saw her silhouette through the blinds, and although I was worried about how to explain things to her that didn’t matter to me at that point. I walked up the couple of steps to the porch and put my hand on the doorknob and turned. Right before I pushed it open two arms wrapped around me and pulled me back. I screamed as loud as I could: “MOM! HELP ME! PLEASE! MOM!” The feeling of being so close to being safe and then being physically pulled away from it filled me with a kind of dread that is, even after all these years, indescribable.

The door I had been torn away from opened, and a flash of hope shot through my heart. But it wasn’t my mom.

It was a man, and he was enormous. I thrashed around and kicked at the shins of the person holding me while also trying to get away from the person who had just come out of my house. I was scared, but I was furious. “LET ME GO! WHERE IS SHE? WHERE’S MY MOM? WHAT’D YOU DO TO HER!?” As my throat stung from screaming and I was drawing in another breath I became aware of a sound that had been present for longer than I had perceived it. “Honey, please calm down. I’ve got you.” It sounded like my mom.

The arms loosened and set me down, and as man approaching me blocked out the porch light with his head I noticed his clothes. He was a cop. I turned to face the voice behind me and saw that it really was my mom. Everything was ok. I began to cry, and the three of us went inside.

“I’m so glad you’re home, Sweetie. I was worried I’d never see you again.” By that point she was crying too.

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what happened. I just wanted to come home. I’m sorry.”

“It’s ok, just don’t ever do that again. I’m not sure me or my shins could take it…”

A little laughter broke through my sobs and I smiled a bit. “Well I’m sorry for kicking you, but why’d you have to grab me like that?!”

“I was just afraid that you’d run away again.”

I was confused. “What do you mean?”

“We found your note on your pillow,” she said, and pointed at the piece of paper that the police officer was sliding across the table.

I picked up the note and read it. It was a “running away” letter. It said that I was unhappy never wanted to see her or any of my friends again. The police officer exchanged a few words with my mom on the porch while I stared at the letter. I didn’t remember writing a letter. I didn’t remember anything about any of this. But even if I sometimes went to the bathroom at night and didn’t remember, or even if I could have gone into the woods on my own, even if all that could have been true, the only thing I knew at that point was,

“This isn’t how you spell my name … I didn’t write this letter.”

EDIT: After a conversation with my mother about what happened when I was a kid, I was reminded of something that cannot be unrelated to this. It answers some questions about this story, but raises other questions that I’m still looking into. It also suggests that much of what I’ve be told about my life since I was a child wasn’t true. You can find the new story here.

Creepypasta: My Name Is...

My name’s Charlie, and I’m 15-years old. I’ve lived in Chicago for just about my entire life before my entire family moved to the small town of ********* (I’m not going to name it for personal reasons).

There’s been a story going around this little town, something about children getting taken away by these things called Takers when they misbehave. So basically what these Takers do is that they’ll climb through the window of the child in the dead of the night, and whisk them off to some unknown place. Nobody really knows what happens to these kids, and I highly doubt it’s true, but it’s been pretty effective in getting kids to behave relatively well.

The more superstitious folk in here think that the Takers are real, mainly because of the few cases of missing children that have occurred in the last decade. But I know otherwise. The dense woods surrounding the entire town would have been a more plausible reason for the disappearances than some stupid rumor concocted by frightened townsfolk. You have a bunch of ballsy young kids and you put them in the vicinity of a deep, dark, mysterious forest. You wouldn’t have to be a genius to put 2 and 2 together- these kids embarking late night exploration trips into the forest and winding up lost. I mean, yeah, a bunch of search groups were sent in to hunt for the kids but I’ve seen how big this forest really is.

It’s enormous. You’ll need an entire army to comb through the area and even then it’ll probably take them a couple of weeks, tops.

Alright so being the new kid on the block, kids generally ignored me in school, which was fine with me- I didn’t have to put up some badass punk image to keep bullies of my back. Eventually I was invited to a big party, it was going to be held at this really popular’s guy’s house so I figured why not? This was going to be my best chance at making friends.

The party was OK, I guess, I’ve been to better ones. The kids here were too quiet, too tame that almost none of them wanted to drink more than a couple cans of beer. I was almost at the threshold of my boredom by 11.30pm though, more then half the people had left and the only highlight so far was some stupid guys versus girls mass badminton match. I decided that this was a good chance to establish some reputation in this town.

'Guys. GUYS!' I clambered up onto one of the wooden picnic benches and clapped my hands for attention. The other kids all turned and I knew from their looks that some of them didn't even know who I was.

Fueled by my 10 cans of booze, I raised my arms and gestured to everyone. ‘Look, I don’t wanna be an asshole or anything, but this party really kinda stinks. Trust me, I’m from Chicago and I’ve seen some hardcore parties over there.’

'Yeah? What do you think we should do then, party-man?' This huge hulk of a guy, Vince, pushed his way to the front of the twenty-strong crowd and sneers at me.

'Well,' I paused dramatically and jabbed my thumb towards the forest just beyond the back-gate of the house. 'We've got this at our disposal, and I think it'll be a shame to just ignore it.'

The crowd lapsed into silence before breaking out into a nervous laugh and turning away from me.

'Seriously? C'mon, we're teenagers, you seriously believe that the stupid monster-in-the-woods story is true?' I climbed down from the table in dismay and disgust. I made my way to the cooler and popped open a can of beer before hopping over the back gate.

'Hey- what the hell are you doing?' I turned back, and it was Carl, a fat guy from my English class, hollering after me.

'What does it look like? I'm going into the damn woods, Carl. There's absolutely nothing to be afraid of, and I'm going to prove that to all you wussies.' I tossed the half empty can towards him before ducking under the branches of the trees. 'Peace out, ya pussy.' I saluted him mockingly before making my way into the woods.

I had to admit, after about 10 minutes of walking into the forest, I was beginning to regret my decision. The initial rush of bravado had gone and what replaced it was a growing feeling of anxiety.

'Just 5 more minutes, Charlie, 5 more minutes and we'll go.' I muttered to myself as I stomped through the bushes to emerge into a clearing. The sudden illumination from the moon took me aback. However, what surprised me more was a rather large wooden cottage sitting in the middle of the clearing. Being the idiot I was, I decided to check it out.

The cottage, as expected, was abandoned and it was clear that it had been so for a long time- it was almost entirely covered by a thick layer of moss and grime. The stairs leading up to the door were all broken at various parts which some of the steps even missing. The only parts of the cottage that still looked presentable were the windows, which were grimy and badly stained, and the door.

Thinking that the inside of the cottage would be a great photo background to show off to the other kids, I gingerly made my way up the steps and pushed the door open. The door opened with a loud creak, as expected with old abandoned cottages in the middle of the woods. I was immediately hit by a foul, putrid odor that rushed out from inside the cottage. Gagging, I took out my phone, turned on my flashlight application and stepped through the door.

The inside of the cottage seemed rather normal, a bunch of furniture pushed towards the back of the living room and a small kitchen to the left of it. There was something eerie about the place though, and I quickly snapped a couple of pictures before turning to leave when all of a sudden something hard hit me on the back of my head.

I was still in the cottage when I regained consciousness. However, I was in another part of the cottage, maybe in one of the bedrooms. I couldn’t tell, because I was blindfolded. Fighting back a sense of nausea and fear, I struggled to my feet before realizing that my feet were shackled to the floor and my arms tied behind my back.

The putrid odor seemed even more foul than before, if that were even possible and I just about had enough. I drew in a breathe to yell when I felt a warm breath down my neck.

'Good, you're awake.'

'What the- what's going on!' I whipped my head back and hollered.

'Please do keep quiet, I wouldn't want to have to gag you.'

Biting down a scream, I forced myself to stay still while tender, soft hands gently removed the blindfold. As I gradually adjusted myself to the dim light from the lamp in the corner, I began to have a clearer view in the room.

I immediately wished for the blindfold to be back on.

All around me, in various forms of decomposition, were dead bodies of boys, all shackled to the ground the same way I was. There were about the same number of bodies as those that had disappeared before. Choking down a scream, I immediately began to hyperventilate and pulled desperately at my restraints.

'Hello, Charlie, my name is Peter. Please, do no panic.' A figure, tall and dark, climbed in-front of me. I could barely make out the features of a man's face in the dim light, but what frightened me the most was the wide, maniacal grin he had plastered on his face and his round, beady eyes fixed right upon my face. Sighing softly, he settled down in-front of me and gestured towards the bodies.

'All failed experiments, I'm afraid. I do sincerely hope you would not end up like them.' He paused for a second, regarding me quietly. 'Are you hungry?'

The absurdity of his question shocked me out of silence. ‘What the fuck is this! What the fuck are you?’ I screamed wildly and swung my legs out to kick him but my efforts were in vain- the shackles held them down.

'Dear oh dear… such language. And violence! You are indeed a perfect candidate!' He rose to his feet in one fluid motion while clapping his hands in glee. 'The other boys had some real fire in them but you, ho boy, you might just make the cut.'

'WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT! LET ME GO!'

Ignoring me, Peter reached into his pocket and pulled out a large hypodermic needle. Uncapping it, he crawled slowly behind me, and caressed the left of my neck gently.

Trembling wildly in fear and horror, I ducked away from his hand, only to feel a prick of a needle on the right of my neck.

It all happened so quickly. My vision began to swirl and blur before I slumped onto the ground.

I woke up with a throbbing headache and sore limbs. My vision was still blurry as I massaged my head gingerly, before realizing that I was lying in the middle of a clearing in the forest.

'Ugh.' I climbed slowly to my feet and surveyed my surroundings. A normal plain clearing, with trees along its sides. The moon was still up, so I couldn't have been unconscious for long. Groaning, I staggered back slowly into the woods and after 15 minutes of walking, I emerged out of the forest and into the back-gate of the house. It seemed like the party had just ended.

'Hey! Hey- dude, oh my god, we were just gonna call the cops!' Carl hurried towards me before yelling wildly to a boy in the backyard. 'Vince! He's back!'

As I was helped through the backgate, Vince grabbed me by the shoulders and laughed in relief. ‘You freaked us all out, Charlie, you maniac!’

As I made my way back into the house while Carl and Vince ran to their phones to spread the news, I felt a grin slowly grow onto my face.

My name is Peter, and I am now 15-years old.

Grabbed from Horror/creepy short stories