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6 ALONE AT NIGHT HORROR STORIES ANIMATED · Martin Animations

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: I've never shared this story with anyone outside my immediate family.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: It may sound insane, but I promise it's the absolute truth.
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: When I was 15, my parents and I moved to
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: a newly constructed housing development in Beltsville, Maryland. We lived
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: right on the end of a cul-de-sac, but our house
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: was the only one that was completed. Granted, our lawn
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: was just one giant patch of dirt, but we didn't mind.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: We loved the experience of living in a brand new
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: house in a quiet corner of the neighborhood. All of
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: the other houses around us still needed the finishing touches
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: put on, such as windows and siding, so none of
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: them were occupied. During the day, there were contractors all
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: over the other properties hard at work. But at night,
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: it was nice and quiet, and my parents and I
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: would take long walks around the area and sneak peeks
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: at the inside of the other empty houses. About a
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: week after we moved in, I woke up at around
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: 2 a.m. from an awful pain in my foot. that
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: turned out to be an ingrowing toenail. But I didn't
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: know that at the time. I limped downstairs trying to
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: find my Game Boy, because I figured if I was
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: going to stay awake and miserable, I might as well
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: play some Pokemon Blue to make the time pass. I
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: didn't turn on any lights on my way downstairs, and
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: I found the Game Boy on the coffee table by
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: the light of the street lamps outside. I walked back
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: past the front door to head back upstairs, when I
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: noticed something out of the corner of my eye. and paused.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: Next to our front door we had a long window
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: that gave us a perfect view of our porch outside,
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: and the driveway beyond. My mom had intended to put
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: up a curtain, but hadn't got around to it yet.
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: I stopped at my tracks and turned to look outside,
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: and after squinting for a few seconds, my heart began
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: to hammer inside my chest, and I'm sure my eyes
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: went as big as stop signs. In the dark, it
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: was hard to tell for sure, The only light I
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: had to judge by was the street lamp at the
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: end of the driveway, but there looked to be a
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: figure of a man standing with his back to me,
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: literally just off our porch, as if he had just
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: stepped off of it. He seemed to be staring in
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: the direction of the empty house across the street. That
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: was scary enough, but what terrified me even more was
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: how dead still he was standing. He wasn't even shifting
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: his weight or fidgeting in any way I could make out.
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: I blinked hard and tried to tell myself I was
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: just seeing things, that it was a shadow or just
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: my imagination. But when I opened my eyes again, I
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: realized I wasn't crazy. The figure was definitely there. I
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: should have cautiously made my way back upstairs and woke
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: up my parents, but instead I did something very stupid.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: I'm not sure why I did it. I guess some
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: part of me just wanted to try to make out
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: if he was breathing. And I moved closer to the window.
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: and practically pressed my face to the glass. That's when
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: the figure either heard me or felt my eyes on him,
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: and his head spun around to face me, not his
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: upper body, just his head jerking around to look over
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: his shoulder, almost like an animal. In that moment, I
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: saw two pale pinpricks of light staring directly back at me,
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: and I just knew they were his eyes. I launched
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: myself back from the window and screamed for my parents.
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: I practically flew up the stairs and started wailing that
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: there was a man on the front porch. My parents
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: don't believe in guns, so when my dad saw the
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: terror on my face, he grabbed the closest heavy object
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: within reach, which happened to be a metal tubing attachment
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: from the vacuum cleaner. He then made his way down
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: the stairs. As I threw myself into my mom's arms,
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: I heard my dad cursing and hollering. Then there was
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: a moment of silence. We heard my dad drop the pipe.
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: And when he called upstairs to my mom, his voice
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: was terrified and desperate. Call the cops! Do it now! Now,
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: my dad is a big guy, 6'4, and at the time,
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: easily 250. And back when I was a baby, he
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: used to work part-time as a bouncer. But in that moment,
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: he sounded frightened in a way I never thought possible.
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: There came a heart pounding from outside the front door.
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: I hid in my parents' closet while my mom called
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: the cops. My dad was halfway up the stairs yelling
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: at the guy just to leave and that the police
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: were coming. After what felt like 10 minutes, though it
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: was probably closer to 3, the pounding stopped. The police
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: arrived maybe 10 minutes later and searched the entire property
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: and the surrounding houses, but they couldn't find the man.
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: I stayed upstairs while my mom and dad spoke to
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: the officers in the driveway. The police did routine drive-bys
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: for the next several nights, but as far as I know,
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: They never found the man. I didn't get a good
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: night's sleep for weeks. I kept remembering how the man's
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: head had snapped around to face me, those pale eyes
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: burning themselves permanently into my mind. It was several weeks
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: later that my dad finally told me what scared him
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: so much. When he had reached the bottom of the stairs,
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: the man had his face pressed up to the window,
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: and the knife was between his teeth. My dad dropped
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: the vacuum pipe when he saw the tip of the
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: knife impaled through the man's cheek. The man had then
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: started tracing his blood against the outside of the window
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: with his finger. After the police had arrived, they noticed
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: streaks of blood all around the siding of our house,
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: as if he had encircled it, continuing to run his
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: bloody fingers across the outer walls. My family never took
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: walks at night again, even after the other houses were
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: eventually occupied, and to this day, I never ever peek
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: out through the curtains at night for fear I may
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: see those eyes again. I used to live in this
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: small sleepy forest town which at the time was notorious
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: for being the most boring place to raise a family
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: in the Midwest. That never bothered me very much. I
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: like the isolation and the privacy and the knowledge that
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: those late-breaking violent stories you hear on the news would
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: never involve us. I lived about a minute away from
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: a large open field where I could easily walk for
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: about 15 minutes without ever having to set foot on concrete.
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: One day last summer, I was taking my dog Oscar
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: for a walk across the field pretty early in the
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: morning as I usually did. But today, something happened to
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: catch my eye immediately after I went through the fence.
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: About 15 meters to the left of the entry gate
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  Speaker 1: is an old fishing pit that was surrounded by overgrown
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: bushes with barbed wire. So I heard something rustling from
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: the undergrowth, and I stopped to investigate. I noticed the
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: outline of someone standing under the shadows of the trees,
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: staring at me without moving. Completely taken aback and slightly unnerved,
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: I decided to just keep walking my dog as if
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: I hadn't seen anything. I usually play music on my phone,
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: but after that chilling encounter, I had no intention of
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: doing so, just in case that person decided to try
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: and come at me from behind. After walking for another
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: 15 minutes, I completed my loop around the field and
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: was making my way back when I noticed a tall
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: man walking from the grassy area around the fishing pit
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: to the gate. It was hard to tell because of
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: the distance, but I would say he was around 30
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: years old and well built. I made sure to keep
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: my distance and decided to play fetch with my dog
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: for a while and give him time to leave as
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: my gut feeling was telling me that it wasn't a
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: good idea to approach him. After a short while, I
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: made sure the coast was clear and called my dog
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: back over to me and reattached his leash. As we
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: were making our way out of the field through the
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: gate where we originally entered, Oscar started pulling at his leash.
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: and sniffing around the bushes where I had first noticed
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: the silhouette of the man. I tugged at the leash
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: and called my dog's name, but he refused to obey,
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: which was strange because he usually didn't give me any trouble.
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: I walked towards him to grab his collar, nervously scanning
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: the area again for the strange man, when I noticed
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: a piece of blue cloth on the other side of
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: the barbed wire divider that surrounds the fishing pit. I
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: tied my dog to a nearby stump, carefully climbed over
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: the fence and went to investigate. This next part is
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: very difficult for me to recount, because while a part
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: of me is pleased my actions that day brought light
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: to a violent crime and brought closure, however horrific, to
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: someone's family, another part of me wishes I had just
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: been less patient and kept tugging at my dog, because
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: the nightmares have yet to stop. There was a body
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: of a young girl covered in bruises all over her
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: face and lacerations to her wrists. Fresh blood was pooling
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: under the gash in her neck. Her eyes were all
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: puffy like she had been crying for a very long time.
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: I couldn't even begin to imagine what she had been
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: put through. After calling the police, I sat by the
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: gate and waited what was probably only about eight minutes,
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: but it felt like a lifetime. even though I obviously
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: knew she was dead. When I overheard the ambulance attendant
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: confirm it, I threw up all over the grass. The
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: police tried asking me questions, and I told them what
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: I could recall about the stranger, while my dog whined
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: and tried to nuzzle me while I sat on the grass.
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: A week later, I read in the newspaper that the
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: young girl was a 12-year-old named Megan that had gone
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: missing no more than five minutes away from my house.
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: She had been sexually assaulted before being murdered. After a
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: three months of continuous searching, nobody matched the vague description
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: of the man I had given the police. More than
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: a few times I've noticed people in my own town
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: giving me sideways glances that feel more like suspicion than pity,
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: and that's almost more than I can bear. Please just
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: remember to keep things in perspective. No matter how shitty
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: a day you're having, however many trivial inconveniences you have
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: to endure, you were at least lucky enough not to
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: have found a dead child while enjoying your daily routine.
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: My thoughts and prayers go out to that poor girl's family.
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: This story is told from the point of view of
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: a female. My husband and I live in Richmond, Virginia.
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: About two weeks ago, we decided that we wanted to
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: get season passes to King's Dominion, which is the biggest
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: amusement park in our state. We were short on cash,
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: and we're in between paychecks, so we decided to sell
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: some of our old things on a mobile app called LetGo,
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: which is basically like Craigslist, where you can post items
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: you have for sale, and it shows it to everyone
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: within a 50-mile radius of your location. The only way
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: LetGo is different from Craigslist... is that you actually have
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: to make an account, but no personal information is required
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: besides your name and your general area of residence. You
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: are also able to chat with other buyers and sellers
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: through the messaging system on the app to keep your
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: phone numbers anonymous. I posted my old tablet on LetGo
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: to make up for the money we still needed to
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: get the passes, and within a few minutes I got
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: a message from a woman named Keisha. who was interested
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: in making an offer, the conversation went as follows. Hi,
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: is the tablet still available? Yes, it is. Great. Can
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: I pick it up in two hours when I get off? Actually,
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: I'm trying to get some King's Dominion passes today, so
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: I can go this evening. I could drop it off
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: to you if that's okay. Yeah, that works. I work
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: at the McDonald's off Nine Mile Road. Okay, great. Can
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: you send me the address so I can head over?
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: Now the conversation stopped there for a bit, after I
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: had asked Keisha for the address to her McDonald's. She
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: didn't respond for a while, and looking back after everything happened,
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: it should have been a red flag, but at the time,
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: I figured she was slow to reply because she was working.
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: I asked my husband if he knew which McDonald's it
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: could be, and he looked it up on Google Earth.
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: I copied the address and messaged her back asking if
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: it was the right address, And she responded, Yeah, that's it.
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: Message me when you're here, so I can tell my
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: manager I need to run out to my car. After that,
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: my husband and I grabbed a tablet and began the drive.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: We had to take the highway at rush hour, so
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: what should have been a 20-minute drive ended up being
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: around 40 minutes. As we were stuck in traffic, Keisha
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: would send me several messages asking me where we were,
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: and each time I would reply the same way. telling
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: her that we were on our way but we were
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: caught up in traffic. We finally arrived and parked in
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: front of the main entrance. My husband suggested that we
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: sit on the bed of his truck because he didn't
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: want to make Keisha walk up to the window of
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: a stranger's car. I agreed and I hopped out of
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: his truck and he pulled down the hitched door to
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: his bed and we took a seat. I pulled out
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: my phone and messaged her saying that we were there.
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: We waited for about five minutes staring at the door.
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: but the only person who came was a man on
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: a cell phone who got into a car that was
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: next to ours and drove off. After another few minutes,
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: my husband and I were tired of waiting, so I
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: checked my phone to see if I had any new messages.
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: I looked up our conversation and discovered that Keisha had
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: blocked me. I showed my husband and he got pissed.
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: He told me to wait in the truck with the
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: doors locked while he went inside and asked the manager
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: if anybody named Keisha worked there. He took my phone
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: with him to use as evidence of our conversation. When
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: he came back to the truck a few minutes later,
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: he told me that the manager said there was a
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: girl named Keisha that worked there, but she had been
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: sent home early because of slow customer traffic. It was
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: in that moment that I put two and two together.
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: The only person we saw come out of the restaurant
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: was the man who was on the phone, who quickly
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: got in his car next to ours and drove off.
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: I never said anything about my husband being with me,
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: For all they knew, I was by myself. We peeled
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: out of the parking lot and sped back home. On
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: our way back, I deleted the application from my phone.
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: I know this sounds like a lot of speculation, but
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: I'm fairly certain that I was almost the victim of
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: a kidnapping because there have been several cases of women
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: in Richmond and other areas of Virginia who have used
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: the LetGo app and have gone missing or have been
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: robbed at gunpoint. I'm grateful that my husband came along
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: with me Because if he didn't, there's a good chance
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: I wouldn't be able to share this story. Keep this
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: story in mind for the future. And as always, make
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: sure to bring somebody with you when meeting with a stranger.
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: My name is Stephanie. I'm 18. But this happened in
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: the summer of 2014. One night my friends and I
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: decided to go to the park that was by our
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: apartment building. just to drink and be rebellious teenagers. We
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: were all having a good time drinking and smoking marijuana
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: when one of our friends suggested that we should go
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: skinny dipping. It sounded like fun. As everyone was getting undressed,
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: I happened to notice this putrid smell coming from the
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: bushes by the water. I brought it up to my friends,
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: and before long, we were all searching for where the
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: stench was coming from. After a few minutes, we found
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: this large old green suitcase sticking out of the water
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: among the weeds. It was locked with one of those
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: three-digit code mechanisms. We all freaked out and got dressed
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: and headed back to our apartments. I volunteered to make
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: an anonymous call to the cops since we were all
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: underage and drinking. None of us wanted to wait down
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: by the lake for them to show up. I watched
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: from my bedroom window as in the distance what was
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: only at first a few cop cars down by the
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: lake steadily grew until there were more than ten. The
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: next day on the news they reported on finding a
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: mutilated body of a young woman stuffed into the suitcase.
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: I immediately felt sick. The crazy thing was that about
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: two weeks prior I thought I heard a woman screaming
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: down by the park and I had my parents call
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: the cops but they never found anything. My friends and
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: I never go down to the park after dark anymore.
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: All I can think about when I look at that
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: lake is the horrific rotting meat smell that led us
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: to the suitcase and the horrible sensation I felt when
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: I poked at it with a stick. I'm probably just
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: imagining it, but at the time, I seem to remember
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: hearing a moan coming from within. My story takes place
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: in Lancaster, California back in 2007. I was 18 at
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: the time, and a senior in high school. I had
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: picked up a job as a sign waver. You know,
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: those people who stand outside on street corners waving promotional
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: signs for businesses. Yeah, it sucks about as much as
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: you think it does, but as a high school student
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: it paid fairly well. By the way, please stop throwing
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: things at us from your cars while we're waving our signs.
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: It's just not cool. The job is demeaning enough without
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: having fast food launched at our heads. Anyway, I had
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: been standing on my corner for about two hours swinging
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: my sign around and waving at passing drivers when I
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: noticed this bald guy sitting across the street from me
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: on a bench looking my way. I waved to him
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: more or less just to keep my rhythm going and
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: he immediately gave me the finger. It wasn't just a
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: casual flip off either. He raised his fist like he
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: wanted to hit me and started shouting at me from
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: across the intersection. I couldn't make out exactly what he
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: was saying. but the word faggot was definitely used at
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: least once. I avoided eye contact with him and focused
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: my attention on the cars again. Soon after, my boss
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: pulled up to the curb and told me that I
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: was free to leave as our company got laid off
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: and all the sign waivers were going to be replaced
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: by a different team. I was disappointed that I would
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: be out of work for the foreseeable future, but in
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: that moment I was relieved to be able to sit
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: down somewhere out of the sun. I was about to
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: tell my boss about the bald guy, when I noticed
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: that the bench across the street was empty. I'm not
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: sure when he had left, but I simply shrugged it
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: off and got into the car with my boss, who
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: told me that my replacement was going to be there
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: within an hour. Over the course of the next hour,
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: I went home, got changed, and was meeting a friend
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: for lunch before going to see a movie, when the
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: notifications on my phone started exploding non-stop, with people asking
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: me if I was alright and to please call them.
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: I was confused and immediately called my mom, who started
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: crying when she heard my voice. I went home to
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: be with her and immediately found out what all the
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: concern had been about. The news was reporting that a
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: sign waiver had just been shot dead on the very
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: corner I had been standing on less than an hour ago.
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: When the victim had fallen, his sign had partially covered
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: his face and he hadn't had any identification on him.
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: So most of my friends had jumped to the horrible
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: conclusion that it was me lying there. The creepy thing
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: was that the victim and I looked very similar. We
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: were both Latino with short dark hair. We were about
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: the same height and even had been wearing nearly identical outfits.
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: I was eventually interviewed by the police and I mentioned
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: the bald man who had been shouting angrily at me
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: from across the street. But to the best of my knowledge,
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: they concluded that the shooting was gang-related. Either way, the
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: situation shook me, and I didn't feel safe or relaxed
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: for a long while afterwards. I felt terrible that the
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: other guy died, but at the same time, had my
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: boss not come and picked me up when he did,
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: who knows if it would have been me who was
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: shot and killed. I have a wife and child now,
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: and sometimes when I look at them, I think about
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: how different everything could have been. This story is not
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: my own, but my mother's. My parents were living in
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: a small apartment complex in Arizona while my mom was
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: pregnant with me. The apartment was pretty much microscopic, with
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: a very tiny kitchen, a small living room, and an
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: even smaller bathroom. It was October of 2001, and my
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: mom was about seven months pregnant with me. She was
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: at home while my dad was working, when she had
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: gone down to the lobby to get the mail. When
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: she got back to the apartment, she sat down and
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: started watching TV. She began to hear deep breathing from
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: behind her. Not even the careful type of breathing of
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: someone trying not to be heard. She walked over to
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: the closet by the door and discovered that there was
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: a man hiding in it. She recognized the man immediately
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: as the guy who lived on the floor above them.
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: She started screaming at him to get out. while he
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: babbled something incoherently about not turning on the news or
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: drawing attention to the room. My mom told me the
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: next few seconds were a blur, and she couldn't remember
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: the specific details, but she grabbed her phone and called
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: my dad, knowing he would get there quicker than the
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: cops would. She put the phone on speaker and my
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: dad started screaming at the neighbor, threatening his life, saying
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: that he was only five minutes away. Well, that was
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: enough to scare the intruder into leaving, but instead of
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: exiting out the door, He climbed out the window and
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: went down the fire escape. After my dad arrived home,
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: my parents called the police. When the police showed up,
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: they explained to my parents that the guy was a
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: drug addict and he had gotten into trouble with some
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: dangerous men who apparently threatened to come to his apartment
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: to kill him. The man most likely panicked and ducked
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: into the first apartment he found that was unlocked. Fast
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: forward a week. During this time, my dad had been
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: keeping an eye out for the guy all over town
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: and in the complex, when he happened to spot him
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: late one night in the parking lot. When the man
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: saw him coming, he immediately started apologizing for breaking into
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: their apartment, using the excuse that there was a couple
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: of people trying to kill him. But my dad grabbed
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: him and slammed him into the wall. The guy grabbed
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: a crowbar from the back of his car to defend himself,
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: and my dad got his gun from his car and
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: called the cops. When the cops arrived, They explained that
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: they could arrest the guy for breaking and entering, but
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: that he could also press charges on dad for assaulting him.
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: Of course, my dad couldn't afford to go to jail
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: since he was supporting my mom, so he had to
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: give the guy a pass. Luckily, the guy moved away
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: a few days later. Looking back, my mom says they
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: were very fortunate as there was no telling what could
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: have happened if the people that were trying to kill
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: our neighbor found him in our apartment with my mom
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: still in there.