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Terrifying Trick Or Treating Stories · Stories from the Dark

• 0:23
  Speaker 1: I was 12 years old and the Halloween had happened.
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: And even all these years later, it still creeped me
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: out a little to walk near water after dark. I
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: know that might sound stupid to some. I mean, I'm
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: almost 40 now. And besides, I've lived through things a
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: whole lot worse than some cold October night in Maine.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: But every now and then, usually when the wind is
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: coming in off the ocean and the house is all
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: quiet like, I remember that night on Bay Road. and
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: how I'd never been so scared in my entire life.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: So I grew up in a little fishing town on
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: the coast of Maine. I'm not going to name it,
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: there's really no point. They're all just carbon copies of
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: each other, in my opinion anyways. And if you've ever
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: spent any time in one of those towns, you'll know
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: what I'm talking about. The kind that's just a church,
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: a general store, a fisherman's bar, and a harbor that's
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: the center of the universe for just about everybody, professional
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: or recreational. It was a deep natural one too, not
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: some place dug out with machinery. But the bottom dropped
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: away sharp. And then God help you if you fell
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: in because in the deep winter, you'd be looking at
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: water that was black and cold enough to kill you
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: before you even had time to panic. We grew up
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: hearing stories about that water. Good ones and bad ones
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: and mostly stuff the old timers like to tell. They'd
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: sit at the bar in the diner with their coffees
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: and tell us about sailors who'd gone overboard in storms.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: They'd talk about how they got tangled in nets and
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: dragged to the bottom, and how their bodies were washed
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: ashore in the days that followed. But sometimes their bodies
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: were never found, and other times they didn't stay dead.
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: They said a man who died at sea with unfinished
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: business might come crawling out of the wash one night,
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: dragging himself up over the rocks and coughing up seawater
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: before hunting down whoever had wronged him. They said that
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: sometimes the fish would eat the men's eyes, lips, and noses,
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: and so there'd be nothing left but this half-rotted, soaking wet,
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: skull-faced monster shuffling around town. But even for us kids,
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: that was a detail too far. We knew they were
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: just creepy stories told by old men trying to spook
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: us around Halloween, and by age 12, I'd actually started
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: to kind of appreciate what amounted to a cool local legend,
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: especially in a town as boring as ours. There were
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: never any big Halloween parties or organized events in town,
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: so me and my buddies usually got our kicks trick-or-treating
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: in a group. That year, there were three of us,
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: and we wore whatever costumes we managed to throw together.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: My friend Joey had a plastic fish man mask that
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: was cracked around the top. His friend Sean wore an
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: old bed sheet with two holes cut in it, and
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: I had a pair of vampire teeth that made me
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: sound dumb as hell whenever I tried to talk. We'd
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: been walking around Bay Road, going from house to house,
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: collecting candy and just generally having fun. And then in
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: some places, the road ran really close to the shore.
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: On one side, You had houses, sheds, and yards with
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: the occasional carved pumpkin sitting on the steps, but on
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: the other, the land dropped away into scrubby bushes and
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: rocks before becoming a shore, and then the water beyond it.
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: We'd been out maybe an hour when I realized that
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: I needed to take a piss, and so I told
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: the others to keep going and that I'd catch up
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: after a trip into the bushes. Joey made some joke
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: about me being scared of the dark and I told
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: him to go screw himself and then I stepped off
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: the road and pushed through the bushes towards the water.
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: I found a spot behind some trees and unzipped my
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: pants and then as I was taking that leak, I
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: looked out across the water and my eye was caught
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: by a boat. Most were already tied up and you
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: could see that their mast lights were bobbing in the harbor,
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: but the one I spotted was sitting out in the bay.
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: well beyond the usual mooring area. At first, I thought
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: it might be somebody coming home late, because even though
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: I could only see its outline, basically, I could tell
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: it was a working fishing boat, not one of the
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: pleasure boats that the summer people brought up when the
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: weather was nice. I could make out its dark shape
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: against the water, and there was a light somewhere near
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: the stern, but I quickly realized that it wasn't moving.
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: It just sat there, rocking gently, with the bow turned
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: slightly toward the shore. I remember thinking it was weird,
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: not like scary weird exactly, just very strange. Everyone in
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: town knew what the harbor looked like at night, even
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: us kids, and that boat didn't belong out there at all.
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: I finished up and then stood there a moment, trying
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: to make out if anyone was aboard, and then suddenly,
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: something moved in the water nearby. I heard the sound
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: of something coming to shore maybe 30 yards from where
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: I stood, and then when I looked, I saw a
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: pale shape breaking the water's surface between two rocks. I
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: thought maybe it was a seal at first, as we
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: had a lot of seals around the harbor, and sometimes
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: they'd poke their heads up and watch you if you
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: got a little too close to the water. But this
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: thing didn't lift its head like a seal. It looked
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: like it was trying to stand up. Now, I couldn't
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: make much sense of what I was seeing at first.
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: But then suddenly, I heard a wet, choking sound, followed
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: by something almost like a low growl. Now, I'd never
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: heard of any kind of animal make a noise like
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: that before, especially not a seal. It sounded more like
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: something trying to breathe through a throat full of mud.
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: I froze as the shape threw itself forward and then
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: watched as an arm came up out of the water.
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: It slapped against a rock and slipped off again, but
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: the thing still pushed itself up the shore. And then
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: I heard that wet, choking sound a second time. I
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: remember my first thought being that somebody had drowned and
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: the old stories came rushing into my head so fast
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: that I couldn't even think. I thought it was a
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: drowned man, returned to wreak a terrible revenge, and it
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: scared the living hell out of me. I wanted to run,
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: but it was like I couldn't get my legs to
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: work and All I did was watch as the thing
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: dragged itself forward again. Its fingers hooked over a rock
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: and I could see them clearly then. Pale and swollen
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: looking in what was a mix of moonlight and distant streetlight.
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: They curled and scraped against the stone as if they
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: barely had enough strength left to hold on. And then
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: I saw its head. Now I couldn't see its face.
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: There was water steaming off of it and The shape
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: was bent forward, almost folded in half. Its hair hung
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: over its eyes, and when its mouth opened, that horrible
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: sound came out again. This sort of long, rattling gasp
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: that I swear to God sounded almost angry. And with
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: this feeling of pure terror having taken hold of me,
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: I finally ran like I'd never run before. I sprinted
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: through the bushes, slipping on wet leaves and catching my
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: coat on branches. I didn't even pull my pants up
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: completely at first. I just grabbed them and bolted. I
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: was running so ragged that I actually tripped as I
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: hit the road and fell hard enough to skin both
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: palms after I threw them out to stop me smashing
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: my face into the blacktop. The others stopped further up
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: the road, wondering what had happened to me, and I
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: got up and ran at them, screaming that something was coming.
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: Joey laughed at first. and said all I'd done was
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: give myself the willies after a seal plopped out of
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: the water. But then he saw my face and how
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: serious I was. Whatever he said next, I don't remember.
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: I just remember grabbing Sean by the sleeve and telling
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: him that we had to go. We ran to the
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: nearest house where an old woman opened her door, one
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: who nearly dropped the bowl of candy she was holding
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: when we yelled for her to call the cops. She
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: said she'd call the cops, but then asked why, and
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: when I told her, she didn't. She just called my
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: mom instead. Mom came down the road in her house
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: coat and slippers, completely furious because she'd been worried sick
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: and couldn't understand what I'd told the lady. I tried
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: to tell her what I'd seen, about the man in
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: the water who crawled up over the rocks making a
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: sound like something dying. I guess this kind of speaks
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: to what kind of mom she was, but she looked
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: me dead in the eye and asked if I'd been
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: drinking anything from somebody's Halloween punch bowl. I was 12.
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: I don't think I'd ever even seen an alcoholic punchbowl
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: like that before, and in my anger, fright, and frustration,
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: all I could do was cry. My mom didn't see
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: sense until one of the other kids said that they'd
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: spotted the boat too, and I guess that little moment
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: of corroboration was enough for the grown-ups to start taking
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: us seriously, and then within minutes, they were on the move.
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: A couple of men went down toward the shore with
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: flashlights after somebody called the police. and the rest of
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: us were told to stay inside, which was about the
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: only sensible thing anyone did that night. I remember sitting
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: at that nice lady's kitchen table with a blanket around
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: my shoulders, watching the adults come and go. Mom asked
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: me to describe what I'd seen, and each time I tried,
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: I started to doubt myself more and more. I didn't
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: know if I'd encountered a seal some drowned body, or
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: some kind of monster crawling up on the shore towards me,
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: like I said. But of course, the cops didn't find
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: anything like that. What they did find was a man.
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: He was lying among the rocks, soaked to the bone,
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: and while he was still breathing... He was obviously in
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: a real, real bad way. I heard his skin was
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: almost bluish and that his hands were all torn up
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: from trying to drag himself over those sharp rocks. He'd
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: been in the water long enough that the cold had
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: nearly killed him, but after they got him into an
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: ambulance and took him to the hospital, the doctors managed
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: to save his life. I didn't find out what really
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: had happened until after a while, because as much as
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: the grown-ups tried their best to shield us kids from
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: what happened... They obviously couldn't do it forever. And it
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: turns out the guy's name was Henry something. I can
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: never remember his last name, but he'd been in the
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: fishing business with a guy named Bill Putner almost all
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: of his life. And the two of them used to
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: be good friends. Friends who bought a boat together when
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: they were much younger. But Bill had a reputation for
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: bad temper and difficult demeanor, so over time, I guess
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: things went bad. Money was missing. Debts were piling up.
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: And word had it that they'd been arguing for weeks
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: by the time Halloween rolled around, which is when Bill
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: took Henry out into the bay under the pretense of
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: settling their business dispute. But then once they were all
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: away from shore and Henry turned his back, Bill smashed
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: him over the head with something. He didn't know what exactly,
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: and Bill never said. But once he was out cold,
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: Bill tied a weight to him and then threw him
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: overboard when he was still unconscious. I guess he wanted
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: to make Henry disappear and I don't know if anyone
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: ever learned exactly what Bill had planned to do afterward,
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: but it doesn't matter because his plan didn't work. Henry
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: didn't drown. He woke up underwater and somehow managed to
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: free himself from the weight that he'd been tied to.
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: He nearly drowned doing it alright as the cold made
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: his hands clumsy, but he managed it and he swam
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: all the way to shore afterwards. When he finally reached
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: the shallows, he was so exhausted that he couldn't stand,
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: and he'd been dragging himself over those rocks when I
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: spotted him. Those sounds I'd heard, the ones I thought
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: were made by a malevolent undead fisherman, that was no monster.
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: It was a man fighting for his life. Bill left
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: Henry in the water and then made his way back
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: toward the harbor, apparently believing the job was done, but
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: the police caught up with him just a couple of
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: hours later. He was arrested... and charged with attempted murder,
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: and then ended up going to prison. Henry moved away someplace,
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: but I couldn't tell you where, and years went by.
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: I grew up, left Maine for a while, and eventually
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: raised children of my own, and then one October, when
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: I was in my forties, I drove back to the
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: old neighborhood to visit my mother. The harbor was the same,
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: only the houses had changed, and there were fewer fishermen
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: than there used to be, but The water was still
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: black at night and the road still ran along that shore.
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: On the drive back I ended up stopping near the
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: spot where it happened and I guess it was to
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: prove to myself that it was just normal, you know.
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: A place like any other. I got out and stood
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: there for a while as the tide was coming in
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: and the only sounds being the wind and the water
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: lapping against the rocks. I stood watching the water until
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: I felt this peace come over me and then I
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: got back in the car and drove away. Henry wasn't
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: a monster. He was a man. A man dragged under
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: the water by someone he trusted. A man left to
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: die in the cold. Sometimes, even today, I wonder what
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: went through his mind as he dragged himself over those rocks.
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: Whether he thought he was going to die, whether he
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: thought he was already dead, or whether for a few
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: horrible moments he started to believe those old stories about
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: drowned sailors and unfinished business. So, this is actually one
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: of the more traumatic memories of my childhood, but I
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: suppose that's what this channel's all about, isn't it? And
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: so I was 13 when this happened, and it was
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: around Halloween. It happened in the late 90s on the
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: council estate that I grew up. There was nothing particularly
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: rough about it, although there were a few streets that
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: you wouldn't have wanted to wander down after dark. Most
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: people knew each other, everyone knew whose kids were whose,
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: and Halloween was one of those nights when you were
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: allowed a bit more freedom than usual. But we were
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: also told to stay within a certain perimeter, and for
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: the first two years of going out alone, we stuck
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: to it. But then this one year, we didn't, and, well,
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: you'll see what I mean. There were six of us
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: that year, all around 12 and 13, and that year
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: we'd made an actual effort with our costumes... especially considering
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: that we were scrint kids using whatever we could find
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: around the house. Now, I was Bela Lugosi's version of Dracula,
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: complete with face paint, slick back hair, and a black
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: bin bag for a cape. My friend Danny used my
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: makeup and a wig to make himself look like someone
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: from Kiss. I don't remember what most of the others
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: were wearing, though. But our mate Chris was dressed as
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: Indiana Jones, and since his dad actually had the hat,
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: he definitely looked the best. We had carrier bags for
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: sweets and we were taking the whole thing very seriously.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: You had to knock on the right door since some
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: houses gave you proper chocolate bars while others handed out
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: those little bags of cheap sweets that tasted like dust.
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: And then that year, like I said early, we decided
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: to go further than we'd ever gone before. Purely out
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: of greed and we ended up paying for it. We
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: went out for maybe an hour and a half and
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: it was getting really dark by the time we decided
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: to stray beyond the agreed boundaries. I remember how the
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: street lamps glowed orange and how my vampire cape kept
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: catching on things, and how it was cold enough that
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: my fingers were beginning to hurt. But above all, I
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: remember that sense of excitement and adventure. We were exploring
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: and reaping the benefits in terms of our treat haul,
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: and then at one point, we decided to cut down
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: a narrow alley that linked to the neighborhoods. It had
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: a brick wall on one side, a railway line on
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: the other, and a sharp right-hand turn about halfway down.
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: You couldn't see around the corner until you were practically
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: on top of it. And then as we were walking along,
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: arguing about which streets to visit first, we heard shouting. Now,
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: it wasn't like happy or excited shouting either. It was
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: angry shouting coming from the other side of the corner.
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: And then before we could even react, four older kids
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: suddenly came tearing around it. They were in costumes or
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: what passed for costumes. One seemed to have a cheap
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: devil mask pushed up into his forehead and another had
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: a cowboy hat trailing from a string behind him and
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: one was carrying a rubber monster face that he'd obviously
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: pulled off to run faster they came around that corner
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: at an absolute sprint with one of them nearly crashing
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: into danny he swerved at the last second swore at
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: us and then kept going the others followed shoving past
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: us and laughing in this horrible breathless way and i
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: remember one of them looking back over his shoulder but
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: he wasn't laughing anymore. He was absolutely terrified. We all
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: stood there, watching them disappear one by one, and then
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: we heard footsteps behind us, heavy and fast, and a
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: man's voice screaming, You're dead! I remember those words because
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: he shouted them before we could even see him, and
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: then he came around the corner wearing an ordinary dark
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: jacket and jeans. No costume, no mask, just a normal-looking
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: guy with a cricket bat gripped in both hands. He
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: didn't skip a beat when he saw us, and I
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: suppose because Chris's hat looked something similar to the cowboy
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: who just ran past, he saw us and just screamed,
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: You little bastards! And then he charged. I can't honestly
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: tell you exactly what happened in the moments that followed,
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: but that's the thing about scary memories like that, isn't it?
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: It's like my brain seemed to keep certain bits and
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: throw away the rest. I remember Corky screaming. I remember
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: Danny dropping his sweets, and I remember the bat swinging
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: through the air. But most of all, I remember how
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: the man made this horrible grunting noise as he brought
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: it down. Chris was the tallest of us. He'd been
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: right at the front, too, and he was easily the
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: slowest as well. And so the man caught up with
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: him fast. He hit him across the side of the
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: head or shoulder, and I couldn't tell exactly where, but
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: he went down hard. I looked back to see this
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: guy stood over him, swinging the bat and shouting, I
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: warned you! But he wasn't saying it to Chris, not really.
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: He was saying it to those other lads, the one
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: who'd run past just a few seconds before. His face
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: was twisted up and his eyes were wide and I
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: remember his teeth. Now that might sound strange, but I
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: remember them so clearly. He was clenching his jaws so
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: hard that his lips had pulled back from them like
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: a snarling animal. And as he took the blows, Chris
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: made noises that I've never forgotten. They weren't screams. They
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: were like these little frightened sounds that he was making
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: as the wind was being knocked out of him. I
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: watched for a second or two, and it must have
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: been a few seconds, but when the man looked up
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: at me with that insane look in his eye, I
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: just ran again. We all ran until we reached the
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: main road where there were people walking around and houses
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: with their lights on. We then stood on the pavement
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: with none of us being able to say anything that
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: made sense, and then someone else came running into view.
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: It was a woman who lived in one of the
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: houses nearby. She'd heard the screaming, come outside, and wanted
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: to know what was going on. Others joined her as
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: we explained, then as soon as they realized Chris had
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: been beaten up by some guy with a cricket bat,
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: they went rushing past us and into the alley. Someone
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: eventually got the bat away from the man, but I
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: never saw exactly how. There were differing stories about it afterwards,
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: including one that said a neighbor had tackled him to
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: the ground and thrown some punches. Another said that he
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: just simply stopped when he realized the children in front
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: of him weren't the ones he'd been chasing. I don't
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: know which version was true, but what I do know
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: is that when the police arrived, the guy was sitting
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: on the pavement with his head in his hand and
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: the bat sitting next to him. But he wasn't shouting anymore.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: He was crying. Chris was taken to the hospital and
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: his injuries were serious enough that he had to stay
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: there for a while. His skull was cracked. Something had
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: broken in his arm. and he had tons of cuts
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: and bruises from his tumble alone. Rumors were going around
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: that he might not recover properly, but those were just that, rumors,
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: and thankfully Chris had made a complete recovery. It wasn't quick,
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: and Chris wasn't the same for a long time afterwards,
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: but neither were the rest of us, if I'm being honest.
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: I didn't go trick-or-treating again for a long time after that.
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: The man was arrested and charged, and the case eventually
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: went to court... And then because we were children, we
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: had to give statements about what we'd seen to be
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: read out to a judge. I remember sitting in a
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: room with my mom and a police officer and getting
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: angry because the officer kept asking me whether I was
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: sure the man had hit Chris twice. I'd never been
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: so sure about anything in my life, so to be
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: treated like that was... Well, it wasn't nice. Let's put
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: it that way. The older kids were eventually identified too.
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: They tried to make it sound like they'd only been
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: having a laugh, but... There was evidence of months of harassment,
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: and that became a big part of the case. The
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: man who beat up Chris had been pushed and tormented
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: for a long, long time, and there was evidence that
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: he'd become increasingly distressed and angry. And there was even
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: a doctor's note from where he'd sought help for the
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: stress of everything. His solicitor argued that he'd only snapped
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: after prolonged harassment, and that the circumstances had to be
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: taken into account, and they were taken into account. He
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: was convicted and sentenced to three years in prison but
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: with mitigating circumstances considered and he served 18 months. I
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: remember hearing that and not really understanding what it meant.
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: 18 months sounded like a long time to me and
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: all I knew was that a man who nearly killed
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: my friend was going away. But my parents weren't relieved
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: and Chris's parents were so angry that they ended up
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: in the newspapers. They wanted the guy locked up for
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: much longer and there were arguments about it for months afterwards.
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: When I was too young to have an honest opinion
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: about any of that legal stuff, all I knew was
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: that we'd gone out to collect sweets and that one
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: of my friends ended up in a hospital. And I
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: couldn't understand how something like that could happen so quickly.
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: This happened way back in the early 2000s when I
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: was 12 years old. Just old enough to go trick-or-treating
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: without our parents insisting on following us everywhere. This was
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: back when our neighborhood went all out for Halloween too.
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: People put up fake cobwebs, carved pumpkins, and hung those
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: plastic skeletons from their trees. There were a couple of
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: houses that went a little overboard too and turned decorations
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: into a kind of competition. But to us trick-or-treaters... there
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: was one house you absolutely needed to visit. It was
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: this big, old, two-story place at the end of a
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: very sloping driveway. A really fancy place and bigger than
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: all the other houses around it. It was all dark
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: brick and white trim with a wide porch and these
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: enormous windows on each floor. The people who lived there
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: were a married couple, I think, but I still don't
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: remember what their names were. What I do remember is
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: that they gave out full-sized candy bars. Not those little
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: fun-sized things everyone else handed out. Actual full-sized chocolate bars. Now,
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: the previous Halloween, we'd gone there, and the husband had
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: answered the door. Now, he'd been friendly, as far as
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: I could remember. A big guy with a thick neck,
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: a little rough around the edges. But he smiled and
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: dropped a couple of those full-sized bars into each of
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: our bags. Now, the woman had been standing behind him
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: in the hallway. She smiled too, but I remember thinking
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: it looked a bit strange. Like she was smiling because
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: she was supposed to, not because she wanted to. Now,
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: kids don't really pick up on that sort of thing, though.
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: Not completely, anyway. Now, we didn't care if she seemed
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: mean or unfriendly. All we cared about was that damn candy.
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: And the following year, when we were making our way
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: through the neighborhood in our costumes, somebody suggested we go back.
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: There were four of us. My best friend, myself, and
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: two brothers who lived down the street. My best friend
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: was dressed as Sonic the Hedgehog, being a huge fan
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: of it, and I think one of the brothers was
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: dressed as like the mummy and the other had some
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: cheap plastic Jason hockey mask that kept slipping off of
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: his face, while I was wearing a Grim Reaper costume
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: that my mom had bought from Spirit Halloween. It was
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: one of those late October nights when the cold gets
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: through your clothes and your fingers start hurting even though
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: you're carrying a bag full of chocolate. And so by
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: the time we reached the big house, I remember feeling
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: cold but super excited. The porch light was on but
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: there was no decorations on the lawn that year which
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: kind of struck me as odd. The front windows were
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: dark though so we figured maybe the family was sitting
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: in the back of the house. But there were no pumpkins,
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: no plastic ghosts and nothing like that, which like I
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: said was very odd. I walked up the driveway and
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: onto the porch and then my friend knocked but got nothing.
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: He knocked again, harder that time, and then we just
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: stood there waiting. The place stayed quiet, so one of
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: the brothers suggested that they weren't home, but my friend
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: said the light wouldn't be on if they weren't giving
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: out candies, so maybe we should just wait. He knocked
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: a third time, now practically hammering his fist against the wood,
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: and it's then that we heard something. At first it
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: sounded like furniture scraping across the floor, followed by a
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: heavy thud. And then there was a sort of noise
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: that reminded me of someone dropping something in the kitchen.
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: Now we all looked at one another and someone asked,
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: what was that? But nobody answered. We stood there listening
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: and I remember how strange it felt. We'd been laughing
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: and messing around just seconds before and then suddenly none
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: of us wanted to make a sound. There was another
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: thud and then something that sounded like a man's voice
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: and he sounded angry, really angry. Now we should have
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: just left then. We should have just turned around and gone.
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: But curiosity is a funny thing when you're a kid.
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: It makes you stupid. My friend knocked again and yelled,
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: Trick or treat! I remember wanting to punch him for
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: doing that, and I kind of still do whenever I
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: think about it. A couple of seconds of silence followed,
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: and then we heard that woman scream. It was so
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: sudden that all four of us jumped, and I can
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: still remember the sound of it. Not because it was
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: incredibly loud, but because there was something in it that
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: I'd never heard before. It wasn't the sort of scream
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: that you hear in a scary movie or when somebody
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: sees a spider or gets startled. It sounded like somebody
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: was being hurt so bad that they were legitimately scared
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: for their life. There was another scream, louder than the
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: first and then the unmistakable sound of something crashing against
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: the floor. My friend backed up from the steps and
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: was like, I think we should go. And then we
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: were just about to turn around when the front door
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: flew open and the woman came stumbling out. For a moment,
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: my brain couldn't sense exactly what I was looking at.
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: I knew it was the woman from the previous year,
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: but she looked so different that it was like somebody
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: else was wearing her face. Her hair was hanging all
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: over the place. One side of her face was swollen
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: and and there was blood around her mouth. Her clothes
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: were torn too, and she was moving strangely like one
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: of her legs wasn't working. But in the moment, the
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: weirdest thing was how she didn't even look at us,
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: not even once. She came through the doorway, nearly fell
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: down the steps, and then caught herself against the railing
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: while making this awful gasping sound. And then she started
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: limping down the driveway as fast as she could, and
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: I remember the sound of her shoes scraping against the concrete.
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: She was trying to run, but she couldn't manage it.
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: Every few steps she'd just stumble and she kept looking
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: over her shoulder while crying so hard it sounded like
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: she could barely breathe. And then the man appeared behind her.
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: He wasn't shouting anything we could understand. He was just
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: making these furious noises like he was beyond the point
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: of sanity. He ran down the steps after her and
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: that was when we ran too. The rest I saw
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: from snatched looks over my shoulder and when I stopped
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: at the end of the driveway for a second. The
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: woman had almost reached the bottom of the driveway when
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: he caught up with her, and then after he grabbed her,
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: she went down hard onto that concrete, and then he
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: started hitting her again. I could see him bending over,
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: moving his arm up and down, and I thought he
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: was punching her. But then I saw the belt. I
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: guess he either pulled it off, or maybe he'd already
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: been holding it. I honestly can't tell you which. But
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: I remember standing at the end of the driveway and
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: seeing the metal buckle catching the porch light as he
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: raised it and then brought it down. Once, twice, and
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: then a third time. There was a horrible metallic sound
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: when it struck her, followed by her screaming. She tried
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: to cover her head with her arms, but he just
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: kept hitting her. I don't know how long I stood there.
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: It couldn't have been more than a few seconds, but
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: time didn't feel regular anymore. It was like speeding up
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: when we didn't want it to and then slowing down
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: when we didn't want it to. I could see the
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: woman's fingers scraping against the concrete as she tried and
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: failed to drag herself away. I could see the buckle
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: flash in the light too and I could hear my
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: friends crying and running, but I could also hear him.
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: He sounded completely out of control, completely losing his mind,
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: and for a long time after I wish I just
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: hadn't looked. I remember turning and seeing my friends running
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: so I ran too, stumbling down the road in my
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: costume with my candy bag bouncing against my leg. We
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: ran until the house was no longer visible and then
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: we stopped near a street light to catch our breath.
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: One of the brothers was crying so hard that he
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: couldn't speak while the other kept saying oh my god
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: over and over again. My best friend was shaking and
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: I was just standing there trying to make sense of
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: what we'd just seen. We decided we needed to tell someone,
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: which should have been obvious, I guess, but none of
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: us had really thought about it until then. We'd been
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: so frightened that running away had been the only thing
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: on our minds. We went to the nearest house with
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: lights on and just hammered on their door until a
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: guy answered, and we told him what happened, or tried
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: to anyway. And we were all talking at once, interrupting
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: each other, crying, getting details mixed up. And I remember
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: saying there was a man hitting a woman with a belt,
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: and The man at the door suddenly stopped looking annoyed
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: about being interrupted. He told us to stay where we were,
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: and then he went inside and got his phone and
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: made a call, I think. Another adult came out a
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: few minutes later and took us into their house. They
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: gave us water and tried to calm us down and
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: then asked us a bunch of questions about what had happened.
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: I later asked what was going to happen to that
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: woman and to the man. Mom told me that the
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: grown-ups were still dealing with it and she'd tell me
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: what happened when everything was all worked out. But my
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: parents didn't give me any more information and whenever I
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: asked what happened to the woman, I got these vague
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: answers about the police being involved and everything being taken
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: care of. We weren't allowed to go near that house again, obviously,
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: and nobody explained anything and because I was just a kid,
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: I eventually stopped asking. Not because I'd forgotten, but because
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: I could tell that they didn't want to talk about it.
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: Now years later I found out that the couple moved
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: within a few months and one day they were there
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: and the next they just weren't and I don't know
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: if they went their separate ways or if the guy
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: went to jail or what but everyone I spoke to
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: about it said that they were relieved. You see, I
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: guess the couple had a reputation, not just for shouting
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: at each other or making the neighbors uncomfortable. They were
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: known for having a horrifically violent relationship and the police
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: had been called to their home more than once. Now
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: there were stories about things that had happened inside that
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: house and to me, the worst part was learning that
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: what we'd seen that Halloween night wasn't some random outburst.
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: It was part of something that had been happening for
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: a long time, so why the hell didn't anyone stop it?
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: Now obviously I'm much older now, I have my own
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: responsibilities and I understand that adults can't always fix things
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: as quickly as children expect them to. But I also
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: remember the woman running down the driveway and the blood
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: on her face and the way she struggled to move
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: and How she didn't even look at us. Whatever was
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: going through her mind, I hope she made it out
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: of that situation eventually. I hope she got somewhere safe
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: and I hope she had a life after that house.
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: And I hope she knows, in her heart of hearts,
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: that the kids who saw what happened to her didn't
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: forget about it. Because I never did. So I found
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: your channel not so long ago, and I think it's
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: pretty cool that you retell people's real-life experiences. But I
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: won't lie, this wasn't easy for me to write up,
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: so I'm sorry if it doesn't read as well as
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: other people's stuff does. And so, now this was over
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: seven Halloweens ago now. My son's elementary school, he was
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: in third grade at the time, was putting on this
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: supervised trick-or-treating thing, like a big group trick-or-treat around the neighborhood.
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: and so the kids could get their candy while us
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: grown-ups made sure that they stayed safe. They were relying
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: on parents to volunteer as chaperones, and since he loved
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: Halloween so much, like father like son, I wanted to
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: be there to see him enjoy it. I could have
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: watched him run around in that dumb zombie costume that
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: his mom made him, like, all day, and I wanted
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: to make sure that he didn't eat too much candy
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: before dinner. And so while I got a lot of
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: pats on the back from the wife and the other volunteers,
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: I didn't need any. I was only too happy to
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: just be there. Now they split into different groups of
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: about 8 or 10 kids each and I got assigned
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: to a bunch of second graders. It obviously wasn't my
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: son's class and I wasn't happy about not being able
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: to chaperone my kid but I didn't kick up some
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: fuss especially not after the nice lady who was organizing
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: the thing apologized and said she appreciated my understanding and time.
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: But damn, now that I look back on it I
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: wish I did. and I feel like all that trouble
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: might have been avoided, and even if it wasn't, at
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: least I'd have the answers that I've wanted for so
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: long now. But the route was short, just three blocks
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: of houses that always went all out with decorations, and
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: then back to the school parking lot for pizza or
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: whatever it was they had. And so I told myself
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: it was fine, that I'd see my kids soon, and
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: I did, after experiencing every parent's worst nightmare. It started
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: normal enough, with all the kids yelling and excited as
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: their candy bags were filling up, and I kept one
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: eye on my group and the others scanning for my
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: kid whenever the groups crossed paths. He waved once from
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: across the street, holding up his bag of candy like
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: it was a magical treasure or something, and he looked happy.
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: And that reassured me, but maybe 40 minutes in, I
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: started hearing shouting. It wasn't a kid shouting, but an adult,
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: one of the other chaperones, and it sounded panicked. I
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: looked and saw a woman near the corner of a
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: street that was crying really hard, the ugly kind of
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: cry where your face gets blotchy and you can't quite
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: catch your breath. Other chaperones were gathering around her, looking
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: like they were asking questions and stuff, and while I
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: stayed with my kids at first, I started listening in
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: to what they were saying. The crying lady was saying
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: the same thing over and over again. He's gone. I
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: just looked around and he was gone. That's what made
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: me think, okay, I should probably get involved with this.
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: And so I drifted over and heard a kid was missing.
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: Somebody asked where, and she pointed vaguely toward the direction
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: my son's group had been walking. And then she said
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: the name. A boy's name. And I just lost it.
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: One second I was listening, calm, but concerned. And the next,
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: I was in front of the crying lady, grabbing her
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: by the shoulders way harder than I should have. I
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: remember yelling stuff like, What do you mean, gone? Where
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: did you last see him? but all she did was
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: keep saying that she didn't know, that he was there
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: one second and gone the next. I feel terrible thinking
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: about that lady now because at the time I remember thinking,
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: are you dumb? How did my kid just disappear? She
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: eventually said that she'd asked the other kids where he'd
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: gone and then none of them had seen anything. But
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: like I said at the time, I was just so
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: angry at her. It's only now, looking back on it,
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: that I know she wasn't dumb at all. My kid
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: really did just vanish and I've never been able to
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: figure out how or why, and I'll soon tell you.
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: I remember shoving past her and yelling out my kid's name.
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: Loud too, like so loud that some of the other
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: chaperones were telling me to calm down. and that I
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: was starting to scare people. Now that made me mad
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: as hell. I did lower my voice for the kids,
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: but they didn't understand what was going on. And when
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: they did, God bless them, they started searching with me
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: while a few stayed behind to keep their eyes on
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: the kids. They started spreading out with me, calling out
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: my kid's name and Then I saw one of the
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: kid's friends who lived two doors down from us. I
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: crouched down so we were about eye level and then
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: asked if he knew where my son went. But he
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: just shook his head, looking frightened and confused as he said,
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: he was right there and then, I don't know, I
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: don't know. But then when it started hitting me for real,
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: seeing the fear in that kid's eyes, I felt a
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: cold sweat. I felt my stomach dropped. And then all
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: I could think to do was walk around calling my
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: kid's name until my voice started to crack. I was
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: thinking about every stupid horror movie I'd ever heard. Every
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: news report about kids who vanished between one second and
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: the next. And no matter how hard I tried, my
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: brain wouldn't shut up with all those worst case scenarios.
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: And that's when I walked past this kid standing near
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: the curb by himself. He was a special needs child
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: from one of the other classes. I didn't know his name.
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: but he was just staring down at the ground, rocking
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: a little on his heels. When I got close, I
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: was still half yelling my son's name, and the kid
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: suddenly yelled something out. The name of this large house
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: about five minutes walk from where we were. I don't
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: even really know why, but I stopped and I asked
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: him if that's where my kid was, and then when
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: he nodded, I just ran. That sounds crazy, but as
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: much as I knew how insane it was of me
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: at the time, I didn't stop myself, like I had
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: to be sure he wasn't there. Anywhere but there. The
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: place the kid mentioned was near the edge of the
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: neighborhood where the houses started to thin out and this
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: big old abandoned Victorian house sits up on a low hill.
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: Everyone around here knew it and at least when I
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: was young, the kids used to tell stories about how
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: I was home to a ghost that ate children. They
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: said the doors would lock themselves, that the lights in
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: the windows would flicker at night even though the place
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: was abandoned and the power had been out for years.
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: Now I knew it was all schoolyard nonsense and I
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: passed the place a hundred times and never thought twice.
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: But on that night, Halloween night, all those stories somehow
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: found a way of scaring the living crap out of me.
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: And when I got there, the gate was chained but
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: since it was old and rusted I was able to
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: yank it until it gave enough to squeeze through the gate.
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: The front door was locked solid with a deadbolt, no
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: give whatsoever, and so I went around the side as
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: fast as I could and then managed to find a
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: window with boards that looked like they'd started to rot.
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: I climbed up and then kicked until one splintered enough
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: for me to pull the rest free. And then since
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: the glass was already broken behind it, I was able
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: to climb through without cutting myself. But it was still
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: tough going, and by the time I was inside, I
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: was breathing hard as I was screaming out my kid's name.
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: I was yelling so loud that my voice sounded like
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: it was bouncing off the high ceilings, and the inside
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: smelled like dust and old wood and something sour. A
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: lot of the furniture was still there, covered with these
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: thick gray sheets that were caked in dust, and the
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: last of the daylight was starting to come through the
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: gaps in the boards in these little slices. I must
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: have yelled half a dozen times and got no reply.
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: And then, out of nowhere, I found them. sitting on
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: the floor in what must have been the living room,
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: sitting next to a covered couch like he was just
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: taking a break or something. His costume was still on,
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: he still had his bag of candy next to him,
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: but it wasn't until I was right behind him yelling
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: his name that he turned around and said, Dad? Very confused.
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: I grabbed him, and I know I held him way
• 43:33
  Speaker 1: too tight, but I couldn't help it. I checked him
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: over for marks, anything that might show me if or
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: how he'd been hurt, but there was nothing, and he
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: was fine. Just a little dust on him, and that
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: was all. He didn't seem to remember anything, though, because
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: when I asked how he'd gotten that old abandoned house,
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: he just shrugged, and no matter how much we asked
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: him afterwards, he never remembered how it happened. I carried
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: him out the way I came in, and by the
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: time we got back to the street... Half the parents
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: and a couple of cops who'd shown up were there.
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: Everyone was relieved but no one could figure out how
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: he'd slipped away so clean like he did. The groups
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: were supposed to be tight with chaperones watching and streetlights
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: and even other kids keeping an eye out too and
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: so the fact that no one saw him wander off
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: none of it made any sense. Later that night after
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: we got home and his mom had checked him over
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: about three times herself I just went back over it
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: in my head. I went over it Probably a hundred
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: times as well, but none of it made any sense.
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: How the hell did my kid get into that house
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: if he wasn't assisted by someone? How did that special
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: needs kid even know that he was there? And we
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: asked him so many times, but all my kid ever
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: said was, I just walked and then I was inside.
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: The house eventually got torn down a few years later
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: after some developer finally bought that area of the land
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: and It turned out the house was owned by some
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: family who'd moved to California years before and couldn't decide
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: what to do with the place. I heard they had
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: issues with something that had happened there years before, but
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: no one ever really found out what. I've driven by
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: that empty lot once or twice and saw how this
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: old haunted house was now just dirt and weeds, but
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: things didn't feel any better. It didn't make me feel
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: worse exactly, but not better either. I don't like Halloween much.
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: I still check the locks twice when my kid's in
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: the house and sometimes I wonder what'd be worse, finding
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: out what happened to my boy or never finding out
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: at all. Let's read submissions at gmail.com and maybe even
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: hear your story featured on the next video. And if
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: you want to support me even more, grab early access
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: to all future narrations and bonus content over on Patreon.
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: Or click that big join button to hear about the
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: extra perks for members of the YouTube channel. And check
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: out the Let's Read podcast, where you can hear all
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: of these stories in big compilations located anywhere you listen
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: to podcasts. I also have a true crime channel called
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: Saturn Soul, and all those links are in the description below.
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: Thanks so much, friends. And remember, it's running down my leg.