18 Most Disturbing TRUE Summer Horror Stories That Make Sunshine Feel Unsafe

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I live in a mid-sized city by one of the great lakes just a few blocks from the shore. My girlfriend, Julian, I shared a small one-bedroom apartment with our two ridiculous cats who acted like they own the place. We did not make much money but between our job and a local chocolate shop and me doing food deliveries. We managed to get by and treat ourselves once in a while. Anyway, on one of those days after getting fired I drove to a small circular parking lot by the lake to relax, clear my head, and pretend I was being productive. I half watched the Comey hearings on my phone while occasionally scrolling through job listings. I was about to head home when I saw a light blue hindi pull into the lot. At first I did not think much of it, but I noticed the driver, a middle-aged man staring directly at me. It was not a casual glance, direct eye contact that did not break even when I looked back at him. A little unsettling sure, but I thought, whatever, maybe I just caught him at a weird moment. But still when I left and started driving back, I realized he had also pulled out of the lot and was following behind me. At first I tried to brush it off as a coincidence, but I turned down several random side streets, deliberately random ones, and every time I checked my rear-view mirror he was still there. Not so close that he was right on top of me, but clearly matching my pace. It is not like I am exactly built like the rock, and while I can handle myself I had no intention of getting into a situation that could turn ugly. So I decided to pull into a gas station. I thought, "If he comes in too, then I will know for sure I am not imagining this." And yes, he did. He pulled up right at the pump next to me. I rolled my window down just enough and said loudly, "Hey, do you need something? You have been behind me for like 20 minutes." He gave me a strange look. His face looked sunken with that heavy exhaustion of someone who had not slept in days. Then he said, "No, you are not her." Right after that he slammed on the gas and took off with the tire squealing. I just sat there stunned, confused, even angry. I ended up calling the police non-emergency line, and they told me to meet a park ranger there where all of this had started. While I was waiting in the parking lot scrolling through my phone, guess who drove by again? That same Hyundai. It made a slow circle and left. That was enough for me. As soon as the officer arrived, I pointed it out to him. They actually managed to stop the guy and talk to him. After about 10 minutes the officer came back and told me the man claimed that I was acting suspiciously as if he thought I was a threat or something. Honestly, I laughed. The officer mentioned that they already knew who he was, though he did not give any details. The only thing I know is that apparently the man was shaking and wanted to apologize when the officer escorted him home. He was officially banned from the park. Julian, I thought that would be the end of it. Around 2 in the morning we were out on our third floor balcony, relaxing with a couple of beers and cigarettes. Then I noticed a car parked down the street, engine running. I could not be 100% sure, but I would have sworn it was the same Hyundai from earlier. Julia already knew the story so when I subtly gestured toward the car she understood immediately. I checked the partial plate number I had saved in my notes, and sure enough it matched. I called the police again. While I was talking to the dispatcher, the car slowly drove away. A couple of patrol cars came by after a while, but they could not find it. Nothing else happened that night, but every door and every window in the apartment got checked at least three times before we went to sleep. Weeks went by, and honestly, we more or less put it behind us, until one random night. Julia and I went to the corner gas station for snacks and drinks. I stayed inside while she waited for me in the car. When I came back out there, he was again parked a few spaces away, the same damn Hyundai. And this time he was staring directly at her. I looked straight at him, trying to make it clear that I had seen him. He did not even react. He just stayed fixed in place. I got into the car and explained to Julia what was going on. We drove off, taking random turns to see if he was following us. We called the police again, but once more, they could not find him. Later we learned from the park rangers that this guy had a habit of following women through the park, especially women wearing headphones jogging or walking alone. Apparently my girlfriend fit his type. The incident with me had been the final straw, and that was why he was banned permanently. Moving back on it, we think he must have seen Julia in my car at some point. He thought I was someone else and started following me because he believed I was her. It is the only explanation that really fits. The police told us to call if he ever showed up again. Luckily, we have not seen him since. Story 2 This happened back around 2008 when I was taking night classes at C.A.L.C. in Toronto. It is around the broadview and Danforth area. One day I got to class way too early, almost 40 minutes before it started, so I figured I would take a walk to kill time and relax. I had a joint in my jacket pocket and thought why not? It will help pass the weight. Behind the school there is a bridge that crosses the highway, and on the other side it leads into a path heading toward Riverdale Park. That park is pretty well known, especially if you are from Toronto. A lot of music videos use shots of the skyline there. Anyway, I took one of the side trails branching off from the main path and found a hidden little spot to light up. I had just lit it and taken a few hits when I saw an older Asian man, probably in his late 50s or early 60s, coming down the same trail toward me. He was carrying a grocery bag in one hand and gave me a friendly nod. I smiled back because back then I was one of those people who tried to be nice to everyone, especially if they seemed calm. But as soon as he got closer something about him gave me a bad feeling, so I decided to keep walking and find another place to finish smoking. At first I thought it might just be in my head, but after a couple of random turns down different trails, I realized the guy was still behind me. At one point I even made a literal circle thinking he would branch off, or that maybe I was just being paranoid. He did not. He kept right on my trail and I started noticing him messing with whatever he had in the bag. It was not subtle at all. He kept handling the bag like someone trying to hide something while keeping it ready at the same time. By then I was not high anymore, I was on alert. I headed back toward the main path because there were more people there. It was summer, late in the day, but still light out, and this guy was still following me. At one point he even acted like he was stopping to admire flowers or some random thing. I took that as my chance to slip away and finish the joint farther into the park. Even so I could not shake the feeling that I was being watched. It didn't make sense to me, I was a teen, in good shape, tattooed, wearing boots with the full punk look. If he was some kind of creep, why follow me when there were women walking along with the headphones on. It crossed my mind that maybe he was an undercover cop or just a very strange guy with some weird reason for staying on my heels. When I finished I started heading back to the school and he started following me again. I sped up a little and he did too, I slowed down, same thing. At one point I stopped to tighten my combat boots, in case I had to fight or run, and he stopped too just like that. When I got back to the little pedestrian bridge I saw a couple of joggers who were resting. I quickly walked up to them and quietly explained what was happening like, "Hey can you pretend you know. me. They got it right away and played along. Then the guy went off into the trees. I kept walking, assuming that was it. Problem solved. I went about 75 to 100 yards down the path behind the school, and the man was nowhere in sight. I looked back a couple of times to make sure, then put my headphones on to relax with some music. But about 30 seconds later, my girlfriend called in the music cut off, and that was when I heard fast footsteps behind me. I turned around instantly, and the guy was literally about 5 feet away from me. Somehow he had caught up that fast and without making a sound. I ran up the stairs toward where Warren, one of my classmates, was standing. I dropped my backpack and jacket ready to fight if I had to. The man walked past us slowly, heading toward Danforth, without taking his eyes off me. Then out of nowhere, he turned around and stopped a few steps away, staring right at me. The smile he gave me. It still turns my stomach when I remember it. It was not friendly. It was like he was telling me without saying a word. You got lucky. He was still carrying that damn shopping bag and gripping something inside it. A few seconds later, he turned and disappeared behind the school. I told the staff at the center everything, just in case the guy started stalking other students. My mother in her own attempt to call me down made a dark joke about how Jeffrey Dahmer also had a thing for young fit guys. I did not see him again that night, and for a while it seemed like that was the end of it. But about two weeks later, flipping through the newspaper, guess who showed up in the crime section. The same man. He had been arrested for, and I am not exaggerating, masturbating on the subway while holding a woman at knife point, and to make it even worse, in the mugshot he was wearing the exact same shirt he had on the day he followed me. Story 3. I have always had a strange fear, a real phobia of feeling watched. It has a name, actually several names, scope of phobia, ophthalmophobia, whatever you want to call it. Basically I get extremely uneasy when I look at a half open door, a dark window at night, or even a strange corner of a room. My mind immediately jumps to imagining someone there, a still face staring back at me. I do not know why I do it, but my brain fills in the blanks with the most disturbing possible scenario. And, well now I more or less understand where it all came from. In the summer of 2016 I was living with my mom in a small but cozy apartment. Nothing fancy. One floor, no attic, no basement. My bedroom though had a little access door inside the closet. Like one of those tiny floor hatches you never think about. Unless you are watching a horror movie. I never opened it. A lot of people would have been curious, but I thought, no way. There is either something dead down there or something waiting, and I'm not going to find out which one it is. At first everything was fine, normal life, everyday stuff. Then a month or two after we moved in, I started hearing noises at night. Nothing too wild. Occasional scratching or tapping behind the walls. My mom left it off and said it was probably rats. And honestly I almost agreed. As long as they stayed inside the walls and did not come into my room, I figured we could coexist. Over time those sounds became part of the background, like the creeks in an old house. I even started to find them oddly comforting. Until one night I woke up around 3am to a soft sound, like a quiet rolling noise. It was very faint, but it sounded exactly like the sliding closet door moving, the one in my room. I squinted into the dark, but I could not make anything out. Maybe I saw movement. Maybe I did not. I tried to convince myself I was being paranoid, but I turned on the lamp. My skin still crawls when I think about that moment. I thought I would see coats, or maybe a shoe I had forgotten about. But what I saw was a human eye. No, not just the eye. It was half of a man's face barely peeking out through the crack in the closet. And he did not look scared. He did not even flinch. He was just watching me, perfectly still, as if he were studying every single one of my reactions. I froze. I could not scream or even think clearly. My body completely locked up. I think I started crying without even realizing it. I tried to say something. Maybe ask what he wanted. But the words would not come out. Then he opened the door a little wider and I saw him fully. I am not going to describe what he looked like. I have spent years trying to erase that face, and honestly I do not want to bring it back to life by putting it into words. That was when he said, "shh." That was all. That whisper made it real. I could not pretend anymore that I was dreaming. I bolted out of bed and ran down the hall to my mom's room. I could not even explain myself right away. I was just sobbing and shaking. She was half asleep, but she still called the police. By the time they arrived, he was gone. He had vanished, but the little hatch in the closet was still open. The officers checked it and said it looked like someone had been living in there. I did not go anywhere near it, but they told us there were tally marks carved into the inside walls. They did not say how many. I did not ask. I did not want to find out whether he had been counting days or counting me. All I knew was that we had to get out of that apartment and fast. They never officially caught him. Later on, they detained a homeless man who more or less fit the description, but he did not say a word. I did not get the impression the police pushed the matter very hard. It seemed like they believed he had heard my name through the walls or something like that. As if that explained everything, but that man, the one in the closet, said my name like he knew me, like we were old friends. That part has never left me. Ever since then, I still see his face sometimes. Not all of it. Flashes the eye, the mouth, the lips telling me to be quiet. Now it is distorted in my head, a little blurred, but the feeling is the same. He is the reason I cannot walk past a half open door without my stomach turning. And yes, it turned out we did not have rats after all. Story 4 Last year, I had a job at an amusement park. It was not technically for the park itself, but with an artsy vendor company that had a small costume photo booth inside. I was 18 years old and one of the oldest people on the team. Most of my co-workers were still balancing high school. My job was to help visitors dress up in period costumes and take those cheesy vintage style photos. Honestly, it was one of the most fun jobs I had had in a long time. We started in the spring and by the time summer rolled around. I was working full-time during the week, while almost everyone else only came in on weekends. Weekdays were incredibly quiet. I basically spent the whole day alone at the booth. Sometimes I would walk over to a co-workers kiosk across the path just to chat with someone for a few minutes. That was when I first noticed the sky. He would walk by slowly, very slowly, staring at me the entire time. At first I thought maybe he was shy or awkward and did not know how to ask about the photos, but there was something about the way he looked at me that made me uncomfortable. Even so, I let it go. After all, I was in a public place and he had not technically done anything wrong. One day I made the mistake of smiling at him and waving, thinking it might break the ice. Bad idea. He practically rushed over and stood right in front of me staring. He finally asked about the prices. I gave him a usual professional explanation. When I finished he gave me the creepiest smile you can imagine. Not just weird or awkward, but the kind that makes your skin crawl. Then he leaned in way too close, invading my space and asked how much it would cost for him as if the normal prices did not apply in his case. I told him that discounts were only for employees. He did not push it. He just slunk away. By then a family had arrived so I took them inside, grateful for the distraction. While I was finishing up with them, I saw him again. He was standing just outside the little chain that marked the store boundary, watching everything. When the family left he tried to slip in behind them and I had to stop him, telling him only paying customers were allowed inside. He looked annoyed but eventually he left. I thought maybe that would be the end of it, but I was very wrong. At the The end of the day I had to stay outside again, park policy, and I saw him across the way, hiding behind a game booth, peeking out to watch me. He did the same thing every day for the rest of the week, lurking around and staring at me. I tried to act like I did not notice, but that seemed to irritate him even more. Friday came. The park had just opened and I was outside setting up props when I saw him walking straight toward me. My stomach dropped. I dropped everything and hurried inside the booth, hooking the chain closed. He stayed outside, pacing back and forth, muttering to himself and shooting frantic looks at me. I was one step away from picking up the phone to call security when, all of a sudden, he lunged and grabbed the chain like he was going to rip it off. His eyes were wide, he had that same disgusting smile as before, and he started whispering the most disturbing things. They were sexual, violent, and completely delusional comments. He kept telling me that he loved me and that he wanted me to dress him up and humiliate him in front of everyone. I was frozen in the back of the shop, trying to stay calm until I finally shouted at him to leave or I would call security. That was when he said something that will haunt me forever. Keep me at the employee exit when you're done, or else. Then he just walked away like nothing had happened. I completely broke down afterward. I cried my eyes out. I had never been so scared in my life. When I told my manager later, her face went cold when she realized I had not said anything sooner. That night she made security escort me out through the back exit. The next morning I met with the security team and described the guy. Just then five minutes after I got back to the booth with two co-workers, the man showed up again. This time his face was twisted with anger, genuinely furious. I went into the back room and finally told my co-workers everything. They stayed with me my whole shift and would not leave me alone even after hours. Security stepped things up. At first they put uniformed guards nearby, but he vanished every time he saw them. When they changed tactics and placed an undercover officer posing as a customer in front of my booth, I felt like bait, but I did not care. I just wanted him gone. In the end it worked. He came back and they arrested him on the spot as he was approaching me. I could not hold it together. I burst into tears while the officer tried to comfort me. It turned out he was banned from every six flags in the country and his membership was revoked. But because he had not physically assaulted me, they had to let him go. That night I saw him walking along the road while I was driving home and I hit the gas so hard I probably broke a couple of laws. I was terrified he would follow me. A few weeks later, a friend from security told me he had been arrested in a nearby town for indecent exposure and other charges. I looked up the records and yes, it was him. I know this might not sound as dramatic as some other horror stories, but that week was a nightmare. I truly never thought something like that would happen to me. So yes, if I learned anything, it is not to ignore your instincts. Tell someone when something feels wrong and pay attention to who is lingering around, and in public places. Story 5 Okay, this weird and disturbing story happened to me when I was about 12 or 13 years old in the early 2000s. I was with my Boy Scout troop on one of our usual weekend trips. And this time we were near Clinton Lake in Kansas. I had already gone on a lot of camping trips, but this was the last one I clearly remember before my family moved to another state. We arrived on a rainy Friday, the kind of cold drizzle that makes setting up tense miserable, but the next day turned out perfect. Clear skies, sunshine, ideal weather for hiking. Just before we headed out that morning, an old beat-up van pulled into a nearby campsite. It looked like something out of a 1970s road movie. A group of guys got out, fully committed to the hippie look, tie-dye shirts, long hair, bongos, and a smell that was definitely not campfire smoke. Some of us asked if there was a skunk nearby, but the adults laughed and one of them, I think, went over to ask them to tone it down with the drugs while surrounded by middle school kids. We went on our hike and came back a few hours later. They were still there, but completely stoned. They were trying to play music, but it sounded awful, like they were too high to strum properly. And by evening things got really strange. The hippie outfits were gone and suddenly, they were dressed like they had just come from a Maryland Manson concert, trench coats, pale makeup, everything black. And instead of their lazy jam sessions, loud grunge metal was blasting from what I assume was a speaker hidden somewhere in their campsite. That night after dinner, we decided to play capture the flag in a clearing fairly close to their area. We avoided using flashlights so we could move around more quietly, but that also gave us a different view of their campsite. By then, the music had changed again, this time to something genuinely unsettling. Dramatic sinister opera echoing through the trees. Curiosity got the better of me and I moved closer to their site. Not too close, just enough to get a better look. Their campfire had turned into a huge bonfire completely out of control, way bigger than any campsite rules would ever allow. And then I saw it in a nearby tree. Something was hanging from one of the branches. At first I thought I was imagining it. Maybe they had hung up some weird decoration while we're still off on some bizarre trip. I brushed it off and went back to the game. We played a little longer and then decided to head back to the tents. That was when everything got serious. In the middle of the night, our troop leaders woke us up and told us to pack our things quietly and take down the tents immediately. No questions, no delay. We were confused, but their tone set it all. This was not a drill. We loaded everything onto the bus in a hurry and while we were doing that, we could still see the huge bonfire roaring at the Goth campsite. But the music had stopped. Instead we heard voices, not normal conversation, but low, strange murmuring, almost like chanting. I could not make out any words, but it had all of us completely on edge. Once we were on the bus, the leaders did not say anything. They just looked tense. We scouts moved toward the back, whispering among ourselves. One of the boys from the other captured the flag team pulled me aside and told me that he had also gone over earlier to snoop around that campsite. What he saw matched what I had seen, but he had gotten closer and what he described. I would rather not think about it. Hanging from the tree according to him was what looked like a dead dog decapitated and next to it two human legs severed at the thigh. He swore they were real. After that I understood why the adults got us out of there so quickly. We never found out exactly what happened that night. None of the leaders ever followed up with us and I never saw anything about it in the news. What I have never forgotten that trip and I have not gone camping near Clinton lakes since. Story 6. It was the summer after 5th grade sometime around late June. My mom, my grandmother and I had spent the morning going around to garage sales in a nearby town. It was kind of a weekend ritual whenever the weather was nice. Most of the sales were the usual stuff. Old kitchen junk, worn out books and if you were lucky, maybe a bargain or two. At the end of the day we ended up in a quiet residential neighborhood on the outskirts of town, the kind with freshly cut lawns, cookie cutter houses, and mostly older residents. My mom and grandmother stayed talking with one of the sellers a little farther down the street. I walked a few yards ahead to check out another house that looked like it might be having a sale. The garage door was open and they had folding tables set up with assorted household items. There was no sign, no balloons, nothing eye-catching. But a man was sitting at the back of the garage in a lawn chair so I assumed it was opened at the public. I stepped in carefully just looking around. What was there looked like the leftovers from clearing out a guest room, an old toaster, a couple of decorative blankets and clothing racks full of large women's clothes. There was nothing especially for kids and oddly enough no sign that a man even lived there. Still I figured maybe he was helping someone else run the sale. The guy watching over the place looked to be in his early 40s. He had a creepy look about him, a receding hairline, a thick mustache, and those short denim cut off shorts that have not been installed. since the 1990s. He was wearing a faded t-shirt with a wolf on it and kept shifting around in his chair, crossing and uncrossing his legs, like he was bored or nervous. At first, he did not say anything. He just kept the smile on his face for way too long while I looked around. On one of the tables, there was a huge container full of old dolls, mostly barbys, all of them naked. I got curious and crouched down to look through them, but I regretted it almost immediately. The doll's hair was stiff, sticky, with some weird residue on it, like someone had poured school glue all over them. And the smell, it hit me right away, sour and damp, like something spoiled that nobody had cleaned up. It made my stomach turn a little. While I was still standing by the bin, the man finally spoke. He asked how old I was and what school I went to. Then he wanted to know if I liked barbys, which felt strange given the condition they were in. I mumbled that I was just looking, trying to be polite, and started slowly moving toward the exit. That was when he started talking about his dog, a cocker span you'll I think. And right then I heard scratching coming from the interior door of the garage. He let the dog out. The strangest part was that as soon as it saw him, the dog growled. A real growl, like fear or anger. Then it bolted around the side of the house and disappeared into the backyard. I remember thinking, if a dog reacts like that to its owner, something is not right. I decided I had had enough until the man I was leaving. He sounded a little disappointed when he replied. Oh already? But I just gave a quick goodbye gesture and walked away without looking back. I caught up with my mom and grandmother a couple of houses down and did not say much about what had just happened. I only told them the place had low quality stuff they would not be interested in. For a while I honestly thought I was being too sensitive or that my imagination was getting the better of me. But about a week later, while watching the evening news, a story came on that made my stomach drop. The police had arrested a man for breaking into a woman's house, dressing in her clothes, and hurting someone in the home. The shocking part was that he had apparently set up a garage sale at the victim's house while all of that was happening. And where did it happen? In that same quiet neighborhood we had visited. I cannot say for sure that it was the same house. Maybe it was not. But to this day I still remember the strange smile, the dog's reaction, and the smell of those barbies, like something deeply wrong had happened there. Story 7 This happened a few summers ago when I was looking after my niece in the afternoon while my brother and his wife were working late. They live in a very old townhouse in England. One of those super narrow quirky homes with a very long garden out back in fences that looked like castle walls. It was early evening, there was still plenty of light, and it was warm enough to leave the back door open so the breeze could move through the house. I was in the kitchen doing two things, making dinner and keeping an eye on my niece, who was wandering around with her stuffed bunny, bouncing between the living room and the garden. She has always been naturally curious, and she especially loved climbing onto the front dining room windowsill to watch people go by and wave as if she were the neighborhood mascot. So while I was chopping vegetables, I heard her doing her usual sweet little greetings and assumed someone with a stroller or a dog was passing by. I glanced over and wave too, not thinking much of it. A minute or two later she did it again, this time with more excitement, but something in the tone of her voice made me look more carefully. All I could see was the top of her head just below the window, only enough to make out a pair of eyes staring directly into the house. At first I honestly thought I was imagining it, or maybe it was a neighbor crouching down to pick something up. But when I moved closer to the window to get a better look, I realized there was a man crouch there watching us without the slightest shame. The moment he saw me, he slowly stood up and held my gaze, without blinking without saying a word. I picked up my niece immediately, not really knowing whether to be angry or scared. Then without breaking that bizarre eye contact he gently tapped on the glass. Three slow steady taps, and he gave this disturbing little smile as if we were playing some twisted game. I started backing toward the kitchen while telling him to leave or I would call the police. That was when I looked around for my phone and realized it was not on the table where I had left it. When I looked back at him, his smile had widened and I swear it was as if he knew my phone was gone. At that moment he stepped away from the window and seconds later I heard the loudest most aggressive banging on the front door that I have ever heard in my life. Over and over again, like he was trying to break it down. My niece started crying from the noise and I shouted that I was calling the police, even though I did not actually know how I was going to do that without my phone. Then I heard this strange laugh like someone trying to hold it in and failing and it made my skin crawl. The only reason I did not completely panic was that the house had a front door worthy of a bank, three locks and a bolt. So trying to make as little noise as possible, I closed the dining room curtains and then moved into the living room to do the same. As soon as those curtains were shut, the banging stopped. For a moment everything went completely silent and I thought maybe, just maybe he had left. I took a couple of deep breaths and carefully set my niece down on the floor. By then she had already calmed down and had gone back to playing with her teddy bear as if nothing had happened. I started desperately searching for my phone, thinking maybe she had taken it without meaning to, but it was nowhere to be found. Then I remembered there was a cordless phone hidden behind the armchair next to the window, so I carefully pulled the curtain back just enough to grab it and take a quick look outside. No one was on the front step, just the empty street. Relieved I was about to call someone when I heard my niece say, "Hi again," in that same cheerful little voice. Only this time she was not near the window, she was looking toward the living room doorway. I turned around and there he was, inside the house. He was standing in the hallway barely lit by the evening light. His face frozen in the same unsettling smile as before. I think I went into some kind of survival mode because I grabbed my niece so fast that I surprised myself. As I backed toward the room's second exit, he started walking toward me slowly with his hands behind his back, as if you were waiting for me to fall apart. I struggled with the locks, my hands shaking, trying not to lose sight of him. I finally got the door open just as he was only a few steps away, and I ran out, only to slam straight into my brother who had just gotten home from work. I could barely get out. There's someone in the house before he moved past me and rushed inside to lock. The guy had disappeared. The only clue was the back door wide open in a muddy footprint on the rug right by the kitchen entrance. The police arrived shortly afterward. Their theory was that he had come in through the back while I was distracted cooking. As for my phone, we never found it. It was as if the ground had swallowed it. We are almost sure he was the one my niece saw first, and that he must have stolen it before circling around the front door to try. Whatever it was he had in mind. First of all all of my information was on that phone. Story 8 Do you ever remember a day that should have been one of your favorites, but instead it left you with a strange weight that never really goes away? That is how I feel every time I think about a summer afternoon from when I was a kid. Near my town there was a place, like a secret oasis, even though everyone knew about it. A big river, an old weir with water spilling over in a cascade. Petal boats, a little food stand without ragesely expensive ice cream, all that kind of thing. On hot days the place would be absolutely packed. Kids running around barefoot, older couples and folding chairs. Teenagers sunbathing as if they were on a beach in Spain. That place was my little paradise. Honestly I must have been around nine or ten years old, old enough to wander around in the water on my own while my mom relaxed with a book on a blanket. I remember that day so clearly because it started out perfect. I was splashing around near the weir, doing my own thing, and I ended up talking to a teenage girl who was there by herself. You know how when you are little anyone older seems unbelievably cool. She had that kind of vibe. Confident calm with big sister out there. energy. We clicked right away. She let me tag along with her while we explored the river bank, looking at little fish darting between the rocks, diving underwater, just messing around. I felt lucky to have her attention. Eventually we drifted toward a shallower area where a group of other teenage girls were hanging out. One of them kept complaining non-stop about how cold the water was. And because I was a mouthy little kid, I muttered something under my breath like, "Wow, what a drama queen." I did not even say it that loudly, but she heard me, and I swear her reaction was immediate. She locked eyes with me and came into the water toward me, shouting at me as if I had insulted her entire family. Before I even understood what was happening, she lunged at me and shoved me under water. I came up gasping my heart pounding, and before I could really get my bearings, she was right in my face again, screaming. I could feel my cheeks burning with embarrassment, especially with my new older friend watching. So I did the stupid thing and laughed, trying to act like it was not affecting me. It did not work. She shoved me under again harder at this time. When I came back up coughing, she was still there yelling even louder, and suddenly it stopped feeling like a joke, something in her snapped. Her face went strangely blank like there was nobody behind her eyes. I remember thinking something is seriously wrong here. Then she grabbed me by the neck and forced me under again. This time it was not a scare. She held me there, and I panicked. I kicked scratch, tried to break free, but it was like fighting a statue. The water turned murky with all the movement, and at some point I could not even tell which way the surface was anymore. That was when it hit me. I might not get out of this. Right there, surrounded by families eating sandwiches and laughing, I was drowning, and nobody noticed. The next thing I remember is being back above the surface, choking up water and breathing in ragged gasps, with my friend holding onto me while people were shouting in every direction. Some of the girls had finally managed to pull the attack her away from me, and she was still screaming like she was possessed. My friend kept apologizing. She said they had not understood what was happening at first, and thought it was just rough play. Honestly, maybe even then she did not fully understand how serious it was. But she bought me an ice cream afterward and took me out in a petal boat to help me calm down. I will always be grateful to her for that. I never told my mom what had happened. I was too embarrassed. I felt like somehow I had caused it, and I did not want anyone to see how shaken up I was, but I did not go back to that place much after that. That day changed something in me. I lost a big piece of the sense of safety I had back then, and ever since I have carried a kind of quiet weariness with people, especially strangers who smile just a little too much. Story 9. When I was around 15 years old, I used to hang out with my friend Maddie pretty much every other weekend. She was two years younger than me, and we would walk around the neighborhood with no real destination. Under the Texas heat, almost always with some kind of ice cream or frozen popsicle in hand. The kind that comes in a plastic tube and always cuts the corners of your mouth. We talked about everything and nothing, and since it was summer we usually wore shorts and tank tops, just trying not to melt. It was the kind of quiet suburb where you knew most people by name, or at the very least by their car. Maddie and I were friendly girls, maybe too friendly looking back on it. One afternoon we were sitting on the edge of the curb next to a large wooden fence near the highway. Not the smartest place I know, but it was shaded and there was a bit of a breeze. Then a beat-up pickup truck pulling an empty trailer came up to us. There were three men in the cab. The driver looked like someone's rough, scruffy uncle, probably in his mid-40s. The other two in the passenger seats were younger, probably in their 20s. The older man leaned out the window and started talking to us. Casual stuff at first. What do you girls up to? Enjoying the summer? That kind of thing. I remember noticing a strange look from one of the younger men. He kept glancing around and giving us these nervous half smiles, like he was not entirely on board with whatever was going on. We tried to stay calm, you know, smiling politely without giving away too much information. I could tell Maddie felt the same way I did, and we exchanged one of those silent, "Are you okay?" looks without saying a word. It did not feel like a normal chat with a neighbor. Then the driver said something that changed everything. He commented on how good we looked and asked if we wanted them to take us somewhere. That hit us like a brick. There were already three of them in the trunk. So where exactly were we supposed to sit? On their laps, Maddie gave a little laugh and told him her dad was on his way to pick us up, which was a complete lie. As for me, I pulled out my old flip phone, held it to my ear and started gesturing as if someone were coming toward us from down the street. I did not even know who I was pretending to talk to. I just needed them to believe someone was keeping an eye on us. It worked. The older man muttered that they had to go. One of the others flipped us off for no reason at all, and they sped away, taking a sharp turn toward our neighborhood. We did not feel safe going straight home so we doubled back. Cut through the side of someone's yard and hid behind some bushes in the back yard of our friend Katie's house. She and her family were on vacation. After staying crouched there for a while, we went home by taking the long way around. Using every hidden shortcut we could think of. We stayed inside for quite a while, trying to act like nothing had happened. But then like complete idiots, we decided to go back out again. This time, though, we brought Max, my 90-pound German shepherd, who looked like he belonged in a police canine unit. We had not even made it halfway down the street when we saw the truck again. Only this time, they were parked in front of a neighbor's house, loading yard waste into the trailer as if they worked in landscaping or something like that. One of the men saw his walking max and immediately whispered something to the older man, who turned and stared right at us. I did not hesitate. We turned around and ran straight back to my house. This time, we stayed inside for good, posted up by the living room window, peeking through the blinds like paranoid spies. My cousins and their friends were skateboarding in the driveway, which I think actually helped. Maybe seeing a whole group of rowdy boys out there made those men think twice about whatever they had in mind. Looking back, I still get chills thinking about how differently that could have ended. We never really talked in detail about how uncomfortable we felt, but we both knew. After that day, Max came everywhere with us. No exceptions. It is wild how close we probably came to something terrible and how easy it was to miss the warning signs at first. That summer taught me a lot, and none of it had anything to do with popsicles or sunshine. Story ten. When I was 12 years old, summers felt endless and brutally hot. I grew up in a desert town where it was not unusual for the temperature to hit 120 degrees. So my days mostly revolved around staying inside, inventing weird snack combinations, watching cable TV and reorganizing my baseball cards for the hundredth time. My mom worked full-time, which meant the house was basically mine for most of the day. And back then, I truly enjoyed that piece. No school, no chores if I got them done quickly. Just me, the couch, and whatever I felt like doing. That summer started out like paradise, and then it got weird. Around the middle of July, roughly around lunchtime, the house phone started ringing at almost exactly the same time every day, usually a few minutes after noon. The first few times I picked up and said hello. There was no response, just complete silence. At first I thought it was a telemarketer, or maybe a bad connection, so I just hung up and moved on. But it kept happening, day after day, at the same time, with the same silence. Eventually, I stopped saying anything when I answered. I would just pick up the receiver, hold my breath, and listen. Every now and then I thought I could hear something that sounded like a TV playing very softly in the background, or maybe the faintest hint of breathing, but mostly nothing. No clicking, no static, just an unsettling patient stillness. I started thinking maybe it was some kid from school messing with me, but the fact that it happened every single day with such precision started to get under my skin. This was before smartphones or caller ID. So, there was not much I could do to figure out who it was. And honestly, I ended up turning it a little into a game, a detective fantasy where I would solve the case like I was starring in some low-budget mystery movie. I did not tell my mom. Really, there was not much to tell. How do you explain that Silence calls you every day at 1215? Still, I could not help getting tense every time the clock passed noon. I would linger near the phone, daring it to ring, wondering whether that day something different would happen. But it never did. I even started answering and holding the receiver to my ear for a few minutes without saying a word. Waiting, hoping to catch any clue. Eventually, the frustration got the better of me. I was not scared. I was angry. Who does that? What is the point? After about seven weeks of the same thing, seven weeks of that strange ritual, I finally snapped. When the call came in and I heard that familiar silence, I lost it. I unleashed a shouted rant at whoever was on the other end, demanding answers, throwing out every insult my 12-year-old brain could come up with. I still remember glancing at the microwave clock in the middle of it. It read exactly 1215, and that only made me even angrier. I ended the call with something like what kind of loser calls every day just to say nothing. Get a life weirdo. When I hung up, my hands were shaking. I had not meant to explode like that, but I could not help it. I had been bottling it up for weeks. What surprised me most, though, was that after that call, it stopped. It did not ring the next day or the day after that. A whole week went by, and that silence I had been dreading somehow became the silence I was grateful for. Eventually, summer ended, and I went back to school. Life returned to its usual rhythm. Homework, cafeteria drama, the usual stuff. And, more or less, I forgot about it. I figured I had scared off whoever it was. Part of me was still curious, but I did not think much more about it until one Saturday. It had finally cooled off enough to go outside without feeling like I was walking on the surface of the sun. I had been out playing all morning, and around lunchtime I came inside for a snack. My mom was washing dishes, and I was halfway through a bowl of cereal when the phone rang. I did not think anything of it had been answered without hesitation. "Hello?" I said as casually as ever. There was a pause and then a teenage boy's voice, with this smug little edge to it said, "Hey, it's me, your summer friend. 1215, remember?" I froze my spoon halfway to my mouth. I turned and looked at the clock. Sure enough, it was exactly 1215. I did not say anything. I just slowly hung up, went back to my cereal, and pretended none of it had happened. Story 11. When I was 14, I was in one of those chaotic phases where I felt like every adult was the enemy. School felt like a prison. My mom didn't understand me, and I had already been arrested once from marijuana. That whole mess ended with a judge ordering me to attend an narcotics anonymous group that met every week at night in a rundown area surrounded by group homes. My mother did not fully understand where she was dropping me off, but I never told her the full picture. I figured I could handle it on my own, and honestly, those meetings became one of the few places where I did not feel judged. The men there were older and had been through serious things, but they treated me with respect, gave me real advice, and for once I actually listened. The meetings ran from 8 to 10 at night, and since there was no parking in front of the house, my mom always picked me up at a gas station a couple of blocks away. I had gotten used to the walk by then. A couple of quick turns, nothing major. One night when the meeting ended and I walked out like usual, I got to the end of the block and saw a group of men hanging out on the porch of the last house before my turn. There were probably five or six of them. One had a little mirror resting on his lap like he was cutting something on it. As soon as they saw me, they started shouting, asking my name, where I was going, what I was doing. I kept walking without answering, hoping they would lose interest. They did not. A couple of them stood up and started moving toward me, still talking to me like we were friends. One of them asked me what time it was, and something in the way he said it made my body react before my brain had even finished processing it. I turned around and ran. I ran back the way I had come with my heart and my throat, and I could hear them behind me running, too. I knew I was not going to make it back to the house before they caught up. Then I saw a truck parked in a driveway with just enough space underneath it. I did not think. I threw myself under it, landing face down, trying not to even breathe. They were right there only a few steps away, yelling and searching through the yard like dogs that had just lost the scent. One of them kicked through some bushes a couple of yards from where I was hiding and said, where the hell did she go? Find her. I froze waiting for a hand to grab my ankle at any second. After what felt like forever, I heard them give up and walk away, cursing. Once I was sure they were gone, I slid back out, climbed the fence into the backyard of the meetinghouse, and ran inside like I was being chased by fire. There were still a few men sitting in the living room. When I told them what had happened everything changed instantly. They stood up, some of them without saying a word, and walked out the front door like they were going to war. The other stayed with me, made sure I was safe, and walked me back to the gas station, where my mother was already parked, clearly worried. We told her what had happened, and she drove straight to the police station to report it. As far as I know, nothing ever came from that report, but I have a strong feeling the men from the group handled it in their own way. I never saw those guys from the porch again, and I never forgot how those men who barely knew me stepped up and made me feel protected. Story 12. A few years ago, when I was living in Montreal, I had a very peaceful summer routine. At the time, I was staying in an apartment near my area and working at a little shop in the plateau. So every day, I walked back and forth through those narrow alleyways that run between the houses. If you have ever been in that part of the city during the warmer months, you know exactly what I mean. Those cozy passageways where every balcony seems to have someone drinking wine or hanging up laundry, with cats slipping between the fences as if they own the place. It really felt like the safest way to get around. Quiet, shaded, and full of life. I had convinced myself that with dog walkers, nosy neighbors, and barbecues smoked drifting through the air. Nothing strange could possibly happen there. One afternoon, I got off work early around four o'clock and decided to take my usual rude home without headphones, just enjoying the warmth and the soft hum of the city. I crossed Mont Royale, as always, turned into the alley and let my mind wander. Everything looked completely normal. There was not a soul around except for someone shouting something from a balcony in the distance. I could not understand a word because my French is basically nonexistent and they were pretty far away anyway. I did not think much of it and kept walking, but a couple of minutes later, just as I was approaching the gate to a backyard, a man suddenly came out and stopped me, visibly nervous. At first he spoke to me quickly in French, and obviously, I did not understand anything. When he saw the confusion on my face, he switched to English and lowered his voice. "Hey, there's a man following you," he said, glancing behind me. We've been watching him from the balcony for a while, and he's been hiding behind sheds and garbage bins, staying just out of sight. He looked bad. I froze trying to decide whether he was serious or whether I had misunderstood something. I had not noticed anything behind me at all. No footsteps, no shadows, nothing. But the way he spoke was not dramatic or exaggerated. It was low and cautious like he did not want the guy behind me to hear him. He pointed to his friend who was still up on the balcony, watching the alley like a hawk. I hesitated for a second, not entirely sure what to believe. Then the man shouted something angrily toward the far end of the alley, something like, "Get out of here." And just like that, the man I had not seen at all suddenly stood up from behind the wall of a garage. He literally appeared out of nowhere. He had shoulder-length hair, messy and unkempt, looked completely rough, and was wearing a heavy leather jacket even though it was easily 86 degrees out. We made eye contact for all of you. only a second, and there was something in his eyes, something tense, angry and vacant. He took off running, the man who had warned me ran after him immediately full speed back in the direction I had come from. But the guy disappeared so fast it was like he had melted into the alley. We stood there for a while afterward, not really knowing what to do next. It was not as if there had been a crime to report, just a scare that could have turned into something much worse. Still he walked me to a nearby avenue, and I thanked him again, probably more than once. I do not know what that man had planned or how long he had been following me, but I never forgot the way he suddenly appeared. As if he had been watching me and waiting for a moment I did not even know I was giving him. I still get chills thinking about how easy it would have been to keep walking without ever realizing anything was wrong. Story 13 In my late twenties I worked in a county office that basically ran like an outdated machine moving at a snail's pace. The exciting part of every summer was the arrival of interns. Some were very capable, most just wandered around pretending to be busy. One time we even caught a couple making out in the supply closet. Usually it was a mix of awkward college freshmen and a few high school students trying to pad their resumes. I hardly ever paid attention to them because they came and went with clockwork regularity. But that summer in 2016 we got an intern much later than usual. His name was Warner. And unlike the others he was around my age, probably also in his twenties. I remember thinking that finally there was someone in the building who didn't call my chemical romance old music. He was talkative, sometimes with way too much energy, and definitely had the social awkwardness of someone who doesn't know when to stop talking. Even so he seemed harmless to me. Every now and then we would share lunch or talk during breaks. At first I actually appreciated the company. It didn't take long though for his behavior to start raising eyebrows. He was the type to show up at the office halfway through the day without any explanation, or just not show up at all. One afternoon he actually strolled in at 3.15 pm when we got off at 4.30. The administrator almost exploded and set him home immediately. But no one really pushed to discipline him because, as I later found out, Warner's uncle had pulled some political strings to get him in the door. So in a way we were stuck with him. When I announced that I was leaving the job and moving to another state, Warner suddenly became uncomfortably clingy. Every day he made some comment about how much it sucked that we didn't have more time to hang out, as if we were lifelong friends or something. It was weird but I assumed it would be over soon. I let it slide because I didn't want to stir up drama during my last few weeks. One afternoon he offered to drive me home after work. I usually took the bus, but it wasn't unusual for coworkers to offer rides. So I didn't think much of it. His car was a total disaster, fast food wrappers, clothes, and who knows what else. Still I got in. We drove around for a bit and he would not stop insisting that we have dinner together. Eventually I gave in and suggested a nearby diner just to make him stop pushing. Dinner was fine. He talked a lot about music and politics, and although he had some odd mannerisms, nothing in the conversation struck me as especially alarming. The turn came when we left and I asked him to take me home. I gave him directions. And when we got to the turn from my street, he drove right past it, laughing. At first I thought he was trying to make some dumb joke, but then he immediately started talking about how lonely he felt and how much he valued the time we spent together. The more he rambled, the more I realized that I didn't actually know this guy at all, and that the only context I had for him was a government internship he wasn't even good at. I didn't want to pressure him or become confrontational. So I suggested we spend a little time at the park near my house. He perked up at the idea, parked and we sat on a bench talking. And just when I thought the situation had leveled out, he dumped his entire life story on me all at once. Drug addiction and arrest for theft, a struggle with depression. It was a lot. I nodded politely but it was overwhelming, so I tried to change the subject by showing him pictures of my dog. Unfortunately I accidentally swiped to a photo of myself where I looked cute wearing makeup, and he latched onto that way too intensely, talking about how photogenic I was. That was when things started to spill over. He started going on about how compatible we were, lamenting that we didn't have more time together, and then out of nowhere confessed that he was high right at that moment. He began rambling about how he had gotten drugs the day before and apologized for saying too much. At that point I froze. I had gotten into a car with someone who had been driving me around while under the influence of heroin. I tried to stay calm and told him I was tired and wanted to go home. That was when the crying started. Not the kind of tears after a breakup, but something strange and theatrical. Gasping sobs without a single actual tear. He called himself a mess and then immediately went back to complimenting me, telling me how kind and understanding I was. I just stood there in silence, barely holding myself together. Finally, I told him I would walk home since the park was close by, and I got up to leave. Then I remembered that my lunch bag and sweater were still in his car. Trying not to scare him, I casually mentioned my things and joked that he could keep my dirty tupperware if he wanted. He immediately stopped crying, ran to the car and opened it. I grabbed my belongings and just like that, his whole attitude changed. Suddenly, he seemed calm and even remorseful. He offered again to drive me home. I accepted but I asked him to drop me off a block away from my actual house. I thought that was the end of it. A couple of weeks later, I had officially left the job and moved to the other side of the country. My nurse still messaged me from time to time. Weird emotional texts about how much he missed me and how we could have been something. I didn't answer any of them. In February, I got a message from a former coworker with a link to a local news story. The headline read, "Man dies from injuries and Riverside stabbing. At first I thought Warner was the victim, but when I opened the article I saw his mugshot and realized he had been arrested for the attack. He killed someone. The articles referred to him as a homeless man, which told me he had probably fallen apart after losing the internship and getting evicted. A couple of phone calls confirmed it. Right after I left, he trashed the men's bathroom, got fired, and from there he spiraled. I tried not to dwell on what might have happened if I hadn't handled things the way I did that night. But I'm glad I stayed calm and didn't provoke him. April 14. The summer I turned 15 was the hottest one I can remember. I lived with my dad in a quiet town in Sweden. One of those places where not much ever happens and everyone knows each other, especially on our street. I was never really drawn to typical teenage things. No parties, no sneaking out at night. No drinking behind the school. I had a couple of close friends, a small crush on a boy in my class, and I spent most of my time reading or riding my bike around town. That summer, though, I decided to make a small change to my routine. I saved up and bought myself an outfit similar to the ones the popular girls at school wore. It wasn't anything over the top. A fitted white tank top and a pair of platform shoes that turned walking into an exercise and balance. I wore it once just to try it out, without expecting it to change anything. But then the notes started showing up. At first I thought it was a joke. I always found them tucked into the basket on my bike. Things like, you look very nice, pretty girl, and you're growing up fast, huh? I assumed it was probably one of the boys at school trying to be funny. I ignored it and didn't tell anyone. I thought that if I didn't show it bothered me, it would stop. It didn't. One morning I saw that the flower beds beneath our windows had been trampled. I mentioned it to my dad, and he became uneasy. It wasn't the first time small things had gone missing from the house, and he was worried that someone might be watching the place. He reminded me to always turn on the alarm if I was home alone, and I promised I would. At the end of that month my dad had a work retreat in the north. It was important. He was celebrating ten years in business and wanted to treat his team. I was used to staying home alone when he traveled. Our neighbors a few houses down, a retired couple, always kept an eye on me. They didn't have children and saw me a little like their honorary niece or something like that. That Saturday night I had been at a friend's house late watching movies. I got home at 1am, peddling slowly because the air was warm and still. As soon as I walked in I noticed that the house felt strange, not in a ghostly way, just that something was off. The alarm was not turned on. I told myself I must have forgotten to set it when I left. In the living room I saw Mr. H, our neighbor from farther down the street. He was standing there with a glass of wine in his hand. [BLANK_AUDIO] smiled and said, "I didn't want to scare you. I just came by to check in. It might have made sense if it had been 7 p.m. and he didn't smell like a wine-seller. I forced a smile and said I was going to bed, but my stomach was turning. He followed me down the hallway talking non-stop. He poured himself more wine, waved the bottle toward me, and started commenting on how much I had grown. He said I looked like a young woman now and that the way I dressed set messages I probably didn't understand. I went cold when he added, I've been watching you for a long time. He stepped closer and said he was a good man that I could trust him, that he would be gentle. His hand closed around my arm and I felt the difference in strength. He was smiling, but there was no warmth in it, only hunger. I don't know where it came from, but I found myself smiling back. "Do you like to play games?" I said. I still don't know how I got the words out without shaking. He led me toward a bedroom, not mine, but my dad's. The moment he turned around to go lock the front door, I slammed the bedroom door and bolted it from the inside. Then the panic really hit me. My room had a window I could have climbed out of. This one didn't, but it did have a landline. With numb fingers, I dialed the only number I knew by heart. My dad's work number. He answered right away. I whispered what was happening while the man on the other side of the door started working something into the lock. My dad stayed on the line while calling the police, and he also alerted another neighbor, Mr. L, who had been in the military and had a reputation for being a bit of a vigilante. I stayed curled up beside the bed, clutching the phone, listening to the scrape of the screwdriver scratching at the door and Mr. H muttering about what he would do when he got inside. Then there were shouts. Mr. L had arrived. What happened outside was chaos, blows, things breaking, and a scream that still echoes in my memory. I did not breathe normally again until Mr. L spoke through the door and asked if I was okay. I didn't open it until the police arrived. After that night I went a long time without sleeping well. Mr. H was someone I had trusted. Someone who had given me candy when I was little. He used that trust as a mask. Later his wife asked for a divorce. I ran into her years afterward, and she told me she had always had a bad feeling about him. She said she had never wanted to have children with that man because she feared they would not be safe. That sentence stayed with me for years. He died a few years ago. None of me felt relieved. He can't hurt anyone anymore, and I will never have to see his face again. Story 15. My childhood summers used to be pretty uneventful. Long stretches of time filled with cartoons, chores I did not want to do, and overhearing far too much adult drama. But the summer of 2002 was different. Very different. First one was burned into my memory for reasons I wish I could erase. I was 12 years old and living with my mom in a quiet apartment complex. She and my dad had separated years earlier, and since then her boyfriend had been living with us. He was not exactly my favorite person, although at the time I did not really understand why. I think I had simply gotten used to his presence, even when he did things that made the whole atmosphere tense. Like one time when I was around nine, we were watching television and he came home drunk. He stormed into the living room, shouted something broken and furious, and smashed the TV with his hands. Glass everywhere, blood on his knuckles. My sisters and I just froze. My mom patched him up, and everything went back to normal like it always did. Fast forward to early 2002. My mom finally decided she needed space and left him. We packed our things and moved somewhere else a few miles away. I did not understand it. I felt like she was breaking up our family for the second time. I was too young to see how dangerous he really was. I thought my mom was being unfair to him. I even remember wishing they would get back together. Then August came. I broke out in a horrible rash around my side and started feeling pretty sick. My teacher sent me to the doctor. The diagnosis was shingles, something I did not even know a child could get. The doctor warned that if it spread too far around my waist, it could cause serious complications. I was really scared so I was relieved to be allowed to stay home for a couple of days to recover. That Friday my mom had to go to work. She woke me up, made sure I had something to eat, checked the rash and tucked me back in before leaving. I had drifted back into a half-sleep when I heard something in the hallway. I assumed she had forgotten something and come back. I called out to her, but it was not her. Her ex was standing in the doorway. He appeared as if it were nothing. Leaning against the door frame he asked why I was not in school. I told him I was sick. He nodded and launched into a monologue about how much he missed us, how sorry he was for everything, and that he wanted to talk to my mom and fix things, and I, being a dumb kid, hungry for a happy ending, told him that I missed him too. I even told him I wanted them to get back together. Before he left, he asked me to promise not to mention that he had stopped by. I told him I would not say anything, but the second my mom got home, I told her absolutely everything. At the time, it did not even occur to me to wonder how he had gotten in. He did not have a key. No one let him in. He must have used something, maybe a car to force the lock, but I did not think about that then. He had lived with us for years, so it did not seem that strange. That same afternoon, I went to my grandmother's house to spend the weekend, a plan we had made at the beginning of the month. My dad picked me up and dropped me off there, and by then I was already feeling a little better. Sunday came, and my mom had not answered any of our calls. Her phone had been silent for more than half a day. It was strange, but no one panicked right away. A family friend picked me up from my grandmothers and drove me back to my mom's apartment, but the door was locked and there was no sign of her. The law where we lived said someone had to be missing for 24 hours before police could force entry into their home. So we waited until Sunday evening. My dad, my sisters, and I were there when they finally opened the door. I went inside, grabbed my school things, and went to the bathroom. When I came out, I saw something on the hallway sideboard. My mom's dental plate. She had only been wearing it for a few months and never went anywhere without it. I picked it up and carried it into the kitchen, where my dad was talking to an officer. The moment my dad saw it, his face changed. That was when I realized something was wrong. That something was terribly wrong. That night, we went back to my dad's house. Still no word for my mom. Monday came and we did not go to school. On Tuesday morning, I woke up and saw the neighborhood priest quietly leaving our house. That was when I knew. Later, I found out that one of the neighbors had gone up to the building shared attic and noticed a locked door. One that normally was not locked. No one in the building had a key, so they called the landlord to open it. What they found inside still turns my stomach. My mom had been dead for two days. It turned out that her exit had come back on Saturday afternoon. The last person she spoke to was my aunt. Right before hanging up, my mom said, "Someone is knocking. It's him again. I'll call you later." He used the same trick to get in. He slipped something into the lock and walked in as if he still lived there. He killed her that night. He was arrested shortly afterward, after bragging to a bar tender that he had done something stupid. The trial was the following April. My sister and I had to testify. Although thankfully, we did not have to see him in the courtroom. He was sentenced to nine years for homicide. He only served seven. I later heard that after getting out, he moved back near the area. I have heard a lot of people say I was lucky that he could have killed me too. And sometimes I think about how close it came to happening. If my mom had stayed home that Friday, if she had left a few minutes later. If both of us had been there when he came back, maybe neither of us would have survived. To the man who took my mom from us and does not deserve to have his name remembered, I hope our paths never cross again. Story 16. I had just gotten back from a night shift rotation on base and had a few days off. So I stayed at the house of a coworker, Trey, who worked with me in military security. He lived near the southern edge of Oregon, where everything dissolves into thick woods and dusty roads. It was one of those late summer days that starts off blazing hot, and by afternoon, gets swallowed by a sky full of storm clouds. With nothing much better to do and the weather turning strangely dramatic, we decided to head up into the hills, look for old forest roads, and let the truck chew through the gravel while we cooled off far from town. That part of Oregon is packed with abandoned old logging roads. Some are still used by hunters and campers, but many are barely roads anymore overgrown. wild. Sometimes littered with broken down vehicles or rusted logging equipment left to rot. Tray and I had a habit of picking a random road off the main highway and seeing where it took us. That day was no different. We turned on to a dirt track that looked like it had not seen traffic in months and started winding deeper and deeper between pines and furs. After an hour of driving we had not seen a soul. No cars, no hikers, not even a squirrel. The road curved and we came out into a wide field surrounded by dense stands of aspen trees. It was almost too perfect. Absolute silence, not a breath of wind. Everything completely still. And in the middle of the clearing there was a strange picnic table. It was bright construction orange and oddly enormous. Much bigger than anything you would see at a campground or park. Tray pulled the truck closer and both of us leaned toward the windshield, trying to figure out what the hell it was doing out there so deep in the woods. I got out and walked over to it. It came up almost to my chest and the benches were just as oversized. I would have had to climb onto it to sit down. It definitely was not built for casual lunches. While I was inspecting the table tray called out to me. He was still in the truck, but he was staring past the clearing toward the tree line. Among the aspen's, far enough in that I had to squint. There was a small faded tent. It was an ugly blue green color and something about it gave me a bad feeling. There were no footpaths leading to it. No sign of a campfire either. No sounds at all. No zippers, no footsteps, no movement. It was like the tent had fallen out of the sky. Tray and I exchanged a look and I knew he was thinking the same thing I was. There is someone in there and they know we are here. We stood there for a while, unsure what to do. Part of me wanted to get back in the truck and get out of there, but another part wondered if someone might need help. It was so remote. If someone was hurt, they would be completely alone. Against my better judgment, I started walking toward the tent. Tray kept the engine running, ready to floor it if anything happened. As I moved in among the trees, the air turned noticeably colder. I could not tell whether it was the shade or my nerves, but that campsite made my skin crawl. There were backpacks scattered around as if someone had dropped them in a hurry. Women's clothing too, dresses tank tops, even a pair of heels. But there was no sign of fire, no food, not even a sleeping bag laid out. Just things. It looked wrong. I turned to get out of there until Tray, but when I started back, I heard him yell. At first I could not make out what he was saying, but his voice cracked with pure panic. I ran as fast as I could toward the truck, branches scratching at my arms, and when I reached the edge of the clearing, I saw what had set him off. An old beat-up sedan was blocking the road we had come in on. Rusted with dirty windows and three people inside. Two men in the front and someone slumped over in the back seat. I could not even tell if that person was conscious. Tray yelled at me again and I sprinted for the passenger side. The second I jumped in, he slammed on the gas and sent us flying across the clearing. The sedan tried to cut us off again, but Tray drove through a stretch of brush and went around them. We did not talk for a long time, we just kept watching the mirrors. Half expecting that car to come roaring up behind us, but it never did. We made it back to the highway without seeing them again. That same night I called the local authorities and gave them the best directions I could. A deputy contacted us the next day and said there was no sign of the tent, the backpacks, or the clothing, but the giant orange table was still there exactly where we had left it, as if it had been waiting for us. Neither of us ever went back. Story 17. It was one of those sweltering summer nights in New England, late August, with fog heavy skies and air as thick as soup. We had spent the first part of the afternoon walking around a little coastal town we loved. The kind with a rundown boardwalk, a couple of fried dough stands, and an old arcade that always smelled like popcorn and rust. After wandering around for a while and grabbing something to eat, we decided to stretch out the night by driving along the coast. The roads were deserted, visibility was terrible because of the fog, and we thought about pulling into one of those small roadside parking areas scattered along the shoreline so we could hang out for a bit. We picked one that was completely empty, tucked beside a dune. It felt secluded, not sketchy, just quiet. We climbed into the backseat to make out. Nothing out of the ordinary just some kissing and teenage-style groping. Even though we were both around 20, neither of us had the nerve to go all the way. Getting caught in the act was not on our list of things we wanted to experience. Once that heated moment passed, we stayed there lying down, tangled together, listening to the muffled sound of the waves and the occasional creek of the car settling on the uneven ground. Outside there was nothing but a blur of fog against the windows, and it felt like we were the only two people on earth. I was resting on his chest, enjoying that warm drowsiness you get after laughing and kissing too much. I looked up to give him one more quick kiss, just a pack. That was when I caught sight of something through the fogged-up glass. For a second I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me, but no. It was a face pressed against the window. Eyes wide open, mouth closed, expressionless, just staring. I did not scream right away. It was more like a choked gasp, but my boyfriend heard it and turned his head. Then he did scream. A strange strangled sound, half surprise and half panic. The face vanished in a blur and we saw someone running away from the car, disappearing over the dune and toward the beach like a shadow melting into the night. After that everything happened very fast. My boyfriend threw the door open, adrenaline surging and shouted after the guy, something like, "You freaking creep! Get back here!" But I was grabbing him, trying to stop him, trying to get him back into the car, trying to get him to lock the doors already. My heart was pounding so hard I could barely speak. All I wanted was to get out of there and find somewhere safe. While we were still panicked, another car pulled into the parking area. A man with fishing gear looked like he was getting ready to cast from the shore at that hour. We ran up to him and asked if he had seen anyone running by. He said he had seen a shadowy figure take off down the beach, but he had not gotten a good look. He did not seem especially concerned. He shrugged like it was not all that unusual in that area. We ended up driving straight to the nearest police station trying to make sense of what had happened. We were not hurt. Nothing had been stolen but it felt like a serious violation of our privacy. We filed a report, told them about the guy watching us, and they wrote everything down. They said they would alert patrols, but it was pretty clear they were not going to follow up much unless someone had a worse encounter. On the way home I could not stop replaying that face in my head. There had been a strange glow around it, not bright like a flashlight, but a dim kind of illumination, like it was coming from a screen or something like that. For a while I was convinced he had been recording us. That idea stayed with me for months. Maybe he was just some misfit trying to scare people, or maybe he was hoping to catch someone doing something he could use somehow. I guess we will never know. The only thing I do know is that we never went parking again after that. Whatever thrill we got from hiding out in dark corners of the world disappeared completely after that night. Story 18. One summer when I was around 15 years old I had to go with my mom, my aunt and my grandmother, to the family lake house in New Hampshire. It was tucked away at the end of a long bumpy dirt road in a small quiet cove surrounded by thick woods and steep hills. We only used the house in the summer and it felt like the rest of the cove worked the same way. Families looking to get away from the city for a while. Most of the neighbors were familiar faces. The kind of wave if they see you grilling outside or paddling by in a kayak. It was the kind of place that never felt unsafe, even though it was practically in the middle of nowhere. On that particular trip I was in a bad mood and completely run down. A summer cold had knocked me flat and I had no interest in socializing. So when my family decided to take the boat out that afternoon I told them I would rather stay behind. I made myself a little nest on the couch with a blanket, a bowl of popcorn and a movie, trying to forget how miserable I felt. The house was quiet except for the click of the old ceiling fan above me and whatever was playing on the TV. I was not paying attention to anything else. I was on autopilot trying to enjoy the calm. That calm did not last. Out of nowhere I heard shouting. A booming, furious voice coming from outside and echoing across the cove. It startled me so badly I practically jumped off the couch sending popcorn everywhere. I loved it. Looked out the window and saw a man I had never seen before standing beyond the porch, red faced, dragging what looked like a half-dead pine tree. He was yelling something I could not understand at first, but when he got closer I heard it clearly. You left your Christmas tree in my yard again. It made no sense. It was the middle of August, and our house, like all the others in the cove, was strictly a summer place. No one decorated for Christmas there. We barely even came in the fall. I froze staring at him as he dragged the pine tree up to the porch, shouting that this was the last time we were going to dump our tree on his lawn. At first I tried to tell him he had the wrong house. I was nervous, but I tried to sound firm, reminding him that it was a seasonal property, and no one had been there for months. It did not matter. He was not listening. He started hauling the tree up onto the screened porch, and something about the sudden determined way he moved sent me straight into panic mode. The screen door was unlocked and the house door was wide open because of the heat. I ran to shut it, but he was right behind me. We reached the doorway at the same time, both of us reaching for the door. I think if my family's boat had not appeared at that exact moment, he would have gotten inside, but the sound of the motor must have startled him, because he suddenly turned and bolted into the woods, dragging that scraggly tree behind him. When everyone got back I was still shaking. We locked the house and I told them what had happened, still trying to make sense of it. My aunt went pale the moment I described the man. She knew exactly who he was. Apparently he lived a few miles away and had wandered into our cove before, but that time he had been polite, even chatty. One of those strange locals who seemed harmless enough. Back then he had been surrounded by adults, so maybe that changed his behavior. With me alone, just a kid in the house, he was a completely different person. I never stayed there alone again after that. Even now it gives me chills to think about how quickly someone can go from eccentric to threatening, and how different the world feels when you realize you are not nearly as alone as you thought you were.