*BONUS* Listener Tales Patreon Edition: PART 2 | Morbid

Hey weirdos, before we dive into today's twisted tale, let me tell you about a place where the darkness never ends.

Wondery Plus. It's like stepping into a haunted mansion where the floorboards creak with ad free episodes and early access to new episodes lurks around every corner.

So come join us if you dare. Morbid is available one week early and ad-free only on Wondery+.

You can join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or in Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

You're listening to a morbid network podcast.

Listening on Audible helps your imagination soar.

Whether you listen to stories, motivation, expert advice, any genre you love, you can be inspired to imagine new worlds, new possibilities and new ways of thinking.

Listening can lead to positive changes in your mood, your habits, and ultimately your overall well-being.

Audible has an incredible selection of over 1 million audiobooks, podcasts, and Audible Originals all in one easy app. find the genres you love and discover new ones explore bestsellers like my sister's title new releases, plus thousands of included audiobooks, podcasts, and originals that members can listen to all they want with more added all the time.

I have been listening to the Martha's Vineyard Beach and Book Club, which actually Elena recommended to me.

She did not listen to it, but she said, girl, this title sounds so you.

And let me tell you, it did. I've been listening to it while I walk and I am absolutely loving it.

I love all the different narrators. I love Audible.

There's more to imagine when you listen.

Sign up for a free 30-day Audible trial and your first audiobook is free.

Visit audible.com slash morbid. Thank you.

Morbid is sponsored by Squarespace. Squarespace is the all-in-one website platform for entrepreneurs to stand out and succeed online.

Who doesn't wanna stand out and succeed?

Get you a girl who can do both. Every dream needs a domain. no hidden fees or add-ons required Every Squarespace domain comes with advanced privacy and security tools included to ensure that your domain remains online and protected.

Plus, Squarespace provides everything you need to bring more of your dream to life. whether that means building a website or adding a professional email service.

Squarespace gives you everything that you need to offer services and get paid all in one place.

From consultations, events, and experiences, showcase your offerings with a customizable website designed to attract Plus, streamline your workflow with built-in appointment scheduling and email marketing tools.

Head to squarespace.com slash morbid for a free trial.

And when you're ready to launch, use offer code morbid to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.

Hey weirdos, I'm Ash. And I'm Alayna.

And this is a little bonus episode of Morbid.

Hey, there's gonna be three this week because it's spooky season.

Girl. And we asked our Patreon lovers and listeners.

Lovers. Lovers. to send us in their spooky tales because we figured we would do like a special spooky you know, Patronus bonus Listener Tales episode and we got so many good ones.

That we were like, we could make this like a four hour episode or we could just give you bonus episodes with extra spooky tales in them.

On top of the regular episodes for the week.

I'm just nodding my head really aggressively right now.

I'm like, yeah. And we figured... That giving you a bonus one, Spooky Tales, on top of the regular episodes for the week would be much better.

Like, so exciting. Who doesn't love extra spooky tales on spooky season?

I don't know anybody that doesn't like that.

I don't know. I think you're all ready for it.

I think you are. I think you're ready for the jelly.

And honestly, the patronuses have really outdone themselves.

And that's why we were like, we can't. we have to keep reading these.

They're so good. No, these are truly amazing.

They have really done the damn thing, so we wanted to We want to do this for you guys.

I'm more excited for Spokane season. I love Spokane season.

Also, I want to hear what everybody's doing for spooky season two.

Like, I think I asked it in. like the patreon i was like what are y'all doing for spooky season because we're like still in a pandemic yeah and you know that that delta That Delta would be a bitch.

She's just creeping around doing the damn thing.

And I know a lot of haunted houses are open.

But, like, I wonder if anybody's doing anything like... you know unique that we can take inspiration from because we really want to do something fun but we're like not super comfy going inside of a haunted house.

Exactly, because the babes can't get vaccinated yet.

It looks like they're going to be able to very soon, but...

They can't get vaccinated yet and nothing's worth putting them in danger.

But outside things, I'm like, I would really like to find some out there.

Outside things. I know there's one that we went to before.

Like an outside one that we could go to.

Because I love... A haunted corn maze. Like give me a haunted corn maze.

Give me a haunted hayride. I'm all about.

So if you live in Massachusetts, let us know.

Yeah, let us know about any outdoor spooky things that we can do together.

Yeah. We're craving it more than anything in the entire world.

I need to be driven through a corn maze.

I know, because spooky season is like... fully on right now and I haven't done anything spooky yet yeah like you know everybody's done some fun fall things like the pumpkin you know picking and apple picking and having i didn't even go apple picking yet yeah see we went apple picking and i made some delicious food out of it but i also made some delicious food out of it because Elena got 40 pounds of apples.

I'm not joking. 40 pounds of apples. She was like do you want some of these?

And I was like yes I do. Because the whole time we were picking them I was like you know ash will make some apple things too so i'll just give her some apples and ma and i will your mother-in-law i will so you know we're we'll make they all went to good use they really we all got a little more fiber in our diet But hopefully we can do something.

You know, I love doing stuff with the kids.

I just hope we can do some more like haunted things when the kids go to sleepy sleep.

I know. Yeah, like more like adult haunted things.

Yeah, so let us know what you're doing. And I'm just interested to see what you guys are doing.

What's up? I just like you. What's the cool jams?

What are you guys listening to? Tell me everything.

You girls keep me young. I love you so much.

I think I messed that whole thing up, but it's fine.

You made it your own. I did. Yeah. You did.

Not like a regular ash. I'm a cool ash. Do you want to go first or would you like me to?

I think you should. Okay. Should I start from the top?

From the top. Should I start? Yeah. Did you get that or no?

Yeah. You did? Wow. TikTok has changed you.

It has. it really has i'm really appreciative of that because that's literally the only reason i know the top listener tales that's fun that's fun Yeah, that's fun.

That's the only thing that I could say that people could listen to in the car.

Anyways. This one says listener tale. And then my neighbor was eaten by a shark.

Yeet. And I was like, well, that subject line will really grab you in.

Yeet. It says, hello, my favorite ladies.

I have attached a puttafu of my listener tail.

It isn't like any of the other listener tales I've heard, and I am slightly obsessed with Morbid, so I think I'd remember.

Yeah. But it involves shark gods and has the word yeet for ash and all sorts of stuff about the ocean, which would freak Elena out.

Yeah, I mean all of it. I'm here for it.

You've sold us. They say, I have many crazy stories about growing up in literally the backside of beyond.

But unfortunately, they're neither crimey or spoopy.

So. So, I hope my shark story is fun. I apologize for any mistakes, and if it isn't your style of thing, I hope you enjoy.

Now I'm going to hit send before I freak myself out.

Keep it weird. Thank you. And they hit send.

I'm glad you hit send. Me too, because this is...

Truly something. All right. Hello to the best, funniest, raddest podcasters there are.

That was the best intro ever. Thank you.

That was so nice. You can use my name. It's Rachel.

Hi, Rachel. As on the infinite... Say that word for me.

Infinitismally. Infinitismally. Tiny chance that someone... from the small community where this takes place is listening.

They'll be able to figure out who I am. I'd say small towns, y'all.

But it's more like small islands, y'all.

I like that. I discovered your podcast earlier in 2021 in a rather roundabout way.

Late night stress scrolling on Instagram because teaching middle school in a pandemic, y'all.

Oh, teach. I bow down. Yeah, for real. I bow down to you.

Thank you. But that showed them Stephanie Harlow video.

We love Stephanie Harlow. We do. Which took me to YouTube.

But I'm trying to cut down on screen time, so when I went to find her podcast, I ended up with yours instead.

Well, that's awesome. You should listen to both though because hers is really good too.

She's great. And I've never looked back.

I have listened to every single episode except for the super hardcore spooky spooky ones like the Ouija board ones because nope.

I promise it's interesting. I'd like to set those ones out too, because I'm terrified of Ouija boards.

So I feel you. But you get some history.

Oh, you do it. It's fun. You would like it.

And if I can do it, anybody can. You can do it.

When I'm getting ready in the morning or on the way to work on breaks, you get the idea.

We've had over two months of lockdown this year and it has gotten me through some serious loneliness and boredom. him i even figured out patreon just so i could support you oh that's so nice and feed my addiction through patreon bonus episodes that's amazing Thank you so much.

I said that like I was like surprised that she was a Patreon.

I was like, oh, you're a Patreon too? This is literally a Patreon listener to the episode.

What we're here for. But either way, thank you so much.

You're the best. I was always sad that I couldn't contribute to Listener Tales because nothing spooktastic or crime-related has ever happened to me personally.

I've dealt with a lot of crime stuff through my job but that stuff's never for sharing and then I remembered the shark god, and the neighbor who got eaten in a mysterious question mark circumstances.

This story is extremely long because background information, but I won't say cut it because you never do.

No way. Never. Hopefully I managed to make it entertaining despite the length.

When I was a child I lived in a remote part of Fiji.

Oh, okay. Oh, alright. That rules. Casual.

That rules. How I ended up there is a long story and it doesn't involve anything podcast worthy.

So suffice it to say. that through circumstances, I ended up living in Fiji from when I was about three until I was 17. with a two-year gap when we went back to Hawaii for my youngest brother to be born.

I was born there too. Hey! This was in the early 1990s and the early 2000s.

The part of Fiji where I lived is said to be home to the Dhaka Wagna, the shark god.

There was a very deep state... Sorry, there was a very deep strait of water between two islands.

We lived on one side of the strait on the larger of the two islands. but literally so far from anything that it was an hour by boat to a road and then a six hour bus ride from that road to the nearest town.

Whoa. Oh, I'm stressed out just thinking about that.

That's wild. The island on the other side of the Strait was much smaller, but it had a post office, PO boxes and a wall of a shop, which was a big upgrade from the previous shelf in the shop where the shopkeeper would dig for your mail.

Oh, my God. Large ferries twice a week would... bring in supplies and even an airport.

And by airport, I mean a paved strip of tarmac and several small one room buildings With benches to wait on.

That's crazy. That would scare the crap out of me.

Me too. If you were flying, you literally had to get on a scale with your carry-on so that they could decide where on the plane you would sit to balance the weight.

Nope. Never. Nope. Nope. The planes usually had one seat to the left and two to the right in each row and carried about 16 passengers.

Nope. No small planes. I am totally fine with flying.

I don't have any kind of fear about it. But those small planes, that's where my fear of flying would happen.

Yeah, see, I've realized that I am very, like through you, I have, because I was never really into astrology before you.

Before you existed. I just did a little ding.

You're like, yeah. But since I realize I'm an earth sign...

And I realize how poignant that is to me because I don't, you're on the earth.

I like to leave the ocean alone and I like to leave the sky alone.

Like just keep me on the earth. Keep me on the ground.

That is true. And I'm an air sign. I have like a deep fear of flying and a deep fear of the ocean. i want to see really quickly i'm a sad but i'm fascinated by the ocean that's the thing with the ocean to me i'm terrified of it But I'm fascinated by it.

Oh. Yeah, I could see that. Yeah. I was just looking up what Sagittarius was because I didn't know what element it was.

And I thought maybe it would be water because I love the water so much too.

But it's actually fire. Why Sagittarius?

Because that's my rising. I was like, you are not a Sagittarius.

But I am a little bit. There you go. I totally lost my place.

So if you were flying 16, but I digress.

I just want to get across the idea of how small this place was.

I remembered going to the Capitol once a year, when they had paved roads and a McDonald's and a movie theater and how overwhelming it all was.

The trip was 24 hours on a ferry and a two hour plus or a two hour plus flight.

And we always went by ferry because expensive, yo.

That's like hilarious that they were like, we can go to the McDonald's in the movie theater.

Yeah, seriously. As I was saying, this was the traditional home of the shark god.

There was a small uninhabited island next to the island with stores that, according to some older folks, was Dakuwanga's special home.

You could go to the island to picnic and snorkel, but you did not wear a bikini or a speedo or leave any trash behind.

Be respectful when in a God's home, guys.

Come on. I mean, don't leave trash behind anywhere.

Yeah, even if there's no gods involved. I'm with the gods on that one.

When traveling between islands, you waited until you passed it before you'd started trawl fishing.

And never even let the blidges of the boat drain until you were a respectful distance away.

I always say that. So people took it like really seriously.

Yeah. You might be wondering what people did there.

Well, this street happens to hold some of the most stunning scuba diving locations in the world. tourism, especially related to diving, was the backbone of the economy.

As you can imagine, most of the tourists were from the States and Europe.

Aussies and Kiwis tended not to get this far out. since the inter-island flights were as much as the international ones, so only those who had already paid for flights paid a fortune would pay for the extra and they didn't really like the whole shark god thing they didn't really take the whole shark god thing seriously There was an incident from when I was too young to hear the story of a tourist who had a limb bitten off by a shark. but was saved and even came back years later after she healed.

And while everyone said it was a freak accident, My adopted Fijian grandmother told me it was because she disrespected the gods' homes.

Whoa. And when you're seven and being tucked under the mosquito net by your adopted grandmother while the kerosene lantern...

Lantern light shines off her hair and glints off of her gold tooth.

You believe that shit. I believe that shit.

I'm here and I believe it. That gives me such Grandma Tala vibes from Moana.

Oh, we love Grandma Tala. I love Grandma Tala.

A few bays over, about 15 to 20 minutes in the 10 feet dinghy with the 15 horsepower outboard, less than in a proper boat, there was a guy.

He was in the habit of going to the island with shops, drinking with his friends, and getting up to the stuff that adults do.

And my adopted grandmother would not tell me about, but she tis-tis'd and generally disapproved. which is the job of grandmothers truth on the night in question it was stormy so he decided to swim out to check his boat where it was anchored about 100 feet from shore.

Not a big deal. My friends and I had done it 100 times.

This time, though, it was a big deal. He left his mate still drinking, swam out to check the anchor, and had his leg bitten completely off.

That's rough. Alerted by the screams, the people around him got out of the water.

Oof. There was a lot of stuff happening around this time that many of the locals weren't happy with. loss of traditions, changing attitudes of tourists, plus the usual, this new generation doesn't show respect.

So just a tragic accident caused by alcohol and a shark crazed by the dumping of animal offal in the seas by a new business.

Or one pissed off shark god who had had enough and took it out on a random swimmer on a dark and stormy night?

You decide. I'm going with shark god. Me too.

I bet you can guess what my adopted grandmother believed and insisted that I show extra respect every time we went through that bit of water.

Hell yeah. I have to say that now in my 30s, I lean more towards a shark that had had its natural habitat and lifestyle disrupted by humans. causing it to develop a taste for land creatures.

But sometime later, when a Japanese fishing ship got stuck on a reef for several months and was selling off its cargo to try to float And some of the people who worked for us bought a shark to eat.

I was staunchy in the group. who was noping right the hell out of there as I still get a weird shiver whenever I see sharks in captivity or as a food resource.

I hope you enjoyed this rambling tale from my childhood and keep it weird, but not so weird that as a community you piss off a shark god. and he eats a poor drunk man who just wants to make sure that his boat doesn't float away.

Wow. That was wild. That was truly something.

For real. That was truly something. I love that it was just like...

Shark God or Random Accident. You decide.

Yeah, you didn't. You know what? I'm going with Shark God.

Shark God. Even though the other one actually makes sense as well.

I think they both make sense. I think it's a little bit of both.

Either way it works. Doesn't have to be one or the other.

It can be both. Yeah. You know? So like things can be savory and sweet.

You don't have to pick. Shark odd or like a potato chip dipped in chocolate. all have you ever had like those like have you ever had those no you have right Have you ever had like those?

I was going to keep going, but I don't really even know what just happened. to be honest with you I love that you just malfunctioned I did you know what I think it's like a little personal story.

I started getting a grande instead of a venti because I never finish a venti and it's really affecting me.

It's really affecting my capacity to speak.

My cognitive behaviors. The velocity of my thoughts.

It is the velocity of your coffee directly influences the velocity of your thoughts.

Like the mass of your copy? Yeah, I'm not a physics major.

I have a podcast. Sherwin-Williams' super sale is coming up from August 8th through the 14th.

That is seven whole days to save big on paints and stains.

We're talking 40% off big. It is the perfect time to start that paint project you've been thinking of.

Whether you're looking to revamp your interior or your exterior, they have you covered with bold hues, soothing neutrals, and everything in between.

So mark your calendars for August 8th through the 14th and get ready to bring your color to life. with the very best paint only at your neighborhood Sherwin-Williams store delivery available on qualifying orders retail sales only some exclusions apply see store for details.

They say that time waits for no one, neither should payday.

To keep your money moving in the direction of your dreams, get earnin'.

What is Earnin', you ask? Honey, Earnin' is an app that lets you access your pay as you earn it up to $100. and $50 a day with a max of $750 between paydays.

Earnin is the app that is helping millions of Americans take charge of their pay and avoid falling into debt traps.

Ernan's mission is to make financial momentum accessible to everyone.

It's your money, so put it in your own hands with Ernan.

I just feel like earning is good for so many things.

Like, you know, every now and again you get in your car and you say, oh, wow, who knew that I was on empty?

I should have known that, but I didn't. And then you look at your bank account and you're like, oh crap, I haven't been paid yet.

Well, You'll never run into that problem if you have earning.

An unexpected trip to the vet will not ruin your day because you'll have the money to pay for it.

Download Ernin today, spelled E-A-R-N-I-N, in the Google Play or Apple App Store.

When you download the Earn It app, type in morbid under podcast.

When you sign up, it will really help the show.

Morbid under podcast. Earnon is a financial technology company, not a bank.

Access limits are based on your earnings and risk factors.

Standard cashouts take one to two business days with no mandatory fees.

Expedited transfer is available for a fee.

Tips are voluntary and don't affect the service.

Available in select states. Terms and restrictions apply.

Visit earnin.com for full details. Download Earnin now and take control of your pay. love it all right so the next one speaking of copies that this has nothing to do with coffee I was like, speaking of coffees, this one's called a disappearing country psycho killer.

It would have been funny if you said. a disappearing coffee serial killer there you go but it's country serial killer country Hey weirdos, here's my true campfire spooky tale about the night my cousins, myself, and our babysitter were almost slaughtered.

Great. You can use my name and I've attached a double space pittifer because life.

I hope you like it. Nick. Thanks, Nick.

I also love she forgot to add it in. And then she goes, because it was like, here's the pit of foot.

And then she goes, just kidding. Thanks, Mercury Retrograde.

Here is the book. You know what? We're all in that with you.

All right. We're all in this together. Maybe that's what just happened to my brain.

I think it is. All right. Hey, Ash and Elena.

Hey. Hey. I'm going to apologize ahead of time for the 27 different tangents this single doc may hold.

But I truly have so many tales to tell that my brain becomes all squirrely and I can't control it.

I feel that. Whoa. We both feel that. Like all of your other avid listeners, I'm a huge fan.

Thank you. Thanks. Thank you for always saying exactly what I'm thinking about the many evil rotten tuna fish stuffed ball sacks that have inhabited the earth.

Tuna fish stuffed ball sacks. You are welcome.

I'm screaming. I gotta use that. I like that.

If you ever really form a true crime task force, I really want to.

May I please offer my super suspicious, never trust anyone, Gemini rising mind in assistance because you are my people.

Hell yeah. You're on the team. Anyway, hi.

My name is Nicole. You can use my name.

Hi, Nicole. Hi, Nicole. I'm a mama bear to four beautiful humans.

Hell yeah. A Boston suburb-based hairstylist.

Same. Hell yeah. Former ghost... Okay. Yep.

Read that correctly. I managed Ghosts and Gravestones Boston for five years.

Holy shit. That's awesome. I went on that.

I have never been on that still. I went on that and let me tell you, it was one of the most fun ghost tours I've ever seen.

People say that it's like super duper fun and I've lived here my whole life other than like the blip in Hawaii and I've never gone.

Well, Nicole managed it for five years, spreading the true dark history of our city to tourists and fellow weirdos.

You want the creepy Boston stories? I'm your ex-ghostie.

Hell yeah, Nicole. Whoa, look at us. I know, we're right on here.

I am a former religious cult member. You're really... What a life.

You are killing it, dude. Wait until the next sentence.

I was at an impressionable age. There were celebrities involved.

I got to travel a decent amount. I had a fucked up childhood that left me longing for a stable family.

You can pick the reason. It happened. And I always win two truths in a lie.

The fact that she's like, yeah, celebrities were involved.

I'm like, what? And I just love that she's like, and I always went true to two truths in a lie.

You know what? That's how you know that your childhood was a little rocky.

When you can win that game. Hell yeah. With your eyes closed.

Yep. I come from a history of intuitive women who experience crazy shit.

Same. A woman died in my house while I was living there.

Not same. It was a duplex. Her head was facing the complete opposite way.

Whoa. Just gonna casually drop that, Nicole.

Her back backwards-headed, straggly-haired spirit haunted my house until we moved.

Holy shit. She probably still does, but I was nine and it's a story for another day.

Please send that story. I always love when people will say like, or like write the craziest sentence I've ever read.

And they're like, but that's for another day.

I'm like, No, it's not. It's for today.

I'm looking at my watch. I'm like, what day?

I got time. What day is that other day? Let me write it on my calendar.

I'll pencil that in. I'm on a need-to-know basis.

Okay, weirdos, welcome to my brain. Hold on to your butts.

I grew up both a city mouse and a country mouse.

My parents divorced when I was young outside of Boston, but spent summers in the real, real country in southern Illinois until my dad tried to kidnap me and bring me to Vegas.

But again, another story for another time.

Nicole. I love how casual you are. This is the best.

My dad and his side of the family lived there.

My aunts and uncles are farmers, my grandparents ran a country tavern, there were only gravel roads, cornfields everywhere, and all the cute cuddly animals a girl could ever want.

Sounds lovely. It does. I usually was with my grandparents or cousins because my dad was, well, not ready to be a dad.

He had a lot of issues, was kind of a pathological liar, hid having other kids from me, whoa, in one extra special time when my grandpa mixed up his meds, my grandpa tried to kill him in front of me to, quote, give us all some peace and so I could see my daddy for what he really is.

But I was seven at the time and just wanted to go rescue the motherfucking barn cats in peace.

Wow. What of time? You weren't kidding when you said tangents.

These are, wow. Ann wasn't kidding when you went to try.

Truths and a Lie. I can see how. You win all of it.

Enough word vomit. Let's get to the good stuff.

Holy shit. What is the good stuff? One hot country night I was sleeping over at my cousin's house.

My dad was God knows where and there was some big party at the tavern that my grandparents owned.

This was honestly the only bar within 25 miles, so it was kind of a big deal.

My aunt and uncle were also there for the night.

I was eight. My cousin Angela was seven.

My cousin Wes was three. and my cousin Josh was a brand new baby.

I need to explain the house. It would have been my dream house. had I not almost been a victim of a country massacre.

You know, that little thing. Just that. My uncle was one of the biggest farmers in southern Illinois.

He had a beautiful old white farmhouse and a large plot of land.

I'm talking acres and acres as far as the eye can see.

That was awesome. Yeah, right? Of course, there was an enormous barn and no neighbors for miles.

Not awesome. It reminds me of the house in Scream, like in the first scene.

Yep. Main floor layout was a kitchen and dining room combo, which led to a playroom and then the living room.

In the living room, there was a door behind the couch, which when opened, led to beautiful stairs that wrapped up and around to a hall.

The first door on the right was my cousin Angela's bedroom, then at the end of the hall was a door, and to the left of that was another door.

The one at the very end belonged to my aunt and uncle.

The door to the left was the boys' room slash nursery, and those two end rooms also connected inside the rooms.

I never knew why the couch blocked the only door up to the bedrooms.

In my head, this house was huge, but maybe it just wasn't as big, actually.

My aunt had hired a 13 year old girl named Kirstie to babysit us.

She spent the whole time talking on the phone to her boyfriend and definitely told us to go to bed way earlier than we wanted to.

My cousin and I were obviously not sleeping.

It was so hot and we were staring out her window trying to catch a breeze.

It was about that time that we saw fireworks.

It was exciting. Our bedtime rebellion was worth it.

Almost immediately, we also noticed a white light in the yard.

It was moving. Another part of the light show?

We ran downstairs to tell Kirsty. As we excitedly ran into the kitchen, we saw Kirsty was not experiencing the same joy.

In fact, she was frantically locking any doors and windows that she could.

She not calmly explained that the fireworks were too close and there was a prowler in the yard.

I didn't know what a Prowler meant at that point in my life, but I felt the vibes of the room. saw the 13-year-old that was supposed to keep us safe grab the biggest knife she could find, and was confident that I did not like any part of what was happening.

She rushed us back upstairs, making sure to pull that behind the couch door extra tight.

She told us to go into my aunt and uncle's room, lock the door, made sure the nursery door was locked, and started crying.

Fuck. She forgot to bring the handy-dandy list of emergency phone numbers because this was the early 90s and cell phones weren't a thing.

Jesus, I don't think cordless phones were even a thing in that house.

She began panic dialing any combination of phone numbers and I just distinctly remember thinking that she was not qualified to be watching us.

I love that like all this chaos is happening and you're like, Kirstie, get it the fuck together.

Kirstie, I don't think you're going to get another babysitting job after this.

Around that time, the banging started. I'm talking loud. breaking into this house in the middle of nowhere where no one could hear a scream kind of banging.

No, thank you. Kirstie took a break from the phone and instructed us to start pushing furniture against the door.

Anything heavy that our fucking seven and eight year old baby hands could move.

My cousin happily danced to the window and said, oh, look, there are three lights.

Does that mean three prowlers? Poor Kirstie.

Kirstie was crying, screaming shit over and over.

I was moving furniture alone. No one seemed overly concerned about the babies in the nursery.

I'm concerned over here. And I can remember giggling a little at the absurdity of it all.

I've always had inappropriate reactions to things.

Same here. I knew you were gonna say that.

Kirstie was now begging my cousin to remember the number to the tavern.

To which Angela responded, I don't know, but I know my phone number.

Super helpful. I love this. Around this time, we heard what I can now describe as Jack Nicholson hacking down the door in The Shining.

Good. It was behind the couch door. The next thing I remember was complete and utter silence.

I could hear all of our heartbeats. We turned the lights off in the room and Kirstie told us not to make a sound.

We listened. And we then watched as the doorknob began to turn, then violently shook. kirsty screamed at us to push against the door i will never in my life forget the next 17

I was like, wait, what? It's so funny because when I read that at first, I was like, wait, what?

I will never in my life. It says the next 17 years that occurred.

I was like, that's a long time in that bedroom.

I will never in my life forget the next 17 years that occurred.

It was probably only 10 minutes, but anyone knows that 10 minutes of pre-murder is equal to... years in our brain i would think so pre-murder we pushed up hard against the bureau and bedside table blocking the door it all pushed back.

Over and over, we felt such a strong force hurtling into the door.

We were all crying at this point. Then it stopped.

It stopped, got quiet, and my cousin piped up that she remembered the number to the tavern.

Thank fucking God. Also, I'm semi sure that she always knew the number.

It was just being an asshole because she tortured her baby. babysitters.

I know I shouldn't say that about a seven year old, but she was a real brat.

Back to the murdering. Kirstie called and no one answered.

She called five more times and finally my grandpa answered.

I don't know if she made any sense at all, but that saint of a man said he was on his way.

That's when the banging started again. Only this time it was different.

It was scratchy and stabby and persistent.

I love stabby as an adjective. Stabby. Whoever was on the other side of that door had a knife or an axe. or a hatchet or something that was going to fuck us all up.

I'm still worried about the baby. I was just going to say that.

We were back in our spots barricading ourselves in after another few minutes of hell.

The sound of tires on gravel could be heard in the distance.

The sound stopped. And the next thing I knew, my angel grandpa's voice was calling to us.

We flung that door open and saw him climbing over the couch and through the door, huge-ass shotgun in hand.

My grandpa, my hero. He scooped us all up and checked it out soon after my aunt and uncle came home.

And you guys... My aunt and uncle didn't believe us.

The door to their room looked like a bear tried to claw it down, and they tried to say it was a windstorm.

A windstorm inside their fucking house that has a secret upstairs.

To this day, when this is brought up, they deny it.

It was our wild imagination. But seriously, fuck that shit.

That scarred me for life. I feel like maybe...

They had to have known like there was like some kind of family secret.

That sounds shady as fuck. fuck like why was there like a couch barricading the door why were they like oh windstorm inside the house like yeah something's weird I love, Kirstie never babysat again.

Fair enough. Fair enough. My cousin went on to be a total know-it-all, but I still love her.

My beloved grandpa passed away about five years ago.

I'm sorry. Three months to the day after my grandma, his high school sweetheart, passed.

He was a retired police officer who entered early retirement after a case in which three girls the same age as his own at the time walked themselves into the police station to report their severe sexual abuse at the hands of their father.

That's horrible. My grandpa was the one to pick up the evil bastard.

And let's just say he looked one way than when they went into the station's elevator. and quite a bit bloodier and uglier than when those elevator doors opened.

You better believe he got a full police funeral, though.

The person or thing that was able to disappear without a trace, we know it was real.

Was it human? That I can't say, but I will never forget it.

Well, that's my Almost Massacre story. Thanks for reading and hope you keep...

It weird. Take it away, Ash. But not so weird that this happens.

Yeah. P.S. In case you're wondering, 911 wasn't an option.

It would have been an hour before help arrived.

PPS, I solemnly swear I wrote the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, and seriously? let me know if you want the inside scoop on all things spoopy Boston, like the common being one of the largest, largest. unmarked mass graves, or my favorite serial killer, Jane Topin, who killed more people than Lizzie Borden and the Boston Strangler combined.

I know that the Boston Common is one of the largest.

Girl, let's talk. It's so creepy. I used to have to walk through the Boston Common every single day.

I was just walking over a mass grave site.

I'm saying, let's talk. A lot of bad things happen there.

I want to hear your, I want to hear your tales.

Yeah, please write in. That was amazing.

I'm terrified for you still. I just want to know what happened there.

I gotta know. I don't know. Let's hopefully find out someday.

I hope. My next one is called... Patreon listener tale, Mountain Dew overload, and off-brand seances.

Hell yeah. Hi, spooky babes. Happy official spooky motherfucking season.

Yay! Thank you. Thank you. I saw that they wrote their name and then I was like, can I say their name?

I'm Demi. You can definitely say my name because hearing my name on my favorite podcast would be amazing.

Hi, Demi. It says, hi, me. Hi, Demi. Anyways, I'll spare you ladies the repetitive stuff by not starting out this email with telling you guys how much I absolutely adore both of you. and the podcast and your hilarious sense of humor and how I literally feel like we could all be friends. and bake appley things together and talk about scary people and ghosts lol i love all of that and i want to do that let's do that isn't it also we're friends that we talk about baking apple-y things.

And then Debbie was like, I'm here. I'm here for that.

She's like, I could use some apples. Just pops right up like, hey.

Anyway, here's my story. When I was about 14, I had a friend who lived in a house that was very old.

Her whole family and family friends had always claimed they'd seen or felt something out of the ordinary and let me tell you being alone in her basement was spine chilling One time she and I were watching a movie in the basement and we actually heard the light switch click. as all of the lights in the basement turned off we screamed our asses off Her mom didn't like it.

It was cool. It was cool. It was cool. But on a particular night, we were having a sleepover with one other girlfriend of ours and her brother.

I don't want to exaggerate, but I'd say around 50 gallons of Mountain Dew was consumed between the four of us.

I don't want to exaggerate. That was an exaggeration, but lots of energy was involved.

Teens are weird. I didn't know that. What is Mountain Dew?

Mountain Dew. It's so good. When I was growing up.

So good. The drink for sleepovers is Mountain Dew and Pepsi.

And maybe if you were Linz, you also threw some orange soda in there.

Hey, Linz, what's going on? Who loves orange soda?

Linz loves orange soda. I just feel like Mountain Dew is like literally nuclear horse pee.

No, for sure. Like, I think that's the ingredient.

And you would go, like... Ape shit. You would just start bouncing off of every wall.

Because it's... And never go to sleep. I just, I don't even know what it is.

It was so good but so terrible. Oh yeah.

And then your teeth always felt horrible the next morning.

Your teeth literally felt like they were like.

On the precipice of falling on your face.

They were just like sentient beings that were about to jump out of your mouth. at any given time and fight people around you.

That's how they felt, actually. well needless to say we were wired in the wee hours of the night we decided to be good smart bright young kiddos and have a seance in my friend's bedroom which was in the creepy ass basement.

Yeah. This was around 2.30, 3 a.m., I'm sure it goes without saying the parents were already long gone asleep two floors up. we weren't sure how to do it.

So we just gathered one or two candles and placed it in the middle of the We kept calling out to the spirits that could hear us, asking for any sign at all.

Nothing happened for maybe 10 minutes. Finally, I got tired of the silence, so I thought maybe being a little dramatic dumbass could help.

Yeah, might as well try. Isn't it always?

I blew out the candle so it was completely pitched black in the room.

I'd be pissed. Just show yourself. Immediately.

My friend's bedroom door. banged loud. It sounded like someone got a running start from the end of the hall and body slammed into her door.

We all screamed and jumped for the nearest pillow or sleeping bag to hide under, except for the little brother who dived for the light switch.

Fucking weirdo. he's like i need light when i lifted my head from being buried into my pillow i immediately yelled at him dude what the hell thinking it was him who had snuck off when I blew out the candle, banged the door as a joke, and then turned the light on.

But once I saw his face, I could tell he was just as terrified as the rest of us girls.

And my two friends confirmed that it had...

Excuse me. And my two friends confirmed it couldn't have been him when they reminded me that we had all been holding hands the entire time. and he had never let go of either of their hands until we all went screaming.

We were all extremely shaken but had to see if someone was messing with us.

After taking a few minutes to calm down, we opened the bedroom door to see nothing but the black emptiness stretching down her basement hallway. and on the ground was my friend's metal cross that had been hanging on the outside of her door the entire time I had known her.

Let me repeat, it was on the ground, as in whatever banged on the door caused this thing to fall off.

Ew. Ew. Yeah, that's no good. The next morning at breakfast, my friend's mom was clearly unhappy with us.

She said all the commotion we were causing woke her and her husband up.

I figured she was talking about our screaming, because I imagine three teenage girls screaming must have been annoyingly disrupting to the slumber of old people.

I went home later that day. Yeah, right.

I went home later that day and I got a phone call from the same friend.

First, she told me she was grounded, lol.

But second, she told me her mom asked her what the fuck we were doing so late at night and why we were slamming on the door.

So that same bang that had scared the actual Mountain Dew infused shit out of us. was loud enough to wake her mom from two floors above us, not our screaming.

So, there you go. I wish I could tell you more scary stuff that happened at that house, but this one particular occurrence is definitely the most memorable And I honestly don't think I'll ever forget it.

I got chills just writing it all or just rewriting it all.

Hope you guys enjoyed. Happy Halloween season, you guys.

I love you and keep up the amazing work.

Wow. Thanks. That's terrifying and it makes me think at my parents' house when I was walking by by what is, because my parents' house is super, super old like mine too.

Like haunted as fuck. Yeah, like hundreds of years old.

And the master bedroom in that house, like the old master bedroom.

They like added on to it, but the original master bedroom is definitely the most haunted in that house.

And, you know, I didn't even know that that was the original.

Yeah, that was the original master bedroom.

I was like, no, it's the other one. Like, no.

One night I walked by it to go to the computer room when I was living there.

And I walked by and as soon as I went by the door, It made me think of what Demi said, because she said it sounded like somebody took a running start and hurled their entire body against them. the door it sounded like someone went from one end of the room in there because the door was closed right to the door and hurls their entire dense as a dying sun body against that door.

It was the loudest, most violent thing. I literally, whatever I was holding, I dropped and I literally like flattened against the wall.

Like, It scared me that hard. That's so scary.

As soon as she said that. And that hallway too is like very narrow and like freaky.

So, ugh. And as soon as she said that in the story, I was like, oh my god, that's terrifying.

What did you do? Did you go back downstairs?

I literally ran downstairs to mom. My parents, it was like, ah, something's in the house.

And dad went in there. Nothing was there.

Nothing was falling in front of the door.

Nothing. That's like I had to, I used to sleep in that room when I would visit if like you weren't home or anything.

Yeah. I was sleeping there one night and there was a little Tupperware box full of stuff.

And I literally watched it slide across the entire floor.

I've never been so scared in my life. I picked up whatever I had and yeeted myself across the hall into Elena's bed. no thank you i was like i'm sleeping in here tonight here i am and i never slept in that room Yeah, that room is terrifying.

I hate that room. So Demi, thank you for bringing that. bad memory to life for real even like these days i don't like that one You know what's even more stressful than a packed calendar?

Realizing you're out of coffee right before a meeting.

That actually happened to me the other day.

And it's exactly why I stocked up during the Thrive Markets back to school sale.

Even if you're not going back to school, I'm not, it's the perfect time to reset.

Thrive makes it easy to shop for high-quality pantry staples, snacks, vitamins, even skincare. without the errands or the ingredient label deep dives.

I just reached stocked with Aloha protein bars, Simple Mills crackers, and my favorite poppy drinks.

I love them so much. Everything is delivered super duper fast, and I saved up to 25% on all of that.

Their filters make shopping by diet or lifestyle a breeze, and their healthy swap tool actually helped me upgrade my usual buys with zero label stress.

I love the Lesser Evil popcorn. I get my chomp sticks from there.

I love Thrive, and you will too. Now's the best time to try Thrive Market.

You'll get up to 25% off select items. and new members get 30 percent off their first order, plus a free gift.

Who doesn't love that? Go to thrivemarket.com slash morbid to start saving.

The sale ends 831. Don't miss it. All right, so my next one is Patronus-centric listener tales.

The dead guy in production. Love that. that dead guy in production let's see It says, happy high holy season to both of you lovely ladies.

Morbid is my most favorite podcast, which is saying something.

Because as a stay-at-home mom-by-day graphic designer at night, I usually have a true crime or ghost story podcast or TV show playing in one ear, AirPods man.

What would we do without them? Also, oh, I also have to tell you that I almost passed out from laughing while I was listening to the Michael Malloy episode.

You two are the best. Whenever anyone asks me for podcasts, I always tell them yours first.

Thank you. All right. So let's get into the story, which I have attached as a double space because I love you.

I love you too. Illy. Sorry in advance for any weird spelling or grammatical errors.

I make words look pretty, not sound pretty.

Ha! Way back in the days when you had to download your podcast from iTunes on your computer.

I graduated college and started working at a sign printing company.

My desk had two large iMacs on it, but one of them wouldn't turn on.

So it was basically just taking up space.

My cheap-ass boss kept saying he was going to get it fixed, but never did.

It ended up coming in handy though, because I positioned it to where I could use the reflection to see if someone was walking up behind me, And could pretend that I was working instead of looking at whatever I was.

We all looked out on the Internet circa 2012 when we were actually supposed to be working.

Okay. Anyway, every once in a while I would get that feeling of being watched.

Out of the corner of my eye, I would see the reflection of someone standing behind me.

When I would turn around, no one would be there, which was a little freaky, but I didn't really think too much of it until...

Pause for dramatic effect. Hold on, I will.

One night when I was working really late to get a project done, The lights in the shop behind me were turned off, and it was unusually quiet. because none of the printers or vinyl cutters were running.

Since I was the only one there, I wasn't wearing my headphones.

During a silence between songs, I heard footsteps on the concrete floor behind me.

I was already a little spooked being in a giant, mostly dark building alone, so I turned around fast in my chair and said out loud, did you forget something?

I was worried it was one of the production guys trying to scare me, but I was just facing a dark room full of equipment large enough to easily hide one of my coworkers, a murderer, or the girl from the grudge.

I figured that the footsteps I heard must have been something else after all.

I had never been there this late or alone before, plus I was already creeped out.

Like the idiot at the beginning of a scary movie, I slowly rotated back to my screen and started working again.

Enough time passed now that I started to relax a bit, but then, in the reflection of the second computer screen, I saw the silhouette of a man standing behind I screamed and jumped out of my chair.

Thinking it was one of my coworkers, I yelled, what the hell, you idiot? but there was no one behind me.

No, thank you, sir. I grabbed my phone and bagged so fast.

I knocked my office chair over and just left it there.

I booked it to the front door, set the alarm with one hand while trying to call my husband with the other.

As the phone was ringing, I was locking the glass front door and looked up to see someone peeking their head around the wall behind the conspiracy reception desk no no i screamed and ran across the dark parking lot chanting oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit sure that any second I'd see Freddy Krueger running up behind me.

I jumped into the car and drove out of there like a bat out of hell for real.

My husband didn't answer the 587 calls I placed between the time it took me to get from my work to our shitty one bedroom apartment above a garage.

When I got home, I banged through the door like the Kool-Aid man on cocaine and jumped onto the bed yelling.

I was very nearly axe murdered tonight and you didn't even pick up the phone.

What if you woke up to a dead wife? My super hot, stable, rational, slightly robotic husband, who is basically just immune to my bullshit, just rolls over, pats my head sleepily, and murmurs, but you didn't, and has the audacity to just go to sleep.

I feel that. It just goes back to sleep.

I get that. the nerve of this guy. Some people just sleep, man. up and watched my I'm Too Freaked Out to Sleep and Need a Pallet Cleanser to Turn My Brain Off movie, Robin Hood, the Disney one with the animals.

But now it's an episode of Ted Lasso. Anyway, the next I still haven't watched Ted Lasso.

I don't know what it is. I also don't know what that is I keep seeing things about it I don't even see things about it It was either that, though.

I was going to get into that or I was going to get into Squid Game.

And I chose Squid Game. I chose The Real Housewives, Always and Forever.

There you go. That's who we are as people, I would like to say.

So, yeah. But now it's an episode of Ted Lasso.

Anyway. The next morning I snuck into work late and no one said anything about my chair being knocked over or having found a dead body in the dumpsters out back.

So I figured it was just a ghost and not Ted Bundy reincarnate or whatever, so I kept my mouth shut.

A few weeks later I was sitting at my haunted desk minding my own business and I hear the vinyl cutter start up behind me.

No. I thought nothing of it until the production manager, Wyatt, who looks like he just walked out of an episode of Sons of Anarchy and is the nicest, sweetest man I have ever met, walks over and looks at the machine for a second and then says to me, did you start this?

I turn around in my chair and say, no, I thought you did just now.

I roll over to see what it's cutting and it's just a bunch of scribble lines, not words or a specific design or anything.

Which in hindsight is really lame. Like how awesome slash horrifying would it be if it was cutting Get Out or something equally...

Scary movie cliche, but I digress. Wyatt sits down at the computer, connected to the machine, and you guys, it was turned off.

What the fuck? He shrugs and says, all should not.

All should not. All should not. He shrugs and says, all nonchalant.

Like it's the most normal friggin' thing in the world.

Oh, it must have been the guy. With a capital T and a capital G. The guy.

Come again? Who is the guy, I ask? Oh, it's the ghost guy that hangs out here.

Tell me everything, my dude. So he proceeds to tell me that one dark winter morning, he gets to work. and as he's walking up to the back door of the shop, he sees someone open the door and stick their head out.

He's surprised because his car is the only one in the lot.

So he yells, hey, what are you doing here this early?

And instead of responding, the person just slams the door.

When he gets up to the door, it's locked.

He's kind of pissed because it's cold and snowy out and it was just open.

So when he gets inside, he says, what the hell?

But inside, it's all dark and quiet and spooky, and there isn't anyone there.

He went around turning on all the lights and calling out for anyone there, but he was alone.

As he's telling me this story, a couple of other guys walk past and ask what we're talking about, because I'm staring at Wyatt like I've just seen a ghost.

Har har. Wyatt says he's telling me about the guy, which like, come on, you guys couldn't think of a real name for this dumb ghost?

That's like the dude. They all go, oh yeah, and tell me their creepy encounter stories.

That very day, I moved the broken computer off my desk and onto the floor so I could be blissfully unaware of any ghosts creeping up on me.

Shortly after this happened, I moved into an office space instead of my desk in the middle of the production shop, and I never saw the guy again.

But sometimes when I stayed a little too late into the evening, I would hear doors opening and closing on their own. which was always my invitation to get the fuck out.

Anyway, I hope this story gave you the heebie-jeebies just for a second.

It did. I always look forward to Listener Tales episodes and it would be an honor to have my story included with all the amazingly well-written and witty stories submitted by those talented weirdos I considered telling you the story about the time I was robbed at knife point when I was working in a snow cone stand at the tender age of 14.

But that's for another time. We should just, okay, this is the thing.

You guys just need to send all of these in and just make the subject line for another time.

Yes, please. Anybody who has said that's a story for another time, this is my siren call to you. please send in that story and put the title For another time.

So that we know. And we are going to do a Listener Tales episode that is. just for another time stories that were left for another time because that time is now the time has come the time has come Bring it in.

Keep it weird, but not so weird that you name the ghost haunting your work probably something super original like the guy.

XO, Danielle. Yes, you can say my name. Thanks, Danielle.

Say my name. Wow. Danielle, I'm glad you're alive to tell that story.

Me too. Because that sounded really scary and I was worried that it was a prowler.

For real. From the last episode. From the last story.

Oh, no, thank you. The town of Agde in France is famous for sun, sand, sea and sex.

But lately, life on the coast has taken a strange turn.

The town's mayor, a respected pillar of the community, has been arrested for corruption.

His wife claims he's been bewitched by a beautiful clairvoyant.

Then there's the mysterious phone calls that local people have been getting.

I am the Archangel Michael. The whole town has been thrown into chaos.

Mr Mayor. As the mayor is unable to carry out his duties, I would like to address you all.

Legal proceedings have been initiated. Join me, Anna Richardson, and journalist Leo Schick for The Mystic and the Mayor as we investigate a story of power, corruption, Binge all episodes of The Mystic and the Mare exclusively and ad-free right now on Wondery Plus.

Start your free trial in Apple Podcasts Spotify or the Wondery app.

My next one is Listener Tale. Creepy phone call saved my sister's life.

A wedding invitation? Also yeet. Also yeet.

Hey ladies, here is my quick but spoopy story. i hope you enjoy it as well as unsolicited pictures of my cats i just can't help myself and i feel like everybody needs to see their cuteness amazing With weirdo love, Kimberly.

Yes. I'm literally obsessed with your cat, so thank you.

Oh my god, I love how he's just sitting there.

Is that a Slytherin tattoo you have? Yeah.

That's badass. Wow, that is badass. Did they mention anything about that?

I don't think so. no all right onto the tale hello you lovely ladies first i have to say how much i love your podcast My friend turned me on to it only one month ago, and I have already binged all of your episodes and became a Patreon.

Wow. Shout out to Emma. You the best. Both of you are incredible.

I also got several of my coworkers to listen, and now we are all obsessed and frequently discuss cases throughout the day.

Not the most appropriate work conversation, but nobody's said anything so far.

You're fine. Everything's fine. I will try not to go on and on, but my brain is often a jumbled mess.

Thank you, narcolepsy. My name is Kimberly.

Feel free to use my name as it is about as generic as it could get.

I am from North Andover, Massachusetts. north andover and i just said massachusetts massachusetts the very trashy version of andover However, a fun fact about North Andover is that it had more convicted witches than Salem.

That's right it did. Hell yeah. But with it being literal trash, the tourism isn't, as the kids say, bumpin'.

But I digress. Do the kids say that? Is it bumpin' in Salem?

Is it bumpin'? Let's go to Salem where it's I need to find a kid and ask them if they say that.

Let's find a kid. Hello, youth. Hey. Do you say bump in?

They're like, get the fuck away from me, old lady.

Stranger danger. This story is rather short, but in my opinion, it is guaranteed to give you full body chills.

Those are my favorite kind. I still get them when I think about it even though I first heard about this years ago.

So hop back in the Wayback Machine and strap in.

We're going to the 90. Hey yo! In a time of questionable fashion choices, even more questionable television, some great movies, and an all-around good time... to be alive some might say the best some might say the best some might say let me give you like a quick teeny tangent Do you remember Lloyd in Space?

Yes, I do. Yeah, I saw this TikTok and it was like, let me unleash a memory for you.

I do remember. I forgot that Lloyd in Space existed.

That's wild. And I watched the whole intro and I was like, I literally watched that I love when somebody will just unlock a memory like that.

It's truly outrageous. Never have I ever thought about it since I last saw it until today.

Yeah. Oh my God. There it is. I do remember that.

Right. So good. Anyways, I was... That wasn't from the 90s, though.

It was from 2001. That's my 90s. I was just going to say, because I didn't watch it.

I just remember it being on. That's my version.

Because it still has that 90s feel, you know what I mean?

It does. 2001 was still like, we're just coming out.

Leftover 90s. Anyways, I was but a teeny human then, and my sister and the star of this story was four.

On this otherwise uneventful night my dad was woken up to the phone ringing at around you guessed it 3 a.m.

Now you have to understand that just like my hermity self, my dad never answers the phone.

Mine either. Are you us? Especially when the caller ID is unknown, as it was that night.

But for some reason, this night was different and maybe due to the late hour of the call or his bewilderment of being woken up so suddenly, He got out of bed and picked up the phone.

Now firmly hold on to your butts. After saying, hello, who is this?

All he heard on the other side was a deep, slow laughing.

And the laughing didn't stop as if the person didn't need to breathe.

Nope. But whatever my dad would say something asking again who this was. why they were calling this late, the laughing would get louder and pick up pace. does not believe in anything super oh excuse me my does not believe in anything supernatural dad swears this wasn't a recording that the changes in its volume and pace were too perfectly in sync with anything he said.

I hate this. I really hate it. After a minute or so, my dad decided to hang up, frustrated and thinking it was a stupid prank.

But as soon as the phone was off, he said he had a cold chill ran down his spine, leaving an overwhelming sense of dread in its wake. oh so instead of going back to bed he decided he should check on us oh that's such a like a parent thing because that'll happen to me if I have a bad dream and I wake up and you know sometimes you come out of a bad dream and you're like don't feel really gross like really upset by it and yeah i will get up and i will go in every single of the like the girls rooms yeah Yeah, because you never know.

And just check on them. Because I'm like, I don't know what this feeling is.

Yeah. I believe in signs. I like that feeling.

Yeah, it's like robotic. I just get up and do it.

There's no way I could just go right back to sleep.

That makes sense. Out of all his five children and the different rooms he could have gone to, he went straight to my sister's bed when he got. to her bed he noticed she was not sleeping peacefully as expected because she was always a good sleeper Instead, her face looked very distressed.

He put his hand on her forehead and noticed that she was burning. she was drenched in sweat and was breathing erratically he swiftly picked her up ran to the bathroom and started running some cold water While he waited for the bath to fill up, he took her temperature.

It was just under 106 degrees. That is insane.

He yeeted my sister into the tub and went to wake up my incredibly useless mother to let her know what was going on.

She and her wonderful motherly instincts barely woke up to say that she would stay home with the rest of us and then she went back to sleep.

Thankfully, their divorce started not long after this, and she was no longer in our lives.

Wow. Anyways, my dad went to the ER with my sister and they were able to get her temperature down and stable.

Turns out she had some virus and the only symptom that presented was the fever.

We still have no idea why she never cried or fussed or had made any sign that she didn't feel well the night before.

But the doctor confirmed that had she been left untreated for much longer, she could have had irreversible brain damage or even died.

After a week or so of treatment, she was back to normal and healthy.

It took until we were all a bit older for my dad to tell us the whole story and how close we really were to losing her.

He says that regardless of who or what called him that night, it is undoubtedly what saved my sister's life.

Wow. and the look in his eyes the few times he's ever talked about this tells me that he truly believes that nowadays she is quite a bad bitch She lives in California and works as a paramedic as well as a volunteer firefighter.

Hell yeah. She even helps to fight wildfires.

I swear she doesn't need sleep. I also think she's a bit cursed, but that's a whole other story.

I feel like this is a sign. Every single story we've had has said that's for another day. time bring them for another time or a whole other story i want them i want them give them all to me If the planets align and you've actually read this, I hope you enjoyed my brief, but hopefully at least slightly spoopy story.

If you read it on the pod, I will literally pee my pants and my hands will do the weird thing my autistic brain makes them do when I get excited.

Picture forever. reference attached and then they invited us to their wedding oh my god that is so nice of you i love you oh my goodness and congratulations on getting married that's amazing you're like the sweetest human being on planet earth and i love you And honestly, this story was amazing because that was truly a sign.

Absolutely. Truly a sign. Seriously. And I love your tattoo.

Me too. Wow that stressed me out in every way it could stress out.

I just love a good sign. Well, a lot of these things keep like relating back to things that like, I think of it.

I, I, like I keep relating them back to my own life.

I don't know why this is happening this episode so often.

It immediately made me think of one of my twins. when she got sick.

When they were in the hospital. As soon as they said... Because the night that we... like, figured out that she was really sick was that we woke up in the middle of the night for no reason.

Yeah. she did have a crazy fever and she had a crazy fever and was breathing erratically and we were like holy and it was the same thing i went in there and she looked distressed yeah and first and i just woke up had a feeling yeah i just woke up and went in there Mother's instincts.

It's definitely like a parent thing. Like your dad clearly loves you and is like really close to you guys and felt something. a dad instinct and then that person or thing called and started laughing in his ear Yeah, what the hell was that about?

Like, what a weird way to give somebody a sign, man.

For real, I'd be like, go check on the kids i'd be like can you give me a like less scary sign please All right.

So where are we in this episode? We could probably read one more.

Let's go. I have a good one. Let's go. So we have one.

And I think we might just continue this through spooky season, like giving you the extra one.

So. Yeah, like three episodes a week for spooky season.

So just like, you know, it's going to be great.

Merry Halloween. Merry Halloween. So this one is called Spooky Season Listener Tales, Drama Club Midnight, A Connecticut Ghost Story. drama club midnight i love it makes me think of um shit i can't remember it now what is the Drama Club, Midnight.

No, I was thinking of The Office, Michael Scott's...

You lost me there, girlfriend. His screenplay, Threat Level Midnight.

Oh, yes, that. You know. I don't. You don't watch The Office, so it's fine.

Sorry. Threat level midnight. Drama club midnight.

Hi, Elena and Ash. I'm writing to you from... I also love that we accidentally picked a lot of New England stories.

This was not... I literally opened this up to follow along and I was like, oh my God.

Yeah, like I don't know why that happened.

Yeah, because we picked them actually like it's a mishmash of all of our picks.

Yeah, it really is. Hi, Elena and Ash. I'm writing to you from a snowy New Hampshire cabin two days after my COVID wedding.

What? Wow. Well, and another wedding. Congratulations.

So hi from my mini moon. I have somewhat recently discovered you guys, and I just want to say thank you for making my drive so much more bearable.

You are welcome. I'm a piano teacher, so my job literally consists of my driving all over the state from lesson to lesson And now it feels like I'm driving with two of my best friends.

You are. And I'm so glad we drive with you.

I have quite the story to share with you, and regardless of whether it gets read on your show or not, though I hope it does.

It does. It does. spoiler alert it feels so therapeutic for me to finally write it down What I am about to tell you might seem crazy, like I made it all up. wish I did, but everything I am about to tell you is 100% the truth.

Feel free to use my name. Hi, I'm Carrie.

Hi, Carrie. But I'm changing the name of the place because I think technically we were trespassing.

Oops. So here goes. I was in college at the time and had come home for the weekend to see my best friend.

Isaiah, pronounced like Isaiah. Thank you for that.

So it's Isaiah. And I fancied ourselves slightly above amateur ghost hunters.

Connecticut is a decently haunted state.

Sure is. Yeah, it is. And we would spend our weekends researching different places and then heading out around midnight to see for ourselves.

Looking back, I feel so sorry for my father for probably giving him weekly heart attacks.

I can only imagine how he felt seeing us put on our war paint and gathering our crucifixes beforehand. heading out to some remote destination in the middle of the night.

Most college kids came home for a decent meal.

I came home for mischief and adventure. I love you.

This particular night, I remember his last words to us.

Be careful of cults at these places. People scare me more than ghosts.

We should not have gone out. Oh no. Oh man.

I love people scare me more than ghosts.

We arrived at, hmm, let's call this place Fields Hollow.

Fields Hollow. oh okay i can't figure out where that is where could it have been about an hour before midnight We parked our car a little ways away from the main property in case police patrolled the area.

Fields Hollow consisted of several abandoned buildings and many acres of woods.

According to our research, we were looking for faces in the windows, curtains moving slightly, Orbs in the houses and shadows on the edges of the tree line.

We had our phones and our flashlights. We were ready.

We began our excursion quietly moving around the small cottage looking buildings.

All the doors were locked, but we were able to take pictures through the windows in an attempt to capture orbs.

So far, we were not seeing anything. Everything seemed perfectly still and the night was an oppressive kind of quiet. all until all of a sudden it wasn't.

Isaiah and I stopped dead in our tracks as we listened We heard music coming from the other end of the property.

Goodbye. The music was scratchy and old sounding, as if being played from a record player that had seen better days.

Fields Hollow was divided into an upper and lower property, separated by a tree line and a huge hill.

We were on the upper part of the property, so we headed into the direction of the music.

Hell yeah, you did. When we reached the trees, we ducked down and looked out into the abyss.

I couldn't believe my eyes. At the bottom of the hill was another house, a large white colonial structure with a huge wraparound porch.

On the porch were about 20 adults wearing long purple robes Dancing in pairs to the bone-chilling music.

Sounds fucking awesome. I'm literally obsessed with this.

Like they're just dancing. I'm obsessed.

We sat perfectly still, shrouded by the trees, mesmerized by the scene before us.

When I could finally form thoughts again, my first was, holy shit, my dad was right.

It seemed like we had come across some sort of cult.

I was instantly worried for our safety and could only imagine what would happen if we were spotted.

I mean, hello, can anyone say sacrifice?

All of a sudden the music stopped. One of the men in the purple robes held a microphone.

He told everyone to line up. In perfect spine-chilling synchrony, each person bent down and picked up a long black tube. and then by single file entered the house.

We were stunned. What were those tubes for?

What was going on? I mean, I knew Connecticut has its own brand of identity crisis, suburban crazy, but this was next level.

Also, why did he have a microphone? I gotta know.

Now at this point, you're all probably thinking, okay, so you went home, right?

Wrong. Our dumbasses decided that as long as we stayed on the upper part of the property, we would be fine.

Sigh. You know what? I'd be there too, though.

I'd be like, we're fine up here. How could you leave?

I gotta know how this ends. What are they doing with the tubes?

Right, thank you. We went back the way we came and decided to not talk about what we had just witnessed.

It was like we both subconsciously felt that words would not do it justice.

We headed towards the woods where the back of the property began, but unfortunately, we didn't make it that far.

All of a sudden we heard a rustling and the sound of footsteps.

It sounded like leaves crunching and it was early spring and the grass was bare.

We heard the footsteps coming out of the woods to our left and we squinted in the darkness to try to see something.

We were too afraid to turn on our own flashlights.

Out of nowhere and from the right, not the left, we saw a man coming towards us.

The footsteps sounded like they were all around us now. but it was clearly just one person coming towards us from the woods.

He was walking in a jerky motion and unfortunately reminded me of the way Samara walked out of the well in the ring.

No thanks. Thank you. It seemed like time unnaturally sped up and in an instant he was right in front of us.

He was stocky with dark hair and eyes that seemed not to be able to focus on us.

I've never felt anything like I felt in that moment before.

It was an approachable dark feeling, like a heavy evil burning my skin, an urgent and primal fear squeezing my heart.

My legs were glued in place. I couldn't get them to move, not even slightly. it felt like the air was frozen in my lungs the only thing i could do was think to myself this is it this is where i die When the man spoke, he spoke in an otherworldly, quivering voice that echoed the scratchiness of the music we had heard only moments before.

His eyes seemed to look behind us as he said, "'You girls part of the acting crew?'

And then came the laughter. Not from him, but from us.

Nothing about this was funny. The sense of doom and fear was still suffocating.

But for some reason, my friend and I began to laugh at the same time.

And we just kept laughing. We physically couldn't stop ourselves.

The man seemed not to notice our strange reaction at all and continued speaking.

If you're not, then the park is closed. And then in an instant, our laughter stopped.

Still not making eye contact, the man began to walk past us in those same jerky, inhuman movements that brought him to us in the first place.

My body was still frozen as he moved past us, and when I could finally move my body again, I turned my head.

What the fuck? Isaiah and I looked at each other and again couldn't speak, just started to walk in the other direction away from where that strange being had gone.

What acting crew practices in an abandoned park at midnight?

What play involves long purple robes and black tubing?

None. Absolutely none. That was no acting crew.

Now you're probably thinking, okay, you girls definitely went home after that.

Ugh, I'm so sorry. We walked around the property a little longer in silence, almost like we had to walk off a bad dream.

When we reached the first building, we took one last picture each and then finally headed back to the car.

I turned on the ignition and we sat there, Isaiah looking through the pictures as I sat staring out the front of the car.

Finally, Isaiah spoke. You need to see this, she said.

I took the phone. The pictures were all normal, boring even. except the last two, the ones we took after our strange encounter.

The picture of Isaiah was completely in focus, except she was a complete blur.

The picture of me had red and blue lines of light swirling above me.

I started to drive. I had finally had enough.

As we drove back down the dirt road that had led us to Fields Hollow, another dark feeling came over me.

The CD we were listening to turned to static and the car started jerking side to side. with no effort of mine being able to control again, taking sorry, with no effort of mine being able to gain control again of the steering wheel.

Isaiah started screaming and I was finally able to put the car in neutral, then to park, and then I turned the car off.

We sat there crying and praying the Hail Mary.

I am not a religious person, but I am sure all my years in Catholic school had prepared me for this moment.

After we prayed, I turned the key in the ignition.

The CD came back on. I was able to control the car and we drove the heck out of there.

Oof. I couldn't face going back home and seeing my dad.

So we decided to sleep at Isaiah's. We were scared silent.

And when we finally got to her room, we put on an episode of Sex and the City to try to get our minds off of what happened.

That is the best. That's exactly what you need to do.

I remember as my eyes were finally closing, seeing her phone slide across the fuller.

I woke the next morning. I wish I could tell you the story ends here.

I apologize for its length, no need to, but it needs to be told in its entirety. any other reason than to stand as a warning to those who meddle with things they shouldn't.

I went back to college. I attended ECSU, a state college in the north of Connecticut.

When I got back, I told my roommates and my boyfriend at the time, Jimmy, all about what had happened.

My roommates laughed it off as another crazy carry tale, but Jimmy seemed to be more affected by it.

That night we slept in my dorm, not his, in an already too small stereotypical dorm-sized bed.

Sometimes the heat would make noises at night, but the dorm was recently built.

Only two years old, actually, and the noises we were hearing were not normal.

It sounded like something was banging on the walls of my room.

Oh okay. Yeah, I tried to ignore it, but my heart started feeling... You've got to stop ignoring things.

I started to ignore it, but my heart started beating faster as I saw the blinds begin to sway, especially because my window was closed.

No thank you. I kept telling myself there was a rational explanation for it.

Jimmy and I were both science majors, I get that. and he didn't seem to be too bothered by it, or was at least not expressing otherwise to me.

I continued to lie there with my eyes closed when I felt something at the foot of the bed.

It felt like something was crawling towards us.

No. Slowly but surely. Then the feeling stopped and I heard my name whisper.

Carrie. I opened my eyes and looked at Jimmy.

What? I asked him. He turned to me and said, I didn't fucking say that.

We jumped out of bed and started hyperventilating what the actual fuck was going on.

Did something follow me back from my so-called adventure that weekend past?

Jimmy said he was going back to his dorm to sleep, but I told him I wouldn't go.

I know, what? What was I thinking? I can't explain it.

I felt like I needed to stay and just deal with it.

He begged me, but I continued to refuse and he left.

Girl, you are wild and out here. You are.

I sat in our living room on the couch. I was too scared to even cry.

This was personal. It said my name. What was I going to do?

I don't know. Get out. I sat there hugging my legs to my chest until morning, and finally I realized what I had to do.

I got in my car and drove the two hours back home.

My dad is stupid. super religious, and has told me in the past he knew priests who had performed exorcisms.

I told him what was going on, and he didn't yell at me like I thought he might.

His expression was grave. and he handed me a book off the shelf.

It was all about how to perform exorcisms.

I then went to my mom's. My mom was a scientist and I knew she had test tubes.

This was how my terrified brain was functioning at the time.

It made sense to me, I swear. I took one from her supplies and drove to the church at my old school.

When no one was looking, I dipped the test tube and filled it with the holy water you used to bless yourself when you entered and left service.

I felt like some sort of weird criminal stealing holy water from a church.

Is that against the rules? I don't know.

Hmm. I drove two hours back to my school, opened the book, and found the section where you can exercise a room.

I performed the ritual, sprinkled some of the holy water around my bed and put the cap back on and placed my test tube in the desk drawer in case I needed to repeat the ritual. but it seemed to have worked.

It seemed to have worked after that. I didn't have another issue.

Another haunting, another dark feeling overwhelming every part of my being.

I felt like I could breathe again. I had won.

Months and months went by and the academic year was ending and I was cleaning out my room for the summer.

As I was emptying out my desk, I came across that test tube of holy water.

I had completely forgotten about it. I picked it up and my heart skipped a beat.

The holy water, once perfectly clear and godlike, had turned a murky shade of brown.

The cap had a copper like rust covering it.

The cap was plastic, not metal. So there was no real explanation for this, not a scientific one at least.

I knew in my heart that I had trapped whatever followed me back to college in this tube.

So I opened it. why would you open like at this point you're literally just asking for this shit Just kidding.

I'm not that crazy. I literally didn't even get to that page yet because it's like a page separate.

I was like, are you fucking kidding me? What are you doing?

Come on, Carrie. No, I totally threw it in the trash.

And that was that. The end of my own personal haunting brought about by a self-induced venture into the unknown.

I vowed to never mess with the paranormal again in fear that it would only decide to mess right back.

I like to think that the dark spirit and I are even now.

It scared the shit out of me and now gets to spend eternity in a landfill.

But there are still so many unanswered questions.

What was that group of people dancing in purple robes doing at an abandoned place at midnight?

What were those black tubes? That's what I want to know.

Was that man alive or something else? And lastly, why would I ever want to keep it so weird that I didn't listen to my dad and messed up something that messed back and then it followed me to college and I literally stole holy water in a test tube and performed an exorcism in my dorm room.

Man, who said college was for studying? Thanks for reading this, guys, and I hope you enjoyed it.

We did. Love always and always. Carrie. Oh, Carrie.

Carrie. What a way to end. It also just occurred to me that you were watching Sex and the City and your name is Carrie.

Your name is Carrie! Lol. Ha! That was a great way to end it.

That was spoopy. That was truly amazing.

That was real spoopy. I loved that. Guys, you killed it again.

Straight up killing it. And we have more.

There's still more in there that I need to read.

But wait. There's more. There's more. Next week we'll have to do another bonus.

We'll do another bonus episode next week.

So you're just going to keep getting three episodes a week until the end of spooky season.

Yay. Because it's just so fun. But you're still going to get your regular two episodes this week, so be on the lookout for those.

And we hope you enjoyed this little extra spooky time.

And we hope you keep listening. And we hope you keep...

It weird. But that's why they got eaten by a shark, because I really feel like that would be a really sad end to your life. do that and that's so weird that like you know you hire a babysitter named Kirstie to watch like a lot of children and then your house gets like hacked into and like hack hack hack and then you're just like I think it was the wind don't keep it that weird at all definitely keep it so weird that you continue to drink Mountain Dew but like do maybe question the ingredients and definitely don't have a seance while you're mixing it with Mountain Dew because I think the nuclear horse pee would interfere with that.

It's just my personal opinion. Don't keep it so weird that like you're trying to tempt the man.

Also, don't keep it so weird that you only name your ghost the guy.

Come up with something better. Keep it weirder than that, actually.

Definitely keep it so weird that you call somebody in the afterlife to warn them that their child has a 106 fever and they're probably going to like, you know, get in trouble from that.

And definitely keep it so weird that you're Carrie because I think she was killing it.

Get it. Bye. Bye. Thank you. If you like Morbid, you can listen early and ad free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts.

Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music.

Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at wondery.com slash survey.

[Spooky Season Listener Tales: Shark Gods, Haunted Houses, and Unexplained Phenomena]-[BONUS Listener Tales Patreon Edition: PART 2]

📋 Summary

Introduction: Celebrating 'Spooky Season'

The Shark God of Fiji

The Country Massacre Attempt

The Mountain Dew Séance

The Ghost at the Sign Shop

A Life-Saving Phone Call

Conclusion: The Haunted Exorcist

🎯Key Sentences

📝Key Phrases

📖 Transcript

[Spooky Season Listener Tales: Shark Gods, Haunted Houses, and Unexplained Phenomena]-[*BONUS* Listener Tales Patreon Edition: PART 2]