 Welcome, Weirdos. I'm Darren Marlar and this is Weird Darkness. Here you'll find stories of the paranormal, supernatural, legends, lore, the strange and bizarre, crime, conspiracy, mysterious, macabre, unsolved, and unexplained. This is a Fireside Frights episode where once a month I strip away all of the background music, the sound effects, all the fancy production is just you, me, this campfire, and stories that you've sent in. All stories I'm sharing tonight were sent in by Weirdo family members, listeners of the Weird Darkness podcast. And if you'd like to send in your own true paranormal story, all you have to do is visit WeirdDarkness.com and then click on Tell Your Story. If you're new here, welcome to the show, and while you're listening, be sure to check out WeirdDarkness.com for merchandise, my newsletter, and our contests to connect with me on social media. Plus, you can visit the Hope in the Darkness page if you're struggling with depression or dark thoughts. You can find all of that and more at WeirdDarkness.com. Now, bolt your doors, lock your windows, turn off your lights, and come with me into the Weird Darkness. Our first story comes from Samantha, and it's a bit different than what we normally do on Fireside Frights, and you'll understand here in just a moment. She calls it Thanksgiving Quadruple Homicide. Mayakka City, Florida. I'm not sure if I'm actually pronouncing that. It might be Mayakka, or I'm going to go with Mayakka, though. Anyway, Mayakka City, Florida is a small city of mainly farmland on the outskirts of Manatee County. A fairly quiet and close-knit community. We never locked our doors and always felt safe. In 2005, my family decided to spend Thanksgiving camping in the back of our 200-acre cattle ranch. It was a beautiful day, and as night fell, we built a huge fire and let the little ones roast s'mores. We all enjoyed being with our extended family and soaking up the laughter and memories of past holidays together. Little did we know that while we were riding four-wheelers and enjoying time with our family that a quadruple homicide was happening on the property next to us. The family of five lived in a house on the dirt road that backed up to our property. From where we were camping, we could see their old home. Richard, the oldest son, had always had behavioral issues growing up, bringing a gun to school, fighting, etc. As he got older, things escalated, beating his young wife, threatening his baby with harm. I hate to call someone evil, but if evil had a face, it would be his. He would kill animals and then laugh about it. On Thanksgiving, Richard walked into his 11-year-old brother's bedroom, closed the door, and beat him to death with a 24-metal pipe. After he bludgeoned him, he found his grandmother in her room and did the same thing. He then isolated both his mother and father in different rooms and beat them with the same pipe until they were both unrecognizable. After he killed all four of his family members, he took a shower and then crawled into his parents' bed and slept. He later took off in his mom's van and no one found the family until three days later when other family members couldn't contact them. They found him a few days after and since he has been convicted and sentenced to life in prison without parole. I attached the full article to this email. I cannot articulate the true horror of his crimes. Their house has been torn down and their property is vacant to this day. We never did go camping again. Every time we have to go to that part of our back property, it's very short and to the point. Just an eerie feeling, knowing pure and true evil was that close to us. Bless those poor souls lost on that day. I don't normally do this on fireside frights, but this does feel like a special occasion, so here is the article that Samantha attached to her story and I've also included a link to this in the show notes. Myakas Lange's sneak attack took four in family one by one Tampa Bay Times written by Brady Dennis. When he had finished with the killings, 20-year-old Richard Henderson Jr. took a shower, crawled into his parents' bed and spent Thanksgiving night staring at the ceiling, he told investigators. The bodies of his mother, father, brother and grandmother each bludgeoned to death by a metal pipe lay scattered throughout the small house on the quiet dirt road. That evening, Henderson scribbled a note and signed his initials. I knew I did it, but I don't know why. I didn't kill them out of hate, but out of selfishness because I didn't want to die alone. Henderson later told deputies he methodically killed his family members one by one, room by room, because they wouldn't let him leave. He said he was not angry at them, but that after he had killed his brother, he had to kill the others. He said he planned to buy enough drugs or poison to kill himself, the sheriff's reports stated. In his two decades, Henderson had proven himself capable of violence, from bringing a gun to school, to beating his young life and threatening to harm their daughter. But his statements provided no clear-cut motive for the killings. Manatee County Sheriff Charlie Wells on Monday said a six-foot-one, 180-pound Henderson had a troubled relationship with his parents, who had tried in vain to get him help for a drug addiction. There was family tension for a long time, Wells said. Henderson's taped confession provided a chilling account of what happened that night. He told detectives that he sneaked up on his family members one after another and beat them to death with a steel pipe more than two feet long and one and a half inches in diameter. He said he killed his 11-year-old brother Jake in a bedroom as they played video games. Then he went to his grandmother's bedroom, where 82-year-old June Henderson was reading and asked her to fetch something from a drawer. When she bent down, he killed her. He lured his father, 48-year-old Richard Henderson Sr., into the living room to play video games and killed him there. And he beat his 42-year-old mother, Jeanine, as she sat playing poker on a bedroom computer. The next day, according to reports, Henderson checked in to the Gusthaus International Inn near Interstate 75 in Ellington, accompanied by his current girlfriend, Danielle Kelvin. He told her his family was in Missouri for Thanksgiving. They checked out Sunday and Henderson returned to the family home, where he encountered relatives who had grown worried because they had not heard from the Henderson's in a couple of days, according to sheriff's officials. Henderson told them not to go into the house because his parents were fighting, but one relative kicked in a door, saw a body on the floor in the hallway and called 911. Later Sunday, Henderson abandoned a Chevrolet van in nearby Wachula, according to sheriff's reports. Deputies arrested him as he walked along US 301, not far from Ellington. He was wearing dark clothes and a backpack, and was carrying a smoking pipe in his left pocket that had traces of marijuana on it. At first, he told deputies his name was Jason, according to reports. Then he told them his real name. Numerous sheriffs and county court records reveal a long pattern of violence and abuse. In 2001, he was part of a Columbine-style murder-suicide plan that was to have taken place at a local high school, but was foiled by police officials said. Henderson, then 15, was arrested for bringing a gun onto school property. He received five years probation and was ordered to undergo psychiatric treatment. Records show that only months earlier, Henderson had fathered a daughter, Taylor, with a 14-year-old girl named Brittany Wilde. The couple married in Hardy County in July 2004. He was 19, she was 17, but it was hardly a happy union. Before the year was out, Henderson had already been arrested on charges of domestic battery, aggravated battery, and violating a domestic violence injunction that a judge had granted his wife. He also had failed to pay child support for their daughter. Sheriffs' reports say that on different occasions, he slapped his teenage bride in the face, kicked her, punched her in the head, shoved her into cupboards, and broke her phone when she tried to call for help. Then he got a knife and walked over and pointed at me and said, if I say anything, things wouldn't turn out good, Wilde wrote on one court form. In the past, Richard has threatened to kill me and our daughter. In May 2002, Richard broke my nose and I left. Due to these incidents, I'm in fear of mine and my daughter's safety. One domestic violence charge was dropped. On another, Henderson pleaded guilty to a lesser charge and was credited with time served. A judge this year forbade him to see his wife and ordered further psychological evaluation. He also was ordered to complete a batterer's intervention program. Records show he was kicked out of the program in October due to excessive absences. Jeffrey Stringer, Henderson's uncle, told WFTS Channel 28 that Henderson was the family's bad apple. Stringer said Henderson's cold-blooded attack and lack of remorse warrants the death penalty. Even when he was a kid, he'd grab animals out here and rip their legs off and just laugh about it, Stringer said, so he was kind of troubled in the first place. Henderson remained in custody without bail Monday night on four counts of murder. Back at the modest Blue House on 14th Street near the Hardy County line, investigators continued scouring the crime scene, which Manatee County detective Bill Waldron described as extremely gruesome. He said it could take until Wednesday to gather all the evidence. Across the street, neighbor Annette Segura, 60, continued grappling with the tragedy that had descended on this peaceful slice of rural Florida. She knew Henderson's well, respected the hard work they put into their lawn care business, and cherished their backyard chats. I'm still in disbelief, Segura said. You couldn't ask for better neighbors. You could just go there any time you needed something. I can't believe they're gone. Time staff writer Graham Brink and researcher Kathy Woos contributed to this report, which used information from the Associated Press. Wow. It's amazing that Samantha, who sent us this story, had such a completely different look on the family that was living next to them. She doesn't like to use that word evil, but that's the way she saw them. Yet this neighbor over here said you couldn't ask for better neighbors. You could just go there any time you needed something. It's not very often that I get a story from somebody who is that close to a story that I've told. That's intense. Okay, let's move on now. This one comes from Andy. My story happened when I was in high school. I'm hoping you can possibly shed some light on this or maybe one of the other weirdos had a similar experience and can provide something. I don't know what to make of any of it, other than it was definitely a creepy experience that changed my perception indefinitely. Like I said, this happened in high school. I'm 42 years old now and grew up in a small rural community in northwestern Illinois, population 1000 on a good year. This was all pre-internet cell phones and information. When kids actually hung out and did what kids do. The story actually starts with my two friends, Cam and Doug. They were hanging out one night, messing around with a Ouija board and supposedly contacted some spirit that called itself Q. I don't remember the exact details of what they said, but apparently that same night, when they were outside smoking, they looked up at Cam's bedroom window and could see a weird mist leaving or going. Pretty sure they attributed it to candle smoke or weather phenomena, regardless it was a little strange. Some time afterwards at Doug's house, they heard a weird noise outside. They described it like a baby or a child crying mixed with a feline. The even stranger thing was they claimed to hear this thing across the street and then in an instant they'd hear it again across town. And again, just in the back alley. Later that night, they said they heard it right outside the bedroom window. Now, this was all what they told me. I wasn't around for any of it. That same night or within the next few, our small town suffered a tragedy. There was a suicide in town which rocked our community. Again, I don't know if that had anything to do with this thing, but we thought so. And they started to call it the Banshee. That weekend there was a party. It's just what we did back then. Every weekend find a place to party, get drunk or high or both and have a good time. I remember Doug coming up to me towards the end of the night. I was pretty inebriated. I don't think Doug was at all and he says that he wasn't. He told me to be careful. Things were weird and that I should watch out or whatever. I said my goodbyes, told him it's all good and went home. I got home without incident. No weird feelings or eerie premonitions. Just went straight to my room, crawled into bed and tried to pass out. I remember the train tracks going off because a train was going to pass by soon. Out of nowhere I got this eerie feeling and I remember just being scared. I don't know why or what, but at this time I pulled the covers over my head and just then a train started going by. I don't know why I was freaking out, but then I heard it. I heard this got off a whale or cry or scream. It did sound like a baby or child mixed with a feline and it was loud. It sounded like it was literally screaming at me on the other side of my covers. It just kept going, screaming without pause or wavering or needing a breath. I don't remember if the train was gone by this point, but the scream seemed to fade out as if whatever it was doing was backing away from me and through my house and then outside. I hate to admit it, but after a bit I was so freaked out I got out of bed and crawled into my parents' room sleeping on the floor, partially drunk and definitely freaked out. The next morning my dad woke up kicking me, asking me why the hell I was on the floor. I said, uh, never mind and went to my room, not knowing what to say. Later that day I met up with Doug. He was sitting in front of the town library and I was telling him what I experienced the night before. Now up until this point we had not experienced anything together and as if on cue during the day we heard that scream slash screech slash whale as if to let us know it knew that we were talking about it. He looked at me, I looked at him and we asked each other if that was what the other had heard and we both nodded in unison. To this day I still get tingly when I think about it. We never found out what it was. That year it was just a strange year all around. A few other things happened that just don't happen in a small rural town. Maybe you have some insight or one of the other weirdos has had a similar experience. I'd like to know, even after all these years. Well, I don't know, Andy. That's something that I would gather as soon as you said that your friends were playing with a Ouija board. I knew, okay, right then and there, there's the source of your problem. But I have no idea what the child screaming slash feline scream would be. You said they started calling it a banshee. Sounds like a pretty good name for it, too. I mean, the way it's screaming. But I don't know if there are actual real animals that sound that way or if that really is an anomaly. But yeah, you know what, if there are any weirdos listening that have any insight on that, please. Drop me a note at Darren at WeirdDarkness.com and let me know what you think about that. By the way, Darren is spelled D-A-R-R-E-N. Darren at WeirdDarkness.com. Okay, moving on, we go to Jonathan. When I was in my early 20s, I moved in with my girlfriend Meredith, her sister Jessica, and her boyfriend Jason. He was in a wheelchair and quickly turned into my best friend. They converted a single wide trailer to work for his wheelchair. We had a small room, so small we could not put up a door. Plus, we had the washer and dryer in there. Yeah, we lived in the laundry room. Go ahead and judge, but on cold nights, that dryer helped warm the room. I quickly learned that there was a ghost in the trailer. He looked like he was from the 1800s and would never leave the hallway. You could find him watching us sleep, watching TV, or he'd do something to make the dogs run into the hallway and play. He was creepy, but never caused any problem. But then we found a dog in our neighborhood. He was lost and so we took him in. Instantly fell in love with this dog. We already had one, but why not have two? A week went by and we noticed something had changed in the house. Something just fell off. It all started one week when Meredith started having sleeping problems. Some would call it sleep paralysis, but seven nights straight. I don't know about that. She would fall asleep quickly, see herself in bed, and felt something coming towards her just to wake up in a sweat. Thinking that it had been hours, she'd find out it's only been about 15 minutes. On the seventh night she saw hands coming towards her neck, waking up crying with light bruises around her neck. That was the last night we slept in the laundry slash bedroom. From there on, we slept on the couches in the living room. We thought the living room would have been safer. About a week after the move to the living room, Meredith had a lamp knocked off a bookcase towards her, missing her head by inches. I personally had the back of my head touched. Thinking it was Jason, I jumped up to confront him to see that he's across the room. Being in a wheelchair, there was no way he could have been that fast and that quiet. Things kept moving. We all just felt run down and sick. The breaking point came when Jason and I were outside with the dogs one night. We had to stay out there because something was attacking dogs in the area. Look up the Bladenboro Beast or Vampire Beast from Monster Quest Season 2. Meredith was walking down the hall when someone whispered in her ear, Meredith, Meredith. She pushed what she thought was a dog out of the way and ran outside just to see that we had the dogs out there. After this, we all decided to leave for good. After finding a new place to live, we moved. Happy to be gone. Lucky nothing followed us. You might be asking why I said something about finding the dog. Well, we believe something evil attached itself to that dog. Well, something. About a year later, Jessica was chatting online. She ended up chatting to the person who moved in after us. He said him and his young daughter moved in. Then they started to talk about all the weird and terrifying things that happened to them. Daughter started talking to her imaginary friend who only stayed in the hallway. Things moving and a dark shadow following him around the house. He said one day they packed up a couple of things and never returned. Jason and I decided to go back to that trailer one night. No one lived there anymore. We went in and used flashlights to look around. No light ever broke through the shadow that followed us around. We ran out of that trailer so fast and never looked back. Last I heard, they removed the trailer and sold the land. I do not know what we had in that trailer with us. And if I'm going to be honest, I do not want to know. After reading this story, Jonathan, I have to wonder if it's got to be the land. I might be wrong. I don't know much about homes. But do they have trailer homes in the 1800s? I don't know if they did or not. They might have. I don't know. I guess it would depend on when in the 1800s. I could look it up. That would be a computer and I'm in front of a campfire. But I just have a hard time seeing somebody that looked like he was from the 1800s or whatever being in a mobile home, in a trailer like that. So I'm guessing this is just my guess that if there is something dark there, it's the property itself. So they may have removed that trailer, but if something else is built there and somebody decides to move in or if there's a business that's built there, it wouldn't surprise me if they'd experience hauntings as well. Just to guess. Moving on, we've got a story from Ben. Rather than a story, I have an experience, Ben says. One I shared with a close friend and both of us are at a loss of what actually happened. Do you let me know what you think this could be? It's a true story. Even I know I sound absolutely crazy. I'd be skeptical if a friend told me this, but here we go. So myself and a friend had something happen the other day. Left another friend's house about 4am. It's dark. Street lights have just come back on. They get turned off at 1am every day, back on 4am every day to save money. And it's a clear night. A couple clouds in the sky. Looks nice with the moon and all. Anyways, my friend and I are out walking. Just a couple minutes go around the corner of the road. It's a dead end road. One way in, one way out, goes downhill. And in front of us, about 50 meters away, is five people. Two children, what looks like the parents, and an elderly woman. It's a bit odd. A family out at 4am stood under a street light. Not impossible to happen. People are unpredictable. As we get closer, they look really odd now. White shirts, beige trousers, and dresses. Exactly the same colors. Again, not impossible, just odd. Getting closer across the road from them now, and you can see how daunting they look. Black rings around their eyes. They don't look healthy. Sunken faces, etc. Quite creepy now, but even creepier when they just stare, eyes following the whole way. My friend, whose female is clearly terrified, as something really isn't sitting well with them. So we walk on a bit faster. I grab her closer to me just in case anything happens. I'd rather she get away safe. So we carry on for just a few seconds before a stone flies by and hits the pavement in front of us. Made us jump. My friend was even more scared now. I got annoyed, so I turned to confront them and they're gone. They were there, mere seconds before and now completely gone from where they were. There was nowhere to hide that fast. No other ways out of that road. They'd have to run past us to get away. Now we're running down the road, away from where they were. Friends crying, I'm getting tense, I hate dark, and honestly, I was more scared too. So I tell her to hold on to me and stay close and move to a walk as we get further down the road. The road itself takes about 10 minutes to walk down. We are probably 6 minutes in, but looking behind us constantly. We get to the end of the road, turn around again, nothing. But the lights turn off, only for about 20 seconds. And now we're submerged in darkness, except for what we can see at the end of the road by a bus stop. And at that bus stop, we see five people, two children, their parents, and the elderly woman just standing there, staring. We have nowhere else to go now. I've called my friends to see if they're awake, but their phones are dead, so I can't contact anybody. My friend's still scared, and so am I. But I start to get angry, scared, so I march towards them to be like, What are you playing at? The lights turn back on and it makes me jump. I look about, grab my friend, go to head towards them again, and they're gone. I still have their faces and clothing all imprinted in my mind. This was Christmas Day morning, so 4AM Christmas Day. My friend doesn't understand what happened, and I for sure don't. We've tried to talk to friends about it, but they think the darkness just tricked our minds. It's something I can't stop thinking about, and I dream about it. More nightmares and can barely sleep since, but she doesn't like to talk about it, as it's affected her a lot. Any suggestions? Honestly, it sounds crazy, I know, but all I have said is true. I have no explanations, so I have to come to weird darkness for help. I hope this is acceptable content for you, and you can accept my appreciation for everything you do. Well, thanks Ben. I appreciate the story and the nice comments. That is freaky, so it's not man, I don't know what to come up with that, because it's not really a haunted location because you walk 10 minutes away, which is actually quite a distance, and you see them again. So it's not like it's a haunted location, unless that whole stretch of road would be haunted for some strange reason. The only thing that pops into my head, as you mentioned, this is Christmas Day morning. And as joyful and loving as Christmas is for most people, it also happens to be one of those days where people report a lot of hauntings. And so I'm wondering if something happened on that road on a Christmas Day in the past. That's just a pure guess, I have no idea, but that's the only thing that pops into my head. If anybody else has a theory, of course, feel free to email me and we can share it in the podcast. This next story comes from Robbie. This happened a couple years back in high school. It was the last day of school, so after school to start off our summer vacation, my friends and I decided to go play basketball at a local middle school that had a court and exercise area open to the community outside school hours. When we got there, we noticed all the sprinklers were on, not a section of the field, but the entire field all at once. This didn't seem weird to us at the time, so we just started playing. After we'd been playing for about an hour or so, we started to hear drums. Not like someone rehearsing in their garage, but drums in the tempo of a stereotypical ritual. It's got to freak this out a little bit. My friend joked, the next round of zombies must be starting, referencing Call of Duty Zombies, as we all played together frequently. At that moment, the sprinklers, which had all been on the entire hour or so, that we had been there, all shut off and sank back into the ground, all in unison. But we'd had enough at that point. Without needing to say anything to each other, we all immediately ran and hopped over the fence to get away. Due to the fact the school that we were at was built on top of the hill, the other side of the fence wasn't even ground, and I sprained my ankle. All my friends came over to make sure I was okay. At that moment, I heard one of my friends say, guys, what is that? We all looked up to the top of the hill on the sidewalk, and we all saw a woman in a white dress just staring at us. In retrospect, it could have been one of the neighbors that lived around there, but we were so freaked out we didn't stay to find out. Everyone took off running. One of my friends helped me to my feet, and I swear I don't even think I ever ran that fast in my life. Sprained ankle and all. It's a true story that has stuck with me all these years later. Thanks for the story, Robbie. I believe all of that, except I don't think you have to worry about the sprinklers. I think that's just something that naturally happens. All the sprinklers at a location could come on all at once, and then they all turn off at the same time and go back into the ground, and I think that's just the way things are built like that. So I don't think that you'd have to worry about being any paranormal or anything. The drums? I don't know. I'm looking here. You said it was outside of school hours. Did you say that it was a nighttime? Or I would have to hear the drums to know what you're referring to, but if there's a school nearby, then maybe like the marching band was getting started, or maybe the drummer for the marching band was practicing? As for the white lady, who knows? Not a clue. The white lady in the white dress could be a ghost. You're right, you could have been one of the neighbors. But I can understand why all of these things coming together at the same time might have freaked you out a little bit. I could definitely see that. This next story was sent in anonymously. I don't remember exactly when this ever happened, but I've always been drawn to the macabre and true crime stories. This may have come from an upbringing of watching Alfred Hitchcock, the Twilight Zone, and the Outer Limits as a small child, mainly with my mother. I read and continue to read all kinds of stories, and wonder sometimes, as a Christian, how far I should allow myself to delve into these interests. One night, and I was probably somewhere in my 40s, I saw an article about a painting that I think may have been auctioned off at Christie's. The description of the painting was that it had children in it, and the article said they'd been seen coming in and out of the painting. Curious, I began to attempt to Google more information about this painting and to be able to see it. About that time, a strong force came down upon me, almost audible, and said, No! And with that, I did not, nor have I ever attempted to look at that painting. I really believe this was God's hand, warning me to stay away from this. It was very well. It very well could have been. I don't know what the painting would have been. It sounds like it might have been one of those crying child. I think that they're called crying child paintings, and there's a few of them, but they're all supposedly haunted, and I am wondering if maybe that's what you were trying to look up. And even though some people have had the paintings and they say that, you know, weird things have happened to them, I've also heard from people who have looked it up online, and even though they didn't have the painting there with them, just looking at it online kind of gave them the heebie-jeebies, and they've had some weird things happen to them. So I don't know how much truth there is to that, but people have actually emailed me saying that that's actually happened. I remember one specific email saying that. So if that's the case, then, yeah, God very well might have been keeping you from going there, because something may very well have happened to you. Interesting. This next story comes from Todd. It was back in the spring of 1992. A friend of mine named Gary went to prom. Unfortunately, his date had a cold. She was able to stick it out through dinner, but didn't stay for after prom. Gary decided with her blessing to invite me to go celebrate with him. Things went well, and we went back to his parents' house afterward to catch some sleep. Their house was nothing unusual. It was a mid-1940s suburban home, the kind with the garage attached to the basement and a large room on the top of the garage. We decided to wind down in that room because it was the farthest from the bedrooms. After all, we didn't want to wake his parents and spoil the night. We were watching some TV, found our way to a few small bottles of booze. We drank a bit, just enough to relax with. We by no means were drunk. We decided to look at the Ouija board that his cousin had brought over months ago. It wasn't anything special, just a generic one that you could get anywhere board games are sold. We asked if there was anyone there. There was nothing for the longest time. We were about to give up when the planchetta went to hello. Gary asked who it was, and it spelled out G-R-A-N. That was when we knew that it was his late grandma. I didn't know that at the time, he did. I knew Gary couldn't be directing it because he's almost totally blind. She then spelled out that we need to get some sleep, and she was shutting off communication. Gary said he thought I was full of it, and asked if there was a way that she could let him know that this was real, not some joke. It spelled out F-I-N-E, and then went to goodbye. Well, a split second later, we heard what sounded like a full-grown person scratch at a screen. Both of us got a fear charge. I looked in that direction, and by the back door was the screen Gary's father was storing. Gary said, well, I'm done. I said, yeah, I think that's smart. We started to get blankets and lay down. We laid down and again started talking. I guess we were not going fast enough for grand's taste. A plastic cup we used earlier to mix the small amount of booze and soda flew to the ground. I flicked on the lamp. The cup was a sturdy Tupperware style cup, not a flimsy one, so no stray air puff would blow it over. I looked around for it. It used to be on the old console TV in the corner. Now it's 15 feet away on the floor across the room. I said in a loud and clear voice, message received! I clicked off the light. Almost immediately after, I heard Gary fly past me. I tucked under the blanket and wheeled myself to sleep. The next morning, well, four hours later, I found that Gary went to his room and locked the door. An hour later, we ate some breakfast and Gary told his mama about last night. I was told that 10 years earlier, her mother was at the end of her life and they used that room to keep her in as they cared for her. She did pass away in that room. I had no idea about this. Gary mentioned the cup. She said her uncle was a drunk and that made her mom hate alcoholic drinks. She also told us that her mom had very little patience when she was annoyed. Well, there we are, yet another instance in my life where the paranormal was there and in your face. Am I lucky? Am I unlucky? Oh, yes, I'll let you all decide. Well, another Orwisha board story. Just because it was sold in a toy store, if it's just like an ordinary ordinary board, that's not the point. The point is, you're actually opening yourself up to the spirits. You're inviting them. You can do it on a piece of notebook paper with a pencil and other things. Still, it's the invitation that's the danger. It's not the fact that it's well made or not well made. It could be a piece of paper or it can be an elaborate giant desk carved out of one piece of wood in order to make a Orwisha board. It doesn't really matter. The fact is, you're going there and you are inviting spirits to communicate with you. That's where the danger takes place. So don't laugh it off just because it happens to be a toy store Orwisha board or something that you bought online or something like that. No. I'm glad that it wasn't anything other than just the granny, though. That could have been a lot more dangerous. This next story comes from Josel. I've got two stories for you. One was told to me by my aunt when I was younger. So funny because I was around seven years old and that I'd still remember it. And that's what got me interested in the paranormal. So the first story I'm going to call it the little one. I was overspending the weekend with my cousin. Her and I were like sisters. All of us kids, seven in total, were in the kitchen one night while my aunt was cooking dinner. So this was when she had set us all at the table. So she could tell us a story. So eager we all sat down to listen to her tale. My aunt and three of her older children were living in Albuquerque, New Mexico where her family lived. One of the kids was approximately two years old. My aunt had put all the kids to bed one night and the next morning she went into the youngest room to get him up. She noticed that his blanket was missing. She looked all over and couldn't find it. And then that afternoon she was going outside to hang the laundry. And that's when she saw the blanket laying on the ground spread out just nice and as you please. So she picked it up and took it back inside. This kept going on night after night for weeks. The blanket was always in the same place and spread out nice and neat. So she contacted the previous owners of the house. Come to find out they had a beautiful three-year-old daughter that had died in the house, supposedly. A lot of people thought that they had killed her and buried her in the backyard. And so my aunt believed that this was the ghost of the little one. Needless to say, my aunt packed the kids up and left. They never looked back. Story number two is a true-telling special to my heart. It's called The Heavenly Being. A few years ago, I had this beautiful friend which we talked to every day almost. She was a psychic and I'm a sensitive, so are all the females on my side of the family, including my daughters. Anyway, one day I had not heard from her and couldn't get a hold of her. You see, I live in Albuquerque, New Mexico. She is in St. George, Utah. A few days went by and I finally got a hold of her husband. She was in the hospital for cancer. She'd backslid. I had no idea she even had cancer, so I told him that I'd pray for her. That is my intuitive part. I pray for healing, guidance, and protection. I ask for our Heavenly Father to guide the angels to help. So I started my prayer and finished with Amen. I have to put her name in the prayer, and during this time I get feeling of butterflies and I feel all warm inside. About a week later, she was able to go home. We started our talking back and forth. I told her that I'd sat down on that Saturday before she came home when I had heard about what had happened. She was absolutely flamborgasted. She asked me what time, so I told her the time I did this. She said, you won't believe this, but at that very time she saw a heavenly being, an angel. She could not believe her eyes. I could just see her smile from ear to ear. After that she was always asking for prayers, and on her YouTube I would have people messaging me, asking that I'd pray for someone or themselves. I feel and felt so blessed. About 10 months after she finally passed away because of her cancer. Sad, but I feel blessed to have known her and had her as a dear, dear friend. Wow, Jozo. You know what, I'll take those prayers anytime you want to send them my way. This next one comes from Fantasia. Hello, Darren. My name is Fantasia, and I'm from a small area near Peoria, Illinois. I'm a pretty new listener, but I'm really glad I found your show. Not only does it get me through my work day, but I feel that this is the perfect audience to share my stories with. Yes, I did say stories, as in multiple. For now, I'll only share one, but for some reason in my life I've always been really connected to weird paranormal activity. If you ask anyone in my family, they'll tell you that weird things seem to always happen around me. When I was about 12 years old, I remember going to sleep on the floor with my little sister who I shared a room with. Sometimes, as kids, we just felt that it was more adventurous to sleep on the floor than our beds. But that night, as I drifted off to sleep, I had no idea that I was about to have a dream that I would never forget. I was at some sort of family cookout or event where there were brats and hamburgers and a little pavilion with lots of people I felt safe around. I was playing with two boys who seemed to be a little bit older than me. One was a more heavy-set white boy. The other was a very tall, skinny African American boy. This is a very important detail for later. Although I knew that I was younger than those boys, I was really enjoying playing with them and I remember that I was trying to teach them how to do a cartwheel. Well, just as these boys started getting the hang of what I was teaching them, an older man who had white hair and glasses was sort of heavy-set walked up to us. He began speaking to the African American boy and handed him a pocket watch. He said, This is from your grandmother and she really wanted you to have it. The boy seemed really concerned as the older gentleman walked away. He stuffed the watch in his pocket and looked at me very seriously. He said, Now it's my turn to teach you something. He walked me over to a pool that I don't believe was there previously and told me that he was going to teach me how to swim. We swam around in the pool having fun and splashing each other like we'd been best friends all our lives. I don't remember too much more of this dream before I was abruptly woken up by my alarm for school. As I woke up, I felt a terrible sadness in my heart. I felt as if I had just lost my best friend and I even told this to my little sister, but at the time she obviously didn't understand how real this feeling was. It was so overwhelming that I even felt the urge to tell my mom about this dream that I had. This wasn't out of the ordinary as my mom and I have always shared our strange dreams with one another. As I explained this odd dream to my mom, she seems to get continuously more upset or shocked by the words that are coming out of my mouth. When I was done, I asked her if there was something wrong. She began crying and repeatedly saying, There's no way. There's no way. I pressed for details and she explained that today was the death anniversary of one of her friends who had passed away in high school. Not only did I describe him perfectly as a child, but the way he died was even more terrifying. He drowned. For privacy reasons of the family, I'll just say that the boy's name was Oliver. My mom had been friends with this boy for a really long time and he was raised by his two grandparents who were white. My mother said that the older man who I described was exactly what his grandfather had looked like. The details of how Oliver died were apparently a little bit suspicious, but either way, he had been out with a group of friends partying on a boat when he fell off and drowned. This was so tragic because not only was he so young, but he was one of the star football players and was loved by everyone. As my mom was telling me this, the feeling of sadness in my heart only grew. He was trying to tell me something, but why and what? I never really found the answers to those questions, but ever since that night, I have gone to his grave when I'm in the area, just to say hello and let him know that I got his message. As I grow older, this dream has never faded from my mind, and I feel that it's almost as vivid as the day that I had it. Oliver was trying to tell me something, and I don't think I'll ever stop trying to figure it out. That is an amazing story. Thank you for sharing that, Fantasia. That is incredible. I wasn't exactly sure where you're going there because I've had dreams that seemed so real that when I'd wake up, I felt like there was a loss of the people that I'd met in that dream, but to then, after that, have it confirmed that those were real people that you were dreaming about, people that you had never met, it would have no reason to know. That's just incredible. Okay, this next story comes from John. My wife, Mary, and I started out without much money to our names, and so we did as much as we could on the cheap, including our honeymoon. We didn't have Hawaii money, or Cancun money, or even Detroit money, but we did have a stay at my cousin's summer house on Bull Shoals Lake in Arkansas for free money. We made the drive from West Michigan in two days, arriving in northern Arkansas late in the evening. The unfamiliar gravel road stretched out of sight beyond the reach of my headlights into a thistle blackness. The rare streetlight showed up periodically along the deserted, traffic-free country highway just to remind us that there was still something faintly resembling civilization, a comfort to this city boy. We didn't have smartphones at this time, just a printed Yahoo map with a list of turns and mileages. I grew increasingly uncomfortable as this drive seemed to take forever, but a week in a remote, scenic, isolated area with my new bride kept me going. Finally, we pulled up to the address of the cottage, more than five miles from the last driveway we passed. Sheesh, this was literally the middle of nowhere. I left the car running to unlock the swinging gate into the property, but none of the keys my cousin provided worked. Great. I had no signal on my Nokia brick phone, so I couldn't call him and see if there was a spare somewhere. I got out my ratchet set and just took the gate off the hinges by the light of my high beams so I could get my car off the road and up next to the house. To my relief, there was one key that did open the house. As we unpacked the car and prepared to rest after an exhausting day on the road, I heard the sound of coyotes howling. Shuttering, I cursed this crazy countryside world into which I was now intruding. I moved a bit faster and hustled to get everything inside. I had reassembled the gate in the morning, I guess. After unpacking and settling in, the clouds had cleared a bit and we stepped out onto the deck, staring in awe at the star-scattered night sky, something I had never seen before, being a city boy my whole life. Suddenly, the light in the kitchen flickered on for a few seconds and then immediately turned off. I looked at Mary and shrugged, but we both thought that was weird. It didn't seem like that's something a timer or a motion light would do. Anyway, we went to bed and the next day we enjoyed a hike and some other outdoor activities. The lake sparkled in the sunshine as we kayaked around. Just as we returned to shore, it started to rain. We settled into the living room, lit a fire in the wood-burning stove, turned a movie on. As the movie played, the smell of burning sulfur hit our noses at the same time. What is that, we wondered to each other, mystified. Mary went into the kitchen to check on the gas oven. I went to the basement to inspect the furnace. I'll interject here to mention that this house was only about five years old, built with contemporary decor and all the modern conveniences, so it didn't fit the profile of some drafty, clapboard country hunting shack. It was a nice place. Anyway, just as suddenly as the smell of brimstone arose, it dissipated just as quickly. Okay, that's weird, I mentioned, because between that, the coyotes and the lights turning on and off, the place began to seem less and less welcoming. That night as we lay down to sleep, we both heard it. Clump. Clump. Clump. It was the heavy, thudding sound of boots slowly and deliberately ascending the creaking wooden steps up to the second level. There was a pair of bedrooms and a bathroom that we snooped in on, but didn't plan to mess around with while we stayed. I was frozen with fright, having never experienced anything like that before. I also felt a backup feeling of rage just in case the stair climber wasn't some phantom entity, because why would my cousin be here on our honeymoon? Mary nudged me, saying, go up there and see who that is. I grabbed a poker from next to the wood stove, determined to deliver a fatal braining to whoever or whatever was disrupting our honeymoon. I got to the top of the stairs, opened the doors to the bedrooms, the bathroom and the hallway linen closet to find nothing. I returned to the bedroom, no less scared, but still relieved that I didn't hear it anymore and that I didn't have to kill anyone. The next night, same situation. We were readying for bed when I heard a quick, insistent knock knock at the entry door. What now, I exclaimed. I walked down on the darkened hallway toward the entry door. The light from the outside fixture came through the curtains in the window, casting a diamond shape on the dark wall. There was of course no one standing at the door. I approached the door with my firepoker in hand, straining to see if there was anybody outside on the lawn in the darkness. Suddenly the door knob began to shake violently as if some unseen person was desperately trying to get in. Nobody appeared in the window. Stunned, I watched the door knob rattle in place until I caught my senses and backed away to the bedroom. I tried to look out the bedroom window to see if there was anyone out there desperately hoping that it was a person, someone I could tell to get the hell out or at least call the cops on. By this time we had our fill of this place and we determined that in the morning we would leave, having stayed two days of the ten we were planning for. I spent the next couple hours cleaning up and packing. Exhausted from fear and frustration with this situation, my heart pounding, I laid down next to Mary to just crash and get some rest before we headed back north. I glanced over at her, knowing she was asleep, just to see her face in the moonlight through the window. I was horrified to see her face grotesquely twisted into a monstrous, demonic visage. A frowning, evil, contorted expression glared back at me. The scream I let out woke Mary from her slumber and with her panicked questions of what was wrong, my mind raced to determine if and how I would tell her what I had just seen. As she stared at me, the contortions faded and her naturally beautiful countenance returned. We left before the sun came up, determined to go as far as we could out of the area to the nearest hotel. I shared this story with my cousin who was stunned to hear it and had never heard of anything remotely resembling what had occurred on our haunted honeymoon. That definitely is a strange one, John, because you're saying that the cabin is new, so it sounds to be like the cabin being new as it was your cousin's place, so he was probably the one that built it or had it built, so it's probably not haunted. You have to wonder about the area, but then again, he's been there quite often and has never had anything. Who knows. Makes you wonder if maybe you brought something with you. What did you do or what did your girlfriend do or was it your bride? The girl that was with you. What did either one of you do something that, you know, like play with a Ouija board, go to a seance, something like that? Did any, either of you do that before going on this honeymoon? That's right, you're bride, okay. I don't know. Anyway, that's, okay. I hate not having really anything to say after these. You know, I try to give my opinion, but I am so ignorant when it comes to some of this stuff. I love telling the stories, but I am not a paranormal investigator. I'm not an expert in this, and so most of these stories leave me just as flabbergasted and in shock as they do to the people that write them. All right, this next story, let me get a drink here real quick. Okay, this next story comes from Kevin. He calls it, So the Planet Hollywood Resort and Casino May Be Haunted. I travel a bit for work, and I've stayed in lots of hotels, and I try to stay in hotels that are presumed haunted. The Manger Hotel in San Antonio being my favorite, and in my book confirmed haunted, but that's a story for another time. So this time I had a quick in and out job to go to field measurements in Las Vegas at another hotel lobby. No big deal. However, that hotel that I was working on was booked. So the Planet Hollywood wasn't, and it was across the street. Plus, it was cheap. So I decided to stay there on this trip. At the time, I didn't know anything about the history. No night ghost hunting, no town ghost tours, just in and out. The last time I'm in Vegas, all the better. So I check in, go to the room, nice room, comfortable bed, very clean, modern. Not my style, but whatever. Overall, I would stay there again. So settle in, drop stuff, and head over to the job site to take measurements. So far, pretty normal and boring. Get done, get dinner, grab some snacks for the night. Have a very early flight, so no partying, and they have the good stations for movie time. So I'm in the room, sitting watching some Olympics when I hear what sounds like someone putting the key card in the slot, followed by trying the handle. Auto locks when you close the door, plus I put the dead latch on as well. It moved three times, then stops. I don't hear anything else, and go back to watching TV, figuring somebody came to the wrong door very commonly. So about 15 minutes go by, and I hear the same thing again, but this time a bit harder. And when I hear what I think is whispering outside the door, I can't hear what they're saying, but I can imagine. They try again, and this time really hard, and then nothing. Now it's at the point I'm a bit nervous, but again, not a hotel rookie, and it happens a lot, so the Olympics is way more important. About another 15 minutes or so go by, and I hear it again, but softer, and almost like they're trying to sneak it open, but it still doesn't open. I also hear whispers, but I can't make it out. This time I go up to the door to see if I can see out, but no peephole. And then I see the handle move a little, and then back up. It does it again, and again. It's not moving much, because it's locked, but still enough where I'm a bit weirded out. So this time I yell out, this room is taken! Half thinking that I'd get a response of, sorry, or hey, this is our room, etc. However, nothing, and at this point I realize I can't hear them leaving. But all day I can hear the footsteps of everyone else walking and talking as they pass by my room. So at that point I go over to the bed and sit down, thinking about the end of that, and either they'll bring a manager or we'll sort it out. A couple hours go by, and now it's late. Not sure about the time, but big trouble in Little China is on, so I don't care. It's an awesome movie that deserves my complete attention. And then I hear it again. The key goes in the slot, and the handle turns. I get mad and rush the door, half expecting some drunk idiots trying to get into the room, and when I open it, nothing. I look both ways down the hall. Nothing. However, I hear whispering. I walk in that direction and turn the corner, and there's nothing there. Now I get that tingle in my spine that I like when I have encounters or weird stuff happen. I go back to my room, and as I'm in front of the door, I hear whispers again coming from behind me. I turn and look. At nothing. I get inside and close the door, and as I walked away from the door, I heard it again. Card in slot, and the handle turns. At this point, I was a bit unnerved, but if the Manger and Coronado taught me anything, it turned that into some fun. Unfortunately, I don't have gear except my cell phone, which isn't really going to help, but I didn't want to know what the deal was. Jump on that good ol' Google and look it up. Turns out Planet Hollywood used to be the Aladdin, and then something before that. A couple of people died here, and the more I look, the more I realized I might be on the side that had a couple of deaths, as well as some other stuff happen. Well, that made this trip a whole lot better, so busted out the cell phone recorder and tried to get the door or whisper either on camera or sound recording, which I'll upload or see if I hear or anything if it looks juicy enough to do so. So the door did it a few more times over the night, and the whispers keep going throughout the night, and before you say the whispers or other people, there is a very distinct difference between what I was hearing and what it sounds like when the living walked down the hall, plus you can hear and feel them walking. So the final thing that happened was I was in bed later, and the wall that separated the bed area from the bathroom sounded like something being dragged across the floor. Then it sounded like the bathroom tub was running. I went into the bathroom and nothing was running. I sat back in the bed, and this time it sounded like it was coming from the wall, not the bathroom. It happened twice and then stopped. After I left the hotel, I felt a little sad. A boring night turned into a hair-raising good time. Oh, and no, it doesn't make Las Vegas any better. However, the hotel was good, and the beds were comfortable, which I like. One of the few emails I get from somebody saying they actually like it when stuff like this happens to them. Okay, Kevin, you are definitely a weirdo. This next one comes from Jen. She calls it my aunt's house. The experience occurred when I was a 17-year-old student, and I had been drafted in to help my newly divorced aunt over the summer holidays. My aunt had recently become a single parent and had relocated to a new area. The house was an old Victorian-style terrace, which needed lots of work, but had plenty enough room for the family and was in my aunt's budget. As soon as I walked into the entryway of the property, it felt very unwelcoming. There was a long and dark corridor which peered off to the living area and cellar, basement, and it was oppressive and cold. Straight away, I had noticed the picture of the Sacred Heart, which sat at the top of the stairs. My Irish grandmother had visited the previous month and had expressed reservations about the house. Apparently, she had felt the need to hang a picture of the Sacred Heart up in the home. The picture had initially been in the entryway, but had kept coming off the wall. Once it was moved to the top of the stairs, it just stayed in place. I tried to settle in as best I could, but one of the first things I noticed was the strange behavior of the family dog, Lassie. Lassie had never been a timid dog, but she wouldn't stay in any room on her own. She would follow whoever around the house and even wouldn't eat alone in the kitchen. Someone needed to sit with her, and she point blank refused to go into the cellar. She would just sit at the top of the stairs whilst we had to go down to bring supplies up. Her sleeping arrangement was also odd, because she refused to sleep in her basket downstairs. Instead, she slept upstairs outside my aunt's bedroom, something she had never done before or has ever done since. My first night there, and I was woken up at 2.30 am with the need to go to the toilet, I'm about to get out of bed, but I can sense that there is the dog right beside me. I couldn't see anything, but I had the strongest feeling that there was the dog there. I automatically presumed that it was Lassie, so I moved to the other side and carefully tiptoed out of the room. As I entered the corridor, I was immediately greeted by Lassie, who was fast asleep outside my aunt's room. I looked back through the light of the hallway, there was no dog in the room. I just brushed this off as tiredness and wasn't too phased about it. That is, until the next day, when I told my mom and she said that she had also experienced that when she had stayed. Just the strongest feeling that there was a dog, but nothing was there when you looked. It was the second night in the house where things started to completely change. I was woken up by my bladder at the same time, but this time there was no sensation of the dog being there. Instead, I looked up and saw three figures at the end of my bed. I used the term figures loosely because they had absolutely no features or human-like structure. They were completely made up of golden orbs. They were different sizes and shapes and were motionless. I'm a scaredy cat, but I generally was not scared in any way. I was initially curious, firstly thinking that it was a trick of the light, and I moved the curtains to see if any light was coming in. Then I thought I was dreaming, so I pinched myself a few times and they were still there. I closed my eyes and opened them again. They were still there. It wasn't until I turned the light on that they vanished. At the time, I put it down to my imagination when I went back to sleep. That is, until it happened the next night. And the next night. I even changed beds with my cousin by pretending that it'd be better for my back, but I could still see them. It got to the point where I knew that they were there as soon as I woke up, and there they were. It was several years later before I spoke to my cousin about it. I never told her because I knew that she had to sleep alone in that room, but I did bring it up when I knew that she was not living there anymore. I asked if she ever saw anything in her room, to which she probably said, oh, you mean the angels? She went on to describe exactly what I had seen, and how they also made her feel safe in that house. So was it an angel or something with a reasonable explanation that can be explained by science? I prefer to believe in the former, but I also stay open to the fact that it might be explained in the future. I would love to hear any of the viewers-slash-fans opinions about what I actually saw. That is a good question, Jen. At first, I thought maybe aliens, like the alien abduction situation where you were actually seeing them come into the room, and you said that your cousin saw them as well, which might go along with that as well. Although the alien stories I hear are usually just one person, not several in the same household. But that golden light? I don't know. I really don't know. The biblical description of angels, I mean, they're terrifying. They're not really the bright, shiny golden angels with wings that we get in movies and TV shows and stuff like that. I mean, they're described with like 10 eyes and two different, two or three different faces and multiple appendages. So I don't know. I really don't know. There might be, I might be, I mean, because they also can appear, angels can appear in various ways. So, I mean, the Bible even says, you know, that you might be entertaining an angel unaware just by helping somebody on the street, somebody you've never met before. So those could be angels. I really don't know. I'd love to hear other people's opinions on that one. This next story comes from Carly, and she calls her story Susie. When I was a kid, my father bought a plot of land with a trailer and an addition built onto it and several outbuildings in Wyoming. We had a trailer and put it on the addition of the other trailer. The yard was full of appliances torn apart and just trash everywhere. This place took a year of hard work to clean up. My dad basically dug a massive hole and buried everything. Once things calmed down and life got into a rhythm, about a year and a half after moving in, we ended up buying a new trailer and tearing down the old one and selling the other trailer that we had brought with us. Once that was put in, I had my own room and lots of space. It was a horse farm in Wyoming. After we got the new trailer in, I met an imaginary friend. Or at least everybody said that was what it was anyway. She had long gray hair, always in a braid, and she wore dark, long skirts and long-sleeved, usually dark shirts. She was my only friend. At the time, my stepmom was abusing me physically, emotionally and mentally. In those times, she would sit with me holding my hand, rubbing my back or playing with my hair as that always combed me down. We always were together and my sisters always made fun of me for it. It never occurred to me that she could have been a spirit. Even when I moved out of my father's and into my mom's and she told me that she can't go with me and wouldn't probably never see me again, not until I was old enough to realize what spirits were, I still wonder if Susie lives on that farm. I wonder if she's okay. From Maria, I'm writing to you from Sweden. This is indeed a true story told to me by my grandmother when I was a child. It fascinated and frightened me and then, back then, and it still does. It took place in Sweden, in the countryside outside of a town called Javle, when my grandmother was she herself a child, which dates these occurrences to the early 1920s since she was born in 1914. She lived with her mother, her siblings and her uncle in a two-story wooden house by the side of a country road. On the other side, there was an old abandoned smithy, dilapidated, dark and silent, except for on the night of New Year's Eve. My grandmother had a particularly vivid memory of one such New Year's Eve. She was taken from her bed in the middle of the night and carried down from the second floor to the kitchen. There, the whole family gathered in silence. They listened outwards, their attention focused on the smithy, preparing for what was to come next. After some time, there were clearly noises starting to emerge from the darkness of the smithy. It sounded like somebody heavy was moving about inside, throwing things around and slamming doors. Finally, they could hear someone rush out and run from the building. My grandmother specifically remembers the steps being very heavy, like there was a person of considerable weight making them and running with great effort. The steps could be heard crossing the smithy's yard, crossing the road and continuing into their own yard quickly approaching the house. Her family members braced themselves as the steps continued up the stairs to their porch. Suddenly, the steps were heard on the inside of their front door, which was still locked and bolted. This someone was now apparently inside their house and ran noisily up the stairs to the second floor. Finally, there was a crash, shaking the foundations of the house, like somebody was tearing it down, according to my grandmother. After that, silence. It was over. The uncle took a lantern outside and let the light sweep over the yard. There was nothing. No footprints in the snow, the smithy was dark and silent. Everything was back to normal as if nothing had happened. This event repeated itself every New Year's Eve. It was never an explanation. I'm not sure they even told anybody outside the family. It was as if they just accepted these events as facts of life and simply prepared for them and endured them. It stopped, however, but only when the abandoned smithy was demolished. Okay, so what the heck is a smithy? That's what I need to know now. I gotta look at it. Let me grab my phone here. I gotta find out what a smithy is. Smithy. Let's type it to Google. Let's see here. What is a smithy? A smithy is a Blacksmith's Workshop. A forage. My grandfather recently passed away August 22, 2019, on his birthday. The night before he passed, my parents got a call from my uncle saying, Kim, you need to come see dad. He's not going to make it through the night. So my mother and father got ready and rushed quickly to go see him. I had to stay home and watch my sister. I stayed up till my parents got home around 1 a.m., so when my parents got to my uncle's house, him, my aunt, and my parents gathered around in the room where he was and spent the last final moments with my grandfather. At 12 a.m., they all sang happy birthday to him. He was really happy and quietly saying happy birthday as he had trouble breathing. So I got a call from my parents while they were on their way home and told me that I can go to bed as they were right down the road. So I went to bed, and of course I fell asleep before I could talk to them. This is a weird but cool part of the story that I hold dear to my heart. As I fall into a deep sleep, I start dreaming. The dream started in the room where my grandfather was in. I was at his bedside looking down at him, and he was sleeping. I remember what he was wearing, and his face looked as clear as day to me. He was wearing a white t-shirt and pajama pants. He was also wearing his wooden cross necklace that was handmade just for him. His face was pale, and he had his mouth open as he was sleeping. Next, a white mist appeared, and my grandfather was standing next to me, holding my hand. And then I saw silver gates appear. They were covered in roses, and had light coming from the inside. Well, the gates opened, and I saw an angel appear out of the light in white mist. It was my grandmother, his wife. She passed away 13 years ago. Me and her were so close, too. She looked so beautiful with her angel wings. So anyway, my grandmother was waving on and telling my grandfather to come. He let go of my hand, kissed my cheek, and walked to my grandmother and grabbed her hand. As they were walking through the gate, they looked back and smiled at me. And then the gates closed, and that's when my mom woke me up saying that my grandfather passed away early this morning. I got up and got ready to go to my uncles, where my grandfather was, to pay our last respects. It took me a while to go see him, because I already knew how he looked and everything, and I was really upset. So towards the end, we were about to leave, and I gave in and went to see him. As I walked in, I saw my grandfather laying there, lifeless. I turned to my aunt and mom, and I told them, and I quote, I had a dream last night about him, and that's how he looked in my dream. Everything that happened in the dream came to reality, as me, my parents, aunt and uncle sat down and talked about it. My aunt and uncle told me, and I quote, my mayor came to see the pair last night to take him with her back to heaven, so they could finally be together again. They also saw her shadow in the nightlight that they left on for my grandfather. She was walking back and forth in the hallway, too. Everything added up, and then I realized both my grandmother and grandfather came to see me that night, not only to say goodbye, but so I can help him get to heaven to be with my grandmother again. I told myself every day as I pray that it was not a goodbye, it was a see you later. This next story comes from Danielle. A couple of things come to mind when looking back at my own life. This was just a moment, but it stuck with me. This happened at my first apartment when I was 19. It had a large and closed porch as its main entrance that I like to spend my recreational time in. One night, my roommates were off, minding their own, and I decided to call my mother. I perched near a window in the dark porch. I can't recall if I chose the dark or if there was even a light to begin with. Anyway, halfway into our conversation, a strange static cut in. It was the freakiest thing ever. There were these voices marbled in with the static. Multiple voices were chanting something that I couldn't make out, and in all honesty, they just didn't sound human. I don't know if it was just the strange shock of it, but it felt sinister. It must have only lasted 30 seconds, and then the call rerouted back to my mother. I was terrified. Did you hear that, I asked her? But she hadn't heard it. I was tearing up, paralyzed with fear and in the dark. My mom was perplexed by my hysterical recap of the incident and stayed on the phone with me until I calmed down. I hung up and raced back into the house. My next encounter was utterly bizarre. I was 22 at the time, and worked until one or two in the morning bartending. The trek home was heavily wooded. One night, a teen or young adult male nearly jumped out in front of my jeep. He had something like a briefcase in his hand. I was fairly certain he was trying to flag me down, but being that it was 2.30 am, I was not about to stop. Don't worry, I pulled over as soon as I got cell service and called the police to have them go and check on him. There were no houses around, and I hadn't clocked a car on the side of the road. What was he doing in the woods? And why was he distressed? I never did find out. Hope he's alright. However, that was not where my strange night ended. For context, my home was down a steep driveway with a neighbor to the left. It was a woodsy area as well. When I pulled into the driveway, I could see what looked like those baseball field lights. You know, the row of four round lights atop a row of five round lights? Well, the lights were green, and this, let's call it a UFO, was hovering over the neighbor's property facing my direction. I only saw this UFO for a quick second before losing it behind the trees as I descended the driveway. I stated my jeep for ten minutes or so thereafter. I texted my sister. If I got missing, aliens abducted me. My logic was that if the aliens were with such intent, they probably had the technology to intercept my text. I thought maybe that would deter them from taking me. Yeah, so that sounds crazy, which is why I rarely tell that story, but it happened. And we have one final story from Brandy. I always like to do a long one, here's my last story, let me get a sip here real quick, and we'll go into it. By the way, I'm drinking some really disgusting water tonight. I won't mention the brand name because I don't want to talk bad about anybody. If it was really good, I'd tell you what it is, but it's just a sparkling water in a can, and it tastes like watered down fresca. Yuck. Okay, anyway. Okay, so this one, this final story comes from Brandy, and she calls it, I stood up to evil. I was dreaming. It was a happy dream, a dream that most likely brought a smile on my sleeping face in the night and filled my heart with the warm, cozy feeling. I remember the dream with an uncanny clarity, like it was a cheesy romance movie playing through in my mind. My boyfriend, joyful yet anxious, was trying to find the perfect ring to propose. He employed the help of his mother and the jeweler as they picked up each ring individually, inspecting each with a careful eye. I thought myself smiling as I watched from a distance, unbeknownst to them. At last, after dozens of rings, he found the perfect one. It was large and classy, and simple, and beautiful, and expensive. The soft light of the jewelry store flickered in the diamond as if it was the brightest star in the darkest sky. He thrusted into the air, declaring, this is the one, this is the ring. He let loose tears of joy, as did his mother, as he held the ring, imagining the rest of his life with me. The dream shifted away from the jewelry store to a scenic green meadow, one which we have spent a lot of time at together. Going on picnics for lunch, evening camping trips, and warm afternoon strolls. When the sun began to set, the sky turned purple and orange and pink and yellow, all mingled together to create a sky no painter could ever capture. He knelt on one knee before me, holding out the ring in one hand and hope, filling his face. He asked the singular question that would change our lives forever, will you marry me, he whispered softly. Unable to speak out of overwhelming happiness, I nodded my head vigorously, holding back my own tears of joy. Yes, I was finally able to happily mutter. He placed the ring on my face. I woke, with a sudden start, violently wrenched from the pleasantness of the meadow, of the sunset, of the proposal, and was brought back to the darkness of my own dark, lonely bedroom. When I opened my eyes, something felt wrong, but I just couldn't place my finger on it. My room, it felt off, as if I were staring at my bedroom from another dimension, or through a veil from another world. I felt disoriented, but I knew that I was awake. I knew that I was in my bedroom. As I lied on my belly, facing the far wall, I could see light from the night light, reflecting off picture frames which hang on the wall. I could hear the heater kick on, and warm air fill the room. I could feel the silky softness of my bedsheets on my skin, and the weight of my head resting on the pillows. I could see my hand, as it rested near my face, and my fingers twitch. I tried to move them, yet I couldn't. I see them, but I can't move them. I could hear the tick, tick, tick of my clock coming from the next room. I could feel the warm body of my dog next to my leg. I felt him breathing, and I could hear him snore. My mind tried to figure out what was wrong. This was my bedroom, but at the same time, it wasn't. Something was wrong. I tried to move my hand, which still rested where I could plainly see it, but still, it wouldn't move. I couldn't I move? My heart began to race. The beats pounded in my ear, loud and forceful, growing faster with each second. Again, I tried to move, but my body wouldn't obey. My hands, arms, legs, and feet are completely frozen. I can't even move my head to look around the room. Only my eyes are able to move, and my scope of vision was limited to only one side of the room. Panic was beginning to set in, and with it came the fast and heavy breathing. I hear my breath in and out, in and out, in and out, growing ever faster to match the rate of uncontrollable heartbeats. This doesn't make sense, I told myself. I closed my eyes, hoping that when I opened them again, everything would go back to normal. The things did not go back to normal when I closed my eyes. Instead, a new emotion emerges. My hair stands on end, covering the entirety of my body with goose flesh. I felt a gaze on me. I felt something laying its eyes on me, but I didn't know who or what it was. I felt it in the room with me, filling the air with something evil and malevolent. I was too afraid to open my eyes. I didn't want to see it. I didn't want to know what it found its way to the darkness of my bedroom. I didn't want to see it. I needed to see it. I opened my eyes, slowly and carefully, more afraid in that moment than I had ever been in my life. Heart pounding, breathing rapid and shaking with fearful anticipation. I saw it. It stood against the wall. At first, it was nothing but a pure black shadow in the shape of a man, but it soon morphed into its true form right before my eyes. It did not stand on the floor across from me. No. It hovered, unmoving. It did not have legs, or maybe it did, but they were covered with a black, raggedy robe which had been torn to shreds. In its right hand, it held a staff which spans the length of the wall from floor to ceiling, on top of which set a mass of morphing black clouds. And its face, my gaze locked on its face. It was smiling, a malevolent smile, but it had no lips or cheeks. How could it smile with no lips or cheeks? It had no bottom jaw and its tongue fell loose, hanging there like a necklace. The skin was not skin, but rather a thin cover of a black, oil-like substance. Its head, shaped like that of a dead carrion bird, a long pointed beak, half skin, half skull. Its eyes were empty, black sockets, staring blankly at me. Seconds passed as we stared at each other. I tried to move to get up to do anything, but I couldn't. I couldn't even look away from the figure in black. My gaze was permanently fixed. It let out an ear-splitting screech and then lurched forward. It flew towards me, flying across the room with an eerie grace. I heard loud, organized crashes and rapid succession. Boom! Boom! Boom! As it got closer, it was the creature's footfalls, but that's not possible. It had been floating. The booming footfalls got louder and stronger as it got closer. With each footfall, the floor shook, the bed shook, the room shook. I watched it in stunned silence, fearfully awaiting my fate as it approached. Time slowed somehow, as if the creature wanted to draw out the fear to prolong the dread and assert its dominance. As the rest of the world slept soundly in their beds, I sat paralyzed, watching what could only be death approach. Was it going to take me? Was this the last thing I was ever going to see? Was this creature going to drag me to hell? What did it want? What was it going to do? My eyes wide, I watched as it came upon me. The boom, boom, boom of its footfalls stopped abruptly. It stood above me, looking down on me with a hideous, disgusting face. It has completely submerged me in its fear and evil. I wanted to scream. I wanted to fight. I wanted to run away. I wanted to do anything, anything at all, except lie there and wait and wonder and endure. But I couldn't move. All I could do was watch. I mentally prepared for the pain it surely intended to bring as I look up at its empty features and harrowing presence. It stood above me, looking down on me as if it had power and rule over me. Its bird-like head tilted from side to side as if in contemplation, as if it was trying to decide the best way to dispose of me. Slowly it mounted the bed, never looking away from me. It crawled on top of me, and I felt its weight on my body. I felt the depression and heard the creak of the mattress as weight was added. It straddled my body. I could feel its coldness and its wickedness on top of me. I shivered violently underneath it. I was breathing even harder and faster. My heart working overtime had found the strength to beat with more veracity. Straddling me, it leaned down. The loose tongue brushed the skin of my neck and ear. It was slick and slimy, and set my nerves afire with a mystical sensation. It whispered something into my ear, its voice breathy and distant, and then again licked the skin of my lobe. I need to get away. How do I get away? I can't let it take me. Panic was growing inside me. I tried to move. I tried and tried. My body would not obey. The creature continued to caress my ear with its tongue. I wanted to cry out and scream for help, but I was silent, forced to endure its terrible touch. No! I won't let it take me! Courage and anger began to rise from somewhere deep inside me. I couldn't move. I was completely paralyzed. Maybe I could talk, could scream. I had to try. I was not going to let this monstrosity take me. I tested the limits of my voice and managed nothing more than a whispered mumble. It licked my neck. I tried my voice again, mustering more strength behind it. Still, it was only a mumble. I had to keep trying. The creature's loose tongue found its way to my cheek. One more time. F off! The words left my lips. They were strong and discernible. The creature recoiled as if shocked by my defiance. F off! I shouted as loud as I could. The creature, as soon as the last words left my lips, disappeared. Just like that, into thin air. The heavy, creepy feeling in my room went with it. I was no longer disoriented. I could finally move. I sat up in bed with a jolt, trying to understand what had just happened. I inspected my neck and ear with a loose tongue caressed. The skin was damp. Surely this wasn't real. This couldn't have happened, could it? No, I told myself. That wasn't real. But the moisture that came away on my fingertips after touching my neck argued otherwise. I sat on my bed in disbelief, willing my breathing to slow and my heart to calm. I looked down at my little dog, who was still sound asleep. No, I whispered to myself. He's still asleep. If that thing was real, he would have woken up and tried to protect me. Right? The clock continued to tick in the other room. My dog's warm little body was still pressed up against me. I could still hear his snoring. My dark bedroom was again my own. I got up out of bed and quickly turned on every light in the apartment. I checked every room, every closet, and every space big enough to accommodate a grown man. I was alone in the apartment. There's nobody here. I could still feel the dampness on my neck left by the creature's tongue. There's nobody here. I was alone. I hope. Even if it wasn't real, I learned something about myself. In those moments, I fully believed there was an evil creature in my bedroom that wanted only to bring me pain. And I stood up to it. I stared evil straight in the face. I felt the fear consume me and the panic control me. And still, I stood up to evil. I stared the creature in the face. I felt him caress me and hold me down. Instead of withering away in fear, I braced myself and let my voice be heard. I stood up to evil. It's also where you can find all of my social media, listen to free audiobooks, shop the Weird Darkness store, sign up for the newsletter to win monthly prizes, find my other podcast, Church of the Undead, and find the Hope in the Darkness page if you or someone you know is struggling with depression or dark thoughts. Plus, if you have a true paranormal or creepy tale to tell of your own, you can click on Tell Your Story at WeirdDarkness.com. Weird Darkness is a production and trademark of Marlar House Productions. Copyright Weird Darkness. And now that we're coming out of the dark, I'll leave you with a little light. Philippians 4 verse 6, Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And a final thought, stop worrying about the past. Stop thinking about the future. Just live in the moment and be happy. I'm Darren Marlar. Thanks for joining me in the Weird Darkness.