- 2 days ago
If you enjoy this type of content and would like to see more of it & support the channel, feel free to subscribe and turn on notifications.
If you want to send a personal TRUE story of yours, please send it through email: mrnightmareinbox@gmail.com
Anything with poorly structured sentences and grammar will not be read, so please just make them neat and understandable. Please also state how you would like your name to be credited in a video.
Step into the darkness with Dark Files: Midnight Tales — a chilling collection of five true horror stories that will haunt your imagination long after the video ends.
From eerie encounters to terrifying real-life mysteries, these stories are based on actual events that prove truth can be far scarier than fiction.
💀 What’s Inside:
Real-life paranormal encounters
Mysterious disappearances
True accounts of haunted places
Psychological horror and suspense
🔔 Subscribe for more Dark Files Midnight Tales — your destination for the scariest true stories, creepy mysteries, and midnight horror chills.
If you want to send a personal TRUE story of yours, please send it through email: mrnightmareinbox@gmail.com
Anything with poorly structured sentences and grammar will not be read, so please just make them neat and understandable. Please also state how you would like your name to be credited in a video.
Step into the darkness with Dark Files: Midnight Tales — a chilling collection of five true horror stories that will haunt your imagination long after the video ends.
From eerie encounters to terrifying real-life mysteries, these stories are based on actual events that prove truth can be far scarier than fiction.
💀 What’s Inside:
Real-life paranormal encounters
Mysterious disappearances
True accounts of haunted places
Psychological horror and suspense
🔔 Subscribe for more Dark Files Midnight Tales — your destination for the scariest true stories, creepy mysteries, and midnight horror chills.
Category
😹
FunTranscript
00:00This happened when I was really young. I'm talking second or third grade. It's hard for
00:19me to remember things clearly from that long ago, but this memory stands out for reasons
00:23you'll soon understand. It was a school day and it had been raining cats and dogs all day.
00:30After picking me up from school, my parents left the house for some upscale events. I can't remember
00:35if it was a fundraiser or a dinner party or something else entirely. Either way, they were
00:40supposed to come back home that night, but while they were gone, the storm picked up like crazy
00:45and it became unsafe to drive long distances. So instead of driving back home, they reluctantly
00:51decided to spend the night at one of their friend's houses who lived much closer to where the event was.
00:55I remember them calling me on the house phone and repeatedly apologizing for leaving me there
01:00by myself, even though I insisted that I wasn't even hungry and I'd be fine. My mom gave me a list of
01:06things to do before bed. Lock all the doors and windows, keep at least one house light on, make
01:11sure all the blinds were closed. Typical stuff. At the time, I didn't understand why they were making
01:17such a big deal about everything. I wasn't quite old enough to realize how important it was to not
01:23leave kids my age home alone. In fact, I was actually kind of excited to have the place to
01:27myself. It meant unlimited candy and no bedtime. I obviously didn't have a TV or any kind of screen
01:34in my room, so I stayed downstairs in the living room watching TV on the couch. I told myself I do
01:39all that stuff my mom had requested right before going to sleep, since I was planning on staying up
01:44all night anyway. But at some point later in the night, the sugar crash got to me and I accidentally
01:49fell asleep. No surprise there. I don't remember exactly what time I ended up waking up, but it was
01:55late enough for the TV to have gone into sleep mode, so 3 hours minimum. I distinctly remember
02:01being much colder when I woke up. Nothing too out of the ordinary. I mean, temperatures drop at night,
02:07but the difference was significant enough for me to instantly make the connection, even at that young
02:11age. I thought about just curling back up and going back to sleep, but then I remembered the list my
02:16mom had given me. Even at that age, I knew she'd find out if I didn't do it, and I really didn't want
02:22to get in trouble after she trusted me to stay home alone, so I forced myself off the couch and went to
02:27check the windows and doors. I went around and did everything she asked, locked the front and back
02:33doors, closed all the blinds, checked the windows, even the light. Everything was shut tight, which
02:38confused me a little because the house still felt way colder than it should have. I even put my hand against
02:44a couple of the windows to make sure they weren't cracked open or something, but they were all
02:48sealed. I figured maybe the storm knocked out the heater or something, and I didn't think much more
02:54about it. That explanation made sense to me at the time, and I was so tired that I couldn't devote more
02:59energy to thinking about the heat, so I headed upstairs to my room, ready to crawl into bed and
03:04forget about it. When I got to my room, I finally realized just how bad the storm had gotten.
03:10Our living room is tucked into the center of the house, so I hadn't really been able to appreciate
03:14the storm from down there. My childhood bedroom has a big external window though, so I could hear
03:19everything. The rain was slamming against the glass like it was trying to get in, and every minute or
03:24so there was a burst of lightning followed by a deafening clash of thunder. I wasn't scared of storms
03:30at that age, but I do remember being concerned that a tree was going to fall in the house. That's probably why
03:35I had trouble falling back asleep, even though I had been dead tired not even 20 minutes prior.
03:41As I was lying there, trying to fall asleep, I started picking up on these odd sounds.
03:46Every so often, there were these weird creaking sounds like shifting wood. Thing is, the entire
03:51floor is carpeted, so it couldn't have been coming from my room. At first, I thought it was a tree
03:57swaying in the wind, but the sound didn't quite fit. Even then, I knew the general sounds associated
04:03with thunderstorms. This definitely wasn't one of them. It started bothering me after a while.
04:10For whatever reason, it wasn't the storm keeping me up. It was that stupid sound. I couldn't take
04:17it much longer, so I sat up and looked around the room, not really sure what I was looking for.
04:22I listened, trying to drown out the sounds of the storm and focus in on the creaking.
04:27Lightning flashed, illuminating the whole room. Everything looked normal, but my eyes were drawn to
04:33the only wooden thing in the room. The closet. The room went dark again, and I sat there,
04:39perfectly still. About a minute later, lightning flashed again, and my room was once again lit up
04:44for just a split second. And in that split second, I saw something that made me choke.
04:51The closet door was slightly ajar. It had been closed before. I was 100% sure of it. Something had
04:57opened it. There was something in my room. I didn't scream. I didn't speak. I didn't even think. I just
05:04got out of bed as quietly as I could and walked out of the room. That walk from the bed to the door
05:10felt like a 500-mile, five-year journey. I immediately went downstairs and hid under the dining room table.
05:16Then, and only then, I started crying. I didn't know what else to do. There was someone in my house,
05:23in my room, and my parents were too far away to help me. I'm not sure how long I stayed under that
05:28table, but at one point, I heard footsteps walking down the stairs. I held my breath,
05:34knowing that any sound I made could have ended my life. They weren't normal footsteps. It sounded like
05:39whatever it was was jumping and pinballing down the stairs. The footsteps got closer. They were
05:45approaching the dining room table like they knew where I was hiding. I can't tell you how scared I
05:50was. I really thought I was going to die. And then, from under the table, I saw them.
05:56I couldn't see their upper body, but two bare feet walked into view. Two nasty wet and muddy legs that
06:03were tinted yellow. I couldn't tell if they were male or female legs. That's how gross and almost
06:08disfigured they looked. There were cuts all over their legs like they had rolled around in a thorn bush.
06:14They were also stumbling like they were struggling to even stand upright. And just as I thought it
06:19couldn't get any worse, they dropped something. It was a wrench. It clattered against the floor and
06:25I'm telling you, it took every fiber in my being to fight back a scream. If that person bent down to
06:31pick the wrench up, they'd definitely see me. With wide eyes, I watched as that person stood still,
06:37not picking up the wrench, but not walking away either. It felt like a standoff, where any wrong move
06:44could end my life. Eventually, they finally continued walking, and I couldn't see them anymore.
06:50I listened as the chaotic footsteps stomped and stumbled around my first floor for what felt like
06:55an eternity. And then, finally, the front door opened and shut. They were gone.
07:04I stayed hidden under that table for a long time after that. Part of it was fear, but another part of
07:10it was what I can only describe as trauma. I just remember being shaken and scared.
07:15I was at the ripe age where I understood how dangerous the situation was, but not old enough
07:20to know how to deal with it. The rest of the night was kind of a blur. I picked the wrench
07:25up off the floor, not wanting my parents to find it the next morning. After making sure the front door
07:30was locked, I slunked back upstairs, crawled into bed, and fell asleep. Everything went back to normal
07:36after that. For whatever reason, I was terrified to tell my parents. I didn't want them to find
07:42out I hadn't locked the doors and done everything they had asked me to do, so I just kept the whole
07:46thing to myself. It wasn't until several years later that I told them the story, and it actually took
07:52some convincing for them to believe me. Looking back, not telling them the moment it happened was
07:57an awful decision since there was nothing that could have been done about it so far removed from the
08:00incident. If I'm being frank, this experience traumatized me for basically the rest of my
08:05childhood. I slept with a nightlight from then on, and I developed a fear of the dark that didn't go
08:10away for a long time. I still have trouble explaining what happened that night, but I learned my lesson.
08:16Lock your doors at night.
08:18This happened over the course of three or four years when I was a kid. I can't remember exactly
08:32when I got the first one, but I started having this recurring, half-lucid nightmare maybe once
08:37every couple of months. From what I can remember, here's how it would go. I'd be lying down in bed,
08:44only the view wasn't from my first-person perspective. Instead, I'd be looking down
08:49at myself from the ceiling, like I was viewing my own bedroom through a security camera feed.
08:55The out-of-body dissociation always freaked me out. I'd try to float or swim towards my body,
09:01but I was never able to move beyond swiveling my head to look around the room. I was half-lucid,
09:07so I knew it was a dream, but that didn't make me any less scared. After calming myself down,
09:13I'd start noticing strange things about my bedroom. For one, the digital clock on my nightstand would
09:19always be counting in reverse. That was typically the first strange detail I'd notice. And once I
09:26noticed that, I'd start seeing other weird stuff. There were these drawings taped to random spots on
09:32the walls and dresser, like crayon drawings you'd expect from a kid my age, but I had no memory of ever
09:38making them. I wasn't the type of kid who ever drew much, so it wasn't like I had just forgotten about
09:43them. They always showed the same thing, a row of people holding hands, all smiling, with one
09:50smaller figure who I can only imagine was me. They were always standing in front of a house with a blue
09:56roof, but I can't remember much more about the drawings than that. The other detail about the dreams
10:01that still sticks out to me is an old toy train of mine that was always sitting in a different spot
10:06on my bedroom floor, which was significant because I had lost that particular toy years prior.
10:12Anyway, after analyzing my room for a bit, I'd get this unexplainable urge to look out my bedroom
10:18window. I'd glance over, and as if it were on cue, a man would appear just a few inches from the glass.
10:25He had short gray hair and what looked like a cut on his left temple. That's honestly all I can
10:32remember about his face. He would watch me sleep for a few seconds, then start clawing at the window
10:37like he was trying to open it from the outside. That's usually when I woke up. Sometimes I immediately
10:44ran to the window, and sometimes I was too terrified to even move. But I always ended up checking one way
10:50or another. I don't know what I thought I'd find, maybe claw marks or a smudge from where his hand
10:57had been, but there was never anything there, or anyone for that matter. After the fourth time it
11:03happened, I finally told my parents. My mom told me that recurring dreams weren't that rare, especially
11:10at my age, and my dad chimed in to remind me that they were always just one room away if I ever felt
11:15scared. I nodded and acted like that helped, but it didn't. Not really. My dad could tell I was still
11:23scared, so he took me by the hand and explored the exterior of the house with me. There was no
11:29indication that anyone had been there. No footprints, no smudges on the window, nothing. Even so,
11:36that didn't calm my nerves as much as you might think. Keep in mind, this was about one year in,
11:41so I was having this dream roughly once every three months. It wasn't happening every night,
11:47not even close, but having the exact same dream four times definitely means something,
11:52which I knew even at that age. But after that fourth dream, though, they just stopped. For a
11:59while, at least. I went nearly six months without a single episode, and at some point, I let myself
12:06believe it was over. It all just kind of faded into the background, the way childhood fears tend to
12:12when life gets more normal. But then it came back. I have no idea what triggered it, but one random
12:19night, I had the dream again. Everything was exactly the same as I remembered. The clock, the drawings,
12:26the train, everything. But there was something different about that dream that was scaring me
12:31twice as much as the earlier ones had. I couldn't figure out what it was. Everything was following
12:36the exact same chain of events. But then, as I was looking around the room, I realized what it was.
12:43My bedroom window was open. As soon as I saw that, I woke up. There was a period of maybe
12:51five minutes where I couldn't move, complete and other sleep paralysis. And it wasn't a passive sleep
12:57paralysis either. My brain was screaming at me to check the window the entire time,
13:02but I couldn't drag myself out of bed no matter how much I tried. On top of that, I felt significantly
13:07colder, as if cold air was blowing through my bedroom window, which I was convinced was wide open.
13:13Those five minutes were unlike any kind of fear I have ever experienced. All I could think about was
13:19how that man was moments away from climbing through my window, yet there was nothing I could do about it.
13:25When I finally regained control of my limbs, I forced myself over to the window, confirming that it was
13:30locked. I couldn't fall back asleep that night. I was too scared. I'm not sure how I was even able
13:36to function the following morning. Another couple of months went by, but I wasn't going to be fooled
13:42again. Every night before I went to bed, I thought long and hard about the dream and attempt to brace
13:48myself for having it again. I'm not sure if this logic tracks, but I was hoping that keeping the dream
13:53on my brain would help me not get too scared should I have it again. To my surprise, that technique
13:59actually worked. The next time I had that dream, I wasn't even half as scared. I didn't even bother
14:06checking the window after waking up. By the time I had it again, I was barely scared at all. Still,
14:13something about it lingered. Not in a scary way, but enough to make me want to bring it up to my parents
14:18again. Maybe it was the way I explained it, or maybe it was because I was slightly older.
14:24But for whatever reason, they actually paid closer attention this time. I tried to provide as much
14:30detail as possible, something I hadn't done before. As I was getting to my description of the man,
14:36my parents' demeanor shifted. Not too dramatically, but enough for me to notice. Specifically,
14:43it was right as I was telling them about the cut on his forehead. Before I could even finish,
14:48my dad cut me off and asked if I was sure about the cut. I told him I was, and he looked over at
14:54my mom like there was some unspoken detail that I wasn't aware of. I asked my parents what was going
14:59on, and they assured me that everything was fine. Not wanting to upset them, I didn't inquire further.
15:06But from that point on, I started wondering if there was more to the story.
15:10As it would turn out, a few days after that conversation, my parents sat me down and came
15:16clean. It wasn't some dramatic reveal or anything. They just said there was something they wanted to
15:22tell me. My mom did most of the talking. Apparently, when I was really little, like too young to even
15:29remember, there was a man named Brian who used to watch me sometimes. They always referred to him as
15:34Uncle Brian, but he wasn't actually family, just a close friend of my dad's from college.
15:40I guess he was around a lot when I was a baby and a toddler, especially during the times when both my
15:45parents were working full-time. But something happened. My dad didn't give details, just said
15:51that there was a falling out between them. Bad enough that they completely cut ties. He said he
15:57forbade Brian from ever coming near our family again. Specifically, from coming near me again.
16:03That was the end of it. I asked what caused the fallout, but they wouldn't tell me. They just
16:09repeated that it had nothing to do with me and that I didn't need to worry. The only other thing they
16:14told me, and this is what gave me a sick feeling, was that Brian had a noticeable scar on his forehead
16:19from a car accident he'd been in years before I was born. They didn't connect the dots out loud,
16:25but they didn't have to. I was old enough to make the connection myself. Later that night, after my
16:31mom had gone to bed, my dad lingered in the living room with me a little longer. I could tell he wanted
16:37to say more, like he hadn't been totally satisfied with how the conversation went earlier. After a few
16:42moments of silence, he told me his theory. He said he thought the dreams were my brain's way of
16:48processing something buried really deep. Some memory from when I was little, before I could even
16:54form full sentences. He mentioned how close I apparently used to be with Brian. How I'd cry when
17:00he left the house. How I always wanted him to be the one to read me to sleep. My dad said he couldn't
17:06think of any other way I'd know about the scar on Brian's forehead. I didn't know what to make of that.
17:12I had no recollection of this Brian person whatsoever. Even now, I still can't recall a single
17:18memory with him in it. I had no choice but to move on with my life though, recurring dream or not.
17:24Another handful of months passed. I'm doing my best to describe the timeline as accurately as
17:29possible, but it's hard to remember exactly how much time passed in between each dream.
17:35That said, the frequency decreased after talking to my parents. I had the dream only once or maybe
17:41twice within the next year, but things took a very dark turn sometime in year four. One night after
17:48waking up from the dream, I glanced over at my window, just out of habit, and this time,
17:53I actually saw something move. It was just a flicker, but I was 100% sure something had just moved from
18:01right outside my window. And just like that, all the fear I had spent years trying to prevent came
18:07rushing back. It was actually worse. I jumped out of bed and screamed for my parents, who took me very
18:14seriously. My dad sprinted outside in his bare feet while my mom held me tightly. Eventually, my dad came
18:21back and started whispering stuff to my mom. They told me to stay put while they called the police.
18:26I listened to them and stayed in their room, although I don't remember ever hearing any sirens
18:32or other voices besides theirs that night. My dad insisted everything was fine and that the police
18:37were going to take care of things. The next day, he confessed to me that he had seen what he thought
18:43were extremely faint footprints underneath my bedroom window. I asked him if he thought it was Brian,
18:49and he said that was impossible, since they had moved and Brian didn't know where we lived.
18:53My dad promised me that nothing bad was going to happen ever, and he would turn out to be right.
18:59I never had that dream again. My parents don't like talking about this incident,
19:04and I can see why. I'm still yet to get a straight answer out of them, but I've since stopped trying.
19:10What I can't wrap my head around is the sickening thought that every time I had that dream,
19:14there really was someone outside my window watching me. Was it really plausible that someone
19:20had been periodically stalking me for four years? It doesn't track, and I can't decide what's scarier.
19:27If it really was Brian watching me, or just some complete stranger that my brain associated with
19:32him for whatever reason. And who knows how that somehow got translated into my dreams.
19:37I've done research, and I still don't even know how that would be possible. Maybe he was making a
19:42noise or something, and my brain picked up on it. I really can't say. What I can say is that I'm 95%
19:49sure my parents never called the police that night. That's something I will likely never get an
19:53explanation for. I'll most likely never get any answers regarding this experience,
19:58since it happened so long ago. But if I do, I'll send an update.
20:10This happened a couple of years ago, right before school ended. It was the last day of 8th grade.
20:16It was exactly what you'd expect on the final day of middle school. Excitement and bittersweet
20:21goodbyes. Everyone was running around scribbling signatures and cheesy messages in each other's
20:26yearbooks. My middle school was huge, easily over a thousand students. So to keep things manageable,
20:32the teachers collected our yearbooks and passed them around to different classrooms,
20:36making sure everyone who wanted to got a chance to sign. I'm sure you could see how that could create
20:41problems. Anyone who wanted to could write whatever they wanted in anyone's yearbook.
20:47The teachers tried their best to prevent things from getting out of hand, but I knew a few kids
20:51who wrote some mean messages to people they didn't like. At the end of the day, when I got my yearbook
20:56back, I flipped through the pages eagerly, reading all the goofy notes from my friends. But as I scanned
21:02the pages, something caught my eye. There was a signature below the face of someone I had never seen
21:08before. His name was Samuel Robinson III, a name I'm going to remember for as long as I live.
21:14The message he wrote was short, simple, and honestly a bit unsettling. It read,
21:19Hags, I'll be seeing you again. I stared at the page, confused out of my mind. I'd never even spoken
21:26a single word to this Samuel kid. It wasn't like there was anything I could do about it, though.
21:31The school year was over, so I couldn't see him even if I wanted to. I just chalked it up to some weird
21:36kid being weird, or maybe an honest mistake. Either way, I stopped thinking about it.
21:42A few hours passed, and before I knew it, I was at home hosting a sleepover in my basement with my
21:47best friends Kevin, David, and Kieran. The four of us ate Doritos and played Call of Duty all night.
21:54My parents' bedroom was three floors above us, so we didn't have to worry much about keeping the noise
21:59down. We were messing around on my dad's rowing machine sometime just before 2, when we heard a
22:04sharp knock at the storm door. The sound instantly silenced us. Who the hell would knock on the storm
22:10door? It must have been someone who either didn't want to wake my parents up, or knew we were down
22:15there, or both. It didn't make sense. The person kept knocking in the same rhythmic pattern. I could
22:23tell Kieran was about to say something, and I couldn't stop him in time. In a loud and assertive voice,
22:29he asked who was there. I wanted to knock him out. He had basically broadcasted to whoever was out
22:34there that we were down there. My basement doesn't have any external windows, so it was unlikely that
22:40they had known we were down there, but now they did. After a long pause and no more knocking,
22:46a muffled voice answered back. He said, come around to the back door, in a high-pitched voice that
22:51genuinely sounded cheerful, like he was a friend of ours trying to join the sleepover. It was definitely a
22:57teenager's voice too, and it didn't sound like someone who was pretending to raise their voice
23:01either. I was pretty scared, I can't lie. My friends were seemingly unfazed though, like they thought it
23:08was somehow exciting that some random kid was outside my house. They insisted that I at least
23:13check it out, and even though I didn't want to, they pressured me into it. We crept upstairs,
23:19careful not to make too much noise. I approached the back door slowly, trying to ignore the pounding in
23:24my chest. Through the narrow glass pane beside it, I could see a shadowy figure standing under the
23:30dim light. I got a little closer, and his face came into view. My jaw nearly hit the floor when
23:36I realized who it was. It was him. It was that kid Samuel Robinson III who had signed my yearbook.
23:44My friends went to go open the door, god knows why, but I stopped them, saying I knew who it was.
23:49I explained to them what had happened, and that changed their mood a bit. Keep in mind, Sam was
23:56still standing outside while we were talking, and he could definitely see in at us. He must have
24:01noticed how freaked out I was, because he started motioning to the side of the house like he wanted
24:05me to go over to the window. You might be wondering why none of us were taking this situation more
24:09seriously. I honestly think it was because it wasn't like some older strange man was harassing us,
24:15it was a kid from our own school. Still, I wasn't opening the door for him. Instead, I went over to
24:21my kitchen window and cracked it open just a tiny bit. My friends followed me and stood a little off
24:26to the side. He walked over to the window, and I asked him what he wanted, telling him I recognized
24:32him from our yearbook. He said, oh, so you got my message, and introduced himself as Sam. Then he went
24:38on to say he always watched me from afar, and that we could have been good friends. I agreed with him
24:44just so that I wouldn't piss him off, but there was zero percent chance I would have been friends with
24:48this kid given any circumstances. I didn't want to press him right away, but I had to know,
24:54so I asked him how he knew where I lived. He didn't respond, and I didn't know what to say.
25:00Before I could de-escalate the situation, David called him a creepy stalker and told him to piss off.
25:06Sam's smile disappeared. He tilted his head like he didn't understand what David had just said.
25:12Then, just as quickly, his expression twisted into something I can only describe as hatred.
25:18He went from passive and honestly kind of friendly to aggressive and angry.
25:22He started screaming things at me. How he hated my friends and thought we should all die.
25:28How my ex hated me and random stuff he had no right knowing.
25:31He reached toward the window and tried to force it open, but I jammed it shut and locked it.
25:36He started snarling at the window and banging on it like an animal. He was two seconds away from
25:42shattering it, I'm telling you. We must have caused quite the commotion, because my parents
25:46came rushing down the stairs, demanding to know why we had woken them up. That's when Sam ran away.
25:52I told my parents what happened as quickly as I could, and my dad raced outside in his underwear.
25:58He came back a few minutes later, saying he had no idea where the kid went.
26:02I'm not sure why, but my parents didn't call the police. They just told us to go back to sleep,
26:07and they'd deal with the school the following morning, just to give the kid the benefit of the
26:11doubt. The next morning, they contacted the school. That's when we learned the disturbing truth.
26:18Sam had been expelled a few weeks before the year finished, and he shouldn't have ever been at the
26:22school in the last day. Apparently, the yearbooks were printed before his expulsion,
26:27which explained why his picture was still included. That meant he had snuck into the
26:31school somehow just to write me that message, which freaked me out beyond belief. Despite working
26:38with the school to find out more, nobody could track Sam down. It was like he and his parents
26:43didn't exist. The whole thing was a pretty big deal, but the school did what they could to keep
26:48things under wraps. To this day, I still have no idea how he knew where I lived. That's what freaks
26:54me out the most. The running theory is that he was a mentally challenged and troubled young boy who
26:59took a strange liking to me for whatever reason, and then he stalked me for who knows how long.
27:05My parents were worried for weeks. It's something we don't talk about anymore because it's just
27:10uncomfortable, but living in that same house has never felt the same ever since.
27:27This happened a decent while ago, back when I was 22.
27:30Enough years passed to the point where I feel safe talking about it. I was fresh out of college with
27:36a desirable job and minimal expenses since I was living in my childhood home with my parents.
27:41Imagine that, racking up considerable savings without having to worry about food or a place
27:46to sleep, and all the while having full access to the room I grew up in, my car, and all my hometown
27:51comforts. It's safe to say I was living in pure bliss. Believe me, I knew how lucky I was to have
27:58parents who allowed me to stay at home and rent free. I know a lot of people don't have that option,
28:03so it's something I never took for granted, but not everything was as stress-free as you might think.
28:09What I'm about to tell you happened not even one month into my time back at home.
28:13I've never been what people my age like to call a party girl. I don't drink excessive amounts of
28:18alcohol, I don't spend every ounce of my free time at clubs, and I definitely don't allow men to dictate
28:24my life in any way. That's just how I was raised. My father is the most important man in my life,
28:30and hookup culture disgusts me. Because of all that, my life is pretty routine. Wake up,
28:36satisfy my caffeine addiction, go to work, go to the gym, read a bit of my book at home,
28:41mess around on my phone, and go to sleep. Weekends are for hiking, mini road trips,
28:46board games, and whatever else I decide I want to spend my time doing. But one random weekend,
28:52my closest friend from college, Lindsey, invited me and our other two friends, Sabrina and Thea,
28:57to spend a few days at her family's beach house. I'd never been, but from the way Lindsey talked
29:02about it, the place sounded like a dream. Quiet, tucked away from the touristy chaos on its own
29:07private beach, and just a short walk from the water. To put it bluntly, Lindsey's family is loaded.
29:14I think both her parents were neurosurgeons, so I had a feeling her beach house would be insane,
29:19and I was far from disappointed. When I first laid eyes on it, I was awestruck.
29:24Look, I'm no architect, but I know a modern style house when I see one,
29:29and Lindsey's must have been ultra-modern because it looked more like a covert military
29:33safe house than a personal home. I'd love to show you guys pictures of it, believe me,
29:38I've got plenty, but out of respect for Lindsey's family, I think that would be in really poor taste,
29:43even if what I'm about to tell you didn't happen. The four of us unloaded our stuff and decided where
29:48we'd be sleeping. Lindsey obviously had enough individual bedrooms for all of us to occupy,
29:53but what would be the fun in that? Instead, the four of us stayed in the same room,
29:58one of the kids' bedrooms that had two sets of bunk beds and its own attached bathroom.
30:02We'd been staying there three nights, which, in my opinion, is the perfect amount of time
30:06to spend coupled up with anyone other than your family. I tend to be relatively irritable,
30:12so anyone who's not clean or polite tends to tick me off pretty easily. Not that any of my friends are,
30:17but you know how it is. I know I told you about my relatively boring lifestyle already,
30:22but if there was a time to drink, it was that weekend with my friends, so I definitely planned
30:27on letting loose a little more than I ordinarily would. We wanted to keep the first night pretty
30:32chill though, so we walked down to the private beach connected to the house and sat in the sand,
30:37stargazing. The four of us were drinking White Claws and listening to house music on Sabrina's speaker,
30:42when we noticed something in the distance. It was this faint, flickering light emanating from
30:48somewhere further down the shore. The four of us quieted down a bit and watched the light flicker
30:53on and off. The sight was kind of hypnotic, as eerie as it was. After a while, it became clear that the
31:00light was swinging back and forth, like a handheld flashlight someone was walking with. And soon after,
31:06we realized that's just what it was. It looked like three or four people casually walking in our
31:11direction. Not running or stumbling or moving strangely, but strolling at a leisurely pace.
31:18As they got closer, we started hearing the sound of laughter, which caused all of us to relax a bit.
31:24Considering how late it was, it was most likely just a group of teenagers or even people our age.
31:29They must have noticed us, because at some point, one of them yelled out hi in a friendly voice.
31:34It was a guy's voice, and he sounded around our age. Thea yelled back, and we made some small talk
31:40while they made their way over to us. As they approached, we could see that it was a group
31:45of three guys who looked maybe a year or two older than we were. They all had that typical beach boy
31:50look, which I could tell right away my friends were digging, especially Thea. She's a bit crazy when it
31:56comes to guys, so I can't say I was too surprised. She knows how I feel about her lifestyle, so it's not
32:02like I'm saying anything crazy. To be fair, she is drop-dead gorgeous, and I've never seen a guy
32:08not take a liking to her. The guys sat down with their beers, and the seven of us continued drinking.
32:14It was actually a really great time. The guys weren't overtly flirtatious, but they weren't boring
32:19either. Fast forward an hour and several drinks later, and they ultimately invited us back to their
32:24place. Personally, I was exhausted and was leaning towards going to sleep, but I could tell all three
32:30of my friends wanted to continue hanging out with the boys, especially Thea, of course. I decided
32:36not to spoil everyone's fun, and called it a night for myself, telling my friends to go on without me.
32:41There were only three guys after all, and I had no intention of hooking up with anyone that night.
32:46I walked back towards Lindsay's house while the six of them walked along the beach,
32:50presumably towards wherever the guys were staying. I washed up and went to bed. Sometime after 3 in the
32:56morning, I woke up to a FaceTime call from Lindsay, which was confusing since she should have either
33:01been home by then, or asleep next to one of the guys. I answered her in a groggy voice,
33:07and what she said woke me up instantly. She basically screamed into the phone that Thea and
33:12Sabrina had been kidnapped, and I needed to get her car immediately. Her words were like a bucket of
33:18ice-cold water being splashed across my face. I've never felt a more intense sense of fear and
33:23adrenaline. I didn't waste a second. My hands were literally shaking as I quickly threw on some
33:28clothes and sprinted down the stairs. I asked her why she had called me instead of the police,
33:34and she reassured me that she already had. She told me to stay on the line as she walked me through it.
33:40With her instruction, I managed to open the driveway gate, find her car keys,
33:44and speed out of there in a matter of minutes. She told me there were about 10 houses down the beach
33:49to the left, so that's where I started driving. She described the car and told me what direction
33:54it had gone in, and I slammed on the gas to try and catch up. There wasn't a single car on the road,
34:00and I was driving at an insanely unsafe speed. It was a miracle I didn't get pulled over.
34:06After a few minutes of driving, I noticed a car matching Lindsay's description driving slowly in
34:11the distance. Then I hung up the phone, called the police, and told them exactly where we were.
34:17The dispatcher told me to keep my distance so as not to alert them to the situation,
34:21so that's what I did. After what felt like forever, I spotted cop lights up ahead. The car
34:27ahead of me didn't try to evade the police. I can only imagine that they assumed it was an unrelated
34:32stop. I pulled the car over and watched everything unfold. It was pure chaos. The cops forcibly removed
34:39all three men from the SUV at gunpoint. They put them in cuffs and escorted them back to one of the
34:44cruisers. Then one of the officers walked over to the trunk of the car and pulled it open to reveal
34:49both Thea and Sabrina, bound and from the looks of it, pretty badly bruised. As horrifying as the
34:55whole experience was, it was nothing compared to the sequence of events told from their perspective.
35:01All three of them were comfortable with me writing this, by the way. We're still close in contact,
35:05so I obviously asked them. But none of them wanted to write it themselves. And for good reason. To
35:12keep things short, after I went to bed, they all continued drinking. Lindsay is the only one who
35:17remembers things clearly, since she was trying to be at least a little responsible given it was her
35:22family's house we were staying in. At some point, the guys Thea and Sabrina were with suggested they
35:28all go to bed. So the four of them split off while Lindsay told the third guy she was going home.
35:32He was really upset about that, which Lindsay initially thought was because he wanted to get
35:37with her. She told him she would have been down but had to watch her house, and he got angry.
35:42They yelled at each other for a bit, and he ended up telling Lindsay to get the hell out of his house
35:46and never come back, which she was more than happy doing. Halfway home though, she realized she had
35:52forgotten her purse, so she went back to get it. That's when she saw the guys throwing Thea and Sabrina
35:57into the back of the car before driving off. She called the police, then me, and that was that.
36:04Thea's parents are both lawyers, and they jumped through dozens of hoops to do two things.
36:08Keep the event as far away from the public sphere as possible, and make sure those guys got maximum
36:13prison sentences. They accomplished both. Turns out the house they were staying in didn't even belong
36:20to them. It was owned by some random old couple who were on vacation in a different country.
36:24That, plus the slew of other crimes they were charged with, put them away for a long time,
36:29although I still think there's no sentence long enough that can properly compensate for what they
36:33did. As much as I hate admitting it, this traumatized me for years. I couldn't do beaches,
36:39late nights, or talking to strangers, no matter how harmless they seemed, or how safe a situation felt.
36:45I became antisocial and drifted away from the girls for a little, but luckily that's since changed.
36:51I can't even begin to imagine how this incident affected Thea and Sabrina.
36:55Part of me feels like not remembering anything is a blessing in disguise.
36:59I think the craziest part about the whole thing is the fact that had I not gone home,
37:03I might not have been able to reach Lindsay's car in time. And had it not been for that,
37:08the police may have never found those guys' car.
37:20This happened just last year. My buddy Jimmy is pretty involved and well connected within the
37:26music community. By music community, I'm more specifically referring to the dance-slash-electronic
37:31music scene all along the East Coast, predominantly New Jersey and New York.
37:36It's actually pretty impressive what he and his team have been able to accomplish in just two years.
37:41The general gist is this. Their company hosts what they call events at high-profile venues,
37:47typically the most well-known club or party space in whatever city they happen to be in.
37:51Then they outsource the talent, which, mind you, is typically a very well-known and sometimes
37:57borderline famous DJ. I'm not too involved or invested in that scene, so I'm not exactly sure
38:03who they've gotten to perform, but I will tell you that there have been some huge names in the mix,
38:08but enough context. Jimmy and I go way back, I'm talking 20-plus years. I've basically known him
38:15my entire life, and he's been my best friend for damn near most of it. Because of that, he lets me,
38:21along with a bunch of our other hometown friends, come to his shows for free and hang out with the
38:25talent in the VIP section. It's actually really cool, and something I wish I expressed my gratitude
38:31for more often. Jimmy was scheduled to host a huge event the weekend of July 4th on the Jersey Shore.
38:37It was going to be their biggest one yet, and all our mutual friends were going.
38:42Jimmy invited me to come down early with him, and I obviously obliged. The two of us made the hour
38:47and a half drive with our other friend Ryan, and we found ourselves at the venue a good four hours
38:52before the doors opened. Ryan and I didn't have much to do while Jimmy and his team set up,
38:58so we decided to get a bit of a head start on the alcohol consumption. Jimmy and his team were
39:03entitled to as much free booze as they desired, compliments of the venue, and Ryan and I definitely
39:09took advantage of that. By the time the first DJ started his set, Ryan and I were more than a
39:14little buzzed, to put it mildly. It was 4th of July weekend after all, so we felt like our degenerate
39:20activities were justified. Fast forward a couple hours, and Ryan and I were completely
39:26wasted. I honestly don't remember a time since then when I was that drunk, not even close.
39:32Don't get me wrong, Ryan and I are grown men, and we can handle our alcohol. Throwing up making
39:37fools of ourselves wasn't the issue though. It was genuinely just the problem of having lower
39:42impulse control and worse decision making. But either way, we were having a great time,
39:47at least from what I can remember. The event was winding down, and it was getting to that
39:52point in the night where you either figured out how you were getting home, or who you were going
39:56home with. Or both. Jimmy had rented an Airbnb really close by and promised both Ryan and I a bed,
40:04so the first issue wasn't a concern. The second problem though, that was what was on my mind.
40:10The two of us danced over to the bar and started talking to some girls we found attractive,
40:15and before long, we had figured out who we were going to spend the rest of the night with.
40:20Neither of us are Calvin Klein models, but we're both above 6 feet tall. For whatever reason,
40:25the vast majority of guys who hang around the Jersey Shore are usually shorter than average,
40:30so being tall is an even bigger boost than it usually is. And for whatever reason, that seems
40:35to be the main attribute most girls on the Jersey Shore seek out. Not looks, not build,
40:40not intelligence, but height. Don't ask me why. The Jerseyan female mind is still something I have
40:47yet to comprehend. I'm probably botching their names, but I'm fairly sure the two girls introduced
40:53themselves as Gianna and Marcella. Us meeting them coincides with where my ability to recall
40:58events precisely becomes a bit hazy, so there may be gaps in the story from here on out. From what I can
41:04remember, it was actually Marcella who suggested we all leave together and continue to party elsewhere,
41:10which Ryan and I weren't going to argue with. Gianna handed the two of us a drink and insisted that
41:14we get on their level before heading out, even though we had both probably consumed the fluid
41:19equivalent of her body weight and alcohol already. I know that whole dynamic. Girls getting guys'
41:24drinks sounds a little unorthodox, and it is, but these girls were clearly wealthy given how they were
41:30dressed. After downing the drinks, the four of us started moving towards the venue's exit.
41:35The moment we stepped outside, Marcella suggested we go back to her place, which was pretty close by,
41:41and also right on the beach. Her saying that actually surprised me a little. I was fully
41:46anticipating going back to our Airbnb, considering the guys were usually the ones to host in situations
41:51like this. But both girls insisted that Marcella's beach house was definitely nicer than whatever
41:56inland Airbnb we found for the night. She had a point, so I didn't argue, and neither did Ryan.
42:02We walked along the beach, talking the whole time. The girls seemed really intelligent and
42:08knowledgeable based on the conversations we had, and I remember finding it so refreshing to talk
42:13about something other than nightlife and whatever other garbage I'm used to talking to girls about
42:17for once. Not just girls. Drunk people in general. At one point, I actually felt kind of embarrassed for
42:24being so drunk because I felt like I couldn't articulate myself well enough and looked like an idiot.
42:29That's when I realized I actually was feeling drunker than I had been 15 minutes earlier.
42:34But it wasn't a drunk I was used to feeling. I felt like my body was melting under my weight,
42:39as if I were going to collapse uncontrollably any second. My legs felt flimsy, almost like cardboard,
42:46if that makes any sense. Moving my limbs, mouth, and even my eyes became increasingly more difficult,
42:53and there was a moment where my extremities started feeling a little numb. But then,
42:57just as quickly as the feeling arose, it passed, back to normal drunkenness, at least for the time
43:03being. Just then, we arrived at the beach house. It was insane. I'm probably exaggerating because I
43:10was so drunk, but it looked like what I imagined a professional athlete's beach house to look like.
43:15We went inside, and after taking our shoes off, found ourselves in what I'm guessing was a living
43:20room. I say guessing because the level of opulence in there was just so foreign to anything I'm used
43:25to. It was decorative, but somehow minimalistic. Even those descriptions are opposite. There were
43:32honest-to-God sculptures on pedestals in there, but it didn't feel cluttered or overly showy,
43:37and everything on display seemed to blend right into the walls like they were just extensions of the
43:41room. I wish I had the wherewithal to take a picture, but again, my mind was elsewhere.
43:47Evidently, so was Ryan's, because not fifteen minutes after stepping foot in the house,
43:52he and Marcela had disappeared somewhere in that maze of a house, which left me alone with Gianna.
43:58She leaned in to kiss me, and that's the last thing I remember before blacking out. Not her kissing
44:04me, but leaning in to kiss me. That's where everything cuts off.
44:07I don't remember feeling woozy again or drinking more or doing anything else, but there's a huge
44:13gap in my memory that spans several hours and will not come back no matter what I try. And the thing is,
44:19I know I didn't pass out because there are texts on my phone sent from me, proving I was still
44:24conscious. There's digital proof that I was sentient, but I don't remember one bit of it. And before you
44:30say I just simply blacked out from alcohol, this was different. I rarely ever black out, but all the
44:36times I have, I can still remember bits and pieces of the night, scattered moments here and there,
44:42enough for me to string together a continuous sequence of events at the very least. Keep in
44:46mind, those were also all times where I was drunker than I was that night, so that's another reason I
44:51think a generic blackout isn't a reasonable explanation for what happened. Plus, Ryan experienced
44:57the exact same thing at essentially the exact same time, which is way too specific to be coincidental.
45:02Here's the next thing I remember, waking up with the sun directly overhead in a random set of bushes
45:08over an hour away from where the event was, something I didn't know yet because my phone
45:13wasn't in my pocket. In fact, nothing was in my pocket at all. Both my wallet and keys were gone,
45:19but it gets worse. It wasn't even my pocket to begin with. I was wearing someone else's clothes,
45:25and not Ryan's either, a complete stranger's. The only personal belonging of mine I still had
45:31in my possession was my shoes, and even those were messed up. Both shoes had the shoelaces removed
45:37and were soaking wet. My head was pounding, and everything felt disoriented, like I was waking
45:42up from anesthesia. I didn't even sit up right away, I just stared at the sky for a minute,
45:47trying to make sense of where I was. Bushes, someone else's clothes, no wallet, no phone,
45:54no keys. Based on my shoes, it was like I had been in the water recently, but I didn't smell like
45:59salt water or chlorine. The worst part about the whole thing was the blankness. I genuinely
46:05couldn't remember anything past Gianna leaving, like I already said. That's when the panic started
46:10to creep in. I wasn't just hung over, I was scared. I had no idea how I got there. What if I'd
46:17gotten into a fight or crashed a car? What if someone drugged me? I didn't have a single point
46:23of reference for the last 10 hours. I stood up and realized there wasn't a single landmark around me.
46:29It didn't look like a beach town, which also scared me. The road ahead just curved into more trees,
46:34but just across the street, maybe a few hundred feet away, was a 7-Eleven. It was genuinely the
46:40only thing in sight, so I headed straight for it. I asked the guy behind the counter if I could use his
46:45phone, telling him that mine had been stolen. He stared at me for a second, probably debating
46:51whether or not I was trying to scam him, but then he slid it across the counter. The first number that
46:56came to my mind was my sister's. It was the only number besides my mom or dad's I still memorized,
47:01and there was no way in hell I was calling my parents. My sister picked up right away,
47:06and I tried explaining things the best I could. She ended up giving me Ryan's number, which I ended up
47:12calling several times, but to no avail. That's when I started wondering if what had happened to
47:16me happened to him too. Drugged, robbed, dumped in some random bushes an hour away.
47:22I was just about to call the police, when what do you know, Ryan walks into the same 7-Eleven.
47:28We just stared at each other for a second before dabbing each other up. He then told me his version
47:33of things, and you guessed it, it was the same story, damn near exactly. That sealed it for us.
47:40We called the police, making sure to thank the 7-Eleven worker profusely.
47:44Fast forward a few minutes, and we're now recounting our story to the police outside the store.
47:49To their credit, they took everything we said seriously, at first. But the more we told them,
47:55the more their questions started turning. Were we sure we didn't just drink too much?
48:00Maybe we wandered off and passed out somewhere? They weren't accusing us outright, but it was clear
48:04they weren't entirely convinced something criminal happened. I told them it was unlikely we would
48:09have drunkenly wandered into a town an hour away by foot, and I don't think they liked that remark
48:14very much. I gave them my sister's number and asked them to call her. She was already tracking
48:19my phone through Find My iPhone. To all of our collective surprise, my phone was showing up in
48:24the middle of a parking lot a few minutes drive away. The officers agreed to drive us, and sure enough,
48:30both our phones were sitting on the pavement next to each other. While it was great to have my phone
48:35back, that only affirmed the police's theory that we had just been drunk. They started saying that
48:40we probably hadn't even been robbed, that we had lost our wallets the same way we had lost our phones.
48:46We tried convincing the police to check out the house Marcela brought us to,
48:49the one she claimed was hers, but they weren't having it. They told us we were probably just too
48:55drunk and didn't remember things correctly. One of them even said, happens more than you think.
49:01Then they gave us their cards and told us to call if we remembered anything else.
49:05It was actually shocking how reluctant they were to even connect us to other
49:08officers that would be willing to help. They told us to find a ride home since our
49:12phones were still charged, and they just left us there. After they left, I went through my
49:18phone for the first time, and things got even weirder. There were texts sent from me to a ton of
49:23people I knew, Jimmy, my parents, a few coworkers, even some girls I had been talking to.
49:29All normal sounding stuff. Stuff I might have said if I had actually had a calm, coherent night.
49:35The texts genuinely sounded like me, but from a continuity standpoint,
49:39they didn't make any sense when considered altogether.
49:43One message to Jimmy thanked him for the events and said we'd crashed at a buddy's place.
49:47One to my dad said we were safe and had found a couch to sleep on.
49:51There was another to a girl I'd been texting that just said something casual,
49:54like I was hanging out at home and thinking about her. None of those texts made any sense,
49:59and mostly contradicted each other. I realized I had a ton of missed calls and texts from Jimmy,
50:05so I called him. He sounded relieved to hear from me, saying he thought Ryan and I had died or
50:10something. He told us to stay put, he'd come pick us up. In the meantime, Ryan and I cancelled all our
50:16cards, but interestingly, none of them had been used, despite the likely fact that they had been in
50:21those girls' possession for several hours. The entire ride home, we talked nonstop about what
50:27could have happened. None of it made any sense. Yeah, we had been drugged, that much was clear,
50:33but that didn't explain things. First of all, I don't know of any kind of roofie that has those
50:38effects, like an induced blackout. Everything I've read just said those drugs make you fall asleep,
50:44but again, I was conscious, as the texts confirm. Plus, why go to such lengths just to rob two random
50:50guys, especially if you weren't going to at least even attempt to use their credit cards.
50:55Two guys who walked up to you, no less, and in such a risky place too, your own house,
51:00or was it a house they had broken into? Both were equally risky. Jimmy thought we had been targeted,
51:07but like I just said, we had been the ones to approach the girls, so we couldn't have been
51:11targeted. But all this isn't even mentioning how or why we miraculously found ourselves in a random
51:17town an hour away wearing other people's clothing. As crazy as it sounds, both Ryan and I checked
51:23ourselves for incisions, thinking maybe some of our organs had been harvested, but there was nothing.
51:28Jimmy suggested that maybe they had just given us some exotic drugs, which I guess makes sense,
51:34but someone had driven us to that town, and someone other than those girls had switched clothes with us.
51:39We never got an answer, but it's not like we just forgot about the whole thing.
51:43Ryan and I ended up driving all the way back to the shore just to go looking for that house.
51:48We tried our best to retrace our steps, knowing that if we just walked along the boardwalk we'd
51:52eventually find the house, since it was on the beach, and we actually did find it.
51:57The two of us walked up the walkway and rang the doorbell. An older man opened the door,
52:02asking us what we wanted. I did the talking. Not wanting to reveal too much or potentially incriminate
52:09myself. I simply asked him if a girl named Marcella lived here, or if he had a daughter or granddaughter
52:14around our age. He gave me a hard no, and I made up some BS story that there was a girl who lied about
52:21owning this house, which he actually found pretty funny. And that was that. I would be lying if I
52:27said I didn't walk away from that house with a sick, unsettling feeling in my stomach. I can't even
52:32describe it as fear, just a sickening discomfort, like something truly awful had happened to me and my
52:37friend that night, and I'd never get to the bottom of it. For a long time after that, I was convinced
52:43those girls had been involved in something much, much bigger that neither me nor Ryan could even
52:48conceive. That maybe they had been planning to kidnap or kill us, and decided not to go through with it at
52:54the last second for whatever reason. I know I'll never have an update, but if something else happens,
53:00I'll definitely send something.
Recommended
2:11
Be the first to comment