https://youtu.be/yM22fbZ8XLs?si=Txbtf8bAbK7BrxUe

Hi, this is the first time I’m sharing something here, so I hope my story will be easy to understand (by the way, this isn’t my account).

For privacy reasons, I won’t give my name or age.

For a bit of context, this happened about two years ago, a few weeks after my little brother was born. Ever since we moved into this house, there’s been this small room in the basement that’s always locked. To show you how little anyone uses it, I don’t even know what’s in there, but I’ve always assumed it’s just utility stuff like meters or something. The room is really tiny, barely big enough to lie down in.

Now, let’s get into it. My parents went away for a weekend together, leaving me, my older sister, and my baby brother (who was just a few weeks old at the time) at home. My parents trusted us to take care of ourselves since they’d done this before. Anyway, that night my sister went out with friends and wasn’t planning to come back until 4 or 5 in the morning. I watched a good movie and, since it was already getting late, I decided to put my little brother to bed in his room upstairs. I did that and came back down to watch another movie, but I ended up falling asleep.

About two or three hours later, around midnight, I woke up to these strange noises coming from upstairs. At first, I thought it was just the neighbors since they can be pretty loud and the walls are thin. But then I looked at the time and realized it was too late for them to still be awake, let alone making that kind of noise. So, I got closer to the stairs to investigate, and just as I was about to go up the first step, I heard the sound of something metal falling on the ground. Guess what? It was the key to the small room in the basement.

I immediately grabbed my phone, and instead of calling the police, I texted my friends to tell them what was happening. One of my friends had the brilliant idea of calling the police for me. Suddenly, I heard the bathroom door slam shut. I knew it was that door because it makes a very specific creaking noise when it closes. I remembered my brother was sleeping upstairs, so I carefully went up to check if he was okay. Thankfully, he was fine.

Still not fully grasping how much danger I was in, I went to the bathroom door. Since it opens inward, I decided to violently push it open—and I heard a man scream. I immediately shut the door and held it closed to keep him from getting out. He broke the window, and outside the bathroom, there’s this sort of balcony—not a proper one, but you get the idea—that connects to the balconies of the neighboring houses, which are all really close together. He used that to escape.

I grabbed my brother in my arms, ran to the kitchen, and noticed that one of the knives was missing from the knife block. I picked up another knife and crouched in a corner of the living room, crying like never before. The police arrived, and I opened the door for them.

When they searched the house, they confirmed that the bathroom window was broken, and I had hit the guy so hard that there was blood on the floor. But the most shocking and traumatizing part was what they found in that small basement room. There were blankets and cans of food. They concluded that he had been living there for several days...

That’s it. I hesitated a lot before posting this because it really affected me, and I’m sorry if the story isn’t super clear—some of the details are still jumbled in my head. Anyway, I hope you found it interesting!

About 2 nights ago I went to see the new Wicked movie with my family who was in town for Thanksgiving. I arrived back to my house around midnight.

I live alone in a shared but divided house, with 2 other tenants living inside. One is upstairs and one splits the downstairs with me so there’s 3 apartments total. My place is in the back of the house and has a back porch you can enter through after walking up the whole driveway.

When I got home, I sat in my bedroom and did about 20-30 minutes of work on my computer. During this time, the house was very quiet and I kept hearing a man’s voice continuously talking. Now, keep in mind, the tenant above me is a man and I know his bedroom is right above mine because I previously lived up there. It sounded like he was talking on the phone, just because of how long and continuous the talking went on. I tried to listen and figure out where the voice was coming from and I couldn’t exactly pinpoint it, but it was either coming from through the ceiling or on other side of my room. Now, it must be noted that my bedroom connects to the porch with a door that I have blocked with my dresser. There’s a main door inside the porch that you use to get into the house but there’s also this strange door connecting to my room.

I couldn’t make out the words, but because of how firm and continuous the voice was going on, I figured it just had to be coming from my housemate upstairs. It’s the only thing that made logical sense. I just kept on thinking though, I had never heard a single voice come through that ceiling before. It’s not that thin. Whatever, I’m worrying about nothing.

After about 20-30 minutes of computer work, I got up to go to brush my teeth, feed my fish, get ready for bed, etc. I come back into my room , turn off the lights and get in bed. Keep in mind it’s been about 45-60 minutes since I first heard the voice and I could still hear it. Damn, I thought. My housemate is chatting up a storm on the phone up there. Oh, how wrong I was!

After about 3 minutes of laying in bed, I all of the sudden heard my porch door creaking along with the talking mans voice. It has a very distinct sound that I knew immediately was my porch door. I crept across my room and put my ear to the dresser/the door that connects to the porch. Sure enough, the talking was coming from inside my porch and I could hear the door moving and shuffling inside my porch along with it. My heart absolutely dropped.

All the lights were off in my house at this point, so I had a sort of sneaky advantage to creep around my house and get a view of what was going on. I crept down my hallway and peered into the kitchen, which the porch leads into. Across the kitchen, through the door and in a streak of moonlight, I just see a man with long , scraggly hair sitting curled up in the center of my porch turned around with his back to me, muttering out loud to himself and rocking back and forth. My fight or flight kicked in and I immediately ripped open the door and started screaming at him to get out and try intimidating him. Looking back, I probably shouldn’t have made myself so vulnerable without a weapon handy, but like I said I was just in fight or flight I can’t explain my actions in this moment other than reacting out of fear and determination to scare him out.

Anyways, this dude didn’t even react to me whipping open the door and screaming at him. Not even a flinch. He simply turned his head to the side very slowly and said “my name is Evan.” This freaked me out so much for some reason, especially because he STILL hadn’t turned around or shown his face. I said I don’t care and kept cursing at him to leave and he slowly rose up with his hands up and said “I know, I know. I’m hiding.” He wasnt saying it in a pleading way though. He said it with this almost childlike, playful tone that freaked me the absolute fuck out. I hated this.

The fact that he kept trying to reason with me and act so mysterious while still not even turning around to show his face just pissed me off honestly. Who do you think you are bro? I ran him out of the porch and was just threatening him. Now I assume it was just a homeless man who was under the influence of something, as I do live in an inner city area and it’s common to see homeless people near my street, but idk man. the sight of seeing him in my porch and knowing he was in there for at least an hour beforehand while I was sitting right there just freaked me the fuck out. I was in full blown defense mode by the time I opened that door and I wasn’t willing to waste any time to do a character dive on the guy. No imaginable situation would permit anyone to be in my porch like that at that hour.

Needless to say, I’ll be double checking my porch lock every night from now on lol. It’s funny because having my room connected to the porch, I always had this horrific intrusive thought that I’d hear someone in there one night. Looks like it came true!

So, please, Evan, let’s not ever meet again you creepy bastard!!

I am a female in my 20s. I’m an entertainer and decided to check out a few clubs a county over from me. This was A couple of month ago, around 1-2 pm when I arrived at this club. It was pretty packed for a day shift (suprisingly! which is why I wanted to check it out in the first place) so I parked kind of far from the enterance.

Anyway, i had a couple of more places I wanted to go so I was walking torwards my car and this man follows me in his pick up truck. not unusual for me so I was being polite with his small talk. Then he told me “do you want to have some fun?” I told him no that I had things to do. Then he insisted that I get in his car, I declined. Then he kept repeating and I SHIT YOU NOTTTT, the whole look on his face changed! His eyes went dark and were piercing, his voice got deeper and raspier! It was like a demon took over his body. I started speed walking to the car because i was sure this man was going to hop out and throw me in his car!

as I finally make it, he blocked my car in and would not leave. remind you , it is broad daylight and he is trying this shxt! damn near had to hit his truck with the back of my car. Once he finally left I got this sick feeling at the bottom of my stomach. I really believe he has some ropes and weapons in that trunkbed if his no doubt. Irs like I got a flash vision of the things he was probably going to do to me.

so creepy predator guy, let’s not meet again EVER

When I was a freshman in high school, Alyssa was my role model.

Alyssa was a senior. She was so gorgeous, confident, smart, effortlessly stylish, and always owning the room. Back then, I was too shy to talk to her. Seniors are already pretty intimidating to freshmen, but Alyssa was next-level intimidating because she was such a queen!

I didn’t expect anyone to see me the way I saw Alyssa, but I was pleasantly surprised in my senior year.

In my senior year, I started finding cute little notes in my locker. I wasn’t expecting that at all, but I was really flattered. The first one said:

“You were beautiful in that dress on Friday ♡”

The handwriting was neat and simple with a cute little heart at the end.

More notes kept coming, always in fourth period. I got a note every week or two. I know they came during fourth period because I checked my locker before and after every class. They were all really sweet. They said things like this:

“Your smile lights up the hallway!”

“You shine brighter than any star!"

"Your homecoming photos are straight out of a magazine cover! So stunning!"

There were more notes that I don’t remember. They weren’t romantic or flirty. They looked like things I might have said to Alyssa if we'd ever spoken. I thought maybe they were from a shy underclassman girl. I had my suspicions.

I didn’t tell anyone about the notes. I really didn’t want my friends turning this into an investigation and embarrassing whoever was leaving them. Whoever was leaving these messages, I thought they meant well.

Then in the second semester, my schedule changed. My last class of the day was upstairs near my friend’s locker. My friend’s last class was near my locker. We swapped lockers.

I forgot all about the notes until my 18th birthday. That morning, my friend handed me a note she found in her (my old) locker. It said “Happy birthday, princess.”

At first, she thought the notes were meant for her since any of those compliments could fit her too. But when she realized the birthday didn’t match up, she put two and two together.

Come to think of it, I don’t think any of the notes ever said my name.

I admitted that the notes had been happening all year and explained that I didn’t want to make a big deal about it.

Then my friends launched their investigation that I had been worried about! All the girls in our friend group became detectives trying to solve this mystery. One friend, who didn’t have a fourth-period class, stationed herself by the lockers to surveil that area. That worked.

The notes weren’t from a shy freshman or even from a boy. They were from a janitor, an older woman none of us knew. We all recognized her, but I don't think any of us had ever talked to her. She’d been leaving these notes for several months, watching me closely enough to comment on my outfits, field hockey games, and even what I posted on Facebook!

I saw her at the last field hockey game of the season. She sat quietly in the stands. That was the only time I noticed her watching me, but I have no idea how places I didn't notice her watching me.

None of us brought this up to her. She hadn’t done anything "wrong," but it felt unsettling in a way that’s hard to explain.

This happened to me about five years ago, and even now, I get chills just thinking about it.

I was renting a small house in a quiet neighbourhood at the time. It wasn’t anything fancy, but it was cosy, affordable, and had a lot of character. The only thing I didn’t love was the crawlspace under the house. The access door to it was in the laundry room, a square wooden hatch flush with the floor. It was locked from the outside, and I never had any reason to open it. I figured it was just pipes, cobwebs, and the usual creepy crawlspace stuff.

One evening, I came home late from work. It had been a stressful day, and all I wanted was to shower and collapse into bed. As I stepped inside, I noticed something strange: my laundry room light was on. I was sure I had turned it off that morning. But I chalked it up to being absentminded in my rush and turned it off again.

That night, I woke up around 2 a.m. to a faint noise. At first, I thought it was just the wind, but as I lay there, I realized it was coming from the laundry room—a soft, rhythmic thumping sound. My heart started to race. I debated whether to get up and check or just stay in bed and hope it stopped. Curiosity got the better of me, so I grabbed my phone for light and tiptoed to the laundry room.

When I opened the door, everything was quiet. But then I saw it: the hatch to the crawlspace was slightly ajar. My stomach dropped. I distinctly remembered it being locked, and there was no way I could’ve accidentally opened it. Trying to stay calm, I convinced myself it might be an animal that had somehow gotten in. I shut the hatch tightly and placed a heavy box of detergent on top of it before going back to bed.

The next day, I called the landlord to ask if there were any pest issues I should know about. He seemed surprised and said no one had reported anything like that before. Still, he promised to send someone over to check it out.

That night, I double-checked the hatch and even put a chair on top of it for good measure. I didn’t hear any noises, and I started to feel a little silly for being so freaked out. But around 3 a.m., I woke up to the sound of my bedroom door creaking open.

I froze. My bedroom door doesn’t creak unless you push it slowly, and I knew I had closed it before bed. I stayed as still as I could, barely breathing, as I heard soft footsteps shuffle into the room. My phone was on the nightstand, just out of reach. The footsteps stopped right next to my bed. I could feel someone’s presence, their quiet breathing in the dark.

Summoning every ounce of courage I had, I grabbed my phone, turned on the flashlight, and swung it toward the intruder.

There was a man, crouched on the floor, his face pale and gaunt, his eyes wide and unblinking. He looked just as startled as I was. I screamed and bolted out of the room, running outside to the neighbour’s house. I banged on their door until they let me in, and they called the police.

When the officers arrived, they found the man still in my house, hiding in the crawlspace. He had a small mattress, some food wrappers, and a collection of random items he must have taken from my house. The lock on the hatch had been tampered with, and from the looks of it, he had been living under my house for at least a few days—maybe longer.

The scariest part? The police said they found a notebook with detailed notes about me. He had written down my daily routine, when I left for work, when I came home, even what I wore. There was also a list of "plans," though they wouldn’t tell me what was on it.

I moved out the next week and stayed with friends until I found a new place. To this day, I have no idea how he got in or how long he had been watching me before I noticed something was wrong.

To the man in the crawlspace: let’s not meet. Ever.

(Firtsly, sorry for my english, I'm french and not used to talk like it, hope I'll write well)

It happened in 2022, two months only after that I bought my first house, and old farm far from neighbors except an old lady (joint ownership), in the center of France. I was leavin' alone, 28 years old, and unlucky 'cause I broke myself my right hand the first day I came here, then my horse broke my nose accidently one month later.

It was during the summer, thunderstorm night, I was sleepin' in my room, almost all naked because of heat, in the converted attic of the house. At 11:30 p.m., I woke up 'cause I heard a sound comin' from the second room, stuck to mine. Something like if someone was standing behind the wall between the both rooms (floor noise, different from wind and beams which are cracking). Not persuaded at all that someone could be in this place, I was lazy but I had to ensure that anyone was on my house, in case of, then anyone else could do this for me.

I have to explain that the second room has an access to the attic, accessible by a stair with an old door leading directly to outside. And on this attic undeveloped part, there's a kind of mezzanine. When I came to the room (still naked, and with my fractures), I found anyone here, but the door between the room and the place givin' with the outside was open. I came to the top of the mezzanine when I saw a shadow take refuge under the mezzanine, out of my sight.

At the moment I realized that I wasn't alone in my house, even if I wasn't sure about what I saw, I came back quickly in my room, which had unfortunately any way to be locked, I posted myself to the only window which is not a velux, then called my ex boyfriend who was policeman, livin' at 10 minutes from home. I stayed here to be able to escape by the window if the intruder came to my room to do... I don't know what but don't wanted to stay to discover it. Then it was the better position to see if someone would get out of the house.

Need to say that I practiced self-defense martial art while few years, and if I was able to fight someone I'd better clear it mysef without involve anyone, even if I'm a girl.

Fortunately, anyone came in my room the time that my ex came here. One arrived, we get around the house together to find the intruder, but anyone. At the second when I believe that I only had hallucination, we heard the little girl of my ex screaming.

She was 6 years old, and my ex came with her because he was livin' in a too dangerous place to let her alone at his home, so he decided to take her, tellin' her that they were comin' here to fix some plumbing troubles, in order to not worry her. He let her in his car, locked.

When we heard her, we rushed out to see what's happening. She was alone in the car, crying. When we asked her why she was screaming, she told us that she saw a guy coming out the house but the old door (overlooking the attic where I was), then he approached quickly the car and the place where the little girl was, to shake the door handle, according to her own words.

Today, I still don't know who was the guy, what was his intentions, why he was standing in the place next to my room while I was sleepin, why I tried to take the daughter of my ex instead of just escape the most quickly I could.. Only questions, any answers.

Since, the old lady livin' close to me told me that someone knocked at her door during the night, it happened few times. Then I lived another experience of the same kind last year (maybe the same guy), that I watched with my own eyes. Police came home (50 minutes later...). I can tell this story later...

This happened shortly before weed was legalized in Germany. In Berlin, regulation was already quite loose; as long as you didn’t explicitly bother anyone, you usually wouldn’t get arrested for smoking in public.

I’ve been smoking daily for years (I know, it’s not great, but that’s beside the point), so I can function pretty well while stoned. However, I almost never smoke in public—partly to avoid trouble, but mostly because I enjoy the comfort of my own home.

One late night, around 3 a.m., I was chilling online with friends, ready to call it a day. I wanted to relax with a joint and one of my favorite shows, but unfortunately, I had no snacks left. Determined to end the night with a proper munchie session, I decided to hit up a nearby Späti—a small convenience store similar to a 7/11. At that hour, only the sketchiest ones are still open, often operating illegally.

I grabbed my coat and keys but stopped short before leaving. “Why not add a little joy to this cold walk?” I thought, rolling a small joint. I lit it as I stepped outside, braving the freezing breeze.

The area I live in is pretty rough—mostly foreign residents, many from Arabic countries. Poor integration has led to crime and violence being all too common. Even so, I was in good spirits as I strolled toward the flickering neon sign of the Späti. Just one more intersection to go.

A group of men stood at the corner. They looked Middle Eastern, a bit older than me, and watched me as I walked by. It felt normal—nothing to worry about, I thought, already a little high. I crossed the street without giving them much thought.

Then, I heard a voice call out, “Routine ID check—please show me your identification.”

My heart sank. “Of course, this has to happen the one time I smoke in public,” I thought, turning to face the "police."

Only, they weren’t police. It was the group from the intersection, now slowly approaching me. “Routine ID check—please show me your ID. We’re undercover cops,” one of them said with a smug grin.

I froze. The fact that they weren’t cops became clear when, despite their demand, none of them reached for any identification. “You know smoking weed is illegal, don’t you?” the man continued. His pupils were enormous, like saucers. It was obvious these guys had no authority whatsoever.

They began circling me. “Show us what’s in your pockets,” the leader demanded.

So, it’s a robbery, I thought. As long as I don’t resist, maybe I’ll only lose my phone and the few bills I brought for snacks. Then, a wave of dread hit me: my weekly tips—about €300 in cash—were also in my pocket. I had forgotten to deposit it earlier. Losing that money would crush my tight budget for the month. What now?

As I slowly reached into my pocket, the leader pressed me. “What’s taking so long?” I pulled out an old pack of gum and some broken headphones, hoping to satisfy them. “Where’s your wallet? I need your ID,” he insisted.

Still fumbling, too stubborn (and stupid) to hand over my tips, I inadvertently revealed something that shocked even me: the glint of a Glock tucked into his belt.

Knives and metal rods are typical weapons here, but a gun? That was insane, even by local standards. German gun laws are incredibly strict. My adrenaline spiked. Slowly, I pulled out the €5 bill I’d planned to use for snacks, trying to keep my expression neutral.

“You’ve got no wallet?” he growled, his face darkening. My brain screamed at me to do something—anything—before this escalated further.

Then, a desperate thought flashed through my mind. The Arabs in this area had a well-known fear of Russians, with frequent clashes between the two groups. Maybe… just maybe, I could use this.

In a heavy Russian accent, I stammered, “My friends have my wallet. They’re coming soon—we meet here.”

To my surprise, their poor English comprehension worked in my favor. They exchanged glances, muttering in German, and decided to wait. I forced myself to look confused, maintaining the bluff.

It worked. Their effort to translate or figure me out must have seemed too much trouble. The leader finally pointed at my €5 bill. “Alright then, you get us something to drink.”

Reluctantly, I followed them into the Späti. They grabbed a six-pack of Coke, and I paid, heart pounding. I was certain this wasn’t over—that they’d either search me themselves or retaliate when my nonexistent “friends” didn’t show up.

But then, just like that, they left.

No violence, no further questions—nothing. I stood there in shock, unable to process what had just happened.

Looking back, I can’t believe I bluffed in such a dangerous situation. It could have been my last day on Earth, all over €300. I’ve learned my lesson. These days, I avoid walking around late at night when the streets are empty.

And to those guys from that night—let’s not meet again. Ever.

Ive held off from telling this story besides close friends as it wasnt big in the news but it was fucked and reading other stories has given me the umpf to share.

When i was 14 (im 23 now) i was naive and dumb and my need for attention all converged. I was abused, alone and hardly had friends because i wasnt allowed to hangout with my friends except in school. I discovered Omegle as most teens did in the mid 2010s. I met a guy from MO and he claimed to be 20, his name is Noble. We talk and my birth giver found out and kept making steps to keep me from talking to him but i was stubborn and thought he loved me. So our relationship goes on as im taken from my home and put in a Safe house to protect me from being exploited. The thing is i still had access to a cell phone, wifi and anything on the internet. So Noble and i keep talking and i find out he is not in fact 20 but he is 31. I was delusional and was like “oh thats fine” because again, i believed he loved me and only he loved me. Lots of in and out of youth homeless shelters and programs and I was then placed back with my birth giver for a short amount of time but was taken again and given to my bio father. Who then also proceeds to find out about this man and try and prevent me from talking to him. It worked for a while as i was in therapy and on meds. After we moved i was taken off my meds and out of therapy and i started acting up and reaching out to him again. Well i was removed from my bio fathers home due to his and my behaviors and i was placed in a group home. Im now 15, My third week there i ranaway and told Noble to come pick me up. He drove 16 hours as i stayed hidden in some random ladies house i met at a gas station. He arrives and we start heading back to MO. While we are in PA (driving from southern tier NY) im playing on his phone and i see he got repeated messages from a few girls accounts on snapchat. I ask about it and he comes clean that he had been doing the same thing with other girls that he does with me (nudes, calls, etc). i start crying and telling him to either bring me back or drop me off on the side of the road and ill find my way back. He tells me no and proceeds to pull over and choke me until im unconscious (im 5’6 111 lbs and anorexic at the time and hes 200 something lbs and 5’10ish) idk how long i was out but it was long enough for him to find a hotel, check us in and get me in the room without someone noticing. I woke up to him on top of me raping me. The rest of the trip was kind of a blur but we end up finally reaching his apartment and i asked to see his phone so i could play a game, his dumbass gave me the phone and i texted my grandma and my birth giver on messenger saying i loved them and if they didnt hear from me i was in MO. After multiple times of being graped, forced to take pictures for other disgusting individuals and forced to act like i was happy so i could live, like the meme minus the yelling FBI, the FBI and MO state police bust down the door and handcuff him, take me to a car and take him to another one. They took all his computers, harddrives etc and i was brought to the juvie, then transferred to the mental ward for weeks then back to juvie (ward of the state and i said i wanted to die bc of all of this happening). instead of being treated like a kid who was groomed and raped and kidnapped i was treated like a criminal. I was in MO for a month before i was put on a plane and sent back to NY where i was quickly put into residential. He was sentenced to 30 years for what he did to me and other girls my age.

I tell this story now because he randomly found my instagram and started trying to reach out to me again from prison. I told him he was disgusting, i wasnt a naive kid anymore and that he needs to leave me alone. He got the memo the first time thank fuck but he shouldve NEVER been able to reach out. I keep my eye on where he goes but it seems hes either working his years off or hes been getting less time somehow because his years dropped from 30 to 26 that he needs to serve.

So Noble if youre on your little prison tablet and somehow on this subreddit, i hope we never meet again.

Edit: spelling and wording

I'm not a very good writer or anything even close but ill try, i also doubt this is a very exciting or concerning to anything else on this sub, but still.

this happened when i was 11-12 (cant remember exactly), i had a bedtime of around 8pm but it never stuck since i'd be busy before then, so i usually got to bed at around 9pm.

i went down to my room after dinner with my parents, it was univentful as always but it felt different that night, i dont know how to explain it but it just felt more important.

when i laid down in bed i felt my cat jump up onto the bed, i looked around slightly for some reason, checking the windows, door and turning on the fan.

i fall asleep a few minutes after getting into bed, i wake up suddenly, turning my head to check the clock, i will never forget this time. 4:27am.

i looked down and saw the cat, happily sleeping against my leg, fan still on so i think to get a drink and try to go back to sleep but before i do that, i check the door and then, the window.

the second i look at that window i see a man, i had no idea who it was (i live in a small town/city so its rare to find someone unkown), he had to be atleast 40, unshaved, grey facial hair, balding, porch light off, the moonlight shining off his face.

he's staring me dead in the eye, my heart was racing unlike anything i had ever felt before, this was another form of terror, given my age, i didn't move as much as a centimetre, i was too scared.

this went by for probably around 30 seconds but it felt like hours, i managed to gather courage to do something, or it could have been adrenaline, reguardless i got up from my bed quickly, falling over immedietly and standing back up, running at the same time.

i scrambled to the door, opening it and running directly to my mothers room on the end of the hall, i bash my fists against her door, yelling for her to get up, my voice waveing, a shrouded cry for help.

eventually she opens the door, half asleep, i, still scared shitless, lead her to my room, ghasping for air, she looks around and timmidly tells me theres nothing there.

i look around, now seeing nothing at the window, she calms me back down slowly and puts me back to bed, i fall sleep, waking hours lately as the warm sunlight shines through the windows.

i went to school, came home and then back to my room, the entire day was a blur, i felt like nothing else mattered that day, only that i had to see if that guy was still at the window, i checked when i looked out the window, there was nobody there, i took it as that, i was safe.

creepy guy staring at me through my window, lets not meet again.

This is a long story, so stick with me. I, (23F) am a bartender. I have some crazy stories where I have been genuinely scared for my life, but this has got to be the worst. I’m working a double at the restaurant. Around 11 am a delivery man comes in with a package that I had to sign for. He comes, I sign for the package, and tell him to have a good day with a smile. I continue my shift per usual. This was a Friday or Saturday, I can’t remember specifically, but later on we got BUSY. The restaurant and parking lot full. I see a lot of different people daily, plus seeing someone (for the 2nd time ever) out of their uniform, you may not recognize them. FedEx driver comes and sits at the bar. I don’t (obviously) remember him from the 25 second interaction we had that morning. I start talking to him as I do all my customers. I get him a drink, appetizer, another drink, entree, etc. Our conversation started… Him: “how long have you worked here?” Me: “a few years, I’ve worked my way up” Him: “how do you like it here?” Just regular conversation with a bar guest. It slowly became…. Not so regular. He asked me if I had a boyfriend, I said yes. He would change the subject and then go back. Complimenting me saying how beautiful I was ever few minutes. “Can I have you number?” “No, I don’t think my boyfriend would appreciate that.” “Okay What’s your last name, we could just be Facebook friends?” All annoying, but normal interactions I have had with men in this industry.

He started to become really pushy over time. Pressing for my phone number or social media. I continued to politely decline and laugh it off. He then tells me… “I actually came this morning to drop off a package with fedex. You signed for it??? I came back just for you..” I smile, and continue with my stupid customer service “oh yeah, I remember you!” Smile and laugh it off. I even stepped in the back to vent to my manager at this point, about how he was being extra pushy and uncomfortable. Flash forward about an hour, he pays his tab and leaves. I’m just glad he’s gone at this point. We’ll say as a guess, it’s about 7 pm when he leaves. We are still busy, and we close at 10.

We finish dinner service, customers slowly start to leave, and the restaurant is finally empty. Ive been cleaning for a while, and am finally finishing up. It’s about 10:30 at this point. I’m cleaning the bar, I look up, (the whole front of the restaurant that im facing consists of large windows that face the parking lot) and I see one (1) car in the parking lot, I notice that the delivery driver/ guest from earlier, is standing outside of the car, walking around it and seeming like he is cleaning the backseat out. Doors open, and he is leaning in and out with a bag. As soon as I realized it was him, who had “left” almost 4 hours ago, my heart sank. Why was he still here?? Why was he cleaning the back seat out?? I freak. My manager and I are the only people left in the restaurant at this point. It’s almost 11. I run to her and tell her everything. About how he came back “just for me” and about how he had seemingly left 4 HOURS ago, and I made her come from the back of the restaurant to behind the bar up front so she could see him in the parking lot… idk, WAITING for me????

She says she’s gonna call the police. At this point my boyfriend and I had an apartment literally 5 minutes away from the restaurant. I told her not to worry about it, I’ll just call my boyfriend to come get me. I did just that, but my bf could immediately tell something was wrong, and when I’m scared/ anxious, I ramble…. So I gave him a quick debriefing of what was going on. He said he would be there soon and I hung up. My manager made me sit in the office until he got there, so I didn’t see this go down. All I remember is my boyfriend coming into the restaurant to get me, walking me to the car through the back door, and me getting home.

My boyfriend, who is very confrontational and protective, later tells me, that he pulled in the parking lot to see fedex driver sitting in the drivers seat of his car. My bf walked up to his car and knocked on the window for him to roll it down. He does, and my boyfriend tells him something along the lines of “ you need to get out of here” this is where the scariest thing happens.. the dude responded to him in a different language, mumbling and acting like he didn’t speak English!! My boyfriend said something like “I know you speak English, you’ve been talking to my girlfriend all night, and you need to get out of here” dude continued to ramble in a different language, until my boyfriend raised his voice and basically said, you have 15 seconds before I pull you out of this car and you never leave this parking lot, for the guy to finally, put the car in drive and speed off. I was on edge for weeks after this interaction and even considered switching jobs. Why was he still in the parking lot that long after close and hours after cashing out his tab, and WHY was he cleaning his back seat???? To the creepy bar guest/delivery driver, let’s never meet again.

PSA: Guys, I think we've been found out

Oh my god there have been TWO FUCKIN THREE new incidents since my original post. I've had to edit this bitch twice. Three times now. Three.

Receipts at the end. Again.

_

tdlr; I thought I was meeting a group of likeminded women and instead, I just watched a cult take advantage of vulnerable people

So, this started on one of those "meet new friends" apps.

I'm not just a huge loser, I swear. I moved to my current city during the pandemic and have a work from home position, so it just hasn't been the prime circumstances for a social life.

I matched with this random girl, we'll call her Annie. I can't remember if I saw her first or vice versa. Honestly, I was paying more attention to the profiles than the pictures, and she seemed okay. Spirituality came up somehow. I can't remember how this happened either, and to be fair, it could have been either of us. I've recently been more seriously following norse paganism, but it wasn't something I was seeking to explore with other people. It's mostly a private thing, not to mention my own beliefs are more metaphorical.

But that doesn't mean I'm closed to the experience entirely. So when she mentioned having a "LGBTQ neurodivergent pagan femme" coven, I was like... okay wow, that's either very specific or very broad. But hey, why not? Maybe it'll be fun. So we agreed to meet first before I went to the event.

ONE weird thing that stuck out in our text conversation was that her partner was in some "bizarre Scientology rehab". At first, I assumed this was a place where one recovers from Scientology lmfAO. But I DID ask her if her partner was a Scientologist. I didn't get an answer.

We only met for an hour to have coffee. I think more red flags would have popped up if we'd had more time, because the little things that went off on my radar were things that weren't... THAT weird. Like there were explanations, or I decided to give her the benefit of the doubt, and my dumbass didn't ask again about the Scientology thing. I kept MEANING to google Scientology rehab, but kept... forgetting to do it. I've since googled it and can't find anything about a rehabilitation for ex-Scientologists soooooo I wish I'd done that sooner.

There were, however, OTHER things that stuck out. They're relatively benign out of context, but putting everything together in retrospect made me feel dumb:

- She wouldn't answer any direct questions about herself. And not for lack of asking. I'm the kind of person who is conscious of when the attention is ALL on me, so it made me uncomfortable, and I didn't... learn anything about her, really. Most of what she said had to do with her spiritual "awakening."

- Her spiritual awakening itself sounded weird asf. She said she had a realization that she was like a lighthouse that was drawing people toward their personal enlightenment. And okay, I DID think this was weird, but like? She's from California, idk. Maybe that's normal. I just chalked it up to her personal beliefs being whatever they were.

- Reincarnation came up. Reincarnation is a big part of paganism, although Asatru additionally focuses on your ancestors. She told me she didn't think she had any past lives and is a "new" soul, which doesn't make a lot of sense, but okay. Whatever. Not my circus, not my monkeys. The vaguely supernatural element she placed on herself was strange, but I know a lot of people want to feel special. That didn't mean I had to believe it.

- At one point, I told her about this random woman I met at the pagan festival who tried to con me. She wanted to charge me so I could be "under her wing" or whatever, lmfao. I don't need someone to protect or guide me, so I declined. As I was telling this story, I could tell Annie was conflicted. Like she wanted to agree, but didn't. Finally she said something blasé, like how it was only inappropriate because the student should CHOOSE the teacher. So I clarified that I did not want a teacher.

- Her responses were very mirroring. And I'm not a moron. I was getting a weird sense that she wasn't being honest with me, that she was telling me things that I wanted to hear, and told myself she was probably just nervous. I have a strong personality. I'm very independent, so I can understand if someone wouldn't want to go up against the things I said at our very first meeting.

I know I'm just dumb at this point, but I didn't want to be paranoid. I don't trust people easily and I KNOW that, so I was trying to loosen up and be more chill.

Yeah, big mistake.

So, I go to this thing.

IMMEDIATELY it's weird, ya'll. IMMEDIATELY. The second I step foot in that house, I'm uncomfortable. It's filled with people and completely silent. Everyone is looking at me. I'm laughing and saying hi, and no one is like... really responding, lmfao, and here I am awkwardly dropping my keys AND phone while everyone is just watching me.

Eventually I take a seat on this short couch, because there's no room in the large circle. It's a very small living room and there are like 20 people circled up. There's a cushion on the couch, so I sit on that. The "leader" starts talking, and as she's going on, I'm looking around at the people there. I was curious. Out of the corner of my eye, I see the leader TRYING to look at me. The girl sitting in front of me is partially blocking our view of each other, so the leader is like... leaning over to try and meet my gaze. Finally I felt awkward enough to like, shift over, so that I was leaning against the arm of the couch.

Staying perched on a fuckin cushion was UNCOMFORTABLE by that point, so I shifted off and spread out a bit to be more comfortable. The leader ended the speech with, "so spread out, I GUESS," which was clearly directed at me. It was said with some humor though, so I... wasn't sure what to make of it.

Everyone introduces themselves and is their own unique brand of neurodivergent. I'm ADHD, but I guess I don't subscribe to labels beyond the requirement to stay medicated. I've been medicated since 2015, so this isn't a new diagnosis for me. That was the ONLY question we got asked about ourselves, beyond our name.

The leader guides us through this meditation, and people are making these weird breathing sounds and hums. I get it. It's spiritual, right? UNFORTUNATELY, my ADHD ass can't focus to save my life, and it's impossible for me to follow the guided meditation. I do not understand. HOW can anyone with actual attention issues listen past trills and deep nose breathing?

So I'm sitting there with my eyes closed and BARELY paying attention. Because I can't. But I DO hear the leader say that we should think of anything we'd want to ask her, or need from her, and THAT got my attention. Wtf did I need to ask her? Other than where the snacks were. Because I paid 8$ and don't see a single snack.

Once the meditation ended, Annie and the leader walked around to give us material for an activity. Annie gave me two long pieces of twine and the leader gave me two sticks. As the leader was handing me the sticks, I asked her where the snacks were.

She was like "in the kitchen. On the table. Where snacks tend to be."

I'm a dry, sarcastic person, so I thought it was her brand of humor. I laughed and played along all, "oh right, I think I'll find them!"

Literally she was deadpan, unsmiling. "Mm-hm." And then walked away.

So stupid me thought she might just be like that, but then I saw her laughing with the other girls, and realized something was off. As the activity commenced, she went back over to Amy and started stroking her back, kissing her hair, and giving me this creepy smile. YEAH. IT WAS WEIRD. I was so uncomfortable, I wanted to get up and go. But I couldn't.

Why? Because of this damn activity.

The activity was the last straw. They wanted us to think of something we wanted to discard that brought us pain. Then they wanted us to FEEL how bad that thing made us feel, as we slowly twisted the piece of twine around the stick. That's shit I would only ever do with my therapist. Obviously, people were emotionally melting down before long.

I wasn't comfortable doing the activity for obvious reasons. So I sat there awkwardly with the sticks and the string in my lap. I was the only one NOT doing it, and it was obvious. But because I wasn't doing it, I had the opportunity to watch Annie and the leader, and it was chilling.

Annie was doing some weird pyramid thing above her head with her arms. There were a lot of references to her as being a lighthouse, or some sort of guiding figure throughout the meeting. She was the ONLY one who wasn't doing the ritual, other than the other leader. They were both running it. Suddenly, it occurred to me (as it probably did to ya'll already) that Annie had been using this app JUST to bring people into their group. She was the only person who seemed to know EVERYONE, yet no one there knew each other. Even the name of the group now made sense - they weren't being *specific*, they were casting a wide net. And I had this big realization in a handful of seconds. It made my stomach turn.

So yeah. I was done. But I couldn't get up, because people were sharing their experiences and shit, pouring their hearts out. This was the most fucked up part of it, imo. There's no reason to do a releasing ceremony that forces people to feel their trauma. Especially at the VERY FIRST MEETING. It's also inherently manipulative, because it requires people to let their guard down. Then they can "save the day" by showing people how to release the very same pain THEY just inflicted.

But that isn't the fault of the people there, so I didn't want to disrespect them. Like, people were sobbing on top of my shoes I left by the door. I had to wait for the best time to ask someone to pass them to me. Finally I got up and told everyone I had to go to the car, then took off.

I texted Annie and told her I wouldn't be back and that I hoped she found "her people", lmfao. Just make sure you're not her people. Be REALLY careful of any spiritual ceremony or practice that demands vulnerability from you, especially directed by people who don't know you beyond a name.

Annie, let's not, under any circumstances, ever EVER meet. Again.

And if ya'll ever hear the term "neurodivinity", run. If ADHD made me divine then I'd be on my 94th incarnation by now.

_

EDIT: Ya’ll there’s been an update. The girl who ran it texted me and I have the receipts. Don't worry, she's got ThEm CeRtiFiCaTiOns!!! It's also EXTRA hilarious that she accuses me of projecting my trauma and insists that's why I took issue with her method. THEN she had the audacity to APOLOGIZE for the imaginary trauma she assumes I have. ALso... I don't know why she thinks I actually did the exercise, because I left behind the twine and sticks untouched. I did not participate or even try to think of a trauma to release.

Because to be honest, although there's some trauma in my past, I'm not haunted by it, and have worked through a lot of it with a licensed therapist. The ad hominem attacks were just silly to me.

_

EDIT EDIT: oh my GOd I am shaking this time. Ya'll. I went back on the app bc I had new matches and messages. One of them seemed normal at first, we were talking about video games, and she asked me about zelda. Zelda is my name on a lot of social media. People typically assume it's about the video game, but I'm actually weirdly obsessed with Zelda Fitzgerald lmfao I'm a lit nerd ok. Anyway, she said "I would love to get together and hear more about what Zelda means to you."

Okay seriously, who talks like that? I'll give you two guesses, but you're only going to need one. So I looked at her profile. 0 mention of spirituality. Finally I ask, dreading the answer, and she is part of Annie's group.

What's particularly hilarious was how vehemently the leader denied getting her members from that app, and yet, the VERY NEXT PERSON I ENCOUNTER ON THE APP is in her group.

I swear, ya'll. I swear. I am getting off this fucking app. I am deleting it off my phone. I'm getting an entirely new phone. I'm changing my number. I'm going to space.

Fuck new friends.

_

EDIT EDIT EDIT: for fuck's sake, someone throw me into the sun

ANNIE responded to me. There's nothing like waking up to a bunch of deflected personal attacks, in "the form of love." The funny thing is, the ESSAY she sent me is responding to things I said in this post. Not to her. My text to her makes no mention of a lot of things addressed, as you'll see. I honestly don't know why she thinks I feel slighted by her, as that's not... something I ever said. Also, can someone Peruvian tell me if that ritual is a real thing? I don't want to discount it offhand, because that's disrespectful, but I also want to know if this is more white woman shamanism. But a lot of her message is an outright lie. There was no SHARING of rituals or personal ideology. They just wanted to know our neurodivergent label. Do I have ADHD magic? I don't get it.

Then she launches into some sort of spiritual lesson out of nowhere, so... enjoy that. I refuse to suffer alone.

Also, the message was so fucking long that my phone had to open a whole new window. A lot of what Annie shared relates to her partner, which I don't feel right sharing, so I'm going to be redacting a lot. But seriously, the certainty she has in her "gifts" is ironic, because turning the blame around on me indicates a lack of integrity. Demanding respect for your "shamanic rituals" isn't how you get it.

But guys I am pretty sure they found us

A few years ago, I (35M) had a terrifying experience that still haunts me today. I was living in a busy city at the time, and I had just finished a late shift at work. It was around 10 PM, and I was walking home through the quieter side streets of my neighborhood. I’m someone who’s always been somewhat cautious, so I was alert, keeping an eye out for any unusual activity.

As I walked down the street, I noticed a guy about 20 feet behind me. At first, I didn’t think much of it—he seemed like just another person walking the same route—but something about his movements caught my attention. He wasn’t walking in a normal manner. He was clearly trying to keep his distance, but his pace matched mine, no matter how fast or slow I went.

After a few blocks, I decided to take a detour. I turned onto a side street that was a little less populated, hoping he wouldn’t follow. I checked over my shoulder, and sure enough, he was still there. It’s hard to describe, but I felt the hair on the back of my neck stand up. My instincts told me something wasn’t right.

I crossed the street, hoping that would throw him off. But he crossed too, without hesitation. I thought, “Okay, this is weird now.” I had to make a decision. I wasn’t that far from home, but something about this guy’s persistence made me uncomfortable. I decided to stop at a nearby 24/7 convenience store to try to lose him.

The store was empty, save for the cashier, who barely looked up from their phone. I quickly grabbed a drink and stood by the door, hoping to see if the guy would pass by. He didn’t. He stopped right outside the store. At this point, I could see his face clearly through the glass. He was staring directly at me.

I panicked and ran back into the aisles, trying to calm down. I could hear his footsteps growing louder as he approached the door. I couldn’t stay here any longer. I tried to pay, but I was so rattled I couldn’t focus on anything. The cashier just stared at me, probably wondering why I looked so frantic. I threw the drink on the counter, paid quickly, and bolted out the door.

I ran down another street, not wanting to look back but knowing I had to. I didn’t see him for a while, and my heart slowly started to calm down. But as I turned the corner to my street, I saw him again, standing at the far end of the block. It was like he had been waiting there the whole time.

I wasn’t sure what to do next. I considered calling the police, but he hadn’t really done anything illegal, just followed me for a while. I didn’t want to overreact. But I also couldn’t shake the feeling that this wasn’t a coincidence. He was still standing there, watching me, and now he was closer. I took a deep breath, checked both ways, and made a beeline for my apartment building, not daring to look back until I was inside.

When I got to my apartment, I locked the door and stayed there, staring out the window for what felt like hours. I didn’t see him again after that night, but the whole experience left me unsettled for weeks. I never felt comfortable walking home alone late at night after that, even though I’ve lived in the city my entire life.

I still wonder if I was just being paranoid, but there was something off about the way he followed me. It felt intentional, and it left me with a gut feeling I couldn’t shake.

If you're reading this, the guy who followed me for hours that night—let’s not meet again.

I posted this in a different sub, but I can't get it out of my mind. The more I consider it, the more certain I am that someone, most likely my creepy maintenance guy, entered my apartment in a very unconventional way.

This happened close to ten years ago. Daylight savings time reminder me of a very strange incident.

My husband, baby daughter, and I lived together in a small apartment. We had a clock on the wall in our living room that we never adjusted for daylight savings time. It had been an hour off for months. It was out of reach, and we were really busy. Rather than changing it, we just joked about it all the time. We rarely relied on the analog clock anyway. Plus, eventually it would be correct again!

One day, I got home from a morning outing with my daughter, and I noticed that a banana peel was in the hall on the floor. It had been stepped on. This was very strange because we did not have any bananas in our house. In fact, we never did. None of us ever ate them. I was quite startled.

I sent a text to my husband, and asked him if he stopped by home during his shift and possibly dropped a banana peel on the floor. He said he most certainly had not. We checked our camera footage, and no one had come into our apartment. I cleaned the banana up off the carpet.

I packed a diaper bag for my daughter, so we could leave for the afternoon. Before we walked out the door, I glanced at our clock. The time was correct. It had been adjusted for the time change. I was startled. I checked my phone to be certain. Sure enough, the clock had been adjusted. I grabbed my daughter and our bag, and we left. Once we got safely to the car, I messaged my husband to ask if he had adjusted the clock. He had not.

When we got home that evening, my husband thought I had been joking with him. I still can't explain what happened. My husband is not a practical joker, and this would be a very weird practical joke to play.

We felt pretty certain no one had entered our front door. We had a camera. They weren't as good as the ones they make these days, but it worked. The only other way someone could have come into our apartment is through our attic, which was connected to the apartment next door. There were little attic doors in the largest bedroom ceilings.

I used to tell myself this was some sort of other-worldly or paranormal activity, but the less naive I get, the more I believe our maintenance guy must have entered our apartment through the attic. I assume it must have been the Maintenance guy because he had access to keys, ladders, and such things. He also gave me very bad vibes. He always made me feel very uneasy. His stares lingered, and he was always hanging around making uncomfortable conversation.

The thing that makes me most uncomfortable is that whomever it was left obvious clues that he had been there. If he had been trying to be stealthy, he surely wouldn't have smashed a banana into the carpet and changed the clock. I wonder what he was doing in our apartment. Just hanging around? How often did he do this? Why was he comfortable enough to leave obvious clues that he had been there?

He was fired after just a few months on the job. I was relieved at the time. Looking back, thinking about things now, I'm more than relieved. I'll be very happy if that maintenance guy and I never meet again.

Edit to clarify: We moved shortly after this occurrence. Thank goodness.

#EDIT: NO, you absolutely cannot narrate my story. It’s distasteful to try to profit off of someone else’s trauma. Sarcastic thanks to u/scaryunclejosh for prompting this edit.

I broke up with my ex boyfriend a year and two months ago (i remember because it was right after my grandma died… the day before my birthday. Rough time for sure). There were plenty of reasons why, but the final straw was him triggering my PTSD “as a joke,” then asking me to go over to his house and perform sexual favors for him two days later. I have rose-colored glasses permanently affixed to my face, so when The Ex showed me a hole he punched in his bedroom door because he thought his dog was gonna die, the logical part of me said “this man never learned how to cope with sadness or loss; he just converts it into rage because he has more experience with that.” The romantic part of me said “aw, he loves his dog so much!” Guess which one I listened to.

Nonetheless, I dated him for 3 months, during which he attempted to bribe me to stop spending time with my friends, accused me of finding someone else because I had a job, and got jealous when I told him I had to stay home and do laundry. Super normal stuff, right?

Despite my extreme naïveté and the fact that he lived less than 1/3 mile (or a 2-minute skateboard ride, his main means of transportation) away from me, i knew it would be better to break up through text. After I did, he started spamming me: texting, calling, FaceTiming at all hours of the day and night. When I blocked him, he tried FaceTiming me with his email address (which I didn’t even know could be done) and used over three dozen burner numbers to continue harassing me, including sending screenshots of him accusing me of “trying to get him killed” on twitter, where his profile picture was a selfie of him wearing a custom spider-man mask that I had crocheted for him and my bra.

I kept thinking he’d give up, but this lasted until Valentines Day, when I finally changed my phone number. Around that time, I started hearing footsteps in the rocks outside my bedroom window in the middle of the night (between 12 and 4 am). Again, I’m dangerously naive, and assumed it was my neighbor taking the trash out, or her daughter sneaking out, or that I was just hallucinating because of the stress. (My curtains were closed and pinned to the wall, so it’s not like I needed to worry about peeping Tom’s, right?)

I spoke with my neighbor, she confirmed she wasn’t taking the trash out in the middle of the night. I spoke with her daughter, she wasn’t sneaking out. I asked my sister, she heard the footsteps too. Well, fuck.

I set up some motion activated lights (conveniently at his eye level), within two days, I saw the lights get triggered and heard a very familiar voice say “shit!” but that wasn’t enough to deter him, he still lurked for at least half an hour before I heard the footsteps walking away.

In April, the dinky little pet camera I ordered finally arrived. I set it up in my window, it didn’t get great videos, but I hoped it would do the trick. On 4/20, at 12:48am, I got a video of someone covering the camera, the sound of something unzipping, and the camera was uncovered shortly afterwards but didn’t get any clear images (despite my frankly obsessive attempts to clear them up in photo/video editing software).

He hasn’t come by since then, but I still live in fear.

Note: before anyone says to call the police, I tried to get them involved repeatedly, they just victim blamed me.

First, I know how this game works. I'll just say upfront in the first paragraph that I WILL NOT BE APPROVING ANY NARRATION REQUESTS. I see them asked in the comments all the time, so I'm guessing DMs are worse, and I just don't think it's right for people to scroll this sub looking to market off of people's trauma.

Now that I've said my piece, back to the reason I'm here.

I'm 22F, and work as a private investigator. Let me clarify up front that it is not that exciting of a job. It's actually fairly mundane. Due to my age and six months of limited experience, I don't tackle super complicated cases. Some cases I have guidance. I'm still very much learning things every day.

This is my first time traveling for work. I'll also stress that the case I'm working is a bluecollar fraud case. Nothing crazy. Again, pretty mundane.

When I was done doing my thing for the day, I walked across the road to go get something to eat. That took about 45 minutes from the time I sat down to the time that I paid my check.

I had an unexpected visitor while I was washing my hands in the bathroom. I won't give too many details about who that unexpected visitor was, but I needed to go buy tampons.

I went back to my motel room, showered, changed, and settled in on my iPad while the TV played in the background. Eventually I fell asleep and woke up around 7.

When I go downstairs, I find three of my tires slashed. I have a dashcam on my car, but I take it off when I'm parked for the night to conserve the memory, which was kind of a dumb mistake.

I called the police and filed a report, but that was about it. As in that's all they really did. I had to ask the front desk clerk to see the security footage, which I was denied. I did ask the officer that responded if there was anything I could do about that, and he simply said he couldn't force them to show the security footage without a warrant. So so so silly.

Anyone who knows the goings on at most Motel 6's can probably hypothesize why they refused to show security camera footage to police.

I called the agency that I work for and asked for assistance, but was told they were in no position to assist. Thanks. That's probably going to be something mentioned in the letter that I wrote when I quit once I get back.

That was this morning. I'm still here, having to pay for another night in this place out of pocket.

I'll have to find a way to get to Wal Mart in the morning and find out about getting three tires for my car so I can drive out of here.

Guy or gal who slashed my tires, lets not meet. You do your thing and just let me do my thing. Slashing 3/4 tires so I can't claim them in my insurance is low. And I'm honestly not letting go of the idea that they may have followed me. I've seen too much ID to know that it's not safe to assume safety. I'd rather be cautious and be wrong than to be ignorant and be wrong.

Hope everyone else's Wednesday is going good.

I was born in Moscow Russia in the early 90s, but my brother was born in 1980, and this is his story (had him write this to follow the rules and get best version):

I was about 7-8 years old, and me along with my friends were the absolute biggest idiots in terms of doing dangerous shit. We would make smoke bombs, fireworks, etc out of whatever we found, and did tons of stupid other shit. Russia in the late 80s resembled the post apocalyptic wasteland you see in movies in a lot of places, mainly because there was really no law and order, so no one cared. You were able to buy crazy things off the streets (my father was once offered an old rocket launcher). With this, parents often just let their kids fuck around in these places, so we would be doing stupid shit in these abandoned buildings.

Well one day, we were fucking around, when one of my friends noticed someone lurking nearby. We didn't really care, we were used to seeing weird shit, but after a bit we noticed the person was not really moving, they just stood there. When he noticed we had seen him, the man slowly walked into view. A large, bald man, black coat (a nice one, likely an import, which was expensive at the time) and american sneakers (also very expensive). He didn't really greet us or anything, but must have seen me looking at his shoes, because he just said "like my shoes? I have more if you want them, come on". Now few things really unnerved any of us, but this dude definitely did. If you know anything about Russia in that era, this dude looked like someone you did not want to fuck with. The kicker though, once he turned around, my friend noticed he had a gun in his pants. The second he saw that, he just yelled "GUN" and booked it, and we all just scattered. I just heard the guy curse loudly, but did not see him again. Now if the story ended here, it would have been just a creepy encounter, but some time later, we were no longer allowed to play in that area. I found out much later that they had found another child beaten to death with a rock in that building shortly after our experience. To be honest, as a kid I never really thought much about this until my parents told me about the death, at which point the dots connected and I realized what we potentially ran away from.

Yeah, so I live in a gated subdivision. It isn't really the kind of place that has many issues. Far away from where I grew up.

I've never been one to shy away from my past. I did thirteen years in federal prison for some crimes that I am still trying to atone for. I know what's waiting for me on the other side, and I know where I'm heading. But I'm still trying to make things right in the world and leave something positive for both of my daughters.

Lately we have been the subject of some random acts of vandalism and threatening messages. One was a letter in our mailbox that said "murderer". I committed no such atrocity. Nobody was murdered in any of my crimes. Given that we're just getting past the Halloween season, I assumed it was someone just trying to play a scary prank. Eh, more or less, no harm no foul.

My wife found a letter under her windshield wipers that had a similar message saying "Don't let him fool you", which included my mugshot from many many years ago. A mugshot that even I've had trouble finding, but managed to do so after some sufficient digging.

Our garage was also spray painted, a lawn gnome was decapitated, and a series of plastic forks were left in my front yard.

My daughters were scared and that's absolutely where the line gets drawn with me. I know people like to say "but cameras" and "call the police".

The ones responsible didn't consider that I work for a security company. Specifically ones that hire ex-cons to save people from people like me. My house has cameras in places you would never think to look, and within a matter of minutes I was able to find a shot of the person responsible.

If you're wondering why I didn't do this in the first place, I did. He was just better at hiding his face the first few times. But like all criminals, he slipped up and got too confident. I can relate.

I knew where to find him. I didn't call the cops. I went over there myself. I knew his parents. Yes, he's a teenager.

I walked over there and told his parents what he did. They didn't believe me, so I happily showed them the printouts of my security footage that had him clear as day on there. I'll give them credit. They stood up for their son, but also acknowledged when he screwed up and called him over.

Honestly the look on his face when he saw me inside of his house was all the confirmation anyone needed. He became very nervous and started shaking. I'm not a monster. I assured him that I wasn't there to hurt anyone and that I wanted to have the matter resolved.

He had vandalism, trespassing, damage to private property, and mail tampering to answer to. I asked why he did it. Basically the answer I got was that he and his friends were trying to do some sort of true crime series for what I'm assuming is maybe a YouTube channel or something. His explanation wasn't very excessive.

I gave him a choice. The police could be called, or he could pay for the damages he caused. His father asked if he paid for the damages I would get rid of the footage I have. I told him no. I assured him if the damages were paid for and be stayed away from my family, I wouldn't call the police, but if he didn't, or did it again, I would.

They agreed. His father asked me again if I would reconsider, but again I refused.

This was his second chance. I'm being very merciful and forgiving those who trespassed against us. I don't know why people feel the need to destroy something that someone is trying to build. In my case, it's stability. We have to seriously start accepting that people are trying to change for the better.

Stan, let's not meet. Unless if course you are coming to clean your mess.

My bf and I live in a big party city so we're pretty used to strange neighbors and odd people, but one month ago we had a really unsettling encounter. We just got the full context today.

We live in a sub-unit of a large house. Our landlord and one other person live in the other units of the house. We noticed that our landlord had brought a few different dates over to the house. We didn't mind, and we weren't surprised when a girl was walking around the property.

Last month, we went to sleep at about midnight and woke up 30 minutes later to knocks at the door. I told my bf not to open it, but he said it was the girl we saw earlier. I still felt very uneasy about the situation. So I put my clothes on, grabbed my keys, and picked up our dog in case I had to run out the back door. I then go stand in the hallway next to the front door so I can hear the conversation, but she can't see me.

She sounds very drunk, and she tells my bf that she is my landlord's fiancé. I am somewhat confused by this because of our landlord's other dates. However, she starts talking about how we are good tenants and mentions personal details about us, so we assume she is actually his fiancé. She asked my boyfriend for a lighter for her cigarette. We expect this to be the end of the interaction, but she then tells my bf that our landlord is at a hotel cheating on her right now. My bf responds with, "Oh wow." She then started flirting with my bf. She invited him to come swim in our landlord's pool with her and he declined. I'm starting to get less scared and more annoyed at her. She is rambling about a bunch of different topics and basically holding my bf hostage. Finally, she gets to our neighbors. She starts going on a racist rant about them, using slurs I have literally never heard in real life because they are that bad. At this point, I'm pretty sick of this woman, so I step into the door frame and tell her that we have to wake up early. She was clearly shocked by me showing up. This is when her face changes. She glares at me. Suddenly, we aren't good tenants anymore. She calls us "white trash" for not taking our garbage bins out in time for trash day. She screams that she is going to get us evicted if we don't get on her good side. At this point, we close the door in her face.

We had a really long discussion about whether or not we should complain to our landlord about her. We assumed that he actually was dating this girl and that she just happened to be crazy. She probably caught him cheating and was trying to sleep with my bf for revenge, but realized that wasn't going to happen. Eventually, we decided to text him. He apologized for the situation but was very vague. He does mention that she is NOT his fiancé and that he will remove her. We assume this is the end of it. For the last month, she's been blasting music, banging on the walls, taking things out of the shed, and coming into our section of the backyard in the middle of the night. I was absolutely terrified the first week and couldn't sleep at all. I would stay up all night listening to sounds and staring at our back window to see if she was in our yard. Eventually, I got used to it.

Our landlord had basically vanished. We haven't seen him for the entire month... until today. Today my bf is walking our dog when he sees our landlord back on his porch. Our landlord finally tells us the full story. He went on a few dates with this woman, and she seemed totally normal. Eventually, they go back to his section of the house, and when he wakes up, she is behaving much differently. He asks her to head out while he goes to work. He comes back, and she's still there. It turns out that this is what she does. She goes home with men and invades their home until they get her lawfully evicted. My landlord went to a different property for a month while he worked on his case to get her evicted. We found out that she got served an eviction warning the same day that she came to our house. That's why she was flirting with my bf in an attempt to squat in our home. That's why she was so angry when she found out I lived there too. My landlord actually negotiated a way to get her out of the house a few days early. He bought her a one-way flight to another state. So, if you live in the Midwest, watch out. She's coming north. I'm very thankful that it's over, though. So let's not meet again, squatter girl.

Caught a cab with my 3 year old son today. Going to preschool but for a coffee at our local first. Cabby was a greasy looking 50 - 60 year old caucasian male with slicked back white hair balding at crown hair and a beer gut. Not that physical appearances necessarily matter but perhaps they add context.

It was a short drive as aforementioned to preschool (8 minutes I think) Within the first couple of minutes he was talking about that “hottie” Margot Robbie (who I’ve been compared to looking like before) and then we passed a cop car and he’s like bloody cops. I proceeded to ask if he didn’t like cops and he kinda stumbled over why and pointed out basically how they do their job and sit on the radar gun at this specific spot. Methamphetamine was mentioned at one point but I kind of blanked on exact conversation bc all I’m thinking is his vibe is weird, he won’t stop talking and from that first conversation about Margot Robbie being hot I was gonna be happy for cab ride to be over.

He went to pull up into a car space that was obviously way too small for this big van that he’s driving and I actually had to say look I don’t want to obstruct traffic and he kind of angrily muttered something about the trees being in the way and aggressively pulled out and into a bigger space further up.

After I’ve paid he’s unbuckled his seatbelt and got out and said do you mind if I caffeinate with you? I was legit so shocked at his brazenness - I’m with my son and have places to be - that I kind of just mumbled an okay.

He proceeds to follow me into the coffee store. He starts to say something about “a nude model on the beach” and luckily the attendant interjects asking if I’d like to place my order so I get out of hearing whatever was going to follow on from that statement.

I order my coffee and head straight down to the back of the store where they have an enclosed play area for my toddler while I wait for coffee.

He orders and follows me down and excuses himself to “make some room”. Gross.

One of the attendants comes down with his coffee and asks if she should put this here. I look at her exasperated and I said “well I don’t know, he’s not with me”

And she said I thought you two were together? I said “Nooooooo he is my cab driver and I don’t know him. This is weird, Isn’t it?”

She looked really confused, confronted and then concerned and was amazing and said I’ll if you need any help let one of know and we will get the owner

So anyway he comes out while at least 10 minutes later but very shortly after the coffees arrived and I’m packing my son up to leave to walk to preschool/daycare (it’s literally a 2 minute walk away) and I mention I’m heading off

He asks if he can give me a ride up to the preschool? No, no it’s fine, it’s a short walk. He tries to insist. I insist: No, thank you, it’s a nice walk. Then he asks what time am I coming back? I am reluctant to give any details by now so I just say I’m not sure and he continues to probe as to wether it’ll be around an hour and if so he call his office and see if he could wait for me. In the politest of ways I say hell to the no and I’ll be a few hours at least - which wasn’t really a lie - I was gonna be three exactly but didn’t want him knowing.

I ended up feeling so out of sorts by the behaviour that I filed a complaint with the taxi company. My husband went looking for his taxi, being a small town, he was ropable but luckily didn’t find him. I appreciated his valour though.

I now feel confused, about wether my gut feeling on this guy was correct and kind of scared because he knows where we live, which is on a property with no neighbours close by and no husband home during the day.

Am I overreacting?

UPDATE 4: Psycho situationship Turned Stalker

ORIGINAL POST: https://www.reddit.com/r/ LetsNotMeet/comments/1dmru3r/ psycho_situationship_turned_stalker/ UPDATE: https://www.reddit.com/r/LetsNotMeet/ comments/1dp7yc7/ update_psycho_situationship_turned_stalker_the/ UPDATE 2: https://www.reddit.com/r/LetsNotMeet/ comments/1ftw5sm/ update_2_psycho_situationship_turned_stalker_3/ UPDATE 3: https://www.reddit.com/r/LetsNotMeet/s/51cGWdA4Sq

STORY:

Hey y’all. It’s been around a month since I last updated you guys, but I’ve been rather busy with school, rugby, and planning my trip back to the States as my older brother and his fiancée’s pregnancy. But that’s not why we’re here. I have some stuff I have to cover and I hope I explain em well enough.

For starters, Jane is done. Jane will never be a problem in my life again. I did end up talking with her ex boyfriend, and for legal reasons I’m not allowed to talk about what he had told me about Jane and her family, but it wasn’t pretty.

I wasn’t planning on using the information I had received from her, as she stopped bothering me, but at the end, her staying away from me was only short lived. After I came back from Joburg with everything I learned about her and her family, I didn’t hear from her, so I decided to live my life as it was before her.

A week or so later, my girlfriend and I got into a heated argument (non Jane related) and we ended up not talking to one another for a little bit. I was beyond devastated (I think I cried myself to sleep listening to Blonde by Frank Ocean more this previous month than i did since 2016).

Jane had heard about the fight me and my girlfriend had, I think she or her friends had overheard my girlfriend and her friends talking about it or something. But once again I got a text from her that said “I’m sorry you and Aubrey broke up, you can always talk to me if you need someone to talk to ☺️”.

It pissed me off as me and Aubrey had not broken up, but I texted Jane back telling her I wanted to see her. She completely got the wrong idea and told me to come over. I printed out around 130 pages of all the stuff her ex told me about, as well as his pictures he had taken after she had physically assaulted him on multiple occasions.

I went to her apartment, and first thing she tried was to kiss me and hug me, like I was her husband coming home from a long day at the office. I pushed her off me and handed her the document I had printed. She only glanced at it and visibly got mad. She started yelling at me. She called me a not so nice jewish word that rimes with like. And then called me a not so nice gay word that rimes with bag. I just kept staring at her with the coldest gaze I could pull.

She said how I’m just some rich and spoiled man who thinks he’s on top of the world just because my father owns a couple of companies, how I’m absolutely no one behind the mask of luxury and what not. I asked her to let me speak for a moment and she just yelled “no, you can’t speak after everything I did for you”. I quickly reminded her that what she has done would’ve landed me in prison had the roles been reversed. I also told her that if she doesn’t stay away from me, my family or my girlfriend and her family, I will personally end her father’s whole career with a simple email.

I think this is when she realized that she’s been cornered, and she has no cards left to play, she just nodded at me. I left the document at her table as I walked into her bedroom and took the portrait she had of me. I dragged that thing through the door as I wished Jane godspeed. I ended up burning the canvas at the fire pit later that night.

Last thing I heard is that she’s transferring schools. Aubrey and I made up, and I think I’m happier than ever with my woman, and had I not been 21, I’d have her married right now, but baby steps in that matter. I think that this is the end of all of this bullshit, and I’m able to breathe fine now, and to have a pint at the only place in town that I actually have fun at. The good ‘ol pub

This happened this saturday, two days ago. I'm a 19-year old freshman at uni who moved from a fairly small town to a big city.

There was a guy I talked to over tinder for around two weeks. He was cute and seemed nice, we had a lot in common, he even studied at the same university. He was older though - he already had a degree and was now doing post-grad. The first time we ever met, we went out to grab a coffee on monday, exactly a week ago. I had a great time and when he asked me if I'd like to get drinks (drinking age here is 18) on saturday, I happily said yes.

We met up at a local bar and talked without a moment of awkwardness for two hours. We really clicked. I had to go to the bathroom and when I came back, a man was waiting for me outside the toilet. He stopped me and told me the guy sitting at my table put something in my drink and asked if I wanted him to call the police.

I thanked him, but said no, everything's fine, and went back to my table. I really liked the guy and wanted to believe that the random man was just pranking me. Still I wasn't willing to risk it, so I told him directly what happened - I said "I'm sorry, this sounds insane, but after I got out the bathroom some random guy told me you put something in my drink".

He laughed and said that's insane, as if we were giggling at the situation together. He wasn't serious about it at all. I apologized and said I don't think he did that, not at all, but I'd be much more at peace if he chugged my drink just so I'd know the random guy was pranking me, because nothing like this has ever happened to me before. I apologized again and said the drinks are on me and I'm very sorry to make the situation awkward.

He said that's absolutely not a problem, he just has to go pee first. I waited. After 15 minutes, I realized he's not coming back. I waited around for a little bit longer and after half an hour I paid and went home.

Upon getting home, I checked my tinder and saw he deleted his account. Okay, maybe he thought I'm so insane our date made him delete the app.

Still, it bothered me. I googled him and found nothing. Today, I went to the records office at my uni and asked if a person with his name was studying here. The lady working there told me that's private information she can't share. I then asked if a person with his name has ever obtained a degree from this university. She looked it up and told me that no, no one with his name has ever obtained a degree here.

He lied to me. He told me he did his undergraduate degree at my uni. He hasn't. Or, alternatively, he told me a fake name. I'm now sure that he had terrible intentions and did spike my drink. I was more than lucky that someone noticed. I have no idea what he'd do to me had I drank that, and I don't really want to know.

I'm still a bit creeped out about the situation. I did delete tinder, and I'm very glad I didn't give him my phone number or my address. He did offer to pick me up, and I cleverly said no, yet dumbly told him that the coffee place we met up at is walking distance to my apartment. So he knows the area I live in. As well as my first and last name and where I study. I don't think there's anything I can do about it though - I seriously doubt he even gave me his real name.

To the random tinder guy who lied to me and probably tried to drug me, let's not meet. And to the kind man who made me aware of the situation, thank you VERY much!!

I work at a retail grocery chain and in the store there is a liquor department which is sectioned off from the rest of the grocery store. I was working in that department when a man came in. He purchased a few alcohol shots and made conversation with me. Everything was normal until he pulled an axe out of his backpack. I was completely shocked to be honest. It seems really odd to say but seeing this very strange man rambling about how nobody would dare to mess with him because of his axe. He held it out in the open and kept mentioning how sharp the blade was. He cut his receipt in half on the counter in front of me, to demonstrate how sharp the blade was.

He was mentioning how it could cut through bone and flesh. I tried to not escalate the situation and didn't really react or say much about the axe. I'm ashamed to say, I was sort of frozen and didn't tell him to put it away or leave. I wanted to keep everything calm and get him out as quick as possible. I let my supervisor know immediately once he left. She pulled me aside and asked me to describe the man.

A security officer was able to identify the man on camera. My store manager ended up contacting the police. I gave a police officer my recounting of events, and he informed me, he spoke with the individual outside in the parking lot and they would be trespassed from the store.

It was incredibly unnerving being in that situation, in an isolated area with somebody who seemed to be mentally unstable holding a huge axe.

This happened about three years ago, when I was 14 or 15. At the time I was making pocket money by mowing the lawn at my moms condominium. The lawnmower was kept in a small storage building, where only I and the landlord had keys to. Some backstory about the building: It didn't have any windows, and only one door. It consisted of only one room, where the lawnmower and other gardening stuff were kept. The buildings inner and outer roof had a small space inbetween them. I wouldn't call it an attic, just a space. The inside roof was made of only spare planks, which meant you could see into said space. Anyways, one sunday I needed to mow the lawn, so I took the keys and headed to the storage. The door was locked as usual, so I opened it with the keys. I stepped into the storage, and with no particular reason, I looked up. My heart dropped. Up there, on those rickety planks, there was a man, just looking down. I looked up for only a second or two, and he looked back at me. His clothes were dirty and face covered in scars. I didn't wan't him to do anything, so I pretended as if I hadn't seen him. I took the lawnmower, walked out the door and closed it behind me. I immediately ran to our apartment and called the police, who arrived in about five minutes. The police went in, and a couple of minutes later they brought out the man in handcuffs. The man had been trying to climb back into the roof while holding a pair of garden shears. Truly horrifying.

Who knows what could've happened, if I didn't look up while entering the storage. Me and my mom moved out some time after...

Man in the roof, let's not meet!

I was a child, between 5yo-10yo. I remember bits and pieces but some of it is what I recall my mother telling me years ago.

My mom had a friend we grew up with, Donna. Donna and her daughter came over to hang out with my sister and I numerous times, having sleepovers and the like. One time, Donna was fighting with her boyfriend and I guess had fled to our house during the breakup, or maybe she was already over when her ex freaked out.

Either way, I remember being hurried into my sisters room by Donna, along with my sister and Donna’s daughter. Donna flipped my sisters full sized bed on its side, and had us lay down against the wall with the mattress and box frame leaning against the wall above us, then moved the dresser to the door. I closed my eyes and covered my ears, because I was still afraid of the dark and my sister kept crying. This is the last I remember of the night.

My mother told me that apparently Donna barricaded us in my sisters room because her ex, Fred, showed up unexpectedly looking for her. My mother went to defuse the situation, and explained that Donna wasn’t here, we hadn’t heard from her, go somewhere else. Fred went to his car and came out with some sort of shotgun, while my mom fled back inside locking the door. Fred let one shot go as she went in the door, peppering my mom’s back with pellets and the front of our house. I guess very shortly after, the police arrived and subdued Fred without a fight. I’m not sure how long it took, or what happened between her being shot and the police showing up but I know we lived right down the block from the police station, and my mom had called when she saw Fred get there before she ever confronted him.

My mom’s boyfriend who worked nights rushed home, and was checking on my sister and I as my father (my parents were split co-parenting) shows up. Apparently my mom didn’t get to properly explain what happened in a phone call with my dad, so all he got from it was “Boyfriend shooting near kids” and came over. My dad punched my mom’s boyfriend in the face, putting him out cold, before being told he wasn’t the shooter. My dad and her boyfriend had never had issues prior, and didn’t after when my dad found out her boyfriend left work and rushed over to check on us first.

But yeah, my mom told me the truth about that night about a year before she passed away. She died with pellets still in her neck and back from that night that caused chronic pain, but for reasons beyond my understanding we’re not treatable.

Fred, stay the fuck away from my family.

I only remember bits and pieces but my mom and husband filled me in. This happened in 2018. My parents, my husband, and I were driving to Indianapolis to see some family. I’d found out about my husband’s four month emotional affair with his unstable ex and I was really struggling and i felt extremely alone. His ex had tried to break us up and I was afraid she’d succeed because of how manipulative she is.

I lied and told my husband I was having a cigarette while actually i went to the bar. I ordered two double vodkas with a splash of orange juice. I was really connecting to the bartender when she said they were closing. She gave me another bar that was close by. I was already feeling relaxed when I got to TGIfridays. I ordered two more double vodka and I was wasted. So I went outside to. Have a cigarette to wake me up.

I was leaning against a light pole in the parking lot. Time passed and I suddenly realized I was being walked and pushed into a car. Suddenly I heard my mom yelling to stop that I was her daughter. This creepy man was challenging her on whether we were related. It was insane and I don’t remember much but I do remember his trying to steal me.

This guy would not give up and was basically holding me hostage. That’s when my mom said she’d call the police. He drove away so fast his passenger driver was open.

My mother and husband told me later that they tracked my phone and came to where it said I was. I had my phone in my purse so idk if the guy got rid of it or what but it’s fucking scary. They found my phone discarded. Then my mom called 911 because I was extremely drunk and am not making sense. I woke up in the hospital. I was tied down because apparently for my safety. When I actually woke up I had huge bruises on my arm from the guy trying to get me in his car and also an incredibly huge bruise on my chest. I didn’t know what happened but felt guilty and never really understood what happened. Update- my husband and i worked it out and we’re good now.

This started when I was at my childhood friend’s apartment for what was supposed to be a fun little movie night.

We hadn't hung out in a while and we were catching up. Her place was cozy, a little disorganized, and full of girly decor. We were in our comfiest sweatpants about to watch princess movies. Her apartment isn’t the most tidy. Things are a bit scattered around, but it’s clean and so authentic, which always made me feel at home. We decided on ordering pizza for dinner.

She mentioned that Sherwood, someone I hadn’t met yet, would bring the pizza over. At first, I was not happy to hear that. I thought that meant she had invited other friends (a boy) over to join us, which wasn’t what I had in mind. But I was in for a surprise.

Sherwood turned out to just be our delivery guy for the night. He wasn't joining us. When he got to the apartment, there was this awkward air about him. He was obviously nervous, fumbling a bit with the pizza boxes, and not quite making eye contact. My friend introduced us quickly, and it was clear from her overly thankful demeanor that Sherwood did a lot more for her than just fetch dinner.

After handing us the pizza, there was this brief moment of forced small talk. My friend was super nice to him despite his awkwardness; he wasn’t the best conversationalist and seemed really out of place. Then Sherwood asked for my number. I was in a tough spot because our mutual friend was sitting right there, so I just gave it to him. Yeah, we chatted for maybe five minutes before my friend gave him a cue to leave with something like, “thanks so much for dropping this off.” He seemed to get the hint. We both gave him a hug before my friend said something like "drive safe," giving him another kind of cue to leave.

When I asked my friend what that was all about, she basically explained that Sherwood was her unpaid personal assistant. He did her grocery shopping, he dropped off pizza, and he did all this other stuff. I think Sherwood was just a really lonely guy desperate for interaction, especially female interaction. My friend and I were both young and immature back then, we were about 23, but I think we both knew something was seriously wrong with Sherwood. It was a little hard to articulate because we couldn't point out exactly what his problem was.

Sherwood started a group chat with my friend and me. He just sent a meme or two every week. It felt like he was trying to stay relevant without being intrusive. Maybe he was used to being sidelined or even blocked by other girls in the past. It felt like he was trying to make me remember him but also carefully trying not to give me a reason to block him too. I can't speak on his behalf. That’s just what it felt like.

Sherwood also offered help with errands. The first time, I said "thanks for asking but no." He asked every weekend after that. One day, I made the mistake of accepting his help. I knew better.

I had recently found a great deal for a new washing machine on Craigslist but I had no idea how to pick it up and install it. When I mentioned it in the chat, Sherwood excitedly volunteered to take care of the whole thing. He handled the whole pickup and installation like a total champ, which saved me so much hassle.

I tried to pay him for his efforts because I wanted to show appreciation. But he wouldn’t accept any money. I insisted. Eventually, he suggested that I could repay him by joining him for a hike—like what? I was uneasy about this—it felt a bit too personal and almost like it could be mistaken for a date. But Sherwood framed it as nothing more than a friendly outing, like a transaction to balance out the favor. I agreed to the hike. I rationalized it by telling myself it was fair trade for installing the washing machine and that it was genuinely a form of payment—especially since I didn't think he had too many friends. This hike felt like maybe a way for him to have some companionship. I thought it might be nice helping him. Part of me was still uneasy about spending time with him in such an isolated setting.

The day of the hike, Sherwood picked this trail that was nearby. I had been there before. It's gorgeous. As we walked along together, he chatted about ordinary things like work, the weather, and his hobbies. Everything seemed normal until he suggested we go off the main path to see something "special" he wanted to share—like what could that even mean?

We reached this secluded spot and there—oh my gosh—was a dead body. My heart pounded so violently as Sherwood stood there, so eerily calm and nonchalant. The casualness in his demeanor made me feel even more uneasy. It felt like he wasn’t just showing me a dead body but also revealing this darker side of himself. It smelled bad, but not like in the movies. I didn't know how long it had been there. I am not a biologist, but my guess is that it had smelled a lot worse before, but now it had gone down.

At that moment, I mumbled some excuse about needing to get back quickly and started walking briskly towards the main path. I was urging Sherwood to follow me. I thought maybe this was some twisted mind game, like a way to intimidate me or show that he wasn’t just some "harmless little boy." Maybe he was trying to send a message that said "you should know I'm familiar with things like this." Oh there's another possibility. Maybe he just wanted me to think about him more. Sometimes when I talk to people, I feel like they only notice me for the time that we're together, and then they won't think of me again until the next time we meet. It's possible Sherwood felt that way with me, and maybe he thought showing me a dead body would make him less forgettable. I have no idea.

But on the surface, he seemed oblivious to how inappropriate this was. As we walked back together, I was in full fight-or-flight mode—instinctively looking around to see if there were other hikers or rangers—anyone who could make me feel like I wasn't alone. The moment I spotted someone else on the trail—I called out! Not to expose Sherwood but just asking for directions back to the parking area. I wanted to make sure Sherwood and I wouldn’t be left alone together. I asked this gentleman to walk us back to the parking lot. I wasn't going to take no for an answer. I kept pretending like I was confused about his directions and eventually he agreed to just walk us there.

Getting help from that guy was my way of re-anchoring myself to safety and normality while I was still under the shock of what Sherwood had shown me. We got to the parking area. There, I called my friend and told her I was with Sherwood. I suggested he could drop me off with her and that we'd be there in 20 minutes. Sherwood agreed. That was my way of making sure that if anything happened, it was on the record that Sherwood was the last person to have been with me. Also, I immediately texted my friend what had happened to get that on the record too.

When I got to her apartment, we said thanks to Sherwood and kindly told him to go away. I had already told her through text but then I started going into all the detail. The fact that the body had insects, the fact that the face was decomposing but still recognizable, etc. Her reaction was pure horror—not just about the dead body but also how nonchalantly Sherwood had treated the whole situation! She confessed she always sensed something was off about him even though she’d never imagined anything this disturbing!

We both agreed that we needed to remove Sherwood from our lives. She admitted she felt stuck and she had become too reliant on Sherwood to just fire him cold turkey.

We planned out how we would do it. It was this gradual phasing out plan. We would limit our interactions to times when others were present. We would slowly reduce our responses to his texts. I would never ask for his help again, and my friend would ask for less and less help.

Sherwood kept texting during weekends offering to run errands or asking if we needed anything—to which my friend would reply “I'm trying to work on being more independent but you've really been such a help.”

Eventually—as my friend started dating someone new—she introduced Sherwood to her boyfriend. Sherwood never contacted her after that.

I had called the cops the same night of the incident, but it was a while before we heard more news about it. At least a full month later, a news report confirmed discovering a dead body in that area where Sherwood had taken me hiking. They made an arrest, not of Sherwood, but of this other guy that Sherwood followed on Instagram. I have no idea if Sherwood was connected to the murder.

Reflecting on everything, I think there's one clear moral of the story. Trust your instincts.

I was 16 and I had met this kid down the street from my house.
He said he saw me around and we should hang out.
I figured why not.
So I gave him my number and told him to hit me up.
The next week comes around and I get a text from him asking if I wanted to play Basketball. Of course I did.
He asked if I smoked (Weed) I did, and asked me to bring some. Which isn't out of the ordinary for teenagers.
I brought a couple friends, since we were going to play sports.
To be honest I was really f*cking stoned by the time I got there.
It was a little out of our neighborhood, but it wasn't a bad hood, so I wasn't bothered.
I was an idiot.

It was a gang. Who ambushed us as soon as we got outta the car.
They violently beat me and my 2 friends, and I got it the worst.
There were 3 of them on each of us.
They stabbed my best friend (not very bad)
They choked me unconscious, held a gun to my head and pistolwhipped me.
They ran my pockets and got my cell phone and wallet.
I swear at one point I actually died, because I literally shit myself when I went unconscious
I was DRENCHED in my own blood.
My nose was broken. both eyes swelled shut later.
They had to wake me up because I drove a stick shift and nobody could drive my car.
My attacker literally had to resuscitate me in order for me to leave.

I stopped at a gas station because I had shit in my pants and I couldn't see with blood in my eyes.
As soon as I got in, the clerks jaw dropped... "Where's the bathroom?" I said. He pointed the way.
I cleaned up the best I could, then drove home.

I got home called the cops and showered.
The cops obviously thought it was my fault for being an idiot.
Nonetheless, an undercover showed up and knew exactly who robbed me because we lived on the same street 2 blocks apart.
Turns out they had turned him informant and he reneged on the deal and robbed the buyers in the controlled buy.
I told them how violent they were and swore they would kill someone.
I did a photo line up but they all looked the same to me. So no case.

2 months later, the cops knock on the door.
My mom was super pro-cop and told them I was asleep in my room and turned them loose on me.
They woke me up and held up a photo and said,
"Who's this?"
ME: "How would I know? I've never seen that person before."
"You called this person from your cell phone."
Me: "The cell phone that I reported stolen in a violent robbery to the police?"
They looked stunned (and STUPID)
Me: "They beat me almost to death, you should probably go read that police report."
They apologized and explained that my cell phone had been used to set up a robbery and the person in the photo had been shot to death.
Me: "I told you guys they would kill the next guy."
They came in blazing glory and left in shame.

I have PTSD now and have kept tabs on my assailant for 17 years.
I have no ability to trust anybody, not even those closest to me.

Let's not meet again.

You hear stories about people unknowingly squatting in other peoples homes but never think it would actually happen to you. It happened to me.

About 10 years I (31F) was living alone in a 2 family house on the second floor with my then toddler. For the story to make sense, I need to try and explain the layout and the backstory.

My brother’s close friend at the time lived on the first floor and is the one who referred me to the landlord. We had private front entrances but a shared back entrance with a staircase that ran from the basement all the way to the second floor. I would frequently leave my back door unlocked because I had a habit of locking my keys in the house and my downstairs neighbor could let me in the backdoor.

The downstairs neighbor had a friend who was kind of down and out. He had a history of substance abuse but was supposedly clean at the time. He was a relatively nice guy and my neighbor had been letting him stay on his couch for a while. The neighbor had a 4 year old daughter and having someone constantly sleeping on the couch without any plans of finding a permanent living situation was becoming disruptive to their everyday lives.

Neighbor tells him he needs to go. It was summer time so the friend decides hes going to sleep on the couch on our covered porch. We tell him thats not acceptable and when we asked him to leave, we meant the property in general. It had also become abundantly clear that he was using again and his behavior had become somewhat erratic. He was also making a lot of unsolicited advances on me which had become increasingly uncomfortable. He wasnt happy but it wasnt our problem. He stopped coming around and we no longer saw him around town.

Fast forward a month or two and I noticed things going missing. Jewelry, small amounts of money left around the house, lighters. Inconsequential items I had written off as lost.

This house was old with paper thin walls. The back door in question was right next to the bathroom along one side of the shower. It also made a very distinct noise when opened.

One day my car was at the mechanic so it probably appeared that I wasnt home. Im showering and I swear I hear the back door open. I freeze, practically stop breathing but after a few minutes when nobody murdered me american psycho style, I wrote it off again. Im a notorious wimp and had a history since childhood of thinking every strange noise was a potential murderer.

This was a long time ago so I dont remember the exact length of time, possibly a few weeks. The basement was really big and shared and the landlord also stored stuff down there. It was very packed with some very dark corners. We rarely went down there. The landlord comes by one day and goes down to the basement. He hears a strange noise, grabs a baseball bat and find this man in our basement. The man pushed the landlord down, runs out of the house and down the street.

We call the police who fine him hiding in a trashcan around the corner (cant make this shit up. Upon further investigation, we find the basement window had been ever so slightly propped open. In a back corner behind some boxes was a nest of blankets filled with our missing items plus some drug paraphernalia. It reminded me of kreachers nest under the stairs at grimmauld place (if you know, you know).

He had also left his flip phone behind in the chaos where we found A LOT of pictures of me sleeping. This man had been high on crack, living in our basement and regularly entering my apartment both when I wasn’t home and when I was sleeping for months. While he seemed like a nice guy, he was regularly high on hard drugs and that changes people.

I still get chills knowing he could have done anything to me and my child and I would have never seen it coming. The worst part is that the charges somehow got dropped and they never even consulted us and they never gave us an option as the victims. This was not even close to his first criminal offence.

My state is notoriously soft on non-violent criminals, regardless of whether it was a victimless crime or not. My local police department is also notorious for making deals in exchange for information on even small time dealers. We didnt get any justice.

Luckily this didnt have much lasting effect on my mental health, just more of a wtf, cant believe that really happened. It feels like a fever dream.

Jason, lets not meet.

Hi, it's me again

I don't know what's going on lately but I have had to remove more stories than usual for violating the fictional names rule. I don't want to remove stories but rule violations = auto removal because if you didn't read the rules then you probably didn't read the guidelines and that often means the story doesn't belong here. Even if I don't catch it, the post ends up receiving multiple reports from users, so you're annoyed your story gets removed, I'm annoyed, the users are annoyed, no one wins.

I have seen a lot of comments from users frustrated with the state of this sub lately, so I know it's not just me. I feel you guys and wish I could fix it, but I can only deal with the content we have. As a reminder: posts here must have been life threatening in some way, extremely unusual, or you found something extremely disturbing. Because of that, it's expected that this would be a slow subreddit. Please read this post for the type of stories that should be posted here with examples given.

If your story has been removed because of it being a wall of text or the fictional names rule, you can message modmail for re-approval.

THE RULES:

1. NO FICTION, NO PARANORMAL - self explanatory

2. NO PROMOTION - if I see any posts or comments asking for permission to narrate a story for your YouTube channel, the offending material will be removed and you get a temp ban. No exceptions. People do not post on this sub just to be content fodder for others. Do not provide permission in the body of your post, either, whether it's pre-emptively or edited in.

3. No stories focusing primarily on rape or sexual assault/harassment (including flashing, catcalling, or other lewed behavior) - however, I've noticed stories that even just mention it get reported. Please stop doing that. Stories mentioning assault or rape as a part of an experience is not grounds for removal. If a story would still fit in this subreddit without that element, especially if it's just a sentence or two saying "this happened" and giving a trigger warning, the story does not "focus" on rape or sexual assault.

4. No series - do not break up a story that has already concluded prior to you writing it (if you go over reddit's character limit, you can continue in the comments). If you write about an encounter and something else happens after that, an update post is fine.

5. No stories that happened to others - you must be able to recall a story from your own memory - no stories that happened to mom, dad, aunt, uncle etc. Stories that technically happened to you but you can't remember on your own (ex: you were a baby when it happened) are kind of a gray area*

6. No "missed close call" posts - if you worked with or knew someone who did horrible things but not to you personally, the post does not belong here.

7. FICTIONAL NAMES ARE REQUIRED - BUT DO NOT USE PHRASES LIKE "LET'S CALL THEM X" BECAUSE WE ALREADY KNOW THEYRE FICTIONAL BECAUSE OF THIS RULE AND REDDIT'S POLICY ON DOXXING. Additionally, don't use initials - it makes it harder to follow along in a story.

• speaking of doxxing - none of that. If it's not freely available information (as in anyone with enough info could Google it and find a news article), don't post it. Doxxing could get this subreddit banned.

8. No walls of text - use paragraph breaks by double pressing enter after each paragraph

9. Don't be an asshole - this is more for comments than anything, but don't be a jerk. We have a zero tolerance policy on victim blaming. Do not start or engage in slapfights. If someone is being a dick, report their comment and I'll take care of it.

10. Keep personal appearance or house/street layouts to a minimum - it is hard to visualize two paragraphs about the specific layout of a street or house. Additionally, in the past when I have seen personal appearance descriptions in stories they just contribute to harmful stereotypes about who gets creeped on or why. Being targeted by a predator is about vulnerability and the predator, not how attractive you are. I've been catcalled in sweatpants and zero makeup. It's not about how you look.

11. No stories focusing on road rage or being briefly followed on the road - This subreddit is for life threatening encounters (an argument can be made that being in a car at all is life threatening...but that doesn't mean it fits here.) If you have a road rage incident and get the shit beat out of you or a gun pulled on you, that fits for sure. But getting flipped off or followed on a highway because you flipped someone off but eventually they give up is unhinged as hell and frightening, but not on the same level as stories like "no good deed goes unpunished."

12. No stories taking place entirely online - stories must have some real life component to them to fulfill the "life threatening" part of the requirements for this subreddit. Stories taking place entirely online belong on r/onlinehorrorstories

*Given the lack of suitable stories lately and the fact this is a gray area, I'd like to hear from the community on whether to let stories like this through. They're not super common, but I have seen a few here and there. I'm also considering loosening up on the no family member's stories, as at least one of my favorite stories from this subreddit is from someone's uncle and I can think of another classic story that happened to the OP's stepmother. Maybe we could loosen it up to if it's not your story, it must be an encounter from someone related to you by blood or marriage? A different subreddit I mod has a rule like that and it works pretty well. Let me know what you think. No other rules are up for debate at this time.

Please continue to report stories that break the rules. If a post doesn't belong here, it may be suitable for r/creepyencounters, which was created to take the overflow from here for stories that aren't life threatening, but still creepy/disturbing in a milder way.