Stranger stories. Never miss another strange story. Subscribe and hit the bell. Sit back and get comfortable. I have a few stories to share with you. I was about 4 or 5 years old and my parents had just separated. My mom was living in a two-bedroom apartment. I had my own room, but I preferred to sleep in her bed whenever I was staying with her. Our two bedrooms were at the end of the hallway directly across from each other. Our apartment was on the first floor. I remember that it was in the middle of the summer and my mom had her room window open, which was directly behind the bed right above the headboard. Anyways, I woke up in the middle of the night and remember sitting up and seeing that our cat was sitting in the door frame of my mom's room. Her door was open and you could partially see into my bedroom. This was strange because our cat was typically always in bed with us. As I was watching him, he walked into my bedroom and meowed. I turned to face my mom and wake her up in the three four seconds it took her to wake up and ask me what was wrong. We both looked back up in the door frame and there was a man standing by my open door making his way out of my bedroom. I still don't know how he managed to do it so quickly, but my mother proceeded to pick me up and literally throw me out of the screen window. Again, we were on the first floor, so it was maybe a three-foot drop to the ground. She quickly followed and we were able to start screaming for help and someone called 911. The police came, but didn't see any signs of forced entry, only that our front door was unlocked, which led them to believe that the man must have exited that way. The strange thing was that my mom swore up and down that she had locked the door that night with a deadbolt and the chain lock. About a week later, she was cleaning the kitchen and opened up our water heater closet and found a notebook with names and drawings, as well as a pair of gloves and some gum wrappers. The police were called again, but all they could do was speculate that the man had been in her house and hid until we were asleep. I grew up on Long Island in the town of Brentwood. It was a quiet town for its location, and we just moved into a new house. My dad worked as a taxi driver at the time, which meant he would usually end up coming home early in the morning. It was a Saturday morning. I was watching cartoons and my dad just came back from work, so I immediately went to say hello to him. My mom heard us from the bedroom and said, "Hello, honey. Don't go in the pool. It's not ready yet." Me and my dad thought it was a little weird as it was 6:00 a.m. and we weren't going to go in the pool anyways. We brushed it off and my dad began telling me his usual stories about the crazies he picked up throughout the night. After a few minutes or so, we both realized it was a Saturday and my mom was at work. It was only me and him in the house, and the voice telling us not to go in the pool sounded just like my mother. Fast forward a few days, my new neighbors came over to welcome us to town. It was a couple with three kids, a son that was my age and two girls, one blonde and one brunette. We went outside to play soccer when I noticed the little brunette girl was nowhere to be found. Being a curious boy, I ran around the property and found her playing in the woods, a dangerous area for a little kid to be exploring. She asked me to come play tag, but I declined, wanting to get everyone in on the game. The reactions of everyone as I asked for them to join us was puzzling, along with the response from the mom saying, "We only have one daughter." Turns out a small brunette girl drowned in our pool 10 years ago. Her mother soon passed from a heart attack. The following 5 to 6 years were terrifying for all of us. I'll start off by saying I don't live in the nicest area. It's not crime-ridden, but I don't feel comfortable around any of the people in my town or apartment building, including my building security guard, who spends most of his time sleeping. So, last night I was getting ready to go to bed. I turned off my TV and AC, and it was completely silent in the living room. I was sitting on the couch and heard people talking from what sounded like the back balcony next to me. Nothing unusual there. Sound permeates our windows easily, I guess. But, I had never heard anyone speaking so clearly before. I kept playing around on my phone, and for some reason I just got weirded out by the tone of the men speaking to each other. I heard the word "ransom" and my ears perk up. I begin heavily eavesdropping. She won't be looking for me. She knows you. The ransom was supposed to happen tonight. It still can. Come 5:00 a.m., this place is like the walking dead. People start checking their doors and There's no security in any of the buildings at that time. I also heard snippets of them talking about a neighbor they had seen walking around naked after she showered. And one of the men telling the other one something along the lines of, "I'd invite her over while you're gone next week. Buy her a bottle of wine, get her drunk, but she's yours, so I won't do that." This I thought was particularly weird. It all ended bizarrely when one of the men, who I learned lives a few floors below came to the apartment next to mine and started banging on the door. I called security and heard the man mentioning it was about my neighbor's dog, who I didn't hear bark at all. So, I'm not sure why he would need to bang on his door so loud at 3:00 a.m. Anyway, I'm terrified to leave the apartment since then, knowing there are creepy neighbors who might be planning something involving a ransom in my building. It's 2003 and I was 6 years old. At the time I lived in a small condo, one bedroom, one bathroom, a connected living room with a kitchen, and a spiral staircase with random miscellaneous things stored under it. I was living with my dad at the time, as my mom was out of the picture. It was Saturday and I remember specifically watching Codename Kids Next Door on TV in my bedroom after waking up. My dad worked during the day, but was nice enough to leave the TV on with Cartoon Network playing, which he knew was my favorite channel. During a commercial break, I got up to go to the bathroom. And even though I knew I was home alone, I closed the door behind me out of habit. And boy, am I glad I did that. As I am in the bathroom, I hear the sound of my incredibly noisy spiral stairs, that can be heard across the condo, begin to rapidly make noise that got quieter over the course of about 2 seconds. Telling me that whatever made the noise was going downstairs fast. I was getting pretty scared, as I knew my dad was long gone. I walk out of the bathroom and look over the 3-ft long railing across from the bathroom. All of a sudden, out of nowhere, I see an afraid-looking man looking into my living room while staying hidden under the stairs. Being terrified and still in the bathroom, I made a distinct effort to be quiet. I knew he couldn't hear me, but he most likely knew I was in the apartment. I remember thinking I had two options. Yell at him to leave, which could end badly in so many ways, or hide and wait it out for as long as I can. I waited for what felt like hours, but in reality was about 20 minutes, until I heard shuffling downstairs for about a minute, and then the sound I was praying for, the front door opening. I was still extremely skeptical, even thinking it was a trap to lure me downstairs, so I stayed put upstairs for the rest of the day until my dad finally came home hours later. I didn't tell him about the incident, thinking he would be mad I didn't approach the man. Now I realize he would never ask me to do that, but at the time that was what I was thinking. Nothing valuable was missing from the house, and I have no idea why or how this man got in. Regardless, I sure as hell made sure to check under the stairs every morning when I walked down for the next 4 years of living in that condo. I live in a moderately-sized city in the north of England, where I study at college. One thing about student houses in Britain is that they almost always have the front lounge converted into a bedroom, which is where I live. This means that I have a fairly big window that faces directly onto the street. There is a small part of the window at the top that opens to allow ventilation, which is maybe 10 cm tall. I never thought that anyone would be able to fit through, and I've always felt completely safe here. So, I usually leave the window slightly open at night. Covering the window is a set of Venetian blinds. You know, the ones made of horizontal slats of wood that you can rotate with a pull cord. My set is white, which when combined with the streetlights outside, means that you can see the silhouette of anyone who walks past the window, even when the blinds are shut. Last night, I was incredibly hungover. So, I went to bed quite early and left the window open as usual. Around 1:00 a.m., I woke up, as I sometimes do, and went to check my phone for the time. It was then that I realized I had woken up because I had heard a noise. The weighted end of the pull cord was hitting against the wooden blinds. This usually happens because of the wind, so I paid no attention to it. As I started to drift back to sleep, I looked at the blinds and saw the silhouette of two people against my blinds. I then saw a hand reaching through the window and pulling the cord out of the window. I sleep in the nude, so I didn't go over to the window, but I sat up in bed and waited for what happened next. The blinds suddenly opened, and two men in their late 20s, early 30s, wearing baseball caps, were pressed against the glass looking in. One of them whispered, "I think they're awake." To which I shouted back, "What do you two think you're doing?" The two men immediately shut the blinds off and ran, shouting, "We're looking for someone else." That was the last I heard from them. I genuinely thought it was a dream until I saw the blinds cord was outside of the window. We had a break-in a few months ago and my laptop was stolen. So, I don't know if it was anything similar to that or who they could possibly have been looking for by sneaking through a window in the middle of the night. They clearly weren't expecting whoever was to be an awake, hungover, angry rugby player. I live between two houses of just girls, so naturally I went to warn them about this that has happened. I will also be contacting the police later. This happened in my freshman year of college. I was very excited to move into the dorms and meet my first ever roommate. About a week before school started, the dorms threw a fun little mixer party where everyone gets dressed up and meets their hallmates and dorm roommates. I got ready to go and asked Anne, my roommate, if she wanted to come along. She said she doesn't like people and doesn't want to go. I decided not to bother her and went alone. When I got back about 2 hours later, Anne was sitting on my bed facing the door. I felt really creeped out. She asked me where I had been for so long. It seemed like she was really angry with me. This was the first time I thought she was weird. Everything got worse after this first night. Anne started doing really weird things like skipping her classes so she could wait for me outside my classes. She would draw pictures of me and leave them on my bed with notes saying they were for me. She's gone through my phone when I left it unattended. Anne would always stay home despite me trying to get her to go out and do social things. My brother was a senior that year and attended the same college. He was living in an apartment about a 5-minute drive from the dorm and like to host small parties. I invited Anne to one of his parties and surprisingly she went. When we got home, she revealed to me that she had stolen a cup from his house as a souvenir to remember the night. I told my RA about this. However, because she said Anne was not doing anything threatening, I couldn't change rooms. One night I went to a late movie with a guy and my phone was off. When I turned it back on, Anne had called me 20 times and sent me 32 text messages. She was calling my mother and the cops saying I had gone missing. When I got home, Anne was sitting on my bed waiting for me. Throughout the semester, I started to notice random things like my hairbrush, random pairs of panties, and clothes had gone missing. I decided to look in her drawers and found she had a few pairs of my worn underwear. Horrified, I went to tell my RA, but she said I could not prove they were mine and I should not have gone looking in her drawers. I could not prove anything and I had to live with this crazy girl. The whole weirdness of the situation climaxed one night. Anne had left a copy of the Old Testament on my bed. When I opened it, she had tied my hair, collected off of my hairbrush, into a cross with her hair. I knew it was our hair because my hair is jet black and her hair was a light blonde. Terrified to be in my room, I fled to my brother's house leaving all my belongings behind. Later that night, I logged into my Facebook account and I had 40 new notifications. Anne had logged into my Facebook from my computer and tagged me in about 30 pictures. She had screenshots of random conversations I had with my friends and posted them on my wall along with a few pictures she had taken of me. I showed these to the RA the next day and she finally said I could change rooms. Fortunately, after the end of the semester, Anne got into an exchange program and moved to France so I never had to see her on campus again. I grew up in the suburbs of Sacramento, California in an area that was very middle class and a place where it always felt safe. As a kid, I would walk home from school with my neighbors. We would play hide-and-go-seek, street basketball, and so on. We never had any strange encounters until one specific day. I'm currently a 30-year-old man and it's still weird for me to think about this story. Anyways, during the weekends when I was a teenager, I would ride my bike for hours at a time for around a 10-block radius from where my house was. In Sacramento, we typically had good weather in the spring and most of the days were mild temperature with a decent amount of clear skies and sunlight. I'm a pretty introverted individual and also pretty naive to things around me. But I vividly remember one time when I was 13 years old and riding my bike in the neighborhood. I had a speedometer on my bike and I always traveled around 12 to 16 mph in the right-hand side bike lane of the street. While I was cruising on my bike, a windowless white van pulled up to the left side and matched my speed. I remember glancing over and thinking nothing of it since it's a neighborhood street and it would be weird if a van sped by me at 35 mph. Within a few seconds of the van matching my speed, the right door slid open. I remember seeing two guys in the back and one driving. I look over and notice the van getting uncomfortably close to me and one of the guys said quite loudly, "Get in the van." I didn't reply, but I started pedaling faster and reached about 18 mph, which I know isn't very fast compared to a van and it isn't going to get me away from it, but it seemed like the right thing to do at the time with my adrenaline pumping. The van accelerated to match my speed. I glanced over at it. It was weird on the inside. I remember seeing no seats in the back. I also remember seeing the metal flooring of the van and some rope. The guy beckoned. Now in more of an insisting tone. "Get inside the van." And reached out since I was within arm's distance. At this time we were traveling straight, but literally just as he was reaching out, the road we were on intersected with another street that I instinctively turned a hard right onto. They were forced to keep going straight, otherwise they would have flipped the van to follow me. I knew the area well and started weaving in between the residential streets that consisted of lots of curved roads that looped and resembled a maze. In hindsight, it wasn't so smart to be in that area. They could have easily found me as I couldn't have seen them coming up on me because of the curved roads, but luckily they didn't make another pass. Nowadays, I look back and wonder what they intended to do. You know, were they just goofing around or did they actually have malicious intent? Did they ever do anything to anyone else who couldn't get away? These questions still linger with me. I went home and never told anyone about it until now. This story was about 4 or 5 years ago, but still gives me nightmares to this day. At the time, I was attending college that was only about a 10-minute walk from my Nana's apartment. In between classes, I would walk over and visit her. This was in a sketchy part of town, so I would dress very frumpy. My mistake was thinking that if I walked there in the middle of the day, no one would try and do anything. I'm not calling attention to myself, so I'm practically invisible. I couldn't have been more wrong. I was leaving my Nana's house heading back to campus when I noticed a plain blue van slowly driving next to me. Inside the van, a man asking me directions to a well-known hotel with giant signs posted all over the side of the road. I don't answer him and keep my head down, walking a bit faster. I see him pull into the parking lot to turn his car off and hop out. He's now walking next to me, telling me I'm pretty and asking questions like, "What's your name? Know any places to party? Why are you being so shy? Do you need a ride?" I don't know why I did this. I probably thought if I act tough, which I'm definitely not, he would leave me alone. I stopped, looked him in the eyes and said, "Take a hint. If I'm not answering you, it means leave me alone." The look he gave me sent chills down my spine. This completely expressionless face with a creepy, cold "Okay, little girl." as a response. He walked away staring at me the whole time. I saw him hop in his van and fly out of the parking lot in the opposite direction. I felt relieved as I saw him drive away and continued on my route. As I'm crossing the road, the same van came screeching towards me. He drives halfway up on the sidewalk in front of me blocking my path and saying, "Get in the van now." I'm frozen in fear. I'm terrified and in shock this is happening. I just stand there telling myself to run, but my legs won't move. He gets out of the front seat, opens the back door and repeats, "Get in the van or else." Just as he said that, I hear a man's voice yell from the hotel right next to us asking, "What the heck is going on?" The creepy guy tells him to mind his own business. Another man from across the street began yelling at him as well. When the creep turned around to tell these men to shut up, I booked it. I ran faster than I have ever ran in my entire life. I somehow made it back to campus crying and gasping for air while people stared at me like I was a lunatic. I told campus security what just happened. They promised they would look into it, but I never heard anything about it since. So, this story began when I matched some girl on a dating app about a year ago. Her pictures weren't great, but at the time I just wanted to meet fun people. After talking for a while, she asked for my number and called me right away. She asked me to come over to her place to have coffee and talk. I took that literally, only coffee and some conversation. So, I thought, "Why not?" and left. We met at the tramway station and walked for about 10 minutes to her apartment, which smelled funny, a mix of dog and some herbs. She soon told me she had three dogs and liked yoga, meditation, and massages, which thinking about it now, totally makes sense. As I said, I wasn't expecting anything sexual going down, but then she said something about staying the night and banging all day. I just brushed it off as a joke. Besides, that night I was throwing a party at my place. It was around 11:00 a.m. and I never told her about my party. Anyways, she brings out the coffee. I start drinking it and it tastes bad. Really, really bad. She offers me a hand massage. I thought to myself, "She's not asking me to undress and lie face down on the massage bed, so why not?" While she was doing it, I noticed her notebooks and started going through them. There were drawings of the human body and in them was written the effects of massage in specific locations. For example, you could have something like "Prevent cold" written on the drawing of the back. She started to massage my ring finger and breathe heavily. I searched for that part in the notebook. Heavier breathing. She begins to apply more pressure on the side. Even heavier breathing. "This girl's almost having an orgasm," I thought. Then I found it. Written on the side of the left ring finger in very small captions penis. I thought it was really weird, but I let her finish. She said that sometimes people feel dizzy after a hand massage. And then I could lie down on her bed if I needed to. Immediately after she said that, I started to feel really dizzy and my vision started to get blurry. She noticed I wasn't feeling well. I said I needed to go to the bathroom to wash my hands. I couldn't even see my own reflection, let alone text or call someone on my phone. I thought about the horrible coffee and the weird massage I just got. I pictured myself waking up naked and tied to her bed the next morning. Her phone rings. I overheard that some friend was coming over for a few minutes. I almost thought I was done for, but noticed she seemed disappointed. I felt relieved. I decided I couldn't do anything but hope for the best. The friend arrived and I took my chance saying I had to leave. She told me to text her when I got home, to which I replied that I would. When I got home, I had one of the worst headaches of my life. I waited for it to pass for hours. That night at the party, I didn't say a word about what happened. I realized I had done something stupid and didn't want to be lectured. I never answered any of her texts and learned a lot from this experience about trusting strangers. This happened to me a few months ago. I was at a club for my friend's birthday and we had a table with around a dozen friends with us. When we get there, a guy immediately starts to hit on me. He seemed super weird, and at the time I had a boyfriend, so I politely declined his advances. Things started to get weird soon after. While walking in the club, I feel like I see him everywhere, and it started to freak me out. But at the time, I didn't really sense any danger. Fast forward an hour, and I'm chatting with a friend from high school who happened to be the bartender. The guy from earlier comes up and orders a drink for both me and him. I decline, and explain to my bartending friend that we already have a table, so I'm good on drinks. The guy didn't like that at all. He gave me about not accepting his offer, and how he's trying to be nice. However, during his nice guy speech, he picked up my drink to refill it, which I again declined, and asked him to excuse me while I chatted with my friend. I finished my drink, the same drink he just picked up, and didn't think much about the creepy guy anymore. After about 30 minutes later, I became very sick, disoriented, and I had my friend help me to the restroom, since I felt too dizzy to walk alone. After a while, I felt sick again, and my female friend was nowhere to be seen. So, I walked myself to the bathroom. While waiting at the door, the same creepy guy swooped in and held onto my waist very tight. He asked if I wanted to come up to his table upstairs to meet his friends. I kept telling him no, and that I needed to get back to my friends. He began dragging me towards the stairs, telling me a list of disgusting, perverse things that I refuse to speak of here. At that point, I was terrified. My legs literally didn't work. He was carrying me upstairs, and as soon as we got up there, he requested his valet to go home. At this point, I know I'm in danger. And notice my purse is missing, and so is my phone. While we were waiting outside, the bouncer made a comment about my behavior. The guy shrugs it off as too much alcohol. And as we are waiting for the valet, six of my friends burst from behind the door and begin screaming at the creepy guy. While one of my female friends grabbed me and started pulling me back inside. I passed out soon after that and woke up at 5:00 p.m. the next day on my friend's couch. I thought I had alcohol poisoning until I went to the emergency room. And I found out I was drugged with ketamine while out the night before. This guy intended to drug me and take me home with him. Since then, I have refused to go out without my boyfriend. I avoid that bar at all costs, and I know to watch my drink like a hawk whenever I'm out. This was a terrifying experience I will never forget. I live in Chicago, and I don't have a car since public transportation is so much easier. I went to do some gig at a local bar, and after it was done, I headed home. My friends and I were all taking different rail lines back home. So, we said goodbye and parted ways. After walking for a bit, I realized how late it was and it hit me that the bus I was taking wasn't a late-night bus and didn't run past 12:00. I saw a taxi go by with its lights on. I just got paid for the gig at the bar, so I thought, "Hell, why not?" I usually don't use taxis because they're too expensive, but I was tired and just wanted to go home. The guy stopped without me waving my hand, which I thought was weird, but oh well, he probably saw me and thought I looked like I'd needed a ride, right? I hop in and he asks me where I'm going. I tell him my neighborhood and he starts driving to that direction. I didn't tell him where I lived exactly, but gave him the main intersection closest to me. As we start getting closer, he starts asking about my tattoos and piercings. I get asked a lot about them, so I didn't think much of it. I just said where I got them done and a little bit about them. He also asked if I have my nipples or genitals pierced. I tell him that I don't. He then asks me to get a drink with him, to which I reply that I have a boyfriend. He begins begging me. By this point, we're about to pull up to the intersection near my apartment and I basically tell him, "Thanks, but no thanks for the date." Out of the blue, he pulls over to a parking lot and locks the doors. I look at him scared and he says to me, "The only way you're getting out of here is if we grab a drink." and gives me a sinister smirk. I'm terrified, frozen in fear. My phone is dead, so I couldn't even call anyone. I'm not sure how I thought of this, but I say, "Okay, we can grab a beer and hang at my place, okay?" I tell him to pull into a 7-Eleven so I can buy us drinks. I get out and tell him I'll be right back. His eyes follow me the whole time as I walk through the parking lot. I go in and act as if I'm asking the cashier to open the cooler for me, but instead I tell him that this taxi driver is insane and I need help. I live not too far from the 7-Eleven and know the cashier by name. He lets me out the back door and walks with me through the back alleyway to my apartment, which was about two blocks away. He had his co-worker keep an eye on the guy until I got back safe. I made it home and thanked the cashier a million times. He said he was happy to help and told me to keep my door locked, and that he tried to get the guy's license plate number. By the time the cashier was back, the driver was gone. I've never taken a cab since and don't plan on taking one anytime soon. This story took place years ago, but it stays in my memories to this day. For some context, at the time, my parents would go out running with friends once a week and leave my sister and I, me 14, her 10, alone for a few hours. They would leave at night, so they usually wore neon clothing while on their run. Where I lived, it's common for houses to have a 7-ft plus tall wall around it. The door to the front yard could be opened from the kitchen, and you could see who was ringing the doorbell on our security system screen. This was a regular night. My parents left in a taxi about 20 minutes earlier to get to the meet-up point with their friends. Our doorbell was broken, and my sister and I happened to be in the room where the security system lit up, showing a man looking up at the ground wearing a neon yellow windbreaker. "Oh, dad's home early," I pointed out, a little confused. "Yeah, maybe he hurt himself." My sister walked over, reaching out to the display to open the door when I stopped her. My dad is a fairly tall man, about 6-ft. While this guy looked about 5'5". We both froze. The screen is supposed to turn off after 30 seconds or so. However, it stayed on for about 3 minutes, telling us this guy was ringing the bell repeatedly. He seemed to be getting frustrated and started banging his fists against the door. We could hear him shouting slurs at us, calling us names, telling us to let him in. Eventually, he walked off, throwing his hands in the air as if he was extremely mad. My sister and I stayed huddled in her room, terrified until our parents called us about 45 minutes later, asking us to open the door for them. I don't know why we didn't call them when we first saw the guy. Shock? Scared of being in trouble for almost letting a stranger in? By the time they'd come home, we had calmed down and told them everything. Turns out my parents took an unmarked taxi that was privately owned and did not belong to any company. My dad forgot his windbreaker in the taxi on the way to the meetup point. So, it seems the driver came back, posed as my dad, and tried to get into the house. We haven't been left alone since, and it took me ages before I finally stopped being scared of this man who had our address and somehow knew that my sister and I were still in the house. It still fills me with dread thinking how long this guy's been watching my family in order to plan this. This story happened years ago, but that doesn't stop me from thinking about it every now and then. I was about 13 or 14 and was babysitting two boys for some church members. I had done it before. The kids loved me and the parents were very comfortable with me. This was a night where they were going to be gone until about 2:30 in the morning. I was doing it for free that day because they were going to do something church-related and that's just how I rolled. Anyway, the place they lived in was an apartment complex. You know, one of those small ones that had two floors. They were on the bottom floor with two bedrooms on either side of the apartment, a kitchen on the left, and the living room on the right with the sliding glass door to a small patio and a bathroom next to the front door. It was around 1:30 a.m. and I knew they would be getting home soon. The kids were already knocked out. I grabbed a couple of DVDs to watch to make the night go quicker. I was already very tired and had drifted in and out of sleep a couple of times already. All of a sudden, I hear knocking on the front door. Knowing the parents had a key, I did nothing but sit there in the dark with the TV glowing. Being a paranoid person who's seen enough horror movies, I grabbed the baseball bat that was next to the couch. What happened next will haunt me forever. I heard a low voice, almost like a young woman's whisper. "Oh dear, that won't help you." My heart stopped. I realized the patio door didn't have the blinds shut. My eyes shift slowly to the door and I see someone on the patio staring right at me. I couldn't make out anything other than that they were very short and wide. I screamed and ran into the kids' room. Thankfully, they were still asleep. This was before I had a cell phone and there were no cordless phones in the house. All I did was push the dresser in front of the door and stared at the one window of the room hoping not to see anything through it. A shadow loomed on the window. The knocking started again and the woman's voice called out, "Come on, dear. I won't hurt you. Please come out." The window was being knocked on so hard I was afraid it would break. The kids woke up screaming and horrified by the loud knocking. Knowing I had two young terrified kids with me, I became vulnerable and afraid. Within 2 seconds, I hear the father yell out, "Hey, who the hell are you?" and the person running away. The front door opened and there was a harsh knocking on the kids' bedroom door. Thankfully, it was the parents. I let them in and put the dresser back. I explained what happened and they called the police. When they arrived, they found nothing but the bushes that hide the patio cut up and ripped, possibly for whomever it was to get through. The family moved away about 5 months later and I never babysat anyone ever again. I know the woman was long gone, but to this day, every time I hear a knock, a chill runs through me. So, I was an anxious kid. I was always kind of afraid to be left alone without my parents, even with my older sister and two younger sisters. I just sort of always had this feeling that something bad was going to happen. One of the scariest nights of my childhood happened when I was about 14 years old and my parents went out with a few friends for a couple of hours. I had that bad feeling that I always get when they leave and begged my parents not to go. I always begged them not to go. So, they didn't think much of it. There was one particular restaurant near my neighborhood that had no cell phone service. It just happened to be that this particular night, my parents were going to that restaurant. I lived in a rural area of the United States. The driveway of my house takes a good few minutes to walk down, but we also had close neighbors. One of these neighbors were having a party that same night. My older sister was babysitting and had a friend over to help her pass the time. All three of my sisters and her friend were watching Titanic. I was playing computer games in our office, which is just off the living room and placed directly in front of the front door. It was peaceful and I was distracted from my anxiety. Out of nowhere, I hear bloodcurdling screams coming from outside. It sounded like a young woman. She was screaming for help or for someone to come outside. She was relentless. My sister, knowing better than to open the door, grabbed all of us a pellet gun and locked us all in the bathroom. The woman continued to scream the most awful, horrific scream you can imagine. We called my parents over and over again, but the calls never went through. We called 911 and told them what was happening. I knew that eventually my mom would go outside the restaurant to check her phone just in case. Waiting while locked in the bathroom as the screams were closing in on our front door seemed like forever. We sat in dead silence. All I could hear were the woman's petrifying screams over the soundtrack of Titanic. The whole situation was extremely eerie. Some time passes and we heard the sirens flying down our road. The woman must have heard them, too, because the screaming stopped. Our parents arrived at the same time the police did. The police searched the property that same night and then came out the next morning in the daylight to search again. This time for blood, tracks, signs of struggle, anything that indicated foul play. They couldn't find anything. I always wondered whether the woman really needed our help or if it was all a trap. We thought maybe she got in trouble at the party down the street, but the logical part of my brain tells me that doesn't make sense. She chose the fourth house in the street with the longest driveway to seek help. She also disappeared as soon as the police arrived. My parents didn't leave us alone at night for a long time after that. The story took place during my freshman year at college around spring time. I enjoyed working out and after a busy day it was time to hit the campus gym. To give you a visual of how the campus fitness center looks, the main center area has several treadmills, some hamstring sets and small televisions. This area also has windows for people outside of the gym area to peer in as well. To the right of the treadmill area, there are weights in the bench press section. To the left is the entrance to the gym. I was doing my nightly routine and the gym was very empty. After I was finished, I decided that it was time to head back to my dorm. This is when things started getting creepy. As I left the gym and was going up the steps, I noticed someone across campus. He seemed suspicious. I hear him say to me, "What's up?" This was a bearded, rugged-looking male wearing a hood over his head. I reply, "What's up?" back at him. At first, I didn't think much of it. Maybe he wanted to be friendly. I began to walk across the grass to my dorm when I noticed the man running towards me extremely fast with his eyes completely locked into mine. I became unnerved, running back into the fitness center as fast as I could. There's always an employee near the entrance of the gym who sits at the desk and has people sign in before they work out. At the moment, I did not tell him what had just happened because I I felt I was possibly being paranoid. What if this guy just wanted to chat? I peered outside the window of the treadmill area and saw shoes pacing back and forth. I started to panic and suspected this was the same guy. I decided to stick around and watch TV in the treadmill area for a good 10 to 15 minutes just to make sure the creepy man was gone. It was obvious now that this guy did not have any good intentions. The fitness worker at the desk asked me if everything was okay when he noticed I seemed uneasy. I said that someone may be following me. He asked if I needed to walk back to my dorm, to which I replied that the guy is probably gone by now. I was dead wrong. It was time. With a deep breath and butterflies in my stomach, I braced myself and left the gym slowly. The weather outside was still and humid. What came next terrified me. As I crept up the gym entrance steps in the dark night, I hear bushes rustling. I peeked around the corner slowly and there he was. The same strange man leering at me with an odd, horrifying expression on his face. He was only a few feet away now. I started to panic. Without a second thought, I ran back into the gym with my heart in my throat and told the worker that someone was right outside the gym stalking me. Campus security was then called. However, by the time security got there, the man was nowhere to be found. I thought the guy wanted to be friendly, but clearly he was up to no good. Thinking about the situation still gives me chills to this day. I worked as a flight attendant for a few years when I decided to take some time off from college. There were a handful of uncomfortable situations I encountered during that time, but this one in particular still makes my skin crawl. I was born and raised in Texas, but I moved to New York when I was 21. So, when I found out at the beginning of week-long trip that I'd have a couple of overnights in Austin, I was super excited to go to my home state for a few days. My brother lived just north of the city and we planned to hang out and go to dinner. And the following day, we were going to meet up with our dad, who lived about an hour away. I get to the hotel downtown. The crew and I check in and then we each head off to our rooms. After a short elevator ride, I get to mine. Not even 5 minutes later, there's a loud, hard knock on the door. It was only around 1:00 or 2:00 p.m. and I hadn't called either my dad or brother to let them know I was in town yet. So, that could not be them. I assumed it may be one of my crewmates, so I headed to the door. Before even making it to the door, I hear a loud, male voice on the other side. The front desk sent me about the bathroom problem you called in. He tries to open the door. Unlock the door and open up, miss. I need to come in now. I froze in my tracks. I hadn't even been in the bathroom yet, let alone called the front desk. I slowly inched toward the door to look out the peephole. All I could tell was that the man on the other side was at least 6 ft tall and easily over double my weight. No way in hell was I going to unlock the door. I responded to the guy telling him he must have had the wrong room. He continued pounding on the door while constantly turning on the handle, telling me he needed to get in and was getting inside one way or another. I panicked, but thankfully had the sense to grab the phone and call the front desk. The concierge confirmed that they hadn't either sent anyone up to my room, nor had they received a call about the bathroom. The entire time the scary guy was determined to get in my room, pounding and yelling. Luckily, the front desk had dispatched security to my floor. I can hear security stepping out of the elevator, approaching the guy, asking him who he was, what he was doing, and telling him he needed to leave the hotel. He immediately got hostile and was aggressive toward them. The front desk clerk I'm still on the phone with tells me the police have been called and are on their way. This entire time I'm trapped in the room, scared shitless. The cops show up pretty quickly and manage to arrest the guy for trespassing. I later found out that guy was wanted in connection to a string of break-ins and violent sexual assaults in Austin. He had seen and stalked me from the minute I entered the hotel lobby. Apparently, I was his type of victim. I still think, every now and then, what could have happened if I had opened the door. This story just happened last night and I don't know exactly what to make of it. I'm an 18-year-old dude who lives at home with his mom. We live in the same neighborhood as my grandma's house and only a minute away from my aunts, uncles, and cousins. It's always been a nice and happy area for me because I grew up around here. To say it plainly, I love this place and I feel comfortable almost everywhere around my city. Most people in my city mind their own business and have a lot of respect for hard work and integrity. But, we definitely have our fair share of crazies. We had a body found in a storage unit not long ago, close to where I live. Another incident saw a man who used to work at the same power plant I work at arrested for killing a woman with his car and driving away. Point is, goes bad sometimes. But, most of the time it's pretty calm. Regardless, what happened yesterday will stay with me for a long time. It was a typical Thursday. I got home from work and had my usual routine. I showered, some video games, a little weed, and dinner. My mom's friend, April, was over. My mom told me that at about 9:00 p.m., she was walking April back to her house. 9:00 p.m. arrives, and the two left. About a minute later, I thought I heard tapping on my window. The tapping was so low and inconsistent that I just shrugged it off. I felt slightly paranoid, so I turned on some music to distract myself. No more than 2 minutes pass, and I hear my back door open. We always kept the spare key in the lock, which jangles every time the door's opened. I turned my music off and sat in silence. I couldn't hear anything. I know someone just opened it. I know someone was inside my house. I could feel it, but couldn't hear footsteps, a voice, or anything. I grabbed the knife I keep in my desk drawer and sat in complete silence. I thought to myself that if I acted like I had the upper hand, whoever it might be will be intimidated or scared. I stood up and walked out of my bedroom, knife in hand. I don't know why, but I whistled just one note. I took a few steps forward, stopped, and whistled once more. Still thinking I was acting tough, showing no fear. Needless to say by this point, I was terrified. I was about to take a few more steps, when I heard something that made a chill run through my spine. Someone just whistled back at me. Sounded like it came from the living room. I was frozen in fear. I peered around the corner, saw nothing. The door was closed, but unlocked. I don't know if it was me who left it unlocked. I truly couldn't remember. Knife or not, I was extremely scared. I ran back to my room. A few minutes pass, and the door opens again. My mom is back. I don't know why, but I didn't say a word to her about just what happened. I have no idea who it was, where he was, or if he ever left. I was 21 at the time of this occurrence and was living at home with my mom. I used to stay up until around 4:00 a.m. The only show that was ever on and was any good at that time was Law & Order. The show comes on and I'm about to turn my lights off when I hear a small noise from the front of my house. I don't think much of it and continue to get ready for bed. At this point I have no clothes on whatsoever because that's how I sleep. But the next thing I remember is hearing footsteps through the hallway and my doorknob jiggle. At first I thought I was just hearing things. And then I hear my mom's door close. I thought maybe she'd gone up to walk our dog because sometimes he would really need to go. Would wake her up at any time throughout the night. Well, then it hits me. The footsteps were slow and there was no light on in my house. Had my mother gotten up, she would have switched on a lamp or something. I get up and slowly peek my head out my door, taking a step towards my mom's room. I open her door to complete darkness. She's in bed and it's obvious she's been sleeping for some time. I quietly call her name and all she says back is go to your room. I tell her to turn the lights on. I was frightened. I knew someone was in my house and needed to know who. Again, she tells me to go back to my room. I've never felt so frozen with fear. I'm shaking. I run to my room, put on some clothes. I was looking for something to defend us with. My room is a girl's room and I don't have to defend us with. I hear the bathroom door shut. It's across from both our bedrooms. My mom is now fully awake. She yells at me to get into her room. I slammed the door shut and lock it. She tells me to grab the phone and dial 911. Meanwhile, we can hear this person going back and forth from my room to the bathroom. We can hear him opening drawers and going through my things. Less than a minute later, the police shows up. They come to the door and the dispatcher I'm talking to tell me that our door is locked. They're going to have to break it down unless we can come unlock it. Dawns on me that this guy came through our back door because I never thought to lock it every time I came home. My mom runs to the door while the guy has locked himself in our bathroom. The police come in and break that door down with guns drawn. I'm freaking out at this point. It hit me all at once and I was in real danger. They cuffed the intruder and dragged him outside. They asked me if I want to try and identify him. I have no idea who he was. They retrieve many of the things he tried to steal, cameras, old phones, and so on. They write a report and the whole situation is over in a matter of minutes. Come to find out he was my neighbor's cousin. He had just been cheated on by his soon-to-be baby mama. He went out, got high on who knows what, and decided to break into our place. I'm not sure what his intentions were and I'm too scared to think about what could have happened if this situation ended differently. So, this is a story of a bunch of dumb teenagers being tormented in the deep woods. I was an 18-year-old high school senior. I had moved that year and switched to a school about 30 minutes away from where I used to go. I stayed in touch with a few people from my old school and got invited to go camping with a few of them over Memorial Weekend. I invited two girls and one guy from my new school to come hang out for a night and met them in the closest town from the campsite about 40 minutes away. The guy, Jeremy, hopped in my car and the girls followed me to the campsite without incident. This campsite was 30 minutes away from any human signs of life outside of a shitty dirt road. The night started off fine with everyone getting completely drunk and me beating one of the girls I brought named Sarah at beer pong. She was very drunk and all over me. At about 12:30, things started to die down as half of us had already puked and were heading in for the night. A lot of the night is still a blur, but I remember climbing into a tent with five of us in it, three guys and two girls. At around 2:30 a.m., I awoke by the sound of a shotgun I was still very drunk and had a hard time processing anything, but in my drunken state, I figured it was one of the people I was camping with being a dick. One of the guys, Brent, had stayed sober the entire night and had brought his shotgun up with him. I figured it was him being a prick to everyone who was drunk. I check my phone and go back to sleep. It was around 3:00 a.m. when I woke again by the sound of someone bawling their eyes out. I was still having a very hard time processing anything. After about 5 minutes, I realized it was Brent. Jeremy and I walk out and see Brent is bleeding profusely from his nose and mouth. I run over to him stumbling the entire time. Out of nowhere, I am hit in the head with a rock and knocked unconscious. Everything from this point forward is from Jeremy's point of view. To this day, Jeremy is my best friend and has told me his version of the story many times. He says I passed by a tree when a large man lunged out and smashed my face with a rock. After hitting me, the man lunged at Jeremy and tackled him straight to the ground. Jeremy described the man as at least 6'4" and 280 lb. Jeremy was being choked to death by this wooden monster of a man when he hears another gunshot from a pistol. Sarah had managed to find a pistol Brent had also brought with them and fired a shot, missing the man completely. This startled him and he sprinted off into the woods. We booked it out of there. Jeremy drove me and Brent to the hospital. I had three broken teeth and a severe concussion. Brent had part of his tongue cut with a knife and a broken nose as well. Brent has never talked to me or any of my friends from that trip about what exactly happened when he was outside alone with the man and refused to give the police much of a description. The man was never caught and I have never been in the deep forest ever again. Okay. A little backstory. This was around 1992-1993. I was 18, just graduated from high school, and recently got married to my ex-husband. Yeah, I know, dumb as hell, but that's a whole other story. Anyways, I was working at a convenience store, one that specializes in ice cream as its main focus. I worked my way up from ice cream clerk to assistant manager. I had started my shift at 3:00 p.m. and had to close the store at midnight, but typically didn't finish till 1:00-1:30 a.m. I had papers to fill, clean, stock, etc. The clerk that was supposed to close with me had an emergency, so I stuck doing the whole shift by myself. At about 8:00 p.m., the customers started slowing down, so I was able to do some of my work. A few minutes pass and this man stumbles in, going straight to the beer cave. I could smell the alcohol on him as he walked by me. He was about 6'3 and dressed in a tuxedo. I made some small talk with him as it was just he and I in the store. He told me he was at a wedding reception down the road and they ran out of beer. I made my way to the register and waited. I knew I had to refuse the sale because he was already inebriated. The guy gets to the register and places the alcohol on the counter. I grabbed the cases and put them behind the counter. I said to the man, "I'm sorry, sir, but I can't sell you this as you seem to be very intoxicated." Within seconds, he started screaming, yelling, and threatening me that he was going to hurt and torture me. Towards the end of the rant, one of my regulars walked in and the crazy drunk man abruptly left my store. As he was walking out, he said, very loudly, "I'll see you when you close the store, bitch." I called the police right away and the customer that walked in stayed with me until the sheriff's office arrived. They took a report and looked at the video footage, noting the car model and what the guy looked like. Towards the end of the night, I started closing down the place when I noticed a car pull into the lot, staying at the far end running, but lights off. I keep on mopping, not paying attention to the car. I go to take the trash out, lock the door behind me, and realize the car is still there. I could now see it was the tuxedo man from earlier. I was completely terrified. I threw the garbage into the dumpster and ran back to the store locking the door behind me. I went to the back, called the sheriff's office, and told them that the guy was outside with his car running. The police arrived back within minutes. I stood in the store watching them approach his car, get him out of the car, and slapped the cuffs on him. He told the police that he was mad at me and was going to take care of me. They searched his car and found duct tape, zip ties, a loaded gun, and a shovel. The police told me later that he was beyond drunk. This story didn't leave my mind for weeks following the incident. My manager made sure there were at least two people on at all times and to this day, I have no idea what happened to the guy after the arrest.