S18 Ep37: Closet demons, shapeshifting UFOs and more Gettysburg ghosts (Sn. 18 Ep. 37)
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Good evening and welcome to Monsters Among Us. I'm your guide, Derek Hayes. Welcome back to another installment. Now I think I have an amazing show lined up for you tonight. I say I think because I'm not entirely positive. Because you see, I haven't listened to these calls yet.

Tonight's a grab bag installment and as we do for each of these grab bag episodes I randomly select calls from my database and play them sight unseen so who knows what we're going to get. So to kick us off here this evening we begin here in my state of California with Mandy's entry. Welcome to the show Mandy.

Hi Derek. My name is Mandy and I'm calling from Southern California. This encounter, however, took place in a small town in Kansas. And I'm realizing now that I'm actually sending in this story that I'm calling from the Antelope Valley and the street the story takes place on was called Antelope Street. Not a big deal, but an interesting coincidence.

I want to preface this story by saying that I'm a believer in just about all things paranormal, but I absolutely do not want any paranormal experiences. I'm a total chicken and I like hearing about spooky things from the safety of my couch. My story: My family lived in a small town in Kansas up until I was around five or six, and then we moved to a larger, though still small, town that was around 15 minutes away. Before moving, we lived in a modest ranch-style home that was perfect for raising a family.

Now, as I mentioned, I was around five or six when we moved, so these events happened before and leading up to that time. There was something about my closet in that home that always frightened me. I slept in the middle bedroom and was absolutely terrified about a wolf that lived in there.

Now, I don't recall having any particularly traumatic experiences as a child, or even that active of an imagination. And a child being frightened of a monster is nothing to write home about, and my parents were always quick to tell me that it was bad dreams that were scaring me. But my closet wolf disturbed me enough that I would oftentimes go and sleep in the hallway outside of my room, rather than in the room itself. When I was in kindergarten, we moved, and I never had any new experiences or recurrent nightmares in our new home, and the whole thing was forgotten.

However, many years later, my father would go to work in a hospital in our new town. He got to chatting with one of his co-workers one day and discovered by accident that she and her family had moved into our old house. They laughed about the coincidence and he asked her how she liked it there. She then proceeded to tell him that one of her daughters was living in the middle bedroom and was terrified of her closet.

She would often tell her mother that there were red eyes in the closet that would stare out at her at night. My dad immediately remembered my fears of the same room and the same closet when I was a child. He came home that night and told my mother and I about what he'd learned that day. It was shocking to all of us, but it's something we can joke about now as it's been my only paranormal experience, thankfully. But it just goes to show that maybe not all bumps in the night are the product of childhood fear. Thank you, Derek. I love your show and I'm always looking forward to new episodes. Bye.

Thank you, Mandy. You know, I always find it amazing when I stumble across a story that validates itself. And that's exactly what it seems like Mandy's story did here. Either that or it was a huge coincidence that both children had the same experience in the exact same room. Thank you again, Mandy, for taking the time to enter your story. Now, folks, I've selected nearly a dozen calls for tonight's Grab Bag episode.

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Now this next entry takes us to the state of Maine. Welcome to the show, Nona. Hey, Derek. My name is Nona. I live in Bangor, Maine, and this happened last Friday. That would make it November 5th, 2024.

Now, just a quick bit of context. We live in a home like so many other homes in Maine, where it used to be a full old family home, but it's been Frankensteined into several apartments. Now, our landlords own one side of the building, and then there are two apartments on our side. We get the top one, and we have a tenant below us. Our landlords primarily live in New York, and they've given us a key to their side to take care of things while they're, you know, gone for long periods of time, and so we can, like,

use their laundry, which is cool. They were having somebody come by to winterize the windows and put a heater on the boiler in the basement. And the basement is like a trapdoor basement that is in a supply closet. It's all very cobbled together. But they asked my husband to do that. And so he took the key and went downstairs. And I knew he was set about doing that.

I was sitting on the couch. This room is directly beneath us. And I heard what sounded like my husband yelling through the floor, either help me or baby. And at first, I was like,

I was like, did I hear what I thought I heard? Like, it just didn't seem right to me, but I felt it through the floor. Like, you know, if like something's loud enough under you, you kind of feel the vibration. And I instantly had a flash to this story that our landlady told us about her accidentally falling through that trap door and like hurting her back. And I was like, oh my God, my husband, he's in trouble. And so like, I'm running down the stairs like a crazy person. And I burst through the door to see him calmly walking out of the closet.

having just come up from the basement. And he's like, what's going on? And I was like, were you calling for help? Did you need me? And he said, no, I don't know what you're talking about. I was like, I swear to God, I heard you calling for me through the floor. And he was like, nope, I'm fine. And then this wiener had the audacity to say, maybe it was Kevin in an alternate universe who needs your help.

And like, that was kind of funny, but it's been really sticking with me because like I know what I heard and it's just so odd. And our other tenant wasn't in the building and our other tenant's apartment doesn't fit right underneath our living room. So I don't know what it could be, but hot dogs, that freaked me out and I haven't been able to stop thinking about it. Anyway, love the show and stay spooky. Thank you, Nona. Part of this reminds me of Sarah.

here in the house. She works all the way on the top floor and I work all the way down in the basement. And we spend the entire day either texting one another or yelling to each other from opposite ends of the house. Thankfully there are no ghosts involved in our scenario. Now folks, if you have a story you would like to share here on the program, just give us a call. The hotline is always open.

888-608-NIGHT That's 888-608-NIGHT Or you can record your story on your phone and shoot me an email at monstersamonguspodcast at gmail.com Also, if you're sitting on any strange audio or pictures of a ghost or a cryptid or something, or even a video, shoot that off my way as well. Lately, we've been tackling a lot of those videos over on Instagram, Facebook, and

I think TikTok. So like I said, if you have some video, audio, or photographic evidence, send it my way. Now next up is a call from Isabella in parts unknown.

Hi, it's Isabella Bell Pepper. I had left you an email letting you know that I just came across the podcast and that I had a lot of stories and I just didn't know what story to give you first. So I have been wondering about it over the weekend. And I decided that I'm going to start with a happy encounter. It's the only happy encounter that I have had.

So my aunt, she's like my second mom. My parents worked a lot, so she was always the one that I had.

So my aunt, she has always been a house cleaner, an office cleaner, or has always done anything having to do with child care services. And she's been lucky enough to be working for a family for 40-plus years already. You know, she raised the kids, cleaned the home. And once the kids were older, you know, she continued to clean the home. But after that, you know, they told her she could start cleaning a dental office that they own.

So she's just had constant work with that family. And my aunt still actually, to this day, is still employed by them.

So the lady that had employed my aunt asked her in 2017 to move in with her father since her mother had passed away from cancer earlier that year. And they wanted her to be there to clean, to cook, to maintain the house since the father was already in his late 80s and had an oxygen tank with him.

And we're going to give the father the name Grandpa. He's not my grandpa, but everybody would call him Grandpa. And I got to spend a lot of time there at that home.

with my aunt and with grandpa and my cousins, and I never got a bad feeling from that home. You know, it was a two-bedroom, two-bath. Oh, I should mention that there was no pictures of grandpa or his wife that died of cancer. I never met the wife. There was only pictures of his children, grandchildren, but no pictures of himself or his wife. And before you could enter the house, on the left was grandpa's man cave.

And he would sometimes have his curtains open so you could, you know, see inside of the room. It was just a TV, a pull-out couch, and then just a recliner. And in 2018, Christmas Day, my aunt was over at our home, and she had taken the bus over to come to us, so she wasn't able to bring the Christmas presents home.

So my aunt asked if I could take her home to pick up the gifts, and I told her yes. So me and my aunt and my cousins went to their home. Once we got there, my aunt was opening the door, and I looked inside to Grandpa's room, and I was thinking to myself, and I smiled, and I said, good thing he's not alone on Christmas. I didn't say anything to my aunt.

You know, I didn't say anything. We just walked in. We got the gifts. And as we were leaving and my aunt was locking up, I turned around and I told my aunt, at least Grandpa's not alone for Christmas. You know, my aunt, she was like, what? And I turned around to look at my aunt again because I was already walking towards the truck. And I pointed at the window and I said, at least Grandpa is not alone for Christmas.

And she looks inside, you know, the window, and she turns back and she says, okay, that's it. She doesn't say anything else. She didn't mention anything, nothing at all. So on New Year's, we were going to spend it at my aunt's grandpa's house.

And I was going to spend the night there, just like old time's sake, like I used to. And the next morning, my aunt tells me, I've been wanting to speak to you about Christmas, you know, what you said. And I was like, what's wrong? You know, what's up? And she tells me, I spoke to grandpa and he said he didn't have nobody over. And to be quite frank, I didn't see anybody there when you told me to look inside.

And I told her that I saw a woman that was sitting right next to him watching TV. And my aunt was making us breakfast, and I was sitting at the kitchen table. So she goes into his cave and tells him, are you lying to me about having a lady friend over? And I can hear him saying, Maria, I told you I didn't have nobody here. And my aunt goes, are you calling my niece a liar?

And he goes, no, but I swear nobody was here. No man comes back out and tells me, are you lying? No. I said, no. And I can hear grandpa making dad noises and I can hear him coming out of his cave. And he tells me, are you trying to get me in trouble? And I said, no, sir. But I saw a woman who was sitting right next to you. She had white hair. It was up in a bun. She was wearing a red with yellow dress.

She had gold earrings, a gold necklace, and a gold bracelet. And she was sitting right next to you. And she had her hand on top of your hand.

Now, not once did I think I had seen a ghost. You know, he starts crying and he walks away and my aunt starts calling me and tells me to stop with this nonsense, you know, and stop lying. I was 26 at the time when this happened. And, you know, and I'm listening to my aunt, you know, calling me and everything like that. And after she was done, I told my aunt, I'm not sorry, nor am I lying. So I'm not going to stop, you know, because I wasn't lying. I know what I saw.

Grandpa comes back, and he's still crying, and he tells me he's sorry for leaving, but asked me if I had seen this woman. And he has a picture that he's holding out to me, and that's when it hit me. I had seen his dead wife. I said, yes, that's her. And the next thing that came out of my mouth was, at least you weren't alone on Christmas, because she was there with you.

And he hugged me and he started crying and he told me thank you and said that every year on Christmas he watches old TV shows that she used to love to watch. And he left again and he came back with all these photo albums and showed me all the pictures of them when they were young. It was bitter, but it was really nice. It was really lovely to see all of that because I had never met her. I had never seen no picture of her in the house because he didn't have no pictures of her.

So, the last picture that he showed me was the picture of her with that red and yellow dress on. And it made me feel good. My aunt apologized to me. And it's honestly the only happy encounter that I have ever had. But thank you. Thank you for this and keep doing the good work. Bye. Thank you, Isabella. Now, you know, I couldn't help but thinking this thought as I listened to that amazing story.

Sure, this might have been a positive experience for Grandpa, but I imagine it would go the other way for just about every other person on the planet. How would you feel if you knew the ghost of a stranger was sitting next to you, holding your hand? It might be positive, but it's still spooky stuff, Isabella. And we can't thank you enough for sharing with us. Now, next up is a call from our neighbors up north. Please welcome Jay.

from Canada. Hi, it's Jay from southern Alberta. I just wanted to share a short little story from my childhood. I guess you could say I was a teenager. I'd say I was probably 17. And I used to go on like midnight drives. Just I lived out in the country in a small town. And

This is kind of funny. I hear people say small town on your show, but I don't think anything compares to this small town I grew up in. It's literally four blocks by four blocks, and that is the entire town. And the population...

Last I knew was 300 people. But anyhow, I used to go for midnight drives and I used to go to this place that had horses just to watch them run around and pet them, whatever, say hi. And as I was leaving this place once, there's kind of a little stack of bales over like, I'd say 25 feet from where I was.

And I started hearing like rustling and like the hay being brushed around on the ground. And I look over in that direction and I don't see anything. But next thing I know, I hear that notorious screech. And I don't even have to say what it was from at least as far as I think.

And everyone will know what I mean when I say notorious screech. It's embedded in us to be afraid of that noise when we hear it. We don't even know why. But anyhow, I heard that.

and again, I didn't see anything, but I heard that, and I knew what that noise meant, and all I could think was, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, and I ran the 30 feet over to my car, and I had to go over probably two different fences to get into my car, and I probably made that run

in under 10 seconds. Like I was across the ground over those two fences and in my car and gone in like 10, 15 seconds. I have an idea as to what I think it is. I don't know. I didn't see anything. All I heard it. I don't know of any other creature that sounds like that. I know what a mountain lion sounds like. I know what foxes sound like. I know what coyotes sound like. And that was not what I heard.

Yeah, it was frightening. But yeah, I just figured I would share that story with you. Thank you. Bye. Thank you, Jay. I don't know exactly what it was that Jay suspected that he heard, but it sounds like it was something supernatural. So are we talking Sasquatch, Wendigo, Dogman, Banshee maybe? Whatever it was, it sounds downright terrifying. And we can't thank you enough, Jay, for sharing that experience here with us.

Now, folks, don't go anywhere. I'll be right back with more spooky stories. Hear that? That's the beginning of a journey powered by the confidence that comes from driving a vehicle so reliable. It's backed by a 10-year, 100,000-mile limited powertrain warranty. Where your journey ends, that's up to you.

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Now this next call takes us down to the state of Florida. Sheila, welcome to the program. Hi Derek, this is Sheila from Jacksonville, Florida. My first story has to do with UFOs. I have never seen a UFO. I think I heard one once.

Years ago, I used to live in a rural section of our city. We owned like five acres of land, and in the back of our house were these sand dunes, white sand dunes. And these sand dunes, you could walk along there and find Indian pottery and pieces and little necklace parts and stuff like that. Anyway, one night I am in bed in a sound sleep when I woke up abruptly with this

I'm not sure what woke me up, a thud or something. And it's complete silence when I wake up. I sit straight up in bed and I'm listening and then I start hearing just like that, womp, womp, womp, and it just keeps building in frequency. And in the background you could hear, it wasn't loud machinery, but it was like a mechanical sound.

And I'm thinking, oh my God, that's not a train. It's not an ambulance. I couldn't figure out what it was. And I woke my husband up. I'm like, hey, hey, wake up, listen. And he listens and he goes, what the hell was that? I'm like, I have no idea. And when he woke up, it was like, and it just stopped. Complete silence and the noise was gone.

He goes, wow, I don't know what the heck that was. I said, neither. Then he starts teasing me like, oh, there's an alien at the window. Anyway, the next morning I get up and I go to get my mail on the side of the road to do a little walk. I go up there and my neighbor's at her mailbox. She looks at me, I look at her, and the first thing out of both our mouths at the same time was, did you hear that noise last night?

Thank you Sheila. You know like I said a little bit ago, corroboration is amazing.

It doesn't actually solve your little mystery, Sheila. But at the very least, it'll let you know that you're not alone in experiencing it. Regardless, thank you again for calling in. Now folks, before I move on, I want to remind you one last time that we have a sale in our merchandise shop. 20% off everything in the physical shop. So just visit MonstersAmongUsPodcast.com and click the shop tab to take advantage.

I promise you the sale will dry up very soon. So be sure to check it out today. And for this next entry, we head to the state of Tennessee, where Devin is waiting with his entry. Hey, Derek. My name is Devin. I'm from Tennessee.

My experience happened at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania on Gettysburg Battlefield. It was in the middle of the day, sunny, no wind, no clouds. I was with my sister and three of my cousins and my aunt.

We went on top of this hill that's located on Gettysburg. And when you look down the hill, you have this little cluster of row of trees, a railroad track going through the trees, and behind the trees is Gettysburg College. Well, me and my one cousin, we were pretending that we were shooting downhill.

Pretending that we had muskets like kids do. And right after we were pretending, all we heard was someone screaming, follow me. And we looked down in the trees. And all we saw was this pure white figure that looks like a man, but just like a white mess. And he was running. And when you look at him, you could tell he was holding something.

or like a musket in his hand, running from one side of the trees all the way to the other, and then just completely vanish. After me and my cousin, my aunt, and my sister all seen this, me and my cousin went after it to see if we could continue to see it, or if we actually saw what we seen. Well, my sister and my aunt went right...

went running down the hill away from it. Well, that same night, it was probably about 9, 10 o'clock at night, you could start hearing cannon fire and gunfire from Gettysburg Battlefield. And we were sleeping at the Gettysburg campground, which is right across from the battlefield. That night when we all went to bed, my mom was in the center, I was on the left, my sister was on the right.

And

And then all of a sudden I felt a full on hand just grab my leg in the sleeping bag and started dragging me probably about good two, three feet while I was dragging me. I was wide awake, but I was on my stomach and I started kicking it. And finally it let go. When I turn around, there was no one there. And I tried to wake my mom up. She was still asleep. Tried to wake my sister.

But she was still asleep and I started calling for my dad and he was still outside with his friend at the campfire. And then the next morning when I was telling my sister about what happened, she told me how she was hearing throughout the night someone outside of the tent whispering her name.

Now, all this was going on was probably back in 2012, 2013, around April or May. And today, it still gives me goosebumps and it still tells my story. I hope you can use this. I love the podcast and I hope y'all continue to do great, wonderful things. Thank you, Devin, for calling in.

Now you know what's weird is as I went through my database looking for calls for tonight, I couldn't help but notice there were several Gettysburg entries in there. Maybe even dozens of them. So of course I had to pull one for this evening. But it got me thinking, there might be enough entries there just to do a full Gettysburg episode. So I'll toy around with that idea and possibly even bring it to life. But in the meantime, we can't thank you enough, Devin, for sharing your story with

Out of the infamous Gettysburg. Now next up, we venture back to the state of Maine, where we meet up with Damien for another story. Hey Derek, this is Damien from Maine. So I got a few different stories. The first one started when I was like four years old, and it was a night where I stayed at my dad's house.

in Pennsylvania when I lived in Pennsylvania growing up. So I used to sleep in his bedroom because, you know, he lived at his mom's house, my grandparents' house. And one night sleeping, I ended up waking up and he always had this sweatshirt on a hanger in his room hanging on the wall. So when I woke up, you know, like I said, I was four years old and I've always chalked it up to like childhood, like imagination, blackness.

But what happened was as I looked over onto the wall, I saw like the sleeve of the sweatshirt come up, wave at me.

And it scared me so bad that, like, I just remember pulling the covers over my head. Like I said, you know, I just always chalked it up as childhood imagination. And then later on in life, like, I used to live next door to a cemetery, like, right across the street. Old cemetery. These dates on the stone were Civil War, you know, 1802 when the town I lived in was incorporated. Yeah.

So they were really old and, you know, it was kind of nice because nobody could build in front of us or around us because we had this bog area. Well, the house that I lived in was almost 200 years old. You know, it burnt down a couple of times, rebuilt. We did a lot of remodeling and everything. It was just a very weird place. You know, remodeling, we could see the burnt timbers where people just put new boards next to it and called it good.

So there was always a creepy feeling there, you know, you'd get people walking, the sense of people walking around Flores Creek and all that such stuff. We just always chalked it up as an old house. Well, one night my wife was staying with me, you know, when we first started dating, she spent the night. And she just got this really creepy feeling and there was always this puppeteer clown in the corner.

in the corner of the room. Well, she asked me to take it down and then, you know, I put it in the closet out of sight, out of mind type deal. Well, we were moving out into our first house together and just going through stuff and lo and behold, that clown was gone, never to be found again.

Don't know where it went. Still don't know where it went to this day. And then, you know, we've been together almost 11 years this year. And so we owned our second house. We're big pranksters and everything. And, you know, we like to scare the crap out of each other. Well, just one night, got out of the shower. I walked past her in the living room to our laundry room to throw, like, my wet towel in the laundry. And as I walked in the laundry room, this...

dark entity came and bum-rushed my face to where I drew back and drew a fist.

And, you know, part of my mind was thinking like, hey, you know, this is your wife doing this. But then part of my mind also remembered, you just walked past your wife sitting on the couch. So I walk out and tell her what happened. You know, I'm white as a ghost and all that. It's just really weird. My wife is very in tune with everything around her. And she always feels, senses something or near something.

I'm going to try to get her to call in and get her stories heard for you because she's got a lot of them. And my last story is another entity. It was back on November 29th of 2022. My wife had day surgery. She was home. We were both in bed sleeping. We ended up losing power that night, really bad windstorm.

So our whole apartment building was out of power, pitch black. So we just were sitting there or sleeping and I toss and turn that night. And I happened to look over on her side of the bed in between her bed and where our closet is. There was this dark mantis figure. Like I could see like the head of a praying mantis. And then it had like arms that came up almost in like a ribbon fashion and

It just was standing over her and really weird and then it kind of like faded back into nothingness. Like the room and everything was pitch black but you can distinctly see that outline of a figure standing there. And it just was really weird. I had a hard time falling back asleep again. You know, it's just a bunch of different things throughout my life that I've seen and always just kind of chalked up to like, hey, overactive imagination.

So, yeah, just listening to the podcast that everybody has and loving the show. I listen to it at work while I'm walking around and driving around. Just love what you're doing. Keep it up and stay spooky, buddy. Have a good one. Bye. Thank you, Damien. I hate to break it to you, man, but I'm pretty sure your girl threw away your marionette. I have no doubt that she tossed that clown in the trash. And I suppose you can't blame her because based on your track record, Damien,

All sorts of activity takes place around you, and having a clown marionette come to life, I wouldn't want any part of that either. So thank you again for calling in, and I hope your clown shows up again soon. He's not going to just do exactly what you saw the last time. Valentine's Day is just around the corner, and nothing says love like the warmth and comfort of a Miki Couture blanket. Whether it's for your sweetheart, your

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comfort, and warmth this Valentine's Day. Miki Couture, blanketing the world in warmth and love. I'm glad there's a pause. There needs to be a pause because you need to figure out... Now folks, this next entry takes us to the land of Lincoln. Emma from Illinois, welcome to the program. Hey Derek, I am coming to you from Chicago. My name is Emma and

I moved to Chicago back in 2020 to go to college and I moved in with three other people. Their names, well I'm going to change their names, but their names are Adrian, Ellie, and Mary. And we lived in this dorm, but it was basically an apartment on Printers Row. And the first couple weeks that we lived there, it was really awesome, really cool. It was during COVID, so we were home a lot.

But it was really fun and just an absolute blast. And then there was one night, I want to say it was like late September, early October, but I don't really remember because it was so long ago. We had all been hanging out and then we all went to bed and I was laying in my bed trying to fall asleep. And I heard someone in the kitchen doing dishes and

And I was like, this is really weird. It's like two in the morning. Why is someone doing dishes? So I got up and I walked from my bed to the door and I opened the door and the sound stopped. And I was like, that's really strange. And so I was like looking out in the kitchen and no one was there. All the lights were off. Everyone was in their room. Everyone was asleep. And so I thought that it was strange, but I was like, ah, maybe I'm just hearing the neighbors.

So I close the door, I go to lay back down, and right as I'm falling asleep again, I hear someone doing the dishes in our kitchen. So I get up again, and I walk to the door, and mind you, the entire time that I'm walking from my bed to the door, I can hear someone doing the dishes right on the other side of my door. So I open up the door, and again, the instant that I open it, it stops.

I was like, "Man, this is really strange." And so I close it, walk back to my bed, and I couldn't hear anyone doing dishes. And then the same thing happened again. And so this went on for like months and months and months. And I feel like it's really important to note that no one, like, none of the dishes were done. It would have been better if there was a ghost or something that was actually doing the dishes, but no, they were just making the noises of the dishes.

So the day after the first time this happened, I was talking with my roommates and the only other person who had heard it was Adrian, but Mary and Ellie had not heard it. And for a little bit of context, our apartment was set up so that you like walk in the door. There's a long hallway. There's the bathrooms off of the hallway. And then Ellie and Mary had rooms right across from each other, closest to the kitchen. And, um,

Adrian and I had rooms right across from each other closest to the living room. And then the living room in the kitchen was really just one big room. So I thought that it was interesting that only Adrian could hear it, but Ellie and Mary could not.

And so we started to kind of joke that there was like a ghost in our apartment. You know, it was getting close to Halloween. So we were like, ooh, spooky. But then there's more things that would happen that made us like take pause and think, oh, maybe there actually is something going on. So like there was some small things like one time I was getting ready in the bathroom and like thing of soap like flew across the bathroom at me.

And it wasn't like sitting on a sloped part of our shower. It was like on a flat surface and it just like flew across the room at me. And luckily the ghost had bad aim and didn't hit me. But it was very strange. And I remember I like told it off a little bit. I was like, dude, you can't be doing that. And then there was one time where all four of us were in the kitchen. I think...

Mary and I were cooking and Ellie and Adrian were just keeping us company. And a bottle of air freshener flew off of our fridge across the kitchen. And it wasn't one of those things where like someone was opening up the fridge and could have knocked it off. Like it just flew across the kitchen unprompted. And then at the time, Adrian was dating this girl who was a little crazy.

Um, and whenever she would stay over, Adrian and this woman could hear someone like heavy breathing in their room, like right next to the bed or like at the foot of the bed. And it's a small room, but they could hear this heavy breathing. And then sometimes when they would try to get intimate, it would start laughing at them, which I think is kind of awesome and pretty, pretty based of the ghost. Um,

And so that went on for a really long time. And then the weirdest thing that happened was I was home visiting my family. Ellie was home visiting her family. And so it was just Adrian and Mary in the apartment. And it was one afternoon where they were ironically watching Buzzfeed Unsolved. And there was some super lame joke that was made that was like dad joke-esque. And

Mary heard Adrian laughing super, super hard. And so Mary turned to Adrian to kind of give them some sh*t for laughing so hard and looked over in the chair that Adrian usually sits in and where the laughter had come from and saw that Adrian wasn't sitting there. They were actually laying on the floor asleep, like taking a nap. And so then Mary was like super freaked out to be in our apartment for a little while.

But yeah, that's like the biggest thing. It pretty much died down as the year wore on. And I think that the ghost got used to us, if it was even a ghost. I will say, I don't think it was any noise from the neighbors because of how well-timed everything was and how circumstantial everything was. And especially with the laughter thing, like Adrian and Mary could hear it in the room with them.

And again, the timing of the dishes just made it so that I don't think it could have been the neighbors. But yeah, it died down as the year went on.

And things were totally fine. But I have talked to people in the years since then who lived in the same building at the same time or like around the same time or just over the years. And like almost everyone who I've talked to agrees that there was something weird going on with that complex. And some people are like timid to call it a ghost or whatever. But a lot of people agree that there's something very strange going on in the building.

And also, Adrian had done some research because they were like, why is this place haunted? And just wanted to figure it out. And in their research, they found out that a train station that we lived by, we lived right by the LaSalle Metro Station. Like, we could see the platform from our windows. Apparently, that train station was where H.H. Holmes would allegedly pick up his victims and take them to his murder mansion.

So that's what they thought that the ghost was. I think it was just the fact that it's a really old building and it used to be like a printing press or something like that. And so I'm sure that accidents happened, but it's just an old building with a lot of history. So...

Yeah, so that's my story. I just want to say thank you for your podcast. It's really awesome. I found out about it a couple weeks ago, so I'm trying to get caught up, but I'm a musician, and so I listen to it on my lonely hours on the road. So thank you for keeping me company, and keep it spooky. Have a good one. Thank you, Emma. And I'm happy that we can ride shotgun and keep you company on the road. Now good luck finding the source of this strange activity.

Because the Chicagoland area has a very rich history. Pre-1800s, it was a settlement for many Native Americans. There was a fort there at one point. Then later on, there was the Chicago Fire. Then, of course, H.H. Holmes and his reign of death. And you also have elements of organized crime. And that's just the stuff off the top of my head. With a big city like that, there's no telling what could have caused that activity. But I can tell you,

I'm very thankful that you took the time to share it tonight with us. So thank you again, Emma, for taking the time to call in. Now this next entry comes to us from the state of Oklahoma and was submitted anonymously. Hi, Derek. This happened in...

In 2012, in college, I went to Oklahoma Baptist University, which is in Shawnee, Oklahoma. And it was in the springtime, probably like April or May, um,

The sky was like clear blue. If there were clouds, they were like small clouds. And my friends and I were talking outside. And there were like five of us. And the conversation kind of split in two. And so my friend and I were the two that split away from the main conversation. And so we had kind of stepped to the side. And as we're talking, we both just freeze and

and stare at what we see. I mean, at the same time, it was probably about three o'clock in the afternoon. So it was still light outside. It was still very visible. We saw this, I would call it an orb, except it wasn't round. And it looked like it had purposeful

movement that determined its shape. And the best like analogous thing I can think of to compare it to is the way like smoke moves. That's not exactly purposeful, but it doesn't keep around shape by any means. So the edges kind of change, but the way that the edges of this thing shifted and moved, it looked like it was navigating itself. And it was moving

light, like actual light, but it didn't produce like beams or anything. It was really strange. I have never seen anything like it. It was not smoke. I know it was not a reflection either because we weren't close to anything that could produce the reflections.

We both saw it and stared at it for a good five seconds and then looked at each other. Oh, it hovered maybe about a foot off the ground and it was moving slowly, but it was moving, it was traveling. It was maybe three feet away from us. I don't know why we didn't go touch it or do something. I have no idea. Take a picture. But we looked at it for about five seconds and looked at each other and said, "You saw that, right?" And she said, "Yes, what is it?" And we both turned to look back at it and it's gone.

I have no idea what it was. Again, I haven't seen anything that is exactly what that object was. I've just been trying to collect images to, like, compile them together to compare what it might have been like. I also realized it kind of moved the way that, like, jellyfish or something moves through water.

I have no answers. I think it's probably some type of orb, but it was not round. So yeah, I hope that's helpful. Thanks. Thank you, caller. You know, this one's pretty relevant, because just last week there was a video released by a whistleblower that seemed to depict an egg-like craft or object being retrieved by an unknown agency. And it's not the first egg-like object that we've heard reported from government whistleblowers.

and the description of the craft morphing as it tumbles through the air. That's also a detail we've heard numerous times over the years. So I can't tell you what you saw out there, caller. But I can tell you that other people have seen it. And we appreciate you sharing your version of the events. Now, folks, I have one more call to share with you. An eerie story from my neck of the woods here in Southern California. A story submitted by Andreas.

Hey Derek, my name's Andres. I live in Apple Valley. What I'm calling about happened in Los Angeles Crest Highway going towards Palmdale.

Jake's call from season 12, episode 10.5, that's actually the one I'm calling because I listened to you for a long time and I just never called in my incidents. But right now when I heard his call, I just had to call it in because it was the exact same story. And he talks about how he had some headlights just drive up real fast on him and he was scared for his life that they were going to run into him. And all of a sudden they just disappeared right behind him as soon as they were going to hit him.

And my story is the exact same thing. It happened back in 2015, around February or March. I was driving through there at night, through the crest at nighttime, going to Palmdale around 8:00 PM. I was going through there. I had just got my new car. I had a Mazda 3. I bought a Mazda 3 stick shift, 2015.

And my brother had come with his girlfriend to pick up the little truck I was driving, my dad's little truck that I was driving actually. They drove it back and I drove my new car back. And at some point through the crest, I passed him up, I passed my brother up and his girlfriend and just to see what the little car can do. And I was pretty excited about, you know, driving it through there. I've driven through there many times. And this particular day was during a weekday.

And there was no one on the crest. It was empty. I didn't pass anyone. No one passed me. I didn't see anyone out in the turnouts. So I was just going pretty fast. And towards the end, going towards almost getting to Palmdale, when it starts to hit the downhill, I slowed down a lot. I slowed down to like 20 miles per hour, 50 miles per hour because there was no one on the road. So I decided to let my brother catch up.

So as I'm coasting down the big wide looping left, it's a wide looping left and then it kind of, it turns right into a straightaway. And as I hit that straightaway, I look at my rear view mirror and I see these lights look like headlights coming down really fast. I would say like 90, 100 miles per hour doing those turns. And that's almost, I would say that's almost impossible for those turns. I'm sure you're familiar with the crest.

And I just got my new car and I thought they were going to slam into me. I was the most scared I've ever been. It was scary because I thought this car was going way too fast and I wasn't going fast enough. And I couldn't accelerate fast enough for them before they hit me. So kind of like Jake, I just braced for impact. I just kind of tightened up and I kept looking in the rearview mirror and right before they're about to hit me, the lights just turned on.

take a sharp left and just disappear. I didn't see him go over the cliff. It could have been like Jake's call where they just disappeared, but for sure I seen him go off to my left, but I didn't see him dive over the cliff. That's what it is, just a sheer drop. And there's a guardrail there too. So I would have heard a big crash or tire squealing if it was an actual car, but I didn't hear any of that. The lights disappeared and I'm left there and with my radio on and just going like 10 miles per hour at this point, 'cause I was just in shock.

Yeah, it was crazy. I started pumping my brakes to see maybe if I can recreate like the lights bouncing off the reflective signs or something. But I couldn't get it to happen again and I couldn't wait for my brother to catch up to me. And when he finally caught up, I started kind of like comparing the car lights to what I had seen. And these lights weren't projecting any light. They were just like an orb and they were way too low and wide for it to be a car. So I don't know what I've seen. I think I'm running out of time. But yeah, it was pretty crazy and

I can't explain it. Your podcast is awesome. I listen to it all the time. I've been listening to it for like four years. Keep doing what you're doing. Thank you, Andreas. You know, Apple Valley is very close to here. In fact, if I take a short drive up here to the rim, I can look down and see it. And there's all sorts of strange activity that's reported from that area. In fact, on Tuesday's episode, there was a call about a dog-like creature with an owl's head. If you want to check that out.

And you know, this experience has been reported to me in the past before. Not necessarily in this location, but here in Southern California, in the Borrego Triangle, to be specific. And in fact, there's actually a segment featured in the film about a gentleman that was driving down a long, dark Southern California roadway when he experienced nearly the exact same thing. And if you'd like to hear that story in full, just visit borregotriangle.com.

to see where you can catch the film. But that's crazy stuff, Andreas. And we really appreciate you taking the time to share it. Now folks, I have one more story, but it's the secret entry. And to hear that, you have to stick around until after the final intro and one more ad. But trust me, it's always worth it. But first, Monsters Among Us is written and produced by me, Derek Hayes. Copyright Red Crow Media.

Additional support is provided by Sarah Carter Hayes and Delaney Bowers. All audio used in this production is done so under the protection of fair use. Be sure to like our social media pages. Give us a like and follow on YouTube as well. And leave us a rate and review wherever that sort of thing is possible. And don't forget you can catch the show every Saturday evening at 11 p.m. Eastern on the Unexed Digital Network. Just visit UnexedNetwork.com to tune in.

And finally, tonight's score was provided by Iron Cthulhu, Apocalypse, Code.agmusic, and Carl Casey at White Bat Audio. Thank you so much for tuning in. Don't forget about that secret call, and I'll catch you on the other side.

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Now tonight's secret entry comes to us from my state of California, but way up north. Please welcome Robin to tonight's program.

Hi, my name is Robin and I'm from Northern California. I have a bit of just a creepy story. I have no idea what it means, but listening to your show, I got reminded of this story. I'm in my forties now and this happened when I was a teenager, probably like 15 or 16, right here in Northern California, right out of Sacramento.

I had a boyfriend and he went to a big church in town and this church in town was well known for being extremely into what they call spiritual warfare. So there's a lot of things about angels and demons and this whole like spiritual realm and basically like being on God's team and like fighting the evil forces surrounding us and things like that. And I actually have a lot of different stories from that.

attending services with this boyfriend that I had. He was really cute, so I just kept wanting to go with him. He kept inviting me, so... They had a huge event. The church had hosted a huge event way out on the property, back property of this church. There was kind of a cleared area, and then there was a big bunch of fields surrounding this cleared area.

One night they hosted a giant bonfire and everybody, hundreds of people came in. They were to throw things in the bonfire that they felt were causing bad influences in their lives or the lives of their children or whatever it is. So people brought all of these things in to try to purge their life of these evil influences. It was like really creepy and scary. I went with him, I didn't bring anything to burn.

But he and I and several of our friends were standing around watching these people just acting really strangely, walking up and throwing harm loads of stuff from their houses, their belongings into this bonfire. And it was just a very eerie feeling. And we were just sitting there and watching all these things burn in this huge fire.

Well, we noticed, emerged from one of the fields that's surrounding the bonfire, a giant toad. And we were just like, wow, you know, look at that toad. The toad hops out of the field and...

kind of is looking like I'm a trance at the fire. And as we sit there and watch this toad slowly hop, hop, hop, hops his way probably, I don't know, six, seven, eight feet from the field to the bonfire and ever so slowly just hops directly into the fire.

Thank you, Robin. You know, some calls are just too odd to comment on.

And I think this might be one of them. So if you have any ideas as to what went on here and why this creature would have crawled into the fire, you know how to reach me. In the meantime, thank you again, Robin, for sharing your story. Now, folks, this is normally where we would go beyond. But unfortunately, there will be no new Beyond episode this week.

After receiving some advice from a friend of mine, we did some radon testing here in the house. And we learned that the constant levels here are three times the safe limit. So Sarah and I have been frantically trying to mitigate the radon risk here in the home. Especially in my office. So that's the cause for this grab bag episode. And that's the reason there'll be no New Beyond episode tonight. But with a little luck, I'll be back next week to make up for it.

But in the meantime, I suggest you test your home for radon gas. You can buy test kits on Amazon. It's like a little hockey puck that sits around for a few weeks and you mail it in. Although I never got mine back. I finally broke down and bought a digital version, which you can also find on Amazon. And that's when we learned of our troubles. So we're going to be fine, I think. But it's good practice to make sure you're not breathing in an invisible, odorless, deadly gas.

So thank you again, folks, for joining me on this grab bag episode. And I'll be right back here on Tuesday with a new themed episode. But until then, keep it spooky and have yourselves a great night.