WEBVTT

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Welcome to Scary Story Podcast. All
three stories today are titled A Strange Request

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the Tapping, and I can see
it. My name is Edwin, and

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here it's a scary story. There
was another knock at the door, a

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woman this time, but the purse
held neatly in front of her with both

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hands, her head leaning slightly forward
as she tiptoed over to the chair across

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my desk. I pretended to want
to get up, and instead waited for

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her to take a seat. I
introduced myself and she began speaking way too

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quickly for me to understand. But
I didn't need to understand another story like

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this. I simply nodded and agreed, telling her that I would be happy

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to help in any way that I
could, that I would send over the

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documents for review. I shook her
hand, and she walked away with the

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nervous but grateful smile across her face. I've been the same story for three

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or four days already. Regular citizens
beginning to show up around this time for

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the fourth year in a row.
Though, if I remember correctly, there

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was a gentleman who used to come
around here back when I was vice chair

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of the Community Projects Committee. He
had this exact request. You see,

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there was a dark, curvy road
on the northeast side of the city,

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the part where the hill startedge but
never ended. I agreed with him.

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The area was dark and eerie most
nights already, so when I was first

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told of his experience and had to
present it to the committee formerly, I

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felt like I would be laughed out
of the room. Instead, the members

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looked at each other in silence,
and every single one of them knew of

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somebody with a similar experience. But
signing off on such a strange request would

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put at risk for backlash and misuse
of our city's funding. If anything,

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I was the only one who was
learning about the whole thing. A young

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boy four or five years max had
been reported around the road sometime in the

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middle of the night. The first
call came from a woman who said that

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she had not stopped in fear of
it being a trap to steal from her

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or worse, She fulled up on
a very well lit corner by the shell

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gas station and called up the police
department. An officer was sent out on

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a search for the boy in the
white shirt. The transcripts of his radio

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transmission seemed to make fun of the
whole thing. The officer asked for assistance

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with quote strange activity by the cemetery
road. When back up arrived, they

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found the officer sitting by one of
the gravestones in a trance like state,

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claiming he had made a mistake in
calling for assistance. He apologized, but

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it didn't take long for him to
later come in support of an investigation to

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offer a proper burial to a boy. The reports kept piling on to this

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town where nothing ever happened, and
where the biggest issues were about the elections

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for mayor, where no one seemed
to like the results. If I hadn't

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made a choice about this request,
they would not be happy with me either.

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The idea came from a blogger whose
article went to Little County Famous,

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and then a bigger network picked up
the news. She claimed to have been

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driving by the dark, curvy road
when she saw a child in the middle

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of the road walking calmly through the
cemetery gates. She grabbed her camera and

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parked the car, ready to follow
the ghost story in the making. She

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got into the cemetery through the side
of the close gates. She was able

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to see the boy once more,
this time standing by a patch of dirt

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by the fourth tree from the entrance. According to this woman and the news

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report, the little boy pointed to
the ground and disappeared. Amateur investigators started

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digging in the cemetery, but were
kicked out by the caretaker, who instead

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took up the job, supposedly as
an act of goodwill, and eventually called

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the police. He had found human
remains in the patch of dirt where everyone

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had been digging, where the little
ghost boy had been standing. All of

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it, just like the rest of
the things that went around the office,

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seemed too much of a coincidence.
Had the remains been planted, there was

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the blogger or the so called investigators
involved. Eventually, the request was approved

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and the city funded a new burial
ceremony and a gravesite. Since then,

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the request stopped coming, and the
ghost of the little boy he's never seen

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again. I'm happy to say I
won reelection the tapping. I used to

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like being home alone, and I
would usually get the chance to do that

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when my parents went out to the
store on Friday evenings. I never went.

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My sister and I would usually spend
the night watching movies and making a

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bunch of popcorn in the microwave.
One day, we couldn't get the VCR

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to work, like he was on
the wrong settings for the television. Something

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like that would happen every once in
a while, so we knew how to

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fix it. This time, no
matter what, I couldn't get it to

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connect. I tried to check behind
the television, but it was too dark,

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so I asked my sister to grew
up the flashlight from my room and

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bring it. She was used to
bring in stuff like that without a problem.

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This time she flat out refused.
She was nice about it and said

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that she would go with me,
but to please not make her go by

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herself. She was afraid of the
hallway, more specifically the entrance to the

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attic that was there. We both
had a theory about it. You see,

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the house was not old, not
by a long shot. The area

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where my parents had moved into was
always known to me as the street of

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the ugly houses. It seemed to
have been built a long time ago,

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But in reality, it's just that
some of those houses could not be renovated

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due to a city law that treated
it as historic or something. The only

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way that they could fix it up
was if the house was in danger of

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collapsing, or if it broke some
other type of building code. I think

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that's what happened to this house we
used to live in. The yard had

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the original shed and old wooden shack
with a door that had a hook n

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We would hear the tap tap tap
from the shed from inside the house.

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My mom tried to fix it with
the nail and a rubber band like the

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ones that held together the broccoli from
the store, but nothing worked. It

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was until one day, when my
sister and I were playing at an old

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work table that my dad had set
up in the backyard that we heard it

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once more tapping. She took two
steps toward me and bumped against the neck

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of the sweater tied around my waist. In an instant that was gone.

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There were the nights of terror of
looking out the window to see a tiny

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creature standing by the shed having just
come out. At the other times,

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I imagined the doll from the movie
we had just seen crawling out of the

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hole by its door. The night, I would cover my head with the

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blankets, fearing for that split second
that my feet were exposed to the cold

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air of my room, it would
grab me. After so many times of

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being ignored by my parents, my
sister started to rely on me to calm

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her down. When she would hear
the tapping, she would step into my

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room and ask if I could hear
it too. She would sit on the

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foot of my bed, and within
minutes I would cover her with my blanket

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as I squeezed into the warm sheets
that had been under me. It's strange

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how it works. It was just
a simple tapping that old door against a

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frame like footsteps in the middle of
the night. Would lay there, never

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once thinking of standing up to look
out to the shed and the trees behind

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the backyard, not even once to
make sure that the sounds were actually coming

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from there, and not where I
thought, no where I knew they were

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coming from. My sister turned her
head to it first. The door to

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the shed was still, and yet
the tapping continued. We both looked at

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each other, slowly getting distracted by
the tapping. Once again, we looked

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up to the glass of the window
from the attic, the shape made by

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the tip of an index finger growing
and shrinking next to the purple nail of

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a thumb as it tapped against the
glass. The rest of the pale fingers

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curled up under it. Ah,
I can see you. I try to

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force a smile at the scammy taxi
driver who had overcharged me once we arrived.

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It's always an issue with a distance
meter thing or something to say that

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the fee was actually higher than described. It was not my first time in

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Mexico, and there was no way
I was about to get into an argument

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with the stranger. At two in
the morning and an empty street that looked

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a lot like a Los Angeles alley, A friend of mine had recommended that

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place to me, saying that the
caretaker of the hotel was nice, a

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woman named Sophia, and that she
could use all the help she could get.

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Sometimes that gets the best of me. I do my best to buy

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from local businesses and help wherever I
can, but then you end up with

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scam artists that make you think twice
about who you can trust. I knocked,

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and then a woman peeked through the
tiny window above the doorbell. I

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could see her smile before she shut
it and unlocked too many locks from the

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metal door before opening it. The
orange light from the candles by the back

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wall threw me off a bit.
There was a woman sitting on a rug

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on the ground, leaning against a
chair. I'm Sophia. The woman who

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opened the door said, do not
worry about her. She will be okay.

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She asked me to wait for her
to finish helping the woman on the

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ground, helping her stand up,
and I walked up to her too.

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I reached for her cold hand when
I felt Sophia's hand slapped mine away,

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fear in her eyes as she tried
to smile at me once again. I

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stepped back and waited by one of
the crooked bench, laughing at the situation,

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half wondering if I had done something
disrespectful during her ceremony or whatever they

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were doing. The other woman pulled
out a cloth from her pocket and handed

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her some money, thanked her and
went for the door. Sophia was behind

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her, ready to close it once
again. Then she turned to me and

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apologized. She told me that she
had been helping the woman with something scary

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going on in her life, but
that she would be okay. I told

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her that it was all right,
nothing to worry about, and I was

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about ready to go to sleep.
She grabbed her notebook and looked at me.

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She then pointed at it and let
me see her list for myself.

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I think she wanted me to know
that I was the only guest. I

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looked around at the two story courtyard, lined with flowers and candles on the

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side of the wall by the now
empty chair. The backyard had a small

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pool in an outdoor dining area,
way too good for what I was paying.

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You are the only guests tonight,
amigo, she said. Other guests

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will come tomorrow, girls from Canada. New friends for you, she said,

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her lips rising far too high with
her smile. Room sixteen. It's

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right there, best view. Do
you need help with anything, she asked.

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I shook my head and grabbed my
backpack. The room was small,

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but very clean, two upside down
glasses on the nightstand and an old television

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said in front of it. I
went to the bathroom and got ready for

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bed. I had another day of
travel the next morning, and I was

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beginning to feel nauseous. I blamed
the meeting I would have on Monday.

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It was two in the morning when
I first heard it. I can see

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you enter the side. Sometimes dreams
linger for a bit while you're awake.

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I looked to my right and grabbed
an upside down glass, and then grabbed

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a water bottle. The light from
the outside was seeping in through a gap

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in the curtains to the best view. I had to give Sophia some credit.

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The skyline view for my room was
surprisingly nice. Perhaps the light was

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interrupting my sleep even more. I
can't see you, I heard once again.

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I felt the blood leave my arms
as I reflected as to what could

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have been the problem here. Though
nobody was in there with me, I

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still remember refusing to act scared.
If I did, I fear that I

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would never forgive myself for believing something
so outrageous. I turned away from the

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window, the shadow of the curtain
now against the ra wall a few feet

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away from me. It was around
four in the morning when I heard a

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soft whisper, I can see you. I jumped up on my bed,

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and thoughts were racing of the woman
by the chair when I had come in,

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her body almost as sweaty as a
T shirt. I was wearing cold

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and stuck to my chest. I've
seen you, had echoed through the room.

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If this was a prank, it
was far too much. Sophia had

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said that I was the only guest. She told me where the office was

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and that she would be there all
night. I couldn't remember for the life

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of me if the room had a
phone, so instead I put on my

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shoes and simply put on a jacket
over my wet shirt and opened the door.

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Sophia was in the security office,
and I could see the television show

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she was watching, soap opera.
I called her name from a distance to

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not startle her, but she still
jumped a little bit. She smiled at

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me and asked if everything was all
right. She'ld have seen her face when

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I told her about the voice I
was hearing. She grabbed my hand and

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asked me to sit by the chair, telling me that it would be all

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right. As I was about to
sit down, we both frozen place whispers

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from the backyard area, saying things
that I could not understand. She lit

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a candle and sat me down.
For some odd reason, I complied.

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She stood in front of me,
repeating a chant that I could not understand.

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Words were just noises, and noises
were just waves of fear coming over

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my body. As I saw the
shape of a little girl running around the

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courtyard, zooming past the front door
and then to the backyard, I heard

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her step coming toward me from the
left, but I was unable to move

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and could hear her steps over Sophia's
voice in a rhythm that was now becoming

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familiar. I tried to speak,
I tried to yell and scream at Sophia

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to tell her to stop, that
the thing was coming for us. That's

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when I heard the deepest growl.
I can see you. Sophia stood over

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me with both hands outstretched. When
I heard the doorbell ring, two girls

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came through the front door and they
looked at me sitting on the ground.

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Candles lit behind me. Sophia told
him to wait a moment as she came

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back to help me up. One
of the girls asked if she needed help.

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Sophia then put both hands up,
stopping them in place. Stay right

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there, she told them, followed
by an of the nervous smile. Do

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not worry about him. He will
be okay. Scary Story Podcast is written

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and produced by me Edwin Komarobas.
To get in touch, visit Scary Story

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podcast dot com and find her other
shows. Links will be in the description

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of this episode. See as soon