Hey, listeners, It's E. J. Miller. I'm the producer and
writer here at Fast Food Horror. Before we get any further, I just
have a couple of quick announcements. For one, this episode is our season
one finale. Just saying that out loud just gave me chills. I never
imagined I'd get to twenty seven episodes in season one. But don't worry.
Fast Food Horror will be coming back in January of twenty twenty four with all
new creepy and suspenseful stories just for you. And two, this episode will
be voiced by none other than the very talented Jonathan Inbody. Jonathan is a
tremendous voice, talent, and writer. His stories have been featured on the
No Sleep podcast and most notably and most importantly, on his very own acid
horror anthology called Gray Matter. Highly highly recommend you go check it out.
It is on every major podcasting platform available, and don't worry, you don't
need to start at episode one. You can skip around. It's an anthology
series of separate stories that are sure to thrill, excite, and creep you
out at times, and if you listen very very carefully, you might just
recognize a familiar voice over there at gray Matter again highly recommend you check them
out, but without further ado, I'll hand the show off to Igor and
take you to this week's creepy tale I goor take it away. Welcome listeners
to this final episode in season one of our anthology entitled The Collector by E.
J. Miller and narrated by Jonathan Inbody of Gray Matter and Acid Horror
Anthology podcast for which I am such a big fan. Every business starts out
as someone's passing fancy before it pivots into a hobby, then takes flight into
a passion before they figure out how to make a and then the profit becomes
the thing, the driving force. I started out at garage sales finding things
to resell online, you know, collectibles, knick knacks, bobbleheads, nineteen
eighties McDonald's glasses, beanie babies, toys, and comics. That turned into
visiting thrift stores, searching for that diamond in the rough label and name brand
clothing, vintage apparel and fashion. I found out some items just needed to
be washed and mended to fetch a high ROI to some buyer on eBay.
Other items were highly sought after concert shirts, sneakers, vinyls, and jewelry.
Things changed when I started coming across gaming consoles and the cartridges that went
with them, the cash they fetched. Then I went to the big time
is state sales. The things you could find there art, coin and stamp
collections, antique this and that. I once bought an old locked steamer trunk,
not because I thought so no one could use it for a function,
but because I thought it would be a better decoration for some hipster. I
knew I could clean it up and get a nice return on my money.
Locke, to my surprise, was easy to pick ah the things you can
learn on YouTube. Thank you gen Z. Inside was too perfectly preserved World
War One officer uniforms with metals, multiple sabers, and a vintage Colt revolver,
photos and a diary. I made my money back ten times over.
I gave the diary and photos to the family. I'm not a monster.
Thanks to certain TV shows, the competition for those things really started cutting into
my profits. The closer you were to a population center, the more people
you had to outbid. Once you found something poof, there were ten other
people over your shoulder offering the owner more or the owner got smart and what
was once there junk was now a lotto ticket. So I started traveling further
out to more remote areas where there wasn't much competition, to smaller and smaller
towns, to areas so far off the map that even my GPS was shrugging
its virtual shoulders, rural areas, locales where I could find older homes where
the owners perhaps were shall we say, down on their luck, both financially
and healthwise, or maybe just not that bright. A few days ago,
I brought home a hall. I was passing through one of those small towns
getting gas. It barely counted as a town, it was so small.
Actually, the gas station was one of the only things in that town.
It consisted of a post office, a library which was closed, a schoolhouse
also closed, a few shacks that passed his homes, and the gas station.
I made small talk with the attendant while I stretched my legs, and
I inquired about any estate sales or collectors in town that he knew of.
A twenty dollars bill got me the address of an old man who had recently
passed. His brother was cleaning out his house and he might be interested in
selling The address was remote, to say the lead. It was up a
dirt road that consisted of nothing more than two tire tracks that meandered through the
woods for a few miles to a large clearing. That's where I found the
two story wood construct that was clearly made without a professional architect, paint peeling
porch, leaning weeds and lawn trying to take back the property that was once
theirs. The recently deceased brother was Odd, an elderly, gruff character that
didn't talk much. He grunted, mumbled, and nodded. As a matter
of fact, I don't believe he said one intelligible word the whole time I
was there. I had offered my condolences. Then I asked if he was
selling any of his brother's collection I had heard about in town. He grunted
and then gestured for me to follow. He led me through the house.
A winding path took us through the dark and dusty rooms time had forgotten,
over creaking floorboards and around furniture from the last century. He guided me down
the basement steps to three wooden armoires and gestured for me to look within.
I opened the first to find shoe boxes stacked one atop another filling the space.
I peeked into each and found leather boots of various styles and colors,
a hall in pristine condition. I tried to hide my excitement so as not
to drive up the price. I removed one box and took a boot out,
worked it around in my hands. It was actual leather, not plastic
or some synthetic, and the leather was remarkable, no scuffs, no flaking,
and the craftsmanship of the stitching. Each box was easily worth three hundred
dollars if they all displayed the same quality and craftsmanship. I gently closed the
box and replaced it into the armoire. I tried to keep my expression stony
and shrugged at the old man. He gestured to the second armoire, and
he opened its door and let out a grunt. There I found multiple black
garment bags. I gently selected one, trying to hold back my excitement,
and worked the zipper to find a beautiful leather duster. Just like the boots.
It was in perfect condition, and it was actual leather, not one
imperfection nowhere, no scuff marks, and the stitching was remarkable. I returned
the coat into the garment bag and replaced it in the armoire. I peeked
inside the other garment bags, seventeen in all, all various styles, from
dusters to biker jackets, all of this beautiful, perfect leather. I gently
closed the armoire and tried to keep my face expressionless. I turned my host
and again shrugged, and he grunted and opened the third armoir. As the
doors opened, the contents came tumbling out like an apparel avalanche and a cloud
of dust. Boots, sneakers and shoes, dirty and worn pants and skirts,
tattered and stained, hats of all manner and style, crumpled and flatten,
piled out onto the floor. The smell that followed must have been from
whatever small animals had made their home within. I covered my face, not
only to hide my displeasure, but to stop the stench from entering my nostrils.
I shook my head and made my offer for the contents of the first
two armoires five hundred dollars, without going into detail. I walked away with
both for about seven fifty I was easily going to make more than ten times
my investment, or so I thought. I got my haul back home and
started unloading into my garage slash office. Then went about the process of trying
to catalog and price everything, looking for tags or a maker's mark to help
establish a price point. Most items of high quality have a maker's mark or
a tag. I started with the coats, and there it was easily seen.
Stitched with elegant, careful precision, into the inside collar of each jacket
was a name. Seventeen different names, none I was familiar with. I
marked them all in my sheet and moved onto the boots. I admired each
the precision and craftsmanship they were each created, with the detail, and began
the search for the mark. And sure enough, on the inside of each
right boot was the mark. High up on the lip was a name,
lovingly stitched, none of which I was familiar. Spoiler, I'm not gonna
make my money back, not because the makers weren't famous or well known.
I'm probably not gonna get any money. Actually, I started feeding the names
into a Google search. None of the names came back as known craftsmen or
makers of leather goods, designers or stores. They all shared one thing,
though, one commonality. Name after name, I received a hit for each.
They were all the names of missing persons since nineteen sixty four. Every
name from various states and two countries. My mind already connected the dots I
wasn't willing to say out loud. I called the cops, the boots,
the coats. They were leather, but they were not made of traditional animal
hives. They were human, at least that's what the officer told me at
their forensics lab, and after I gave my statement, the detective speculated that
the third arm wire I mentioned was most likely the personal effects of the victims.
I gave the detectives precise directions to the address. God knows what else
they'll find.