Welcome to Scary Story Podcast. In today's story, a group of teens as
a hangout spot by the edge of town. What they discover will make headlines.
Literally, here's your Halloween story, and I hope you enjoy it.
My name is Edwin, and here's a scary story. It was like a
rite of passage, that first bonfire out on the field at the edge of
town, by the creek and at the start of the hills of Hatford that
liked to cast those wavy shadows across the mp areas. I had heard about
it in junior high. Even my parents used to go when they were younger.
They would casually mention what it would be like. Once I was in
high school and always wanted to be out with my friends. Mom would squish
my face and comment on how fast I grow. But times must have been
different when they were younger, because they would see it as just a casual
thing. But I had heard now the place was made for teenage just trying
to get away from their parents for bonfires. Some would sneak in cigarettes and
energy drinks and crank up the music and sit on the back of the trucks
they borrowed from their parents for hours, especially on Fridays. It was time
to change schools again, and before I knew it, I was in high
school and figuring everything out. I got bored of the barren area out by
the edge of town pretty quickly, so whenever word got around that everyone was
going to go hang out there, I would skip out and play video games
in the basement instead. A couple of my friends that would come over and
play desperately wanted to go, and I still remember that conversation that got us
into everything. Why do they call it the schools? Jason asked as we
were choosing our Mortal Kombat characters. It was a good question, and one
I had asked my parents a long time ago, but they didn't know the
answer either. I thought it was a play on the words, like the
way you would say when you were going to school but instead go out there
to hang out, or maybe the school of life, a place about things
nobody teaches you but you'll learn Anyway. We quickly forgot about the question and
just kept playing as we got older. Heading into our junior year in high
school, my dad started letting me borrow the old truck after I got my
drivers permit, and then my temporary license and we would head out to the
arcade. Sometimes it would go fishing by the creek. But as soon as
girls started getting into the picture, things changed. It was like oxygen to
high schoolers getting to go to the schools on Friday nights after the football games,
crushes and friends trying to get rides for me to get there. I
would go, but I always knew there was something off about the place.
Maybe it was how dark it would get, even with such open clearings.
The tall hills right next to it would block out the moonlight. On some
nights, the orange globe of the fires would bounce off the rocks and cast
shadows on each other until they disappeared against the US guy. But like with
most students, as senior year came around, that was all about the schools,
rallying up people to go there with us, especially the new ones,
scaring them, showing them the rules of the place, and having a good
time. But like with everything again, I started growing tired of it.
One night, we were all around some of the palette fires others were starting
when a group of the cool kids like we called them, came up to
us and asked us to move the truck I never wanted any trouble from anyone,
and I had managed to stay away from bullies for most of elementary and
junior high, so I wasn't about to let it happen now, especially in
senior year. I acted like I didn't care and got on the truck while
my other three friends helped guide me to find a new spot to park on
the other side of the fire. It was a cold October evening, almost
Halloween, and that fire was helping. The group that had just arrived opened
up some cans of coke and some glass bottles, being obnoxious with their music.
We stuck around for another hour or so, and then Mike and the
others got on the truck with me to head down the road to look for
another place to hang out. It was a dark and long road that would
lead us back to town, the lights of the streets barely visible in the
distance through the trees. Her other friend, Jason asked what we were all
thinking? So where do we go go? It was like admitting we had
gotten kicked out of our own game, not like we ever owned it,
but we had her in that spot at the schools, and now we were
there on a lonely road, sitting in the car with nowhere to go.
We could go get a burger, Mary told Mike. Both were sitting in
the back seat, and between arguments of we can go get a burger any
day of the week and yes, let's go, I just kept staring out
the windshield, and then I watched a small figure that seemed to be crawling
from out of the bushes went onto the road some one hundred feet in front
of the car. It stood in the middle of the road and then went
back to the bushes, where my eyes kept scanning to see when it would
come out again. And it did, this time a little bit closer.
Jason looked at me while the two were arguing in the back and looked in
the same direction. Suddenly his gaze froze. He had seen it too.
It was like a mist, except they was able to move along the ground
crawling. What is that? He said, getting the attention of my and
and Mary, who immediately turned toward the area between our seats to get a
better look. The mist rolled toward the truck for another ten feet or so,
and then instead of going back to the bushes, we went to the
opposite side of the road. We're all quiet for a few seconds before Mary
kicked the back of my seat, nearly knocking out the bottle of water I
was holding in my hand. Jason and Mike started laughing, but I kept
my eyes out toward the empty road through the windshield, knowing that it was
very much possible that we had all just seen a ghost. Right then the
laughter died down. I asked Jason what he thought it was, and he
sounded a little nervous when he said that he didn't know that maybe it was
just missed from the creek. But mists don't form into figures that roll around
the ground and cross the street, So you think it was a ghost?
Mary asked from behind me, a serious question. This time, we all
looked out in front of us in silence until we noticed movement again. This
time I was able to look in the rear room mirror to see headlights in
the distance, along with faint music approaching us. It was one of the
trucks coming from the schools. They stopped right behind us before they passed us,
yelling and laughing before the red tail lights passed right by. For we
had seen the mist form just a few minutes before the lights and faded among
the trees once they turned farther up ahead. Halloween was a few days away,
and of course the typical scary stories were circulating around town on the radio,
the news, and even the high school newspaper. Mary was a writer
for the newspaper club at school and had been complaining about how they always interviewed
Missus Becker from down the street about her house. It was an old wooden
mansion looking place that was long rumored to be haunted by the ghosts of the
family that died mysteriously. Missus Becker would tell anyone who was willing to listen
about the ghosts she would see in her house, but it was always the
same story. A man and a woman that danced in the living room and
two children that would roll them toys around in the attic of her house.
It was like candy for reporters on Halloween, and the advisor for the school's
newspaper had asked her to write it this year again. Mary was one of
the popular kids at school and I don't know what she did hanging out with
us, but she was the one that got us out of uncomfortable situations or
answer our questions about girls and stuff whenever a situation would come up, or
so we like to call them. And it was in that truck that night
when she got the brilliant idea to tell the story of the ghost we had
just seen. Not before investigating a little bit more, she said, there
was another spot east of the hills and still part of the schools, but
no one would go there for whatever reason. Maybe because it's haunted. Mike
blurt it out without missing a beat. It might be, Mary said with
a straight face. Either way, we can go check it out and then
get a If we find a ghost, I'll give you all of my fries,
Mike joked. Jason looked at me from the front seat as Mike and
Mary leaned forward waiting for me to start the truck. All right, let's
go, I said, as the engine rumbled to a start and shifted into
gear. I turned it around and started heading back to the schools. And
even now I wonder why we ever went. We're about to have the most
terrifying night of our lives, something we still talk about to this day.
Silence took over the inside of that truck, with only Mary's directions about where
to turn. As we drove past the people by the bonfires at the schools.
The music still blasting and bouncing off those hills, but the sound started
to fade and lights started to dim as we got to the end of the
dirt road. From a certain point forward, the truck stopped rattling so much
from the tires being on cracked pavement instead of dirt. On that open field.
No matter where I turned the car, it felt like road, and
yet all I could do was follow those headlights in front of me, although
if I looked hard enough, the rolling mist seemed to move from the edges
where the darkness started. Part two of the schools is coming up right after
this. Stay with him. We're here, Mary whispered, are you guys
ready? There's a story about this place, and no one talks about it.
Jason and I were both distracted by something in the distance right before I
shut off the headlights. It was only the green light of the clock of
the radio inside the car. Now, what's the story, Mike asked,
as you were all interrupted by a sudden tapping on the truck. It was
like the wagging tail of a dog against the rear bumper, or like the
way someone taps on your car when they're trying to tell you to stop,
as they're helping you part We all stayed quiet, afraid to say anything.
Remember that nothing could be seen outside of the car because of how dark it
was, except for maybe some faint silhouettes of the hills and a distant glow
from the fires at the schools. Then the tapping grew to knocking, and
the knocking grew to straight up beating on the truck. My hands were shaking
as I turned on the headlights and started it up, flooring almost immediately.
Unsure of where to go, Mary yelled out directions as I finally felt the
dirt road against the tires and kept driving, rushing past the dying bonfires and
back to the road we had been waiting on. I drove past the creek
and around the trees until I started seeing the houses of town again. The
whole way, we struggled coming out up with something to say, although Jason
and Mike kept asking what the heck that was. We finally pulled up to
the main street, and a few blocks later we had got into the parking
lot of Jimmy's Burgers. It was around eleven by this time. The burger
plates will be opened for another hour, and we sat there for a bit
before Jason opened the door and stood outside, asking if we were going to
get anything. We all got out and walked up to the takeout window.
We ordered our usuals and then started leaning against the truck as we waited for
our orders. That wasn't hungry. That feeling of wanting to vomit and adrenaline
were still rushing through my body. Maybe it was a dog, Mary said,
waiting for our reactions, or some animal of some sort, an animal
like what a bear that knocks on a car politely before trying to break it
apart. Mike said to her, try again. He talked about every single
thing that it could have been as we ate, until we saw a truck
pull up then stop right behind us. The dad of one of the guys
from school nearly jumped out and walked straight to me. Do you know where
David is? Was looking at everyone, but pointing at me. We all
knew David. He was one of the guys that hung out with the kids
with the truck that made us leave our spot at the bonfire. We used
to be friends with him back when we were in chess club and we would
play games after school at each other's houses. That was before he started hanging
out with that crowd. Someone say something, The man snapped, calming himself
down as his wife stepped out of the passenger side of his truck. Everyone
says, he was with you, he said, catching his breath. Another
car pulled up next to us, and I recognized the obnoxious group from the
schools. They were calm now and came up to Jason and I to tell
me that he had stayed with us as a prank while we were hanging out
on the side of the road. We all looked at each other and then
ran to the bed of my truck a white mask and a plastic knife.
Mary was the one that got it first before we all realized that those were
the sounds we had heard that night. In that panic, nobody turned to
see what had been making the noises, and we just stuck off and this
other guy, David, must have gotten off the truck and we left him
there. I tried explaining this to the man, but his wife was a
more reasonable one, so she was relieved by the whole thing. As we
told them we would go back to get him, we'll follow you, his
wife said, as she walked back to their truck. Mary was quiet the
whole drive back, obviously disappointed by the way her story fell apart in the
span of half an hour, but she still guided us with directions until the
tires ran smooth against that same pavement an hour do we go, Mike asked
from the back seat. We were there with another truck behind us this time,
and yet it still felt dark navigating this large empty space. We circled
around and pulled up to David's dad and told him we had been around here
somewhere. If David had started walking back, we would have a tougher time
finding him, but they were relieved to know that he probably wasn't far.
They said they would circle around for a bit and for us to hang out
there with the headlights on in case David found his way to us. First,
don't leave the car, he said, This place still gives me the
creeps. He pulled away as he went straight ahead and then turned left.
We watched him pull away, and Mike finally said, well, isn't it
his fault? But it wasn't the time. The area was too dark to
be able to find your way back just like that, and if he was
hiding in the bed of the truck while we were driving, or fell off
somehow, he might be hurt somewhere. Just the thought of that made us
go quiet again. But not even four minutes after that, we all caught
a glimpse of a mist of about thirty feet in front of us. It
rolled out of the view of the headlights, but then it came back,
stayed right in front of the truck, close to the ground for a few
seconds before stretching out, taking the form of a small human figure. We
were all holding our breaths as this thing simply walked off the right side and
disappeared in the darkness. But then another figure appeared in its place, and
then another one startled. Mary tapped me on the shoulder to have me look
back, and even from the faint tail lights, with those reds and yellows,
we could see another one for me. I was about to shift the
truck into gear to drive to another spot when we heard the tapping again from
the back sat David. The tapping again grew to knocking, and then something
else started tapping on the front of the car, on the side, tapping
against the doors and windows. There was no way it was only one person
around us if it was a prank. But then it got worse. The
truck started rocking with knocking even on the roof. Then Jason started screaming,
saying to just drive, but the car wouldn't shift. The radio turned on
and scans for channels as we heard music mixed with static, and the headlines
struggled to stay on for what seemed like forever. We yelled as I tried
to get the car going with those knocks all around the truck strong enough to
break anything, but something about them felt desperate trying to get inside. Mary
was screaming until everything finally stopped. The car was finally able to shift in
the drive, and it drove a short distance away. The other truck could
no longer be seen in a figure. They may have found David already.
I was still shaking from the whole ordeal, but managed to keep calm enough
to ask if we should get back to the schools and wait for David's parents.
Nobody said anything, so I just started driving. This time, we
really were speechless. There was no way anyone could have pranked us, not
with the mists and the sounds, not like that, and there was no
one around there. This time, no one had been on the bed of
the truck and we were alone out there. We pulled up to where the
other bonfires had been. Some wood had been left behind, and we got
out now with the place completely empty, before voting two wooden pallets on the
fire. It smoked for a bit before catching and turning into a large flame
that lit up the side of the hills. Mike turned to the truck and
grabbed my shoulder, his fingers shaking at the sight hands dozens of handprints all
over the dirty truck's windows, over the sides and doors. We all gathered
around the truck to get a closer look, with Mary making the observation that
they looked like children's hands all over it. We spent about half an hour
there coming up with theories as to what we had experienced this time, not
doubting anything anymore. Were those misty figures and how we just seen with these
handprints. Eventually a truck started coming from the same direction we arrived. It
was David's parents. David's dad rolled down his window as he said that they
had found him, but we're going to head back right away. His wife
was leaning toward the back seat. David was looking straight ahead and did not
acknowledge us without saying another word, pulled away. It had been a long
night, and once I had dropped off Mary, she asked if we could
wait while she got her camera. She took a bunch of photos of the
truck and the handprints that were still clearly visible. With that, we said
goodbye and I dropped everyone off. We rarely saw David at school after that,
with some saying that he was homeschooled for the rest of the year,
while others, including my parents, confirmed that his parents had moved away to
another city nearby because the dad had gotten a new job. Mary had been
trying to get a hold of David for her story in the school newspaper,
but eventually, over the next couple of days, Mary put together her story
for Halloween, keeping us updated with her research as she found new details about
what we had experienced. In her final article, we all got to read
the whole thing. The areas where everyone used to hang out used to be
a part of a larger property that was eventually returned to the county, large
empty fields that people started using for camping on the weekends, but the purpose
of the property was for boarding schools back in the nineteen seventies. Hundreds of
children attended the place, and the property owners hoped to build even more for
older children, and rumor has it that they even wanted to build a university.
She had interviewed a local historian and several of the oldest citizens in town,
including Missus Becker, the woman living in the haunted house, who told
Mary that the building had been built so quickly that they skipped on several safety
features, and one night, a small kitchen fire expanded so quickly that it
engulfed the dormitories. As part of the supposed safety features it did have,
the building wouldn't open from the inside without a key, and slowly the desperate
knocking and attempts to escape faded against the sound of the roaring fire. The
schools were shut down and later demolished, with those in charge doing their best
to keep the story under wraps. They say that on quiet nights, those
that visit the area can still hear the desperate knocking and the hundreds of students
that died that night. Scary Story podcast is produced by me Edwin Kovarubias.
The ideas for stories you have been setting me will be put on a brand
new Instagram. It's Scary dot Edwin and I'll link to it in my regular
profile and hear in the description there's nothing on there right now, so don't
freak out and hank tied as I also bring up a YouTube channel. I'll
update everyone as you move along. In the meantime, be sure to tap
follow and drop some stars for me. Also, Scary Plus is available if
you want to listen to it without ads and help out the show at the
same time. Happy Halloween everyone, and thank you very much for listening.
See you soon.