Episode 47

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The following podcast includes scary stories with content that could be triggering to some listeners.

Listener discretion is advised.

Hey, come on, shh, don't do that.

Oh.

It's you.

Sorry, I'm a bit snippy.

I'm not my usual chipper self today.

I guess I went a little too hard for Halloween this year.

I only got back in from my bender last night.

Well, I guess this morning, technically.

Well, I guess actually, two hours ago.

That's right, Susie.

That's right.

Uncle Terry had a few too many

Skittles this year.

What are you giving me?

No, no, Susie, I don't want more Skittles.

No hair of the dog for me

Okay, all right fine just one

Too much citrus

Okay, I'm okay.

I'm okay.

Let's just do the thing

Susie roll the tape For Uncle Terry, please he's having some tum-tum troubles

I was a freshman in college in central Texas.

I had navigated to one of my favorite parking lots and there was an attendant in an orange high-viz vest who came over to collect payment.

We just kind of struck up a conversation.

I was pretty young, brand new to the state.

He was just a real friendly guy.

We had some banter when I was paying for my parking.

And then when I came back, he just leaned into that trust a little bit and kind of was like, you know, I'm new to the area and kind of lonely, looking for some people to be friends with.

Would it be okay if we exchanged phone numbers?

He was much older than me, definitely not my type.

It seemed harmless.

Gave him my number.

I said, hey, yeah, we can be friends.

Text me if you want to.

That's sort of where it left that day.

And then we evolved into a text conversation.

He starts talking about NFL games, specifically a game for a Texas team.

At the time, my most recent ex-boyfriend was a fan of this particular Texas team, so young me was really jazzed about the thought of potentially going to a game.

I was hoping for some attention, some jealousy.

We already agreed to go to the game.

We already picked out a date.

He said something, just asking along the lines of whether or not I had an outfit for the day.

I had clothes that were in the colors of the team, and I think I told him, like, yeah, I've got something that could work.

He was really grateful that I had been so kind and being willing to share phone numbers and being willing to text, being willing to go to this event with him.

I want to make sure that you feel good and you look good and I want to thank you for being so kind and that kind of thing.

He offered to buy me a whole outfit for the day, which he ended up doing and sending to my home address.

At this point, I'm telling all my friends, hey, this is, you know, this is what's going on.

He started asking if he could buy me clothes to wear to the game and that kind of thing.

Maybe my ex would see me at this game with all this cool gear on with this new person.

I thought it would just be something so cool to do.

And at that point in my life, I'd never been to an NFL stadium.

Apprehensively, all of my friends were like, you know, what can I hurt?

So we talked about the day of the game and he was pretty insistent that we take my vehicle.

which I was really happy with because I preferred it that way.

I wanted to drive and I wanted to have my car in case something happened and I needed to get out of town.

I had talked with a lot of my girlfriends, let everyone know this is what I'm doing.

We had kind of talked through the scenarios, like if something weird happens, can you pull over?

The route that we were going is a route I had driven many times in between these two cities.

It's pretty common for me to make that commute.

I knew there was always going to be a town every 15 minutes or so at most.

So I could claim car issues, gas issues, something.

Like worst case scenario, I could pull over on the side of the highway if I needed to.

He gives me his address and I go and pick him up and it's an area of the city that I'm somewhat familiar with.

It's a lot of the get-to-know-you kind of questions and we shared a lot of stories about ourselves with each other.

This is where we're from, this is how we grew up, this is some of the life experiences that we've had.

We talked about the game too.

We talked about the team and who they were playing and what to expect.

When we got into town before we went to the stadium, we stopped and had a meal together, which he paid for and just seemed really relaxed all the way there.

Just kind of like a buddy road trip is what it really felt like.

When we got to the parking lot, he pulled out a plastic flask full of alcohol, vodka,

and asked me to hold it.

I was like, you know, be cool.

He's been so nice.

It's not that big of a deal.

The jersey's pretty baggy.

It's plastic.

It'll be fine.

So we go in to the stadium and we get to our seats.

We grab a couple beers and a couple sodas, some snacks and that kind of thing.

And it was a really interesting game.

We had great seats.

It was really, really cool.

I paced myself because I knew we had a multiple hour drive home on the other side of this.

I sort of slowed down and he finished the flask and kept drinking his beers.

Throughout the game, he started to get visibly drunk.

Glassy eyes, sloppy with his cup.

Okay, great.

I don't know this guy.

I don't know his limits.

Am I going to be having to pull over so he can be sick?

Is he going to fall asleep?

I just started to count up like, oh, great.

I'm going to be babysitting this guy for a little while.

The game wraps up.

We head back to the car.

We had had enough between the meal before the game and the snacks in the stadium that we were just gonna punch it all the way home.

And even then, we were gonna be getting home kind of late.

Get out of stadium traffic and we head back down the road, a couple hour trip back to where we started from.

He's sitting in the passenger seat.

He started getting really emotional.

He was sad, but it was also sadness with an undertone of anger.

anger.

Like he had been wronged.

Like something had been done to him that was unfair.

But then he started kind of just alluding to how he's got a dark past.

He's a bad guy and there's a reason that he's so lonely.

People aren't really that forgiving.

So I was trying to be, you know, consoling and empathetic and, you know, hey, you know, I'm sure it's not that bad.

And, you know, if there's people who can't forgive you for things that you've done maybe you just need to give them time

he just seems so stuck on it it seemed like he wanted to admit something

so then it was kind of okay you say you're this bad guy like what do you mean why do you say that about yourself

He starts with literally physically lifting up his clothing to show me some of his tattoos on his body and talking about how he is a member of

one of the most notoriously violent prison gangs in the state.

Those were his exact words.

I got really scared.

He was showing me some of his tattoos and how they were affiliated with this organization.

telling me about what they meant and some of the things that he had to do to earn them.

He would say things like, you wouldn't believe the things I've seen.

He had a lot of sadness in his countenance and in his demeanor.

And so I was just pro, but we had so long to go.

It's like, so what have you seen?

He gave me details about what happens to a body when you drop it in a vat of acid.

What do you have to do with the bones when they don't all dissolve?

This person is

dangerous.

He's still pretty intoxicated and he's starting to get this bravado pride and like showing off what this connectivity had done for him.

Once he kind of made this confession and he was really emotional about it, then he started to kind of stand on like, I'm this cool guy.

You know, I can do all this stuff because of this involvement in this organization.

He wanted to fix my air conditioner.

I was in early college.

My car was a piece of crap.

It's Texas.

My AC just isn't really working that well.

He gets on the phone and he's bragging to his buddy.

And he's like, yo, I need you to hook my girl up.

We're going to get her AC running super frigid.

And he just started like making a show of just how connected he was and how he could just get stuff done.

That's when he started using the like the possessive language, which

nothing romantic had happened.

I don't think he ever even escorted me by like pushing on my back or anything.

Like we never had touched.

So all of a sudden using this language and I started just looking to the closest gas station I could find.

He actually also had mentioned that he needed to go to the bathroom.

So I was like, perfect.

This is his cover.

We'll go to the bathroom.

I'll stay in the car and I'll call somebody.

I was pretty scared.

Parking that guy goes into the gas station to use the restroom.

I immediately called my friend who is from a legacy FBI family.

So she was studying criminal justice.

Her father was in the bureau.

She was on her way to being there herself.

She didn't answer.

So I just text her.

I'm in a weird situation, but this is the name.

This is who he claims to be.

Do I need to leave him on the side of the road?

Needless to say, she didn't answer in the few minutes that this guy was inside.

So

we just continue on down the road.

He tells me, I could tell you how many times a day you flush your toilet.

My stomach fell out of my body at that point.

He had my address.

I lived alone with a couple women.

Knowing who he was, knowing what he claimed, all of a sudden I'm just thinking, it doesn't matter if I get this guy out of my car or not.

He knows where I am now, and he's going to know where I am forever.

Knowing how frequently I flushed my toilet, that really, really scared me.

I don't even know if the water authority in the city that I'm living in could do that.

That's just such a weird thing to claim to know and such an intimate thing.

It's almost like saying, I could know everything about you because this is is probably one of the most intimate things I could know about you.

While parking lot guy is going on this rant about how well connected he is and how he's plugged in everywhere, and he's got a network that can, you know, literally tell you how many times a day I'm flushing my toilet.

I get a text message back from my friend who's in the FBI.

She says, Yeah,

that name is the name of a man who's holding this position in this organization.

Get out.

Get away as quickly as you can.

It's not a good place for you to be.

I was already in a state of panic and fear.

When everything was confirmed,

my world just got so much smaller.

Everything sort of caved in on me.

What's going to happen?

I was really scared.

I was gripping the wheel tightly because if I didn't, my hands were visibly shaking.

I felt nauseous.

I was super sweaty.

I kept trying to just prompt him to go into a story so I didn't have to speak or do anything.

I was certainly in fight or flight mode.

When we were nearing the end of the road trip,

he insisted that we stop pretty quickly at a gas station.

And he's like, you want to know why I made you pull over?

My parole officer had been following us since we left town.

It just really drove home that this person is a dangerous person.

I'm shaking on the inside.

I'm sweating.

I feel nauseous.

I'm just doing everything that I can to try and stay calm on the outside and get us the heck back to his house and get him out of my car.

I just wanted to get home and never talk to him again.

It was only about 45 minutes to get back to his place.

I think I finished that drive in less than 30 minutes.

I kind of hoped that a cop would pull us over.

I would have done anything to have the officer take me out of the car just so I could tell him, like, impound my car, let me go home with you.

I just don't want to be with this person.

But I didn't have that luck.

I got back to his place without getting in any trouble at all.

And when we got there, he asked if I wanted to come in.

I just said, no, thank you.

And he took no at no.

And

I drove away.

I didn't want to do anything that would upset him, but I also wanted to make it very clear that this friendship is over.

You've told me that people learn about the real you and they refuse to be your friends, and I'm sorry to be that way too, but I just don't feel comfortable.

I had a pretty active Instagram account, and a couple years later, just a comment pops up from first name, last name of this guy.

Some innocuous comment, like, oh, do you look pretty or something like that?

It kind of made my blood cold.

All these years later, he still follows.

He still knows where I am.

And if he's who he says he is, he knows everything about me.

He's probably right around the corner.

It was like I had jumped out of a plane.

All of my senses were heightened.

My stomach was in my throat.

My heart was racing.

It was just creepy.

Even though it wasn't anything weird that he said, it was just that non-verbal nudge, like, I'm still here.

I still know where you are.

Huh?

Huh?

What?

Huh?

Oh, oh, oh, yes.

Oh, what a thrilling tale.

I heard all of it, every word.

I could presite it back to you verbatim.

Nailed it, Terry.

Huh?

What?

What are these?

What?

Wet socks?

How do you know all these niche hangover cures?

Huh, okay.

Well, fascinating.

I think.

Oh.

Wait a minute.

Did you just drop these in the toilet?

You just dropped my socks on the toilet, didn't you?

Oh, nice going.

Good going, Butterfingers.

No, I don't want a

Butterfinger, Susie.

No.

Please don't.

Can you just

feed it to the void or the cat or something?

Please, Susie.

Okay.

Fine, fine.

I'll eat it.

One day you'll grow up and appreciate this.

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And we're back.

That was.

shrill.

I have a splitting headache now.

And wet feet.

So thanks for that, sponsors.

Let's do another story.

Maybe one that isn't so loud.

Oh, keep it down, Voidy.

Your baritone is giving me the shakes.

Okay, next tape, please.

Next tape.

it was

my second year of teaching preschool.

We had a new little girl start.

Sarah was very intelligent.

She couldn't memorize books.

She would read them back to you verbatim.

She was a really sweet little girl.

Very happy-go-lucky.

Very easy to get along with.

She was always a little bit different.

She always stuck out from the other kids just because of that high intelligence.

She was kind of on another level.

It was midway through the year, which was kind of different.

She didn't have a lot of friends.

All the other kids were pretty acquainted with each other.

She talked to me a lot.

She told me everything.

She was quite a talker.

She told me mostly about her friend named Jenny.

She just talked about her every single day, all day long.

Everything that happened in the classroom somehow tied back to her friend.

She was obsessed with Jenny.

I remember her talking about them playing on the swing sets together a lot.

And they played dolls, they played dress-up, they watched TV together.

She made it seem a lot like she lived at home with her.

Jenny must be a sister.

She wasn't just like a neighbor or a simple friend.

They seemed very, very close.

Usually during pickup, that was my time to talk to parents.

converse and just talk about how the day went.

Her dad showed up to pick her up one day.

I had been hearing so much about Jenny for the past couple months.

I was wondering why he never brought her along to pick Sarah up.

Most parents would, like, if there was an older sibling or a younger sibling, they would bring them along.

And he never did.

I asked him, so, hey, when am I gonna get to meet her sister?

He didn't like that question.

He just got this look on his face, like he was really surprised and kind of upset.

And he said, she doesn't have any siblings.

Oh, well, she just talks about Jenny all the time and I thought they were sisters.

I'm sorry I misunderstood.

And he just said again, well, she doesn't have any siblings.

He seemed very...

visibly upset that I was bringing up Jenny at all.

Especially when I said her name.

But he didn't want to tell me any more about it, so I left it alone.

He just took her by the hand and he was like, alright, come on, let's go.

My curiosity got the best of me because of his reaction.

I wanted to know who this friend was.

So I decided to ask her instead.

She was sitting down at a table drawing pictures.

I sat next to her and I said, hey, who's your friend Jenny, by the way?

Can you tell me about your friend?

She stopped what she was doing

and she told me,

she's the girl who watches me sleep through my window at night.

I was in shock.

I don't think I've ever experienced a child looking at me the way that she did in that moment.

I was terrified.

That was the last thing I was expecting to hear her say.

She went back to what she was doing like nothing had happened.

She didn't ask me any questions or say anything else about it.

I told the other teacher in the room about what happened and she kind of laughed and she was like, there's no way she said that to you.

We both decided we weren't going to tell the parents or talk to to them about it any further in any further detail because clearly it was something upsetting to them.

It must have been a very sensitive topic.

I babysit her about several months after that happened.

That night, when I was putting her down for bed,

I realized, oh my god, she's on the second floor of the house.

There's no way that it could be a person unless they were climbing up to her window to stare at this child and watch her sleep.

I was scared to be there.

No matter what was going on, something was staring at her through her window.

If it had been an imaginary friend that she was talking about this whole time, and her parents were aware of that, and that they didn't believe anything was going on, I think her dad wouldn't have had the reaction that he did.

He He would have said something like, oh, that's just her imaginary friend.

But he didn't.

This was not just a simple imaginary friend.

He knew something was wrong, and he did not want to discuss it.

I think he really knew that there was something else there.

He seemed like one of those kinds of people who, when you bring something paranormal out to them, they're just like, that's not real.

There's no way that could be true, but they're kind of in denial and deep down they know that there is something going on there.

She just stopped talking about her altogether.

Probably finally told her, you need to stop talking about your friend.

Jenny isn't real.

Jenny isn't here.

I wouldn't be surprised if they had gone about it that way with her.

I don't know how you tell a kid that when they deeply believe that they're seeing something or someone, how you would get them to stop.

I think Jenny was something beyond our understanding.

Usually when kids say weird things, I just knock it off as kids say weird things.

This time felt different.

I don't think I've ever heard something

So creepy in my life.

It's still something I think about And I still tell the story all the time to people.

It's still shocking every single time.

I guess I took the whole thing about kids seeing things that we don't for granted until she said that.

And it was kind of a realization for me that, wow, they really can see something

that we can't.

If parents have kids who are saying stuff like that, I hope that the parents would listen.

That's a scary thing to go through alone.

You think that was scary?

You should be inside my body right now.

Well, wait, that's not...

Oh, oh, shoot, that didn't really come out right.

And besides, I'm not really in the mental state to be entered right now.

Oh, God, I'm really striking out today.

Sorry.

Not what I meant.

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You'll like that.

They're good ads.

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And we're

back.

Okay, I can't do this anymore.

Where's the trash can?

Where's the trash can?

Susie, did you move my trash can?

Malachi, was it you?

Et too brute.

Et too Malachi.

Oh, I can't hold it in any longer.

I have to.

I'm so sorry, Void.

Make way.

I'm so sorry.

Wow, it's funny how you feel so much better afterwards.

Sorry, Void.

Sorry you were a casualty.

Actually, I wonder where will all of that interdimensional vomit go?

Is there going to be a rainfall of half-digested Skittles and some multiverse?

Well, at least they'll get to enjoy a rainbow of sorts.

But don't taste this rainbow.

That was good.

Oh, God.

Oh, God, here comes the Butterfinger.

Radio Rental is created by Payne Lindsay and brought to you by Tenderfoot TV.

Lead producer is Eric Quintana.

Executive producers are Payne Lindsay and Donald Albright.

Hosted by Rain Wilson as his character, Terry Carnation.

Written and produced by Meredith Stedman.

Additional writing by Mark Lachlan.

Supervising producer is Tracy Kaplan.

Associate Producer is Jaja Muhammad.

Editing by Eric Quintana, Mike Rooney, and Meredith Stedman.

Sound design, mix, and master by Cooper Skinner.

Additional sound design and mixing by Devin Johnson.

Original score by Makeup and Vanity Set.

Video editing by Dylan Harrington.

Cover artwork by Trevor Eiler and Rob Sheridan.

Special thanks to Oren Rosenbaum and the team at UTA, the Nord Group, Station 16, Beck Media and Marketing, and the team at Odyssey.

If you have a radio rental story that you'd like to share, please email us at yourscarystory at gmail.com or contact us via the form on our website, radio rentalusa.com.

Follow us on Instagram and Twitter at Radio Rental.

You can also follow the illustrious Terry Carnation on social media.

Just search at Terry Carnation.

On behalf of the Radio Rental store, we'd love it if you'd subscribe, rate, and review.

Thanks for listening.

When faith outlasts fear, truth has a way of rising to the surface.

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Goodbye.