Haunted

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Speaker 1 Hey, I'm Leftov Nasser. This is Radio Lab and your podcast feed a day early because it is October 31st.
We're celebrating Halloween by bringing you a ghost story for the occasion.

Speaker 1 There aren't a lot of radio stories out there that will genuinely spook you, but also make you laugh out loud. And this one, oh man.
does exactly that.

Speaker 1 We first released it exactly 10 years ago today, reported by our now senior producer, Matt Kilty. This was one of his first stories, actually.

Speaker 1 It's about exactly how far one man is willing to go to understand his haunted house. This story is both a trick and the perfect fun-sized Halloween treat.
So here you go. Happy Halloween.

Speaker 11 Enjoy haunted.

Speaker 11 You're listening

Speaker 11 to Radio Lab.

Speaker 15 Radio Lab from

Speaker 7 WNYC.

Speaker 17 I think there's a lot of moments in your life that you find yourself doing something.

Speaker 18 Okay.

Speaker 18 There's anybody in here. My name is Brittany.

Speaker 18 I'd love to be able to talk with you.

Speaker 19 And you take that moment and step back from it.

Speaker 16 Are you here?

Speaker 20 And you realize come through to us.

Speaker 9 What the fuck am I doing?

Speaker 21 What just happened?

Speaker 22 Was this real?

Speaker 23 And I think that was one of those moments.

Speaker 10 Hey, I'm Jad Abun Rod. I'm Robert Krowich.

Speaker 7 This is Radio Lab. And today on the podcast,

Speaker 1 a ghost story.

Speaker 14 Really?

Speaker 25 We're going to do a ghost story?

Speaker 7 Yeah, Talloween, dude. Well, you don't even know what we're doing.
Just listen. All right.

Speaker 26 Let's listen.

Speaker 26 Okay. Okay.

Speaker 7 This one comes from our producer Matt Kielty. Yeah, so I first heard this story from a buddy of mine.

Speaker 7 His name is Dennis Conroe.

Speaker 21 Dennis? Andy.

Speaker 28 Hey, what's up, dude?

Speaker 7 That's producer Andy Mills. You guys are all buddies.
Total buds. Anyways, the story.
All right.

Speaker 28 Well, Dennis.

Speaker 7 Yes. It's about a lot of things, but in particular, a house.

Speaker 7 So let's start with the house.

Speaker 21 When did you move back in?

Speaker 29 Well, let's see.

Speaker 30 I was probably...

Speaker 13 I don't know, age 20.

Speaker 7 Dennis had been going to college. Yep.
By the way, what did you study?

Speaker 9 Creative writing.

Speaker 21 Okay.

Speaker 17 But, you know, I just cut, I just kind of got bored there.

Speaker 17 Kind of stopped going to class.

Speaker 16 And

Speaker 17 I think once my parents realized that, they weren't very happy.

Speaker 7 I would assume so.

Speaker 30 And so,

Speaker 17 so, yeah, I was kind of asked to come back home.

Speaker 7 Back to a town just outside Kansas City.

Speaker 34 A little town called Grandview.

Speaker 21 Did you grow up in this house?

Speaker 11 I did.

Speaker 19 I did.

Speaker 31 And the house was fairly old.

Speaker 35 Yeah, it was about 105 years old at the time.

Speaker 7 Two-story white house, nice little porch, awning over it.

Speaker 29 Typical farmhouse style.

Speaker 7 And so you were at your parents' home back, what, in your old bedroom?

Speaker 17 Yep, in my old childhood bedroom.

Speaker 31 Yeah, so there was always a sense of like, I need to get out of this house.

Speaker 29 It's holding me back somehow

Speaker 19 from things.

Speaker 7 So we got a job.

Speaker 24 Worked a job and got laid off.

Speaker 7 And one year turned into two, and then three.

Speaker 7 Then four, and then five.

Speaker 36 It was not

Speaker 33 a great time to be there.

Speaker 22 In what way? Just that I felt like I was still

Speaker 17 16.

Speaker 7 He says he'd overhear his mom telling people on the phone, oh, well, you know, he's never got to move out, is he?

Speaker 7 Then she started circling classifieds.

Speaker 19 Jobs for typists, printing press, sales rep, typesetter.

Speaker 17 I don't know. I think everything in my

Speaker 16 life.

Speaker 17 However, I mean for it not to sort of move at my own snail's pace.

Speaker 7 Eventually.

Speaker 29 When he was fairly old, like 27, maybe.

Speaker 7 Actually, he was 28. After eight years in this house, Dennis gets a steady job, finds his cheap apartment.

Speaker 35 This ratty six-plex apartment.

Speaker 7 He starts packing up his things. But right when he's set to move out, to finally leave home, my mom got really sick.

Speaker 7 Dennis's mom had been in remission from breast cancer for like nine years, but that summer, her doctors told her that it had returned.

Speaker 34 And it had spread quite a bit.

Speaker 39 So I said to her, like,

Speaker 40 you know,

Speaker 23 do you want me to be here?

Speaker 26 Or do you want me to go?

Speaker 17 And she was like, well, you know, if this is my time, she wants to go knowing that her kids can take care of themselves.

Speaker 7 So Dennis moved out. And about five months later, his mom died.

Speaker 34 Yeah, she went pretty fast.

Speaker 36 About a month or so after my mom died, my dad found out he had stage four prostate cancer.

Speaker 34 Wow.

Speaker 35 And he was really too sick to take care of the house and just being a guy by himself at that point.

Speaker 7 Now Dennis pretty much had to come home. I'd take care of him three, four times a week.

Speaker 22 And as he got worse, he had said to me, like, hey, let's try to find you a house to buy so that I can teach you how to do all of the kind of stuff that one has to do.

Speaker 36 You know, that men know how to do things like change out plumbing, all this kind of stuff.

Speaker 24 And so we put an offer on a house.

Speaker 7 But that fell through.

Speaker 7 And before they could find something else.

Speaker 17 The cancer from his prostate spread to his brain.

Speaker 29 And, you know, the last week of his life, he was really not there.

Speaker 26 I can remember

Speaker 38 one day, you know, like maybe a week or so after he had died.

Speaker 7 Dennis was walking through the empty kitchen.

Speaker 17 And there was so much stuff. There was so much stuff.

Speaker 19 Papers all over the place.

Speaker 38 Junk mail all over the kitchen floor.

Speaker 7 And down in the basement.

Speaker 30 Tools all over the place.

Speaker 36 You know, I had this moment of, you know, here are his tools. And I, and now I have them in my hand.

Speaker 34 And, you know, I just remember picking up this claw hammer and just crying because this is now my hammer.

Speaker 29 This is now my house. This is now my

Speaker 27 problem.

Speaker 7 But a few days pass and you start thinking, okay, I can handle this. Yeah.
Just got to get in in there, clean it out, sell it. Clean and flip.

Speaker 30 That was the plan.

Speaker 7 So, at the age of 32, moves back in.

Speaker 23 There was all this just junk in the basement.

Speaker 7 Puts that stuff on the curb, sale after sale after sale. And one day he finds himself standing in the downstairs bathroom looking at the nasty floor tile.

Speaker 26 It was just horrible.

Speaker 7 His dad had meant to replace it before he died, but, you know, couldn't finish.

Speaker 31 And my thought was like, oh, just do this one bathroom so it looks pretty good to sell.

Speaker 7 Problem was, his dad had never showed him how to do any of that stuff.

Speaker 19 It's at that point that I was was like, oh, YouTube.

Speaker 7 Now hold the tile in one hand firmly and begin with your ceramic tile nephew. So he went online, learned how to tile, do some plumbing, and he redid the bathroom.

Speaker 40 And turned out pretty good.

Speaker 33 It was kind of fun.

Speaker 17 And then the next thing I knew, I was taking wallpaper off of the kitchen.

Speaker 29 Well, that's got to go.

Speaker 17 Hardwood floors, insulation in the attic, glass block windows in the basement.

Speaker 30 And pretty soon.

Speaker 29 And that turned into the whole house.

Speaker 9 And how long did that take?

Speaker 29 Five years.

Speaker 7 Actually, it was six.

Speaker 14 Wow.

Speaker 7 And he says, the whole time he was doing this renovation at night, I would have these dreams where

Speaker 17 my parents just kind of came through the back door.

Speaker 23 And it was just like, oh, what are you doing here?

Speaker 14 Oh, that's right.

Speaker 19 You're dead.

Speaker 36 And then I would turn my back and then

Speaker 29 they would have somehow undone all of the things that I did.

Speaker 7 Oh, they had brought the house back to where

Speaker 7 state it was in when they were alive. Yeah.

Speaker 30 And I probably had this dream, I'm not kidding, like at least a hundred times.

Speaker 16 Wow.

Speaker 7 Night after night after night.

Speaker 17 It just kept going on and on, and ultimately kind of

Speaker 26 drove me crazy.

Speaker 7 And so one day, after yet another one of these dreams, Dennis is finally like, all right, I'm selling it. Puts it up on the market, starts waiting for a buyer.

Speaker 35 And then

Speaker 10 something strange happens.

Speaker 40 Well, something kind of strange.

Speaker 17 I had made this friend, and she came over for the first time.

Speaker 9 It was like a date. A lady friend? Yeah, it was a lady friend.

Speaker 7 And so... Dennis was giving her a tour, showing her all the improvements until she was in the kitchen.
Right by the basement door in the kitchen.

Speaker 21 When she was like, oh,

Speaker 36 there's some kind of weird presence here.

Speaker 23 And I was just like, uh, okay, well, that was kind of a sign that was not going to last very

Speaker 15 long.

Speaker 17 Fast forward a few years. Didn't really think too much about it.

Speaker 7 Until one day, Dennis's realtor is having an open house.

Speaker 31 No one shows. So she was in the house by herself.

Speaker 7 And Dennis starts getting these text messages from her.

Speaker 11 Like, dude,

Speaker 29 your house is haunted.

Speaker 17 Like, I can hear people walking around. And...

Speaker 7 She texted that there was definitely something weird going on.

Speaker 29 Right by the basement door.

Speaker 7 Wait, that's the same spot? Yes.

Speaker 9 Yeah, I was like, ah, that's...

Speaker 30 That's kind of weird.

Speaker 39 But then here's the crazy thing.

Speaker 7 Not too long after this, Dennis bumps into an old friend of his, and he's like, hey, funny thing, two different people, two separate occasions, had come over to the house and they said they felt this weird presence.

Speaker 36 And she was like, wait, right by the basement door?

Speaker 11 Oh, get out.

Speaker 21 Yeah. And I was like, oh, okay.
So I've got Heather, I've got Stacey, I've got Carla, all three who say they feel this weird presence.

Speaker 7 Would you consider yourself a bit of a skeptic about such things?

Speaker 36 I would say so. Rationally,

Speaker 30 I'm just going to say no.

Speaker 7 So you don't believe in ghosts?

Speaker 9 No.

Speaker 16 All right. What happened next?

Speaker 39 Well, this also happened to be right at the time that I sold the house.

Speaker 7 Dennis had finally put in some pen to paper, signed a contract, packed up all his stuff. And so Carla, the girl that first felt this thing, the girl he went on a date with, they stayed friends.

Speaker 17 Said to me, like,

Speaker 39 you know, I'm really curious about this.

Speaker 17 Would you mind if I call like these ghost people to come and like check out this place?

Speaker 16 And I was like, well,

Speaker 37 sure.

Speaker 24 I don't care.

Speaker 38 You know, it's like, why not?

Speaker 38 So very shortly, in a few minutes, actually,

Speaker 16 we

Speaker 19 are bringing paranormal investigators to find out what's in the basement.

Speaker 23 You know, I'm just kind of walking through the house.

Speaker 17 I think I got this on tape, of just me walking through the house. I'm like, well, you know, this is probably a waste of time, but I'm still kind of curious about it.

Speaker 26 It's Friday night.

Speaker 21 What else you got to do?

Speaker 21 Right.

Speaker 17 It's a Friday night, mid-November.

Speaker 7 Around 6 o'clock.

Speaker 40 I can see some cars parking on the street, so I go downstairs.

Speaker 7 People start filing in. Maybe 10 people.

Speaker 18 We all have different specialties.

Speaker 28 Larry's our tech guy.

Speaker 26 About four techies, two sets of clairvoyants.

Speaker 18 Chantal's the psychic.

Speaker 36 She's very gifted. Who are all these people? Can I get you to just say your name?

Speaker 18 My name is Brittany Elaine.

Speaker 22 Well, they're part of the Kansas City Paranormal Investigators Club, or some kind of thing.

Speaker 7 And pretty much right off the bat.

Speaker 17 When you guys came in, you were saying like you could talk to people.

Speaker 20 could get.

Speaker 7 But when we first got here,

Speaker 4 we both saw a woman looking out the window at the top.

Speaker 36 So what did she look like?

Speaker 7 I didn't really see what she looked like.

Speaker 16 She had like

Speaker 28 her hair.

Speaker 2 It was like gray and she was wearing one of those weird old tiny dresses.

Speaker 7 Dennis was like, whatever.

Speaker 17 They set up cameras in the basement and in the kitchen.

Speaker 7 And the clairvoyants decided they wanted to try to talk to this woman or maybe any other spirit in the house. And so Brittany.

Speaker 17 She sort of explained how she does things.

Speaker 24 You know, she was like, the best way that she could get them to talk to them was through flashlights.

Speaker 14 Huh.

Speaker 7 Yeah, so what they do is they take a few flashlights, turn them on, and then they unscrew the tops of them just enough so that they turn off.

Speaker 7 And then they just kind of set the flashlights that are now off in the room by themselves.

Speaker 7 And the idea is that if the ghost or the spirit wants to communicate, they can just sort of touch the top of one of the flashlights with their ghosty finger, and that'll turn it back on.

Speaker 18 When it's barely connected, all they have to do is either push or pull a tiny bit of energy. I see.
So

Speaker 18 it's the easiest for them to do.

Speaker 19 And I was like, okay.

Speaker 35 So she took three flashlights, and we all sat in this dark room in a circle.

Speaker 32 Okay.

Speaker 7 And Brittany sets the flashlights in the middle of the circle by themselves. No one's touching them.

Speaker 19 And she says there's anybody in here my name is Brittany

Speaker 18 I'd love to be able to talk with you

Speaker 18 can you turn one of those lights on

Speaker 19 and we sit there and we sit there

Speaker 16 are you here

Speaker 33 then all of a sudden this light

Speaker 17 kind of barely blinks on

Speaker 30 And then she said, okay.

Speaker 15 Thank you.

Speaker 20 Please turn it off.

Speaker 19 And And then it goes off.

Speaker 18 What we can do with these lights here is if I can ask you.

Speaker 21 And then she says, we have three lights here.

Speaker 17 The one you just turned on will call yes.

Speaker 36 Please turn on one more, and that will be no.

Speaker 18 So if you could do that for us, that would be wonderful.

Speaker 19 And then a second light comes on.

Speaker 17 No way.

Speaker 7 Are you like scanning the room like looking for somebody who has like a little switch or something?

Speaker 19 Yeah, but like we didn't pay these people, so they have no reason to fake this, I suppose.

Speaker 20 But you know, I just keep thinking, well, you know, the house is really close to the train tracks, and maybe the train.

Speaker 7 The vibrations of the train.

Speaker 28 Yeah, yeah, that makes sense.

Speaker 13 But all of a sudden, they were like,

Speaker 37 can you hear that?

Speaker 19 Footsteps.

Speaker 19 It sounds like there's somebody walking right here in front of me.

Speaker 19 And they're going towards the kitchen.

Speaker 17 And I could hear

Speaker 19 dishes rattling on the countertop

Speaker 42 in the kitchen.

Speaker 7 No one's in the kitchen, no one's in the kitchen.

Speaker 18 If you're in the kitchen right now, can you turn one of these lights on?

Speaker 7 And so they sit and stare at these three flashlights.

Speaker 7 And then

Speaker 11 I'm at this point leaving the room.

Speaker 11 What happened?

Speaker 7 Well, actually,

Speaker 7 everyone in that room

Speaker 11 died,

Speaker 7 except for Dennis.

Speaker 7 God.

Speaker 25 I have no idea why I even invited you into this building.

Speaker 35 They did not die.

Speaker 11 What happened to them?

Speaker 7 They're actually, they're fine.

Speaker 7 So what have you?

Speaker 7 It turns out that

Speaker 7 there was a guy downstairs in the basement one of the techies walking around pitch black down there and he just like bangs his head into like an air duct and the sound just reverberated throughout the whole house

Speaker 15 scared him a little bit

Speaker 17 it was very blare witchy yeah anyhow the techies decide that they want to get the three psychics down in the basement by themselves

Speaker 13 and so

Speaker 17 you know these three women go down in the basement by themselves we can kind of hear them downstairs talking, but we don't really know what's going on.

Speaker 17 That was interesting. Yeah.
They come back upstairs.

Speaker 30 Howdy.

Speaker 15 How to go.

Speaker 31 And they said...

Speaker 18 The girl was downstairs.

Speaker 36 Well, she was definitely down there.

Speaker 7 The old woman that they first saw when they got to the house. And they said that she was standing down in the basement next to where the old furnace used to be.

Speaker 7 And they told Dennis that she said that she'd lived here for a long time. And Dennis was like, wait a second.
He knew that back in the 30s or something, a woman had lived in this house.

Speaker 33 Who was kind of not all there.

Speaker 7 And one day she had gone down into the basement.

Speaker 23 And thought she was picking lice off of chickens and throwing them into this big furnace that was downstairs in the basement at the time.

Speaker 7 She got a little too close to the furnace, story goes.

Speaker 39 Caught herself on fire and then died there, I guess, in the basement.

Speaker 15 Oh.

Speaker 18 But then there was another man downstairs who showed himself to me, but he won't talk and he just completely disappeared.

Speaker 24 What did he look like?

Speaker 18 He was bald.

Speaker 18 He was about Rick's height, but it wasn't Rick.

Speaker 26 Did he have a little

Speaker 14 like me?

Speaker 15 Yeah.

Speaker 34 A lot like me?

Speaker 7 Not a lot, but similar, definitely.

Speaker 22 If I were to show you a picture of my father,

Speaker 23 would you have any sense of this was him?

Speaker 18 If I saw a picture of him, yeah, maybe.

Speaker 23 I found this the other day.

Speaker 7 Dennis goes and gets this photo of his dad that he had that was left over from his memorial service.

Speaker 18 Yep, that's the man I saw. Really? Yep.

Speaker 24 Let's pause this for just a second.

Speaker 22 Like, you know, she's very hesitant at the beginning. It's like, well, you know.

Speaker 7 I should jump in here really quick and just tell you that this was actually the first time that Dennis had ever listened to this tape. Really?

Speaker 7 Yeah, and the reason is because for a long time he didn't want to listen to it.

Speaker 9 Why?

Speaker 7 Well, I think part of it had to do with this moment because...

Speaker 17 This is the point where my skepticism kind of kicked off.

Speaker 7 And part of it had to do with what happens next. That's coming up when we return.

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Speaker 7 This is Radiolab.

Speaker 7 Let's get back to Matt Kielty's ghost story and we'll pick up with our main guy, Dennis Conroe, having just heard from the ghost hunters that they encountered a spirit in the basement of his home who looks remarkably like his dead father.

Speaker 18 Yep, that's the man I saw here.

Speaker 30 So he's here.

Speaker 18 Yep, he's here.

Speaker 24 Can we try to talk to him?

Speaker 18 We can try to talk to him.

Speaker 26 I think he's in the basement.

Speaker 38 Or here?

Speaker 18 I feel like he went upstairs, not in the basement anymore.

Speaker 23 Can we go upstairs and just talk to him?

Speaker 15 Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 24 So,

Speaker 17 you know, I hadn't really told them a whole lot about what the different rooms in the house were, but they led me upstairs to what was his room

Speaker 17 and to the corner of the room where his bed was.

Speaker 7 And they had no idea that that used to be

Speaker 17 no idea.

Speaker 17 And

Speaker 17 I said to them, okay, well, if he's going to talk, he'll just talk to me.

Speaker 13 Alright, Dan, are you here?

Speaker 17 And would you turn on a light if you are?

Speaker 27 Thank you.

Speaker 27 Thank you, Dad.

Speaker 19 We're going to call that yes.

Speaker 43 If you can turn that one off now

Speaker 13 and turn on the no light, any other light,

Speaker 27 please.

Speaker 19 I need to know that you're here.

Speaker 16 There you go. Oh.

Speaker 27 Thanks, Dad.

Speaker 16 Do you want us to leave?

Speaker 30 Um, Dad, would you like these people to leave?

Speaker 43 And just talk to me?

Speaker 16 Yeah. Yes, okay.

Speaker 13 Dev, I want to know, are you in a good spot?

Speaker 12 Are you okay?

Speaker 12 Are you okay?

Speaker 42 Are you okay, Dad?

Speaker 14 Yes. Alright, good.

Speaker 42 I'm glad to hear that.

Speaker 20 Okay,

Speaker 20 everything off.

Speaker 27 Everything's off almost.

Speaker 27 Almost done.

Speaker 27 Alright, thanks.

Speaker 23 I'm gonna ask you this:

Speaker 12 you know,

Speaker 20 this mom here too

Speaker 20 this

Speaker 27 mom here too?

Speaker 13 And

Speaker 37 the other of the three flashlights lights up.

Speaker 12 Yes, she is here.

Speaker 27 Alright.

Speaker 27 Hi, Mom.

Speaker 27 I want you to know that

Speaker 42 if you're both here, that I love you very much, and I miss you both.

Speaker 22 I have so many questions for you but I can't ask

Speaker 43 them all than just yes or no questions.

Speaker 19 But I said well have you been able to see the things that I've done to the house and

Speaker 37 both of the lights lit up very brightly yes

Speaker 13 and then

Speaker 42 so I've lived here for six years.

Speaker 43 I've redone the house. I've undone a lot of things.

Speaker 19 You know I said rethink are you happy with this are you happy with the things I've done with the house?

Speaker 37 They both lit up very brightly. Yes.

Speaker 34 And

Speaker 16 I said, are you proud of me?

Speaker 27 So you're proud of what I've done and

Speaker 12 who I am?

Speaker 12 What I'm doing?

Speaker 43 So, in a few few days, guys,

Speaker 20 I'll probably never set foot in this house again.

Speaker 20 And

Speaker 20 I don't want you to stay here and feel

Speaker 12 like you belong here. I want you to grow up and be free.

Speaker 12 Can you

Speaker 12 like

Speaker 12 go to this house?

Speaker 12 Are you

Speaker 12 willing to finally move on?

Speaker 12 Next time.

Speaker 12 Yeah.

Speaker 12 I'm going to leave you guys

Speaker 12 that you've been haunting my dreams a lot about this house.

Speaker 42 and I know it's very important to you.

Speaker 12 It's very important to me,

Speaker 12 but

Speaker 12 this is the time that

Speaker 12 we leave.

Speaker 12 Okay.

Speaker 12 I feel pretty good.

Speaker 7 So that's where it it ends.

Speaker 7 And keep in mind that this was the first time that Dennis had heard this tape, and so we played it back to him

Speaker 7 because we just wanted to see, like, how he remembered that experience.

Speaker 39 Yeah, I guess

Speaker 35 part of my fear of listening to it was that it would change it and that it would be a different experience.

Speaker 13 It would be a little more hokey and it would be a little more unclear what was happening.

Speaker 44 But listening to it again,

Speaker 30 it was as I recalled it being.

Speaker 7 So in the end, does he believe he was actually talking to his dead parents?

Speaker 11 Well,

Speaker 7 no, no.

Speaker 7 Uh I ended up actually calling this guy who explained to me how this whole flashlight thing works and that there is a perfectly non-paranormal explanation as to what's going on with the flashlight.

Speaker 25 It almost feels bad manners at this point to have a practical explanation, but I'm very curious to hear it.

Speaker 15 Sure.

Speaker 7 Well, what's going on is you turn the flashlight on. Yeah.
And when you turn the flashlight on, the bulb gets really hot.

Speaker 14 Right.

Speaker 7 Then you take the top of the flashlight and you unscrew just like enough that the flashlight flickers off.

Speaker 7 So the flashlight's off and the bulb, it got really hot, so the inside of the flashlight also got really hot.

Speaker 7 And there's this little piece of plastic inside the flashlight that when it got hot, it expanded.

Speaker 7 And now as the flat, since the flashlight's off, that piece of plastic, it starts to cool down and starts to contract. And when it contracts, it pushes these two tiny bits of metal together.

Speaker 7 These two little bits of metal come into contact, and that's your circuit. So the circuit opens, the light bulb, it goes back on.
Oh, then it warms again and then it gets hot.

Speaker 7 Yeah, and so the little piece of plastic, it starts to get hot, it starts to expand, it pushes the two pieces.

Speaker 41 And these people chose this flashlight because it had that particular property.

Speaker 7 Yeah, do you think it's like a con or something? No, I don't think so. No, I don't think so.
I mean, I even talked to Dennis about this.

Speaker 7 He's like, I think they're just trying to make sense of randomness. I mean, I don't think they necessarily know that this flashlight does this thing and therefore they can manipulate people.

Speaker 25 Well, here's why I don't think it's a con because in this case,

Speaker 25 it's such a strange coincidence that whenever he wants his mom and dad, his ghostly mother and father, to approve of him and congratulate him and honor him with a yes,

Speaker 25 I mean, it's random. He could get a no, but he gets a yes.

Speaker 7 It's just chance.

Speaker 7 And you told Dennis all this.

Speaker 7 Yeah, I told Dennis because you told me to tell Dennis.

Speaker 35 It's true.

Speaker 15 That's true.

Speaker 36 I forced him.

Speaker 7 Okay, so when you told him, what did he say?

Speaker 7 Well, on one level, like, it didn't phase him. Dennis basically said, like, look, I know.

Speaker 30 I know

Speaker 30 that

Speaker 38 the way that the world works is the way that the world works.

Speaker 40 People don't come back from the dead.

Speaker 17 People don't talk to you through flashlights.

Speaker 7 But he also said that, like, he's not going to let go of that experience. He wants to have it both ways.

Speaker 38 I guess so.

Speaker 36 I guess I want to have both, yes, this didn't happen, and yes, this absolutely happened.

Speaker 25 I understand that.

Speaker 7 Because even if you are the world's biggest skeptic, if you don't believe in ghosts, like there really aren't that many ways to talk about these sorts of things, these sorts of things that we all feel.

Speaker 7 You know, guilt for the things that we've done in our past, the loss of those who we've loved, that like ghost stories kind of seem to stick around because they are an experience, albeit like a metaphorical experience, but an experience that lets us talk about these things that we can't adequately talk about.

Speaker 7 You know, that feeling of being haunted.

Speaker 7 So did he eventually sell the house, move out? Yeah, yeah, sold the house, moved out. No more dreams of his parents haunting him.

Speaker 21 Well...

Speaker 44 It's been odd in the time that I've sold the house now.

Speaker 44 I thought the dreams would stop.

Speaker 38 And now the dreams are that I am the one haunting the house of the new people

Speaker 38 where I will just walk in. Really?

Speaker 30 Yeah. And just be like, hey, I'm here.

Speaker 21 And are you like going around repairing things?

Speaker 44 Nope. I'm just like being somewhat shocked at what they've done to it.

Speaker 37 It's like it never stops, you know?

Speaker 7 Thanks, Matt.

Speaker 14 No problem.

Speaker 36 Matt Kilty.

Speaker 10 I'm Jad Abumrod. I'm Robert Krowich.

Speaker 7 Thanks for listening.

Speaker 10 Hi, I'm David, and I'm from Baltimore, Maryland. Radio Lab was created by Jad Abumrod and is edited by Soren Wheeler.

Speaker 38 Lulu Miller and Latif Nasser are our co-hosts.

Speaker 26 Dylan Keith is our Director of Sound Design.

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