We Played a Game

[00:00:00] Before we begin, I want to remind you about the live Halloween event that will be held this Saturday, October 30th at our updated time of 6pm Pacific, 9pm Eastern Time. It will be a live stream with me sharing stories, a live Q&A, and a short virtual hangout.

[00:00:18] It is completely free for everyone and you can find the link to it on the description of this episode or by going to scary.fm forward slash live. That link will send you straight to our YouTube event page.

[00:00:33] I'm sure you can find the same event on our YouTube channel. Find more information on our Facebook, Twitter or Instagram. I'm looking forward to meeting you. But now, on with the show. Welcome to Scary Story Podcast. This episode includes ghostly stories about things that cannot be,

[00:00:57] yet still managed to find their way to us. My name is Edwin. Here's a scary story. I had forgotten to turn off my notifications and it really bothered me. The phone had been plugged into the wall and set on the floor, which made the vibration even louder,

[00:01:22] feeling like an insect crawling inside my ear. It was tiring, you know. Working late and adjusting to a new schedule, but that was going to be my life. Work started at 5.30 in the morning and my alarms, yes, alarms, were set at 4.30, 4.40 and 4.50 in the morning.

[00:01:44] Oh right, that's why I had my notifications on. I checked the time and I felt a sudden rush of anger come over me. It was dark and cold. And I fogged up the screen of my phone when I held it up to my face.

[00:01:59] The numbers that showed the time slowly started de-blurring, if that's even a word, to show the big numbers 2, 1 and 3. It was 2.13 in the morning and it had been woken up by a dumb message from Facebook. Well, their messenger thing. Worst of all, the thing was a message request.

[00:02:20] Who knew those things send out notifications? I used to think spammers were not supposed to make alerts on my phone. I put the phone back down on the floor and looked up at the ceiling, being dimly lit by the light of the phone itself.

[00:02:34] I kept waiting for it to turn off as my mind went on its usual trip through old memories. I thought of Priscilla, the girl from work, and how she probably hated my guts. I thought of the time nobody showed up to my party when I turned 14.

[00:02:51] The way I met my boss and tried to awkwardly shake her hand. Oh no. The phone screen wouldn't turn off, so I did what most people would do. Pick it up and check what it was. Now I know I would have read the message at one point,

[00:03:08] but I wish with all my heart that I would have never gotten it in the first place. His name was Andul, a guy that I knew back from the apartment when I was little.

[00:03:19] He used to live in one of the houses across the street and one of my only friends from my street. Everyone else was older and mom didn't want me hanging out with him too much. But Andul, this guy had a bunch of siblings, four others,

[00:03:33] and we would all play with his toys and games that they'd get. I just guessed that they had a lot of birthdays because of what a large family they were. I tapped on the message notification and there he was.

[00:03:47] I could tell that was him, though now his hair was thinning and had a semi-mustache and beard. It is interesting to see us age through our phone screens. The conversation window opened up right away and, shoot, it had been marked as read by me.

[00:04:04] He had sent another message a couple of years back, an invitation to a funeral. Hey, do you remember who was chosen after Margaret? The phone slipped out on my hand and landed on my neck.

[00:04:20] I felt it slide off the edge of the bed and fall on the wooden floor. My eyes were open wide as my mind once again circled back to the shed of his neighbor's house. Andul's message was asking about the same thing.

[00:04:36] Hey, so this is random but do you remember who was chosen after Margaret? Strange things have been happening man. I could feel my heart on the side of my neck and on the inside of my ear as I thought about the weird things we used to do.

[00:04:52] When I met him, I remember Andul's mom made me step on a heap of leaves and repeat some words after her. Andul said that it was a way to welcome me into the house but I just took it as a different family's customs.

[00:05:06] My family had their own quirky things also. Even though I would find him and his siblings a bit strange, they were friendly and always invited me to their events. And at that time, a few friends to hang out with after school and would join them.

[00:05:23] One day they waited for me by my door when I got home from school and told me that they had found a new game inside their neighbor's house.

[00:05:31] I thought that they were friends with the neighbors so I'd just get to meet some other kids but when we got there, the house was run down and empty. The front yard was taken care of by someone. The backyard was a mess.

[00:05:46] The tall grass and dry branches that had fallen off, the two trees in it had to be moved a bit before we stepped into a tiny structure, a shed, out by the corner of the property. There's a man who lives in here and he gave us money.

[00:06:02] Look, one of the younger siblings, a kid named Sammy, may he rest in peace, said, pulling out a small stack of bills rolled up with a rubber band. I think they were $20 bills and even one of them was a lot for me, even to think about.

[00:06:18] 50 cents to buy a 35 cent bag of chips at school was the most I had gotten every day. Sometimes I'd save it for a slurpee at 7-eleven.

[00:06:28] I asked who it was and they all shrugged and I think that adult was also trying to figure out what was going on. And we all stepped inside. The shed had two windows, both broken and Sammy said that all we had to do was play a game.

[00:06:45] We would sit in a circle, hands out stretched and our eyes closed. If we just sat there and waited, the man would come inside and give us money. But we had to keep our eyes shut. That was the rule.

[00:07:01] It sounded strange but we all arranged ourselves in a circle facing each other and then stretched out our arms.

[00:07:08] Dull and I sort of looked at each other trying not to laugh, but hey, it was keeping their siblings entertained and nobody had any idea where the money had come from. So there was nothing to lose.

[00:07:21] It was dark enough in there already so I thought I'd just open my eyes a bit. But to my surprise, everyone was really closing their eyes tight. So I figured I'd do the same and just wait. It was probably about a minute later when I heard something move.

[00:07:37] That's when I heard Sammy's voice say that the rule was to keep our eyes shut. All six of us stayed dead quiet trying not to breathe. Once suddenly we heard Margaret grunt and then scream. She had opened her eyes.

[00:07:56] I felt the cold wind against my face when we ran out of that shed, but Andul and Margaret were still inside. I peeked in with the rest tidying behind me as the oldest one of our little group now. That's when I saw Margaret and Andul step outside.

[00:08:13] Margaret trying to explain what happened holding something tight in her left hand. She got it Andul announced, sounding not too excited. Margaret had a roll of green bills in her hand. Sammy was more than excited about that and was jumping around her asking her to count it.

[00:08:35] To this day I don't know what happened or if it was some sort of trick they were playing on me. But I remember that at one point we played again. And that's what Andul was asking about in the Facebook message.

[00:08:49] I was there when Sammy was sick and mom asked me not to go to the gathering they had for him when he died, saying that it would be too sad for me to see such a thing at that age. It must have been what, 10 years old?

[00:09:05] But I was much older when Margaret died and that was one of the messages that I missed. Andul has sent another message while I was lost in the memories of back then.

[00:09:17] He mentioned the house still empty next to them, the rumors around the people who used to live there and why they left. Sammy and Margaret were far too young to know what they were dealing with, making deals with dark beings that cost them their lives.

[00:09:34] I had a tough time grasping what he meant, but suddenly the overwhelming thoughts through those memories of the game we played took over. We all sat in a circle, my hands stretched out over the center. Margaret saying that we would wait and shut our eyes tight.

[00:09:54] That was a rule. But again, I remember cracking my eyes open just a bit. Enough to see a dark shadow crawling toward us. My mouth wouldn't make a noise as my eyes, open wide now, looked at the thing straight in the eyes.

[00:10:13] I looked around, the rest still with her eyes completely shut as the thing grabbed my arm and stretched out its pale hairy hand. Its long fingers reaching for the palm of mine. Sweat was rolling down my forehead and into my eyes.

[00:10:31] With all my strength I tried to scream but only the sounds of my desperate gasp for air came out. I was able to force myself to lean to one side until the thing, finally, released its grip.

[00:10:45] I yelled and stumbled my way out of the shed as fast as I could. The rest opened their eyes and came running after me and into the golden light of the sun, lighting up the branches of that yard once again.

[00:10:58] They followed me all the way until we reached the street, looking at my left hand close tightly in a fist. I opened it to reveal only my sweaty palm to the disappointment of the others. Me, had it chosen me, who stands outside?

[00:11:37] The place was old, but unlike the others we had seen it was a good price. We hadn't moved in there yet and it was hard to imagine how anyone else could have possibly lived there with a house in such a bad state.

[00:11:57] We would drive over every day to make the repairs and everything was taking longer than it should. We had replaced the windows and doors after doing a deep cleaning of absolutely everything and even replacing the floors.

[00:12:11] It was a holiday I think, I don't keep track of these things. But Vincent was off from daycare that day and he wanted to go see this new place so that he could choose his room.

[00:12:23] We knew which one he would like so that wasn't that big of a deal. He loved it. He ran around the house up and down the stairs and finally he got to see what would be our room.

[00:12:36] A big empty space with a large closet, though without a light in there and its own bathroom. The only thing I didn't like was the big sliding doors that would lead out into the backyard. A bedroom with direct access from the outside was a little weird for me.

[00:12:55] Still Vincent was happy in there and I could see him playing with his toys while Mark and I were out in the yard getting rid of a tree stump and also replacing the fence.

[00:13:06] I would turn to look at him occasionally and would catch him sitting on the floor tinkering with his toys. But while I was moving some of the old rocks in that yard, I noticed Vincent doing something else. He was standing by the sliding glass door waving at us.

[00:13:26] I waved at him but he didn't seem to notice. And then I called Mark over so that he could wave at Vincent also. He both sort of smiled and waved at him but something was strange about the situation.

[00:13:41] Vincent kept smiling as his gaze turned away from us and onto another part of the yard. Weird I said out loud before getting back to the rocks and to checking out the patches of yellow grass around the yard.

[00:13:54] It was when we were almost done when I noticed that Vincent was still standing by the doors looking at something. I grabbed one of the wheelbarrows and pushed it toward the side of the house and left it by the porch.

[00:14:08] I stepped inside and grabbed a bottle of water then made my way to the back of the house to the master bedroom. That's when I saw Vincent laughing and waving out the window. I asked him who he was waving at and in his own words he said,

[00:14:27] I have a friend now. I looked outside at the yard but could only see the now empty place and nobody in sight. I didn't pay much attention to the whole thing and simply agreed with him and went back toward the kitchen.

[00:14:42] There were lots of things to finish if you wanted to move in by the end of the week. Finally the day came when the furniture was being moved in and everything was getting set up.

[00:14:54] I stepped into the bedroom and took a look at the bed then out the glass doors. Some curtains would help I remember thinking to myself. But that's when I caught a glimpse of a little boy standing out in the yard. Perhaps one of the neighbors kids?

[00:15:13] The one that Vincent had seen the other day? I turned toward him to slide open the door. My own reflection started appearing on the glass. The little boy turned toward my reflection and took several steps back, vanishing into a door. The backyard had no doors.

[00:15:38] That's when I turned around only to find the open door of our still empty closet. I bit panicked and I left the room. Eventually, I forgot about it. It would be years of stacking boxes and moving clothes that had fallen from the hangers before I discovered

[00:15:59] children's drawings and crayons on the wall inside that closet. The following story is called Cookies for my neighbors. And it is coming up right after this. I looked up from the kitchen window to catch that old car coming into the shared driveway once again.

[00:16:38] I knew in the back of my mind that the woman would take up some of my parking space as well. And for a while, I had been wanting to tell her something about it.

[00:16:48] I lived in a type of dead-end street where the neighbors' houses, four in total, would share a tiny parking lot. It was part of the housing contract that we would all get access to two spaces. Well, two for every house.

[00:17:04] Now I'm not very confrontational and I had no idea how to tell her that because of her taking up part of my designated spaces. I had to leave one of our cars out by the curb. Plus, I didn't know how to ask them to stop.

[00:17:18] They seemed like nice people. The younger woman would drive the old clunker straight into the driveway after picking up the kind old man who was always with her. He would look directly toward my house and whenever I was looking out into the street and see them coming,

[00:17:35] he would wave at me through the passenger seat and wait patiently for the car's engine to turn off. I was always a bit angry at this point, though the waving kind of helped.

[00:17:47] But still, I would walk away and try to talk myself into going out there and just ask them to move the car a bit to the right. It was no big deal for anyone else but me, apparently.

[00:18:00] My roommate told me to just introduce myself to them and then I could just casually bring it up eventually. I thought about this for days and I swear I didn't know there were videos on how to introduce yourself to your neighbors.

[00:18:13] It was like a whole science that varied from county to county. Some people would walk up and knock on the strangers' doors. Others would bring by snacks or drinks.

[00:18:24] By far, the one that seemed the most common was to bake a few cookies and walk over to their doors as a way to introduce yourself to them for the first time. That's what I decided on.

[00:18:37] Finally, the day came and I had the cookies baked and ready to go. I sat outside until I heard the old car rattling toward the driveway.

[00:18:47] So I rushed inside to grab the cookies and then wait a little longer so that maybe I could catch them at the door. I looked in the direction of the car and sure enough, I caught the same old man waving at me from the passenger car.

[00:19:02] There was nothing wrong with asking for my proper parking space, right? I thought I was overthinking it. But like I said, I walked inside, grabbed a little box of cookies I had made and sat down for a little while. Enough for them to get to their house.

[00:19:19] So I stood up and walked over to the blue and white house. I could hear keys shuffling inside as I was walking up to the porch. Then I had a mini frozen moment right before knocking.

[00:19:33] I took a deep breath and watched the knuckles of my hand tap against the wooden door. Too quietly. I knocked again a bit louder this time. Had it been too loud though? Just at that moment, a woman looked much younger up close.

[00:19:50] Smiled at me and asked if she could help me. I introduced myself and told her that I simply wanted to say hi and that if they needed anything, they could knock on my door. Thank you, she said. Do you live by yourself as well?

[00:20:05] I couldn't fake away my confused look as I was answering that no, that I lived with a roommate. I know it wasn't any of my business to ask about the kind old man, but I couldn't help it. Oh, you just take care of your father? I asked awkwardly.

[00:20:23] Oh, the car? Yeah, that used to be his. I can't get rid of it. In my lame attempt to make a conversation, I said, Well, he seems happy in it. That's when she looked at me straight in the eye and asked me what I meant.

[00:20:42] She then asked me what her father looked like and what I meant by he seemed happy in it. Once I described the white beard and blue cap, She set the box down with a new expression on her face. Yes. That's my father. He died last year.

[00:21:05] The stories and scary story podcast are written and produced by me, Edwin Covarrumas. If you want to get a quick note from me with every weekly set of stories, Put your email over on scarystorypodcast.com and you won't miss one.

[00:21:32] You can also tap follow right now on your podcast player. If you want more creepy content, Be sure to find the links to my other podcasts on the description of this episode. Until next time. Thank you very much for listening.