190. Reddit Scary Stories: The Darkest Things Hiding in Plain Sight (feat. Angela Giarratana & Morgan Absher)

A creepy neighbor ruins cousin sleepovers forever when he takes it too far. A blind date turns into a fertility ritual!? An online stranger messages a private photo to an OP that was never posted previously, and a boyfriend discovers that his partner is hoarding every single thing he disposes of…yes, everything…it gets gross. Today we’re getting into some of the craziest stories from the internet with Angela from Smosh and Morgan from Two Hot Takes. TW: Stalking Find Angela here! https://www.instagram.com/angelagiovanagiarratana/?hl=en Find Morgan here! https://www.instagram.com/twohottakes/?hl=en Listen to mentioned episodes here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01d0Km1IHcg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jS_6HxCb0kQ https://youtu.be/9To4Mxnam7A?si=lkSbhMfwHq9rIm09& https://youtu.be/9To4Mxnam7A?si=lkSbhMfwHq9rIm09& Love true crime, horror, folklore, and the unexplained? Join us in the Rogue Detecting Society on Patreon. Start for free to stay up to date on all things HSP with our newsletter, bonus content, and more. If you want to dive deeper into a community of fellow darkly curious listeners, upgrade for ad-free listening, monthly bonus episodes with topics voted on by members, merch perks, and Patreon-only group chats. High Council members also get Footnotes, our weekly after-show where Kaelyn dives deeper into the episode, recent true crime news, theories, and other scary stories from around the internet. Join free or go paid: https://www.patreon.com/heartstartspounding ❥๑━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━๑❥ About Heart Starts Pounding Hosted by Kaelyn Moore, Heart Starts Pounding explores the terrifying, the mysterious, and the downright spooky. Kaelyn brings you chilling true crime, unexplained phenomena, and haunting stories from across the globe and submitted by listeners like you. Have a heart-pounding story to tell or a case request? Submit your story at https://www.heartstartspounding.com/stories Follow Heart Starts Pounding: TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@heartstartspounding Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/heartstartspounding/

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Kaelyn Moore?

  Today, we're going to dive into some very spooky, very bizarre Reddit stories. And joining me are my two friends, Angela Giarratana and Morgan Absher. But quick, first, before we dive in, I just want to say thank you to all of the teachers out there in our Heart Starts Pounding community. Heart Starts Pounding was actually able to support over 40 classroom wish lists, all from teachers within our community. I really mean it when I say thank you for listening. You guys are the reason this show exists, and I hope that every teacher out there has an amazing start to the school year. Okay, this is Heart Starts Pounding. I'm Kayla Moore. We upload once a week, so make sure you're subscribed.

• 0:38Speaker 01

  It's when your heart starts pounding.

• 0:43Kaelyn Moore?

  Welcome, guys. We're doing it. Okay, Morgan's been on the show before, but like, Heart Starts Pounding listeners have been asking you for so long.

• 0:53Speaker 01

  Oh, my God.

• 0:54Speaker 02

  Highly requested.

• 0:54Speaker 01

  I'm popping my Heart Starts Pounding cherry. That was a tongue twister.

• 0:58Kaelyn Moore?

  Yes.

• 1:00Speaker 01

  I cannot wait.

• 1:01Kaelyn Moore?

  And everyone's so excited to watch it. I have some spooky stories for us today, which I'm really excited about. But Angela, have you experienced anything spooky? And I say, when I say spooky too, I don't necessarily mean paranormal. I'm like, was there like a let's not meet type situation that you've ever been in?

• 1:17Speaker 01

  Ooh.

• 1:18Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, something where your heart started pounding.

• 1:21Speaker 01

  See, I grew up in the church, so all my heart started pounding was like, is that the Holy Spirit? Or the devil?

• 1:30Kaelyn Moore?

  Or the devil. Catholic church?

• 1:32Speaker 01

  No. Like, non-denominational hipster church, the worst kind.

• 1:37Kaelyn Moore?

  Wait, where are you from?

• 1:38Speaker 01

  I'm from the valley here.

• 1:40Kaelyn Moore?

  Oh, interesting. Was it like a mega church type situation?

• 1:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, a little bit, a little bit.

• 1:44Kaelyn Moore?

  Okay.

• 1:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, like a Hillsong-y like type. But it was like, there were a lot of like, cool ladies that were like, open yourself up to feel the Holy Spirit in different ways.

• 1:56Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 1:57Speaker 01

  And then sometimes you're like, are we feeling the Holy Spirit? Or is this house haunted?

• 2:01Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, for sure. I mean, so I grew up Catholic, and then my husband grew up like Texas evangelical. So we had straight up demons in Catholicism, and you were always kind of on the lookout for them. And like, there was like a guy that could go to your house and like exorcise the demons. And then Matt grew up more like people speaking in tongues, like revival.

• 2:19Speaker 01

  My mom's like that.

• 2:19Kaelyn Moore?

  That kind of, which also is its own kind of like spooky supernatural thing.

• 2:23Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 2:23Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, too. Well, okay, so I have a couple of stories that I want to read us today. Some of them are supernatural. I have this thing recently, I don't know what it is, but I feel like my sensibilities are getting a little darker. Like, I'll start looking for stories, and then I look at the list together. I'm like, some of these are really messed up. I don't think people will enjoy listening to them. So they, they actually might get darker as they go, but we'll start with some of the really bizarre ones. I have, okay, I actually, I'm going to read this one first, because you mentioned being in the church. So initially, we're kind of in the middle of what I call dark summer. Like, it's summertime, I'm doing a lot of stories on Heart Starts Pounding that have to do with like islands and shipwrecks and kind of summery things.

• 3:06Kaelyn Moore?

  And this story, when I read it, reminded me a lot of one of my favorite movies, Midsummer.

• 3:13Speaker 01

  Favorite? Yeah, that's like on your top?

• 3:16Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, like Letterboxd, top four. If I ever got that Letterboxd like microphone shoved to my face, I would say Midsummer.

• 3:21Speaker 01

  So I wasn't going to say anything, but then Morgan said something? I was like, I've never known anyone that's like, I love that movie.

• 3:26Speaker 02

  It definitely, it traumatized me. I had nightmares for weeks.

• 3:30Speaker 01

  Really?

• 3:31Kaelyn Moore?

  Oh, yeah.

• 3:31Speaker 01

  But is it like a comfort watch for you?

• 3:34Kaelyn Moore?

  I guess kind of. I think it's one of those movies, what I love about it is, it feels like every time you watch it, you pick out more. There's so much imagery in the background. As a piece of art, you know, like, there's a bear suit at the end, and then you're seeing like, in her house, there's like a picture of a bear, and you're, like, the whole thing is so intentionally put together. And as a breakup movie, it's great. Like, their relationship, I thought, was so well constructed, and it's fucked up, which I love, you know? Like, that's the stuff that I like.

• 4:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:01Speaker 02

  No, when you put it that way, okay, I can get on board for you, for your passion for it.

• 4:05Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, it's very beautiful. It does feel like a piece of art.

• 4:08Speaker 01

  Florence, her breakout role.

• 4:09Speaker 02

  Oh, I love her.

• 4:11Kaelyn Moore?

  Well, Colter, oh my God, the cast is so good. But so, this one is called, "I Thought My Brother Was Being Tricked Into Joining An MLM, But Now I Think It Was A Cult Or Something." This is from Reddit. It was, I have it initially as it was posted in Best of Reddit Updates in March of 2022. Okay, so, this is the story. Starts, "I don't even really know where to start, to be honest, but me, female, 28, and my brother, male, 25, have always been very close, considering that we're only three years apart in age, and we started hanging out with the same friend circle in our mid-teens. I had to move back in with my parents, it's a long story, and my brother has been living in a house down the road from my parents' home for the past four years. He works from home, but only has a part-time job, and he hates his job. He came over about a month ago for coffee during his lunch break.

• 4:56Kaelyn Moore?

  So we were chatting, and he told me how his friend had set him up on a blind date. He was really excited. He went on the date a few nights ago, and I heard all about it the next day. I'm going to call this girl Sarah. He told me Sarah was gorgeous. She was a year older than him, tall and slim, she had long blonde hair and green eyes. He said she's probably one of the most beautiful women he's ever met. I was so happy for him, because I don't think he's had a girlfriend since he was 18, and the way he was talking about this girl made it sound like they really got along. He brought up that at the end of the date, she did ask him if he would like to meet her aunt and her sisters, because he'd mentioned that he was unhappy with his work life and that she and her family have their own business.

• 5:39Kaelyn Moore?

  I thought that was weird, but he sounded really excited about it. I did make my feelings known, telling him it kind of sounded like it was an MLM and like they were going to try to recruit him. He just laughed it off, and he said that he was going to go around to the house to discuss it, and if it was an MLM, he would nope right out of there. I said, okay, be safe, have fun, call me if you need anything, etc. A few days passed, and I sent him a text asking how it went, and he replied saying, "It definitely wasn't an MLM. There were more people there than just Sarah's sister and aunt, though." He said there were around 11 women there, and he was the only guy. He said that there was a lot of Catholic imagery around the house. We're in Ireland, so I didn't really suspect anything of this, to be honest, but also

• 6:21Kaelyn Moore?

  there were like weird wooden masks on the walls and locks of hair inside of frames that they said belonged to deceased relatives. He got there, and they made him some tea, and then all the women were just chit-chatting until the aunt, not really their aunt, just a woman in her late 40s, came out and told them all to be quiet. They all took their seats, including my brother, who sits down next to Sarah, and the aunt begins to speak. He said he wasn't really 100% sure what she was talking about, but it sounded like she was reading gospel passages or something, bits of English and bits of another unidentifiable language. The aunt asked my brother to stand up beside her at the front of the living room, and all the women started passing around a basket and filling it with money.

• 7:06Kaelyn Moore?

  Apparently, soon after this collection was finished, the women started singing in this other language, and then they just dispersed around the house. He said, "From that moment onwards, it was just kind of like a regular party or get-together." He was a bit baffled, but an hour later, all the women had left, and he was helping Sarah clean up glasses and plates when the aunt came over and sat down at the kitchen table. She handed my brother the basket of money, which he didn't take, and said to him that if he comes back every week for these meetings, he'll receive that same money, if not more, as payment for his presence. He asked Sarah later that night, once he had left, what the heck had happened? And she said it was a family tradition, and as a man, he should be rewarded. And she was really adamant about him coming back the next week.

• 7:51Kaelyn Moore?

  He ended up not going, he blocked her on everything, but what the hell did my brother just attend? Why were they giving him money for doing nothing? Also, I just want to make it clear that I know my brother very well, and he's a very honest person. He did not provide any sort of service to these women, nor did they ask him to. He and I literally have no idea what any of this was about." So I want to read one of the comments that came under this, because this helped make it a lot, make a lot more sense. But someone goes, "This could be a fertility ritual. It's not super common, but it does sound likely. So think about it. All the women in the house were of childbearing age, between 18 and 30. Your brother was treated as an object rather than as a human being, which indicated he

• 8:32Kaelyn Moore?

  played some sort of prop role, and the whole thing sounds like it was a little bit ritualistic. I could be completely wrong, but that was my first take on it." And also, there's some, shall we say, slightly more holistic women in the Southwest where I'm from, and I have heard of this kind of thing before.

• 8:49Speaker 01

  Whoa.

• 8:50Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 8:52Speaker 02

  I love your reaction.

• 8:53Kaelyn Moore?

  So he does this. There is an update of the sister who kind of sort of figured out what it is. After someone suggested it was a fertility ritual.

• 9:02Speaker 02

  I literally, the only thing that came to mind was that movie Hereditary.

• 9:04Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 9:05Speaker 02

  That one where like they, they like do a ritual to bring the guy and like their god and they put him in the boy's body. And I'm like, either way creepy.

• 9:17Kaelyn Moore?

  Yes.

• 9:18Speaker 01

  Creepy. And he was the only guy.

• 9:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 9:21Speaker 01

  And that he would get that bag of money.

• 9:23Kaelyn Moore?

  And they were just gonna give him the whole collection thing of cash.

• 9:27Speaker 01

  And then, and then what, what, what is he gonna do? Is he gonna have sex with all of them?

• 9:32Kaelyn Moore?

  So.

• 9:33Speaker 02

  That's what I was like, I was envisioning. I'm like, no one gets money for free.

• 9:36Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, it feels like it was some sort of like, like they were grooming it to become something. The author did say, so the business, I found out, that was run by Sarah's grandmother, basically does perform rituals every week where women who are trying to get pregnant, come and essentially listen to her sermons with a man who's present so that they can absorb the masculine, whatever that means.

• 9:58Speaker 01

  Whoa.

• 9:58Kaelyn Moore?

  And it's supposed to help them conceive. The payment doesn't a hundred percent go to the man. He gets thirty percent and then the aunt takes seventy percent.

• 10:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, she's gotta, she's gotta get some money.

• 10:07Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 10:07Speaker 01

  She's doing a full service.

• 10:08Kaelyn Moore?

  So it is some, like, it's weird. It's not really an MLM, but there is kind of like a, like, the people have to go out and like recruit this man to come in. That's why it made me think of Midsommar, because that's basically his thing.

• 10:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, pretty Sarah going out there as your like little carrot getting dangled.

• 10:24Speaker 01

  So his energy is what they need, like this masculine energy.

• 10:29Kaelyn Moore?

  Yes. I do wonder though, if it would escalate and because it is women who are trying to get pregnant.

• 10:35Speaker 02

  Like, where would it, where would it end up?

• 10:38Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 10:38Speaker 02

  Yeah. I wonder what the success rates are. I wonder if like she has an actual website and like, we have a seventy-two percent success rate.

• 10:46Speaker 01

  Like, all you have to do is like drink tea next to like a dude we find.

• 10:51Speaker 01

  And then you get his masculine energy.

• 10:53Kaelyn Moore?

  You pay him a little bit of money.

• 10:55Speaker 01

  Yeah. That can't be the end all, because there's gotta be.

• 10:58Kaelyn Moore?

  I know.

• 10:59Speaker 02

  Uh huh.

• 10:59Kaelyn Moore?

  That would be my fear with it.

• 11:00Speaker 02

  Yeah. I mean, I've heard of crazy things that people do to get pregnant. A lot of like mucinex. I've heard mucinex can help you get pregnant.

• 11:08Kaelyn Moore?

  Really?

• 11:08Speaker 02

  Yeah. So I'm like, honestly, if you've struggled, I'm kind of like, I get it why you'd like, why you'd sign up. Honestly, it sounds like a beautiful community of camaraderie and women going through the same thing.

• 11:18Kaelyn Moore?

  Well, no, but that, here's the thing though.

• 11:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:20Kaelyn Moore?

  It is one of those things where I think so many people take advantage of women who can't get pregnant and want to.

• 11:25Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 11:26Kaelyn Moore?

  And then they run scams like this where they're like, well, if you stand near this man, like, we actually found that this works and all you have to do is pay us money.

• 11:31Speaker 01

  Honestly, that is.

• 11:32Speaker 02

  That's true. That's very manipulative.

• 11:33Speaker 01

  It's giving the acting class scene in LA. Where all you gotta do is kind of pay money and somebody with a lot of like wisdom comes out and starts talking at you and you go, yeah.

• 11:45Kaelyn Moore?

  Oh, yeah.

• 11:45Speaker 01

  And they go, you're in a community of people and you're all wanting the same thing.

• 11:48Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 11:49Speaker 01

  And you have each other and you're leaning on each other.

• 11:51Kaelyn Moore?

  There's bonding over it.

• 11:51Speaker 01

  And then some acting classes just prey on the weak and then get you to pay for this workshop.

• 11:56Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 11:56Speaker 01

  And this thing. But, I mean, that's a massive jump I made, but it reminds me of like that, where it's community.

• 12:02Kaelyn Moore?

  Also a thing too, where like you sign up for this class and sometimes someone will come out and be like, I have the key to success.

• 12:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 12:07Kaelyn Moore?

  And whatever they say is just so weird and off base and is like, wrong.

• 12:11Speaker 01

  In that time, it makes sense, like when people are so desperate for something that any type of confidence you're drawn to.

• 12:17Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 12:17Speaker 01

  Because you're so like, I want a baby or I want a this.

• 12:20Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. I mean, so we literally just were on Two Girls, One Girls, and we talked about Scientology because that came up. But I remember I used to work at a talent agency and I would have to go through listings every week of like auditions and I would send them to actors, whatever. We'd get people to go audition on stuff. And there were always ones that were like, have a meeting with a real manager or like roundtable with a big Hollywood actor, whatever. You click on it. Nothing on it says Scientology, but the address is at the Scientology center. And that's kind of how they would get people. Again, it's like, get your confidence, like we have the tools that can, you know, which is also kind of like a weird culty thing too. So I'm like, I think it's just like an area where if people are desperate for something, you're so susceptible to signing up for something like this.

• 13:04Speaker 02

  You're very vulnerable and you don't even realize.

• 13:07Speaker 01

  No, you don't. I wonder if Sarah, that was that her name, the blonde hair?

• 13:13Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, the girl.

• 13:14Speaker 01

  If she wanted a baby.

• 13:16Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, yeah. She must, if she was part of this group.

• 13:19Speaker 02

  Also, there's no way the, the hair that was framed, that's not dead relatives. That's, the minute I heard hair framed, I'm like, baby, baby's first haircut framed.

• 13:27Kaelyn Moore?

  Oh, yeah.

• 13:28Speaker 02

  It's gotta be baby's hair, not dead. Even dead relatives, like, you would have been better off saying that's, that's our first haircut from my family.

• 13:36Speaker 01

  You do save the hair more. I feel like you save newborn's hair more than dead people's hair.

• 13:40Speaker 02

  I've never heard of saving a deceased person's hair.

• 13:44Speaker 01

  That's so true. I've never heard of that.

• 13:46Speaker 02

  That just stuck out to me.

• 13:47Kaelyn Moore?

  I have heard about the baby's hair. Yeah. Even now with my baby, everyone's like, when are you gonna shave his head? When are you gonna keep the hair? Cause it also apparently makes it grow back thicker. So people are really like trying to get us to do it. It, well, his hair's a little janky. Like, I'm not against it, you know?

• 14:02Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 14:03Kaelyn Moore?

  Especially if it grows back thicker.

• 14:04Speaker 02

  I got there.

• 14:05Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 14:06Speaker 01

  I feel like my newborn's in a desperate need of a haircut.

• 14:08Kaelyn Moore?

  I know. Well, we were kind of joking at first. We were like, we gotta get this guy to Turkey. Like, it was just like, he had like the half court hairline.

• 14:16Speaker 01

  So is that true though? When you shave off a baby's hair, it's gonna come back stronger or like thicker?

• 14:20Speaker 02

  It's a cultural thing, I think, in a lot of communities.

• 14:24Kaelyn Moore?

  Yes. I think some people will bury it in the backyard also. Like, that's a cultural thing. But my gut is that eventually their hair starts growing thicker anyways. And so like, you can't really say that one causes the other.

• 14:35Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 14:35Speaker 01

  Cause I remember like in high school or middle school, we'd all be like, be careful when you shave your legs. When the first time you shave your leg, it's gonna come back really, really strong and really thick.

• 14:45Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 14:46Speaker 01

  So scary.

• 14:47Kaelyn Moore?

  My mom would say that because I would have to do my upper lip, starting from like age ten, like really young.

• 14:52Speaker 02

  Self-conscious of my arms.

• 14:53Kaelyn Moore?

  Always was like, yeah, it's gonna come back so thick and like you just have to be careful.

• 14:57Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 14:58Speaker 01

  Is that true?

• 14:59Kaelyn Moore?

  That's what I'm wondering. It's like.

• 15:00Speaker 02

  I think it depends on the part of your body.

• 15:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 15:03Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. I thought, always thought it was like, oh, your leg hair is out and it's getting bleached by the sun. So when you shave it off and it grows back, it's just darker anyways.

• 15:11Speaker 01

  Oh, that makes so much more sense.

• 15:12Kaelyn Moore?

  What makes it look dark? I don't know. Sound off in the comments if you know.

• 15:19Speaker 02

  So, and those are getting bleached by the sun every day and they're still dark little guys coming in.

• 15:24Speaker 01

  Like this.

• 15:24Speaker 02

  That's been the hardest part about aging, I think, is finding more chin hairs every week.

• 15:29Kaelyn Moore?

  Ever since I had a baby, it's unreal.

• 15:31Speaker 01

  Really? Your chin?

• 15:32Kaelyn Moore?

  No. Cause I think my hormones are all messed up.

• 15:34Speaker 01

  Your chin's different?

• 15:35Kaelyn Moore?

  My chin.

• 15:36Speaker 02

  Do you know what they say?

• 15:36Speaker 01

  They say your boobs change. No, I get ear hairs that I hate.

• 15:40Kaelyn Moore?

  Really?

• 15:41Speaker 01

  Like a, don't look. But my chin's fine, y'all.

• 15:45Speaker 02

  Have you got it waxed, David?

• 15:46Speaker 01

  My ears? No.

• 15:47Speaker 02

  I waxed my nose recently and it was the most enjoyable experience of my life.

• 15:50Kaelyn Moore?

  Enjoyable?

• 15:51Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 15:52Kaelyn Moore?

  It feels painful.

• 15:53Speaker 02

  No, it didn't hurt.

• 15:54Kaelyn Moore?

  Stick it up and.

• 15:55Speaker 02

  Didn't hurt a wink.

• 15:56Kaelyn Moore?

  Wow.

• 15:56Speaker 01

  But what, okay, hurting is one thing, enjoying is another.

• 16:00Speaker 02

  Nice little tickle.

• 16:01Speaker 01

  Oh, you just like the tickle?

• 16:03Speaker 02

  Yeah. And then it's just, I feel like I could smell colors.

• 16:07Kaelyn Moore?

  High pain tolerance or a low pain tolerance?

• 16:10Speaker 01

  No.

• 16:10Kaelyn Moore?

  Oh, okay. I have a low pain tolerance.

• 16:11Speaker 01

  I have a high pain tolerance.

• 16:13Kaelyn Moore?

  Really?

• 16:14Speaker 01

  Yeah. And I have to tell everybody.

• 16:15Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. You know, people do like to tell you when they have a high pain tolerance.

• 16:19Speaker 01

  That's me.

• 16:19Speaker 02

  How'd you find that out?

• 16:21Kaelyn Moore?

  Um, a doctor once was just like, wow, that's, that's hard. You must have a high pain tolerance.

• 16:26Speaker 02

  Wow. No, that's flattering because you know how I found out I have a low pain tolerance? I was giving birth and the doctor came in and was like, wow, you just have a really low pain tolerance.

• 16:33Speaker 01

  Shut up.

• 16:34Speaker 02

  That is not the time.

• 16:36Speaker 01

  A doctor went, you're kind of being a baby about this.

• 16:39Kaelyn Moore?

  I think it was one of the nurses. It was hard to tell. I was in so much pain, but like, yeah, they're like, I guess you just have a really low pain tolerance.

• 16:45Speaker 02

  Who says that to someone giving birth?

• 16:47Speaker 01

  They'll say anything to women.

• 16:49Kaelyn Moore?

  I know.

• 16:50Speaker 01

  You're kind of being a drama queen right now.

• 16:51Kaelyn Moore?

  Can you be a little more quiet? Like, we got people drawn to sleep here. I couldn't believe it.

• 16:56Speaker 02

  Can you smile?

• 16:57Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 16:58Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 16:59Kaelyn Moore?

  Oh my God. Yeah. It was, and they left the window open the whole time. I mean, I guess no one could really see what was going on inside, but I was just like, I felt like it was a performance, you know, the whole thing.

• 17:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, you're just letting it out.

• 17:08Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 17:08Speaker 02

  Yeah. But I'm deeply upset for you.

• 17:11Kaelyn Moore?

  They don't let us rest. What can I say? All right. Shall we read another one?

• 17:15Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 17:15Kaelyn Moore?

  Let me read this one. Okay. This one is not from Reddit, so you might not have come across it. It's from like darkstories.net or something. I really scour the internet for dark stories. Okay. It's just called My Cousin's Neighbor. So I was spending the night at one of my cousin's house, I'll call him Charlie, with all my other cousins. Now I should make it clear that we're not biological relatives. We're really close and so are our parents. So it's, we're just like family, but we still got split off into boys and girls at this trip. This will make sense later. There were eleven of us, six boys and five girls. I don't know how our parents managed. Luckily, we were on a farm with quite a few acres surrounding the house.

• 17:55Kaelyn Moore?

  The boys would take the sunroom near the front of the house while us girls would take the toy room at the back of the house. The boys had the sunroom because it was bigger and there were more boys. The toy room where we were staying had a door leading to the backyard where we would play games, swing on the swing sets, jump on the trampoline. We spent hours out there. In our backyard, there was a small section of dense forest. On the other side of that was Charlie's neighbor's house. He was a weird old guy. I'm guessing late forties, early fifties. He would always coincidentally be in the forest between the two houses when we kids would go and play on the trampoline or if we were just in the backyard near the woods.

• 18:35Kaelyn Moore?

  Worst of all, he would always talk to us, especially us girls. He'd say things like, hello ladies, is dad home? And you wanna come to my house? I made some cookies you could try. Every time we would say no and we would go inside. Charlie's mom and dad both told us to not listen to him. And if he came onto our property to get one of the adults. He'd been warned by Charlie's father a few times. And once Charlie's father had come out armed because the man started getting aggressive. Charlie's mom said that we could also come get her if he tried anything. But we all knew that she was just as terrified as we were of this man. She would also get constantly harassed by him when she hung out the washing or fed the dogs at night. And she would get it much worse. Things like, is your husband home?

• 19:20Kaelyn Moore?

  When's the last time you've been satisfied? And why don't you come by my house later? She would reply quietly and just like us, go inside. One of the other times we were all staying at Charlie's, we saw her mother come in and call Charlie's father into the bedroom. Most of us were trying to hear what was happening on the other side of the door, but we heard muffled whispering and crying. Charlie's father then left with a weapon and walked out the door. Turns out the creepy man said something terrible to her mother and we never found out what it was. We know that it was something to do with ending all of us, except Charlie's mother and kidnapping her and doing god knows what to her.

• 19:59Kaelyn Moore?

  We tried to get the police involved, but they gave him a verbal warning and they said that they couldn't really do anything else besides that due to a lack of evidence. Now, back to what I firsthand experienced. We were playing on the trampoline after having a Nerf war when we heard rustling in the bushes. We all went quiet and my little cousin held on to me. I asked, what was that? Thinking that we were about to see some deer or maybe a coyote. I used to live in Australia, so I was pretty exciting about seeing more animals, especially American animals. Charlie hushed me and told me it probably wasn't that. It was dusk. I was high on sugar and surrounded by my cousins. Being one of the oldest, I was feeling a bit brave. Who's there? I yelled. No response. Go on, show yourself. My other cousin yelled. His name is Gabe.

• 20:44Kaelyn Moore?

  He's one of the other boys and he's probably the most outgoing in the group.

• 20:48Kaelyn Moore?

  Stacy, one of the girls, suggested loudly that we should go inside and check on dinner. Then the other kids went in, except Charlie, Felix, Gabe and I. Like my father, I was very territorial and I wanted to protect my cousins. We waited for a while and nothing happened. No more rustling, nothing. We all got bored and headed inside. Charlie and I were the closest to the woods. And I was talking to her when we both heard a voice whisper and a not so quiet, Charlie. We both turned back, white as ghosts. And then we heard whistling, like slow whistling. We ran inside and we didn't tell Gabe or Felix what we had heard. Later that night, we had broken off into our makeshift bedrooms and five of us girls were watching a movie.

• 21:33Kaelyn Moore?

  I can't remember what we were watching. I was just looking out of the open window. I thought the neighbor was looking in the woods for a lost dog or something, but I kept seeing flashes of light. By the end of the movie, the girls were asleep except for Charlie and I. And we were talking about school, boys, et cetera. When I saw a shadow of a man in the background, near the trampoline, we both shot up. Could that be your dad? I asked. No, too short. Plus you can hear him snoring. Shh. In the silent night, we could hear the TV softly, the boys occasional laugh and her father's snoring. Then through the open window, that same whistling. Charlie and I thought one of the boys was trying to scare us. So we went in their room to tell them off. But when we got there, they were all watching a soccer game.

• 22:17Kaelyn Moore?

  They looked at us and we just turned around and headed back without a word. When we got back to that room, we saw Charlie's creepy old neighbor at the open window, making that horrible whistle. I never believed freeze in fear until that very moment. Hey ladies, he smiled, holding something up that looked like a box cutter, trying to rip open the screen on the window. Charlie screamed so loud that I didn't even think that was humanly possible. Everybody in that room shot up. The boys came running into the room, followed by Charlie's mother and father. Charlie's father ran after the guy as her mother called the police. Charlie's father came back about 10 minutes later. He found duct tape, rope, some sort of whip and a lighter in that very same bush that we heard the rustling just hours before.

• 23:02Kaelyn Moore?

  Only god knows what he was planning to do that night. He was eventually found and he was finally arrested. He was put in jail, but I can't remember for how long. I hope it was for the rest of his life and that I never see him again.

• 23:15Speaker 01

  Oh my god.

• 23:17Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 23:20Speaker 02

  I'm not okay.

• 23:22Speaker 01

  Heart starts pounding.

• 23:25Kaelyn Moore?

  I mean, it's one of those things too, where you're like.

• 23:27Speaker 02

  Goosebumps.

• 23:28Kaelyn Moore?

  On clues, we cover so many stories where it's like, how many times does this person have to be like?

• 23:34Speaker 01

  Saying things and doing things and pretending to be a cop and pulling people over. And just like all this stuff where like they just technically can't get arrested for it.

• 23:42Kaelyn Moore?

  There's not enough there yet.

• 23:42Speaker 01

  And then they just go and try to do something like this.

• 23:46Speaker 02

  It reminds me of the case too. Was it Elizabeth Smart? Who, like the cousins after Elizabeth was taken?

• 23:54Speaker 01

  The sister. Right, saw her.

• 23:56Speaker 02

  Sister or cousin had someone come up to their window at night and was like trying to get in through the screen.

• 24:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, they tried to take her cousin too.

• 24:03Speaker 02

  I mean, like this is, this is fully kidnapping. I think when the four of those kids were in the woods and he didn't go after them then, it was because he's only trying to get the one, which is probably Charlie, based on, hey, Charlie.

• 24:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 24:16Speaker 02

  Like you avoided kidnapping, like Charlie did.

• 24:19Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah. And probably because of the numbers. And then when the girls were just isolated.

• 24:24Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 24:24Speaker 01

  That's disgusting.

• 24:26Kaelyn Moore?

  Or the mom, because didn't he say something like?

• 24:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 24:28Kaelyn Moore?

  Threatening to the mom, like I'm gonna kill all the kids and take you.

• 24:32Speaker 02

  Insane.

• 24:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 24:34Speaker 02

  Insane.

• 24:34Kaelyn Moore?

  Horrible, horrible. Yeah, this stuff, I don't, I hear, I mean, this is extreme, but now that I have a kid, I hear so much online discourse about sleepovers in particular.

• 24:46Speaker 01

  What do you mean? Just like them being scary or?

• 24:48Kaelyn Moore?

  Well, parents don't do them anymore.

• 24:49Speaker 01

  What?

• 24:50Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 24:51Speaker 02

  Sleepovers are kind of a thing of the past.

• 24:53Kaelyn Moore?

  What do you mean?

• 24:55Speaker 02

  They're gone for a lot of people.

• 24:56Kaelyn Moore?

  A lot of people don't. But I mean, think about it. Because now that I have a child, I sort of get it where you're like, I don't know the parents. You don't always know the parents. Like you have to know everyone in the house. You don't know if like the older brother is weird or like the sister is, I don't know, whatever.

• 25:12Speaker 01

  But like, sleepovers were always a kind of a risk.

• 25:15Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 25:16Speaker 01

  But then you would, like, sleepovers with your cousins were like, some of my.

• 25:19Speaker 02

  I think families, yeah, families are a little different. Or like, hey, I'll be the one hosting the sleepovers. Like, I'm not gonna let my kids stay somewhere, but like all host.

• 25:28Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 25:29Speaker 02

  Or like, we do a group hotel room and like.

• 25:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 25:32Speaker 02

  Like, it's more like.

• 25:34Speaker 01

  Especially with tablets everywhere. You're like, you can't control the internet in your friends' houses. You can only control yours.

• 25:41Kaelyn Moore?

  I think about that all the time. I'm like, what if my son goes somewhere and people are just showing him things on the internet that I've tried to block in my house?

• 25:49Speaker 01

  Or they stumble on something because there's not anything like blocking it.

• 25:53Kaelyn Moore?

  I feel like that's what I'm more afraid of, honestly. It's just like this internet age or like, I don't know, the kids have chatbot girlfriends. Cause it's the future and that's the world we live in. And like that, I don't know. It's just like.

• 26:05Speaker 02

  Could see it.

• 26:06Kaelyn Moore?

  I can't protect him from that stuff.

• 26:08Speaker 02

  No. Wow, this is crazy. I think there's gonna be like a lot of people that comment.

• 26:15Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 26:15Speaker 02

  And they're like, I had someone follow me in a van. I had this, I had that. Like, I think, especially if you grew up in rural places, like there's stories in my like friend group where like someone was followed on their bike. And it's just, people are creepy with kids.

• 26:33Speaker 01

  Yeah. Kids, like kids discernment. Like, like thinking about like when I grew up and there were some freaky people. Like, if they had a bad vibe, I don't know, like a kid's not making that up.

• 26:46Speaker 02

  No.

• 26:46Speaker 01

  No, I know. Not just being like, oh, that guy looks old and weird.

• 26:50Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 26:51Speaker 01

  They're not like.

• 26:52Speaker 02

  I feel like oftentimes you don't say anything because you're nervous to say stuff or, you know.

• 26:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, but your brain isn't developed enough to have these like biases.

• 27:00Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 27:01Speaker 01

  You're just like, oh, I feel weird around this guy who's whistling.

• 27:04Speaker 02

  That like literal gut instinct. That's just like trying to scare you and like save you.

• 27:11Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, yeah, I know. And I feel like kids often aren't believed either. There was a story I covered on an episode where we were talking about cold cases that got solved after like a lot of time. Where these two girls, it was like outside of Chicago in maybe the sixties. It was one of the oldest cold cases in that area, or I think in all of Illinois that got solved. But they, these two little girls are playing outside in like the late 50s. And this guy comes up and he's like, can I give you a piggyback ride? And one of the girls is like, one's eight, one's six. And the eight year old is like, this feels weird. I'm gonna go get my mom. Goes inside, comes out, the six year old's gone and the guy is gone. And they're like, okay, how do we find this guy?

• 27:55Kaelyn Moore?

  Turns out years later, on her deathbed, this woman goes, I know that my son killed Maria, was the little girl.

• 28:04Speaker 02

  I saw headlines of this.

• 28:06Kaelyn Moore?

  The police came to my house and asked where, because they had singled out this guy for, like from this, from the jump. So the police went to his house to be like, where were you around this time? And the mom was there and he wasn't home, but the mom was like, he was with me the whole time. And she didn't know and she had this like gut feeling that he had done it. But she was like, he was, he was here the whole time and they moved on.

• 28:23Speaker 02

  Never came back.

• 28:24Kaelyn Moore?

  They didn't come back, they didn't look into him. And yeah, on her deathbed, she was like, I, I never said anything. But it was him. Or I'm pretty sure it's him. I didn't witness the crime, but I lied.

• 28:35Speaker 01

  She was like, Zalba isn't.

• 28:36Kaelyn Moore?

  Which how dark of a person do you have to be where like, even though your mom didn't witness a crime, she knows you're capable of that. And she knows that's what you were probably doing when you weren't at her house. And like on her deathbed, she, oh.

• 28:47Speaker 02

  You've had another episode of this. It was like one of your mailbag episodes about the kid in Australia. And I, I remember that the mom also kind of knew and covered up for him a little bit.

• 28:59Kaelyn Moore?

  Oh.

• 28:59Speaker 02

  With his gun and like.

• 29:01Kaelyn Moore?

  Are you talking about the, the shooter in Australia? I think it, yeah, where his parents were just like, no, he's fine, he's fine.

• 29:08Speaker 02

  They like bought him the gun.

• 29:10Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 29:10Speaker 02

  The mom bought him the gun.

• 29:11Speaker 01

  Well, it is, it is, it's a, in their body, moms are gonna protect their kid. And it is not okay.

• 29:20Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 29:21Speaker 01

  But you can see so many parents go into denial to just try to like keep their kid.

• 29:26Speaker 02

  You know what? My dad told me when I was really young, when I was probably like eight years old. He's like, if you ever commit a crime, I'm gonna call the cops on you.

• 29:33Kaelyn Moore?

  But my dad like did try to call the cops on me when I was a teenager to be like, I wasn't joking. Like, don't mess up. And I was like, that actually might be something I take with me as a parent. To be like, I'm not your buddy in this. Like, I'm not like Brian Coe, or not Brian Koberger, but um, uh, Brian Laundrie's mom, who was like, if you kill someone, I'll hide the body with you.

• 29:54Speaker 02

  She was in love with him.

• 29:55Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 29:55Speaker 01

  And you're like, love doesn't look like one thing.

• 29:58Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 29:59Speaker 01

  It looks like accountability and truth and like.

• 30:02Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. Yes. Yes. A hundred percent. So.

• 30:06Speaker 01

  God, these poor cousins. They were just playing nerve.

• 30:09Kaelyn Moore?

  I know. And then I would be so scared to go to that house.

• 30:14Speaker 02

  No.

• 30:14Kaelyn Moore?

  It's like ruined the cousin sleepovers.

• 30:16Speaker 01

  I also can't believe I just learned sleepovers are over. It's crazy.

• 30:21Speaker 02

  Did you do a lot as a kid?

• 30:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:23Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 30:24Speaker 01

  But it did take me, I was like, not one of those kids that was allowed to do sleepovers till much later.

• 30:29Speaker 02

  Hmm. Interesting.

• 30:30Speaker 01

  Yeah. Cause my parents were like, pretty nervous about it.

• 30:33Speaker 02

  I think if your kid has a cell phone and can call you if something happens, then I'm like, okay.

• 30:39Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 30:40Speaker 02

  But you just have to really trust they know right and wrong. Cause I was going to sleepovers and older brother, alcohol.

• 30:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:46Kaelyn Moore?

  Oh my god.

• 30:47Speaker 02

  Better be safe than sorry.

• 30:48Kaelyn Moore?

  That's so scary.

• 30:49Speaker 02

  Sneaking out, going to boys' houses. Cause you have one friend's parent that doesn't care.

• 30:54Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. That's always how it is.

• 30:55Speaker 02

  Oh, we're staying at so and so's house. It's a free for all.

• 30:58Speaker 01

  Oh my god. Meanwhile, we're doing an interactive retelling of Bethlehem. And we're like, let's go home. All it's and sleep over at each other's house and sleep on the trampoline. So we have church in the morning.

• 31:08Speaker 02

  Oh my god, wait.

• 31:09Speaker 01

  Nobody was drinking, doing alcohol.

• 31:12Kaelyn Moore?

  No one was doing alcohol.

• 31:13Speaker 02

  Peppermint schnapps at thirteen.

• 31:15Speaker 01

  Oh my god.

• 31:16Kaelyn Moore?

  That's. It's too young.

• 31:19Speaker 02

  Makes me scared.

• 31:20Kaelyn Moore?

  It's too.

• 31:20Speaker 02

  As a, as a parent.

• 31:22Speaker 01

  I mean, as like a teenager, I would have been like, hell yeah, drinking schnapps at thirteen. And now I'm like, no.

• 31:26Kaelyn Moore?

  No, oh my god. I hope, everyone jokes like with the dog food comment. I don't know if you'll get this or if you whatever, but it grinds my gears when I hear comments from people in my life that are basically like, your baby's gonna be your karma one day. You're gonna get all that back. And I'm like,

• 31:45Speaker 02

  Oh. Wait, like.

• 31:48Kaelyn Moore?

  Don't wish that upon me.

• 31:49Speaker 02

  Oh, interesting. Like you misbehaved as a child and then now when you have a kid, like that's gonna be your karma.

• 31:54Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. And I'm like.

• 31:55Speaker 02

  No, I don't buy it.

• 31:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, I don't buy it. If anything, you're gonna be a smarter parent because you broke the rules.

• 31:59Kaelyn Moore?

  Thank you.

• 32:00Speaker 01

  So you know what rules to do.

• 32:01Kaelyn Moore?

  Yes. Yes.

• 32:03Speaker 02

  Like really kind of hurt my feelings. I'm like, was I that bad?

• 32:06Speaker 01

  The best parents are the ones that are like, I did this. I recognize this. Here's how to do it safe.

• 32:11Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. I agree.

• 32:14Speaker 01

  If you're gonna have peppermint schnapps at thirteen, don't get behind the wheel.

• 32:20Kaelyn Moore?

  Yep.

• 32:21Speaker 01

  Don't do that either. But like parents that just like, no.

• 32:24Speaker 02

  So were your parents strict then?

• 32:26Speaker 01

  My parents were like, they were strict in the silence. That makes sense. Like they were never like, you can't do this. You can't do this. You can't do this. They would just be like, oh. Or I remember it was right when texting was a thing and I had like a flip phone. And my dad, when I would go on sleepovers, he was like, I need to hear from you. And my dad would always text me like, you good or something. And I would never text. Because you're just like, you put your phone down. You're not like, it's not like a smartphone back in the day. It's just like a chain to your parents. So I would just like throw it in my backpack.

• 32:57Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 32:57Speaker 01

  And then he'd be like, I need to hear from you. If you don't respond within an hour, you can't go on your own. Like I need to hear from you. And that was the hardest learning curve for me.

• 33:08Speaker 02

  Would he come pick you up if you didn't listen?

• 33:10Speaker 01

  Yeah. Or he would call their parents.

• 33:12Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. He wasn't messing around.

• 33:14Speaker 01

  They'd be like, tell her to check her phone. And it was just getting me in the habit of communicating. Was I guess the thing.

• 33:20Speaker 02

  That's really good.

• 33:20Speaker 01

  But like, I remember I wasn't allowed to like, were you guys allowed to go to the mall with your friends without a parent?

• 33:24Speaker 02

  Yeah. Bought my first thong underwear at the mall by myself at nine.

• 33:28Speaker 01

  At nine?

• 33:29Speaker 02

  I know you guys.

• 33:30Speaker 01

  Thong when you were nine years old? I'll be the first somebody who used the thong. I was twenty-four.

• 33:35Kaelyn Moore?

  I think I was in my twenties.

• 33:36Speaker 02

  Duluth, Minnesota, man. I had an older friend. She was fourteen. I was nine. We biked to the mall. Bad. You gotta, you gotta really just.

• 33:45Kaelyn Moore?

  Wow.

• 33:45Speaker 01

  Thongs were so scary.

• 33:47Speaker 02

  My kids are gonna be on a leash until they're twenty. Just.

• 33:51Kaelyn Moore?

  I mean, yeah.

• 33:52Speaker 01

  Like, if you wanna wear a thong, do it in the house.

• 33:56Kaelyn Moore?

  I'm a cool mom.

• 33:58Speaker 01

  I'm a cool mom.

• 33:59Kaelyn Moore?

  They're also just uncomfortable. And when you're so young, it's like, so uncomfortable.

• 34:03Speaker 02

  Try to fit in with my older friend.

• 34:05Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. I mean, a nine-year-old and a fourteen-year-old is an interesting pairing.

• 34:09Speaker 02

  Bad.

• 34:09Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, it's not great.

• 34:10Speaker 02

  Different.

• 34:11Kaelyn Moore?

  I remember I had, I had a cousin, I don't know if everyone has this cousin, who same difference of like, I was nine, she was fourteen. And every time she came over, she had some story of like, my friend got held at knife point. Like just.

• 34:25Speaker 02

  Oh my god.

• 34:26Kaelyn Moore?

  My friend Tim's in jail again. Like, and she's fourteen. Like, I'm not sure if any of this is true, but she just always, it was like scared straight almost. Like just crazy stories.

• 34:34Speaker 01

  There is the liar friend that's like, I have a chat like boyfriend and he's fifty-four. And you're like, what? Like, yeah, I talked to him on Club Penguin.

• 34:44Kaelyn Moore?

  Which actually, if it's Club Penguin, it probably is a fifty-four-year-old man talking to her. That was bad.

• 34:50Speaker 01

  Is Club Penguin still around?

• 34:51Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 34:52Speaker 01

  Not if sleepovers aren't.

• 34:53Kaelyn Moore?

  I played it. I for sure played it in COVID. Like it was at least around during COVID.

• 34:57Speaker 02

  Oh my gosh.

• 34:59Speaker 01

  Oh my god. Club Penguin, people would like simulate sex.

• 35:02Kaelyn Moore?

  I know.

• 35:03Speaker 02

  Oh my god, I thought that was only on the Sims.

• 35:04Kaelyn Moore?

  No, and I think Predators would go into Club Penguin being like, okay, there's a bunch of nine-year-olds in here.

• 35:09Speaker 01

  Get a f- life.

• 35:10Speaker 02

  Get a job. Yeah.

• 35:12Speaker 01

  If that's the way.

• 35:14Speaker 01

  Sorry.

• 35:15Kaelyn Moore?

  No, seriously.

• 35:16Speaker 01

  I just got really f- angry.

• 35:18Kaelyn Moore?

  I know. It's scary.

• 35:20Speaker 01

  Get a hobby.

• 35:21Kaelyn Moore?

  Yes.

• 35:22Speaker 02

  People need more hobbies.

• 35:23Speaker 01

  You wanna abuse kids on a, on a pang, on a fake Penguin Island?

• 35:29Speaker 02

  Yeah. Scary thought.

• 35:30Kaelyn Moore?

  Get a hobby. It's horrible.

• 35:32Speaker 01

  Take a shower.

• 35:36Speaker 02

  Well, that's dark.

• 35:38Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. Yeah.

• 35:39Speaker 02

  I was gonna say, sleepovers don't have to be over the week. I'll have a sleepover.

• 35:43Kaelyn Moore?

  Well, we were thinking about doing like a girls' retreat away for a weekend, if you wanna do that. Something creative and.

• 35:49Speaker 02

  Would you be down for a Ouija board though?

• 35:51Speaker 01

  Absolutely not. I'll just go on a little walk.

• 35:53Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, just go on a walk.

• 35:55Speaker 01

  You guys do that? We're going on a walk, gonna go on a walk. Could you imagine if we have like an adult sleepover?

• 36:00Kaelyn Moore?

  Demons in the house. Like we've unleashed something.

• 36:02Speaker 01

  We have an adult sleepover and I'm like, I'm leaving. That's not fair. If you take that out of my mouth.

• 36:06Speaker 02

  You're like, I just have to text my dad by midnight.

• 36:08Speaker 01

  I literally got my dad to pick me up. And he's like, you're in your thirties. Everything cool?

• 36:13Kaelyn Moore?

  Dad, they're doing Ouija boards here. Come get me.

• 36:15Speaker 01

  Please.

• 36:16Speaker 02

  Yeah. I feel like you would actually like really, I feel like you draw in some probably positive energy though with your Ouija board.

• 36:25Speaker 01

  I think that's the nicest compliment I've ever heard. That if I did a Ouija board, I'd bring in good vibes.

• 36:30Speaker 02

  You'd have like Mother Teresa trying to talk to you.

• 36:32Kaelyn Moore?

  Oh yeah, that would be.

• 36:33Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 36:33Speaker 01

  That's so nice.

• 36:35Speaker 02

  You'd get like Casper, the friendly ghost. You just have aura.

• 36:39Speaker 01

  That's the sweetest thing I've ever heard.

• 36:43Kaelyn Moore?

  Okay. So this one that I have, also not from Reddit. This is also from another scary online like forum where people write their scary stories. But this is just called my online friend. I use the app Kakao Talk, which is a Korean app that lets me talk to people worldwide. Mostly people from South Korea. I also have screenshots to back up the story if anyone needs them. Last night I had a message from someone called Gangnam Guest House. I thought that someone had just added me randomly. That's pretty normal. And I didn't mind it too much as I usually do get random people adding me. At the moment, I have around three hundred and fifty friends who I don't really know and have only talked to them using this site.

• 37:23Kaelyn Moore?

  The first message I received from this person seemed normal. She told me that she wanted help with learning English and that she lives in London. I was happy to help her, especially because I'm from the UK too, and I've never met anyone who was so close to me. She sent me three pictures of herself, which showed me that she was a normal girl of Asian ethnicity. She seemed nice and I proceeded to talk to her. However, things got weird quickly. She sent me a picture of myself that I took last year and had never been put onto my Kakao profile. It was on my Facebook. I gave her the benefit of the doubt and thought that maybe she had found me on Facebook. My heart started racing when a second picture message came through though. This time it was a picture of me when I was fifteen.

• 38:07Kaelyn Moore?

  I had never sent this to anyone. I was in my pajamas. I had messy hair. I have no clue how she got this picture. She told me that the pictures were on her old phone, but I had never posted it anywhere. So I don't know how she would have gotten it. She then sent me my number and added a ha ha at the end. I was terrified. She even changed her display name to say I'm, and then my name instead of her name. I had no idea what was going on. My stomach dropped. I felt so sick. She proceeded to tell me that she's a hacker and she managed to hack into my phone. However, I did not believe this as she couldn't answer basic questions like where I lived or my full, full government name.

• 38:48Kaelyn Moore?

  After a while of trying to find out who she was, she told me a couple of hints, like she's from London. She was meeting her boyfriend in Bloomsbury and that we had once been friends and actually had met. That shocked me because I know that I have not met this person before. She told me that when she was fourteen and I was thirteen, we had met up, but she wouldn't tell me what we did. She started to get angry that I couldn't remember her and she told me that I was mean. But I know that I've never met her. I have no idea how she got my ID or how she got my pictures and number. All I'll say is that I'm terrified. So I think specifically too, this person was using like a, an anonymous name on this app. And that's why it was weird that like she had this person's actual name.

• 39:30Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 39:30Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. Yeah. Yes, it is very freaky to me because I, like, the internet is so big and there's just so many people out there and I don't know. I could ju, I can see stuff like this.

• 39:39Speaker 02

  It feels very plausible, honestly though, that it could happen to any of us.

• 39:42Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 39:42Speaker 02

  Like anyone out there, like this could, in today's day and age, like this could happen to you so easily.

• 39:48Kaelyn Moore?

  Totally agree.

• 39:49Speaker 02

  And.

• 39:51Kaelyn Moore?

  It's so scary, like getting a picture that you've never posted anywhere, sent to you.

• 39:57Speaker 01

  You as a kid?

• 39:58Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. Well, I think today, kids use more anonymous apps than we used. We didn't have a lot of anonymous stuff. I remember using like Omegle and Chatroulette. And there was like Formspring or something where you could-

• 40:10Speaker 01

  I remember Formspring, where you would kind of like wish terror on your life and put it on your like-

• 40:16Kaelyn Moore?

  Who has crush on me and like people could message you?

• 40:19Speaker 01

  What do you have to tell me that you won't say to my face?

• 40:20Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 40:20Speaker 01

  And then you'd walk through the halls and you'd be like, did she say that?

• 40:23Kaelyn Moore?

  Oh. Did she? Who said that? Was it her? Like who was spreading stuff about me, whatever? But I can't think of any more than really those things, maybe like Klopenguin. Yik Yak, that was when I was in college. But now you can do everything anonymously as a kid. I mean Instagram, you don't have to use your real name on Instagram. So no one really knows who anyone is. You can use Reddit, but also there's like Kick and like, I don't know, just like all these apps.

• 40:47Speaker 02

  That's scary because like I, I just read this story about this guy who turned out to be like an internet troll. And his wife found all of his posts and that's terrifying. Like that is so terrifying.

• 41:00Speaker 01

  I think we need like, like, you know, like the DMV gives you like lessons for the road. I think we need like a, you can't go online until you like take internet safety.

• 41:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, you should have internet etiquette too.

• 41:11Speaker 01

  Like you should absolutely have to do like bare minimum, don't drink and drive. Like bare minimum, don't do these things.

• 41:17Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 41:18Speaker 01

  Or else you are susceptible to people finding your stuff.

• 41:21Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 41:22Speaker 01

  Yes. Yeah, definitely like to protect yourself, to be like, yeah.

• 41:26Speaker 02

  Yeah, don't wish ill on people. Don't convince people to do bad things.

• 41:29Kaelyn Moore?

  Well, one thing that I didn't even know that my husband, Matt, told me, he was like, anytime you take a picture in the house, make sure that the wifi router is not in the frame because people can get the number off the wifi router and hack your wifi that way. And I don't, I don't know if he's being extra paranoid, but apparently it like happens.

• 41:46Speaker 02

  I could see it. Do you know you're not supposed to do peace signs? So they've been saying, you shouldn't even with AI now, you shouldn't even do like peace signs in your photos anymore. Because they can zoom in on your fingerprints and take your fingerprints.

• 41:59Speaker 01

  I had, I had heard something like that. For every picture.

• 42:01Kaelyn Moore?

  Just do them like this now, backwards.

• 42:03Speaker 02

  Backwards. Show off your cute nails. Well, we're gonna go get them done. It's fine. Mine aren't done either. Mine aren't done either. I'm not roasting you.

• 42:11Kaelyn Moore?

  But I do have the target stick-ons on, even though I am missing my thumb.

• 42:14Speaker 02

  I love, this is so cute.

• 42:16Speaker 01

  The other day, there was a, it actually wasn't the other day. It was like a little bit ago, it was a couple of months ago at Smosh. We're all doing these like, we're doing these like signing these posters on Instagram Live. And I go, we're signing them. And I had this like memory from when I did this like internet crazy musical that this lady was like really paranoid about signatures. So I look over while we're on the live, I go, hey, everybody, don't use your real signature. And they're like, what? I didn't think to like stop down, but I go, hey, yeah, nobody, do you use that on checks? Do you use that on checks? Don't do that. And they're like, and it made the live so awkward.

• 42:55Speaker 01

  And I don't know if people are- And I keep going, don't do your real signature.

• 43:02Kaelyn Moore?

  I guess that is a good thought though, because someone could be like, oh yeah, I'm just gonna sign a bunch of checks to myself as Angela now.

• 43:08Speaker 01

  I guess.

• 43:09Kaelyn Moore?

  I don't think that, but maybe, maybe they couldn't do that. But still to like have that thought in the middle of the live where you're signing stuff.

• 43:14Speaker 01

  So scary.

• 43:16Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 43:16Speaker 01

  Even if you take a picture of like a tree on a walk, like near your house.

• 43:21Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, I know. You have to be so careful. There is that like famous story of-

• 43:24Speaker 02

  Is embedded in your photos.

• 43:26Kaelyn Moore?

  I think she was a K-pop idol or maybe she just lived in South Korea, but she took a picture and in her eye, a guy was able to figure out what train station she was at and most likely what time she would take the train and he showed up and killed her.

• 43:40Speaker 01

  That's a guy where-

• 43:40Kaelyn Moore?

  What?

• 43:41Speaker 01

  Get a hobby. Get a life.

• 43:43Kaelyn Moore?

  Yes, yes.

• 43:45Speaker 02

  What do you mean?

• 43:45Kaelyn Moore?

  Too much time on his hands. If you're looking, you're zooming in enough to see where they're at in their eye, too much time on your hands.

• 43:51Speaker 02

  That's like those videos. Haven't you seen them? It's like drop a pin anywhere and I'll figure it out. And they just like look at a couple of trees in the landscape and they're like, that's blah, blah, blah, Bangladesh.

• 44:00Speaker 01

  Videos, people find those fun and I don't find that fun.

• 44:03Kaelyn Moore?

  That guy is using it for good and he has the absolute opportunity to use it for pure evil because he can find anyone, anywhere.

• 44:09Speaker 02

  I know.

• 44:10Speaker 01

  That's good to use it for good.

• 44:11Speaker 02

  It's so unsettling. Like I, I love people, listeners, but like I'll get letters from listeners sometimes sent to my like address. And I'm like, there's a P O box. Please don't do this.

• 44:23Kaelyn Moore?

  They've found your home address.

• 44:25Speaker 02

  Don't do this.

• 44:26Kaelyn Moore?

  Horrifying. Yeah. Do people get really like obsessed with you guys at Smosh? Like are there people that are like, oh, I'm married to Angela and she just doesn't know it yet?

• 44:36Speaker 01

  No, we have, yeah, we have some, we have some crazy interactions, I'll say.

• 44:42Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 44:42Speaker 01

  My favorite was there was a meet and greet. I don't know if I've ever said this on a podcast. There was a meet and greet where, and there's a lot of us, right? There's like 14 or 15 of us.

• 44:50Kaelyn Moore?

  Big cast.

• 44:51Speaker 01

  So we're doing this meet and greet and there's, you're kind of talking to the masses and you're taking one big group picture. Each person comes up, sees a big group and smiles at us. And then that person walks away. And this person walked up and points at me in the back and goes, can I say something to you? She's like a mother, an older lady. She goes, I need to talk to you. And everyone's like, are you good? And I was like, we have to hear this.

• 45:10Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 45:11Speaker 01

  This is the craziest. Cause there's all these kids and then a woman's like, I need to speak to you.

• 45:16Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 45:16Speaker 01

  And I was like, you safe? And she was like, I have to hear it through.

• 45:19Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, very important message.

• 45:19Speaker 01

  Yeah. She whispers into my ear, everyone believes in you, except yourself. And then walks away.

• 45:28Kaelyn Moore?

  Oh my God.

• 45:29Speaker 01

  And she thought she was building me up. And everyone was like, you good? And I went, the funniest thing, just having.

• 45:38Kaelyn Moore?

  But also, no, but also.

• 45:40Speaker 01

  Except you.

• 45:42Kaelyn Moore?

  In that moment, she like cut so deep into your soul.

• 45:45Speaker 01

  Babe, you're not my mom. Go home. You can't talk to me like that. It, I, I think the sentiment was that she wanted to build me up.

• 45:54Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 45:54Speaker 01

  But it felt like she pantsed me.

• 45:56Kaelyn Moore?

  A backhand, yeah.

• 45:57Speaker 02

  Oh, but like backhand to come like also.

• 46:00Speaker 01

  Believes in you, except yourself.

• 46:02Speaker 02

  How much did she pay to tell you that?

• 46:04Speaker 01

  She did pay a lot.

• 46:06Kaelyn Moore?

  Maybe, I don't know. I'm like, was she-

• 46:08Speaker 01

  That's Morgan. Your brain?

• 46:10Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 46:11Speaker 01

  How much she paid to tell you that?

• 46:12Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. She bought a V I P meet and greet, yeah, to tell you that. Maybe she really thought you needed to believe it.

• 46:17Speaker 02

  Just in hindsight, do you think that there was any truth to that?

• 46:21Speaker 01

  I think it, it was like one of those like, it's a very old millennial core thing too, like with that One Direction song, you don't know you're beautiful and that's what makes you beautiful.

• 46:31Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 46:31Speaker 01

  And like being like, oh, I think I'm gonna help you realize how beautiful you are because you don't know it.

• 46:37Kaelyn Moore?

  You don't know it.

• 46:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 46:38Speaker 01

  And you're like, it's not that I don't know it. There's blocks. I'm working on it.

• 46:42Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 46:43Speaker 01

  You know, like that's kind of how I feel about everybody where they're like, girly, you got this. And you're like, I know.

• 46:49Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 46:50Speaker 01

  I just, then that I think is just like an old way of instilling confidence. Where it's like assuming that no, people don't wanna be confident. Like that woman assumed that I didn't wanna believe in myself. Of course I want to.

• 47:02Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. I, I, I remember watching this interview with Alona Maher, the-

• 47:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 47:07Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. And someone asked her like, how do you deal with imposter syndrome? And she's like, what's that? And they're like, you know, like the feeling, but this person just assumed that she had it as like a woman. And she's like, no, like I worked really hard my whole life. Like I think I should be here. And like people just couldn't understand her saying that. But it is that idea of like, you're an Olympic athlete, but you probably don't even think you should be here.

• 47:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 47:29Kaelyn Moore?

  Yes, you know, that, that way of thinking.

• 47:31Speaker 01

  And we don't put that on men. And I think when girls just happen to be like self-deprecating to be funny or to just like, I don't know, call out your flaws, because maybe you're a little self-aware. They're like, she's insecure.

• 47:41Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 47:41Speaker 01

  I gotta tell her that she should believe in herself, because we all do.

• 47:44Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 47:45Speaker 01

  But I do believe that that woman was just trying to build me up, but it was very funny.

• 47:49Kaelyn Moore?

  Totally, totally.

• 47:50Speaker 02

  Imposter syndrome is something I deal with a lot. And I'm just like, I look at it after and I'm like, why? You got invited in that room. You were clearly wanted in that room. You're meant to be in that room. Why are you feeling weird?

• 48:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 48:01Speaker 02

  But it's just, it's, but to have someone whisper that in your ear, it would, it would hurt my feelings.

• 48:06Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, to call you out specifically to like, I gotta say, like of all, of the whole cast, like you're the one that doesn't believe in it.

• 48:11Speaker 01

  Yeah. She's like, I wanna talk to her.

• 48:13Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 48:14Speaker 01

  Very funny.

• 48:15Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, I did have, this is so different, but one time I went to a lunch and this guy sat next to me. It was like our friend's maybe birthday. And so he was there or like something, but it was like a friend of a friend sat next to me and he goes, God, put me next to you because he wants me to, he wants you to tell me a secret. And I was like, maybe he's joking, whatever. And then he like very clearly was not joking. And he kept pestering me the whole lunch to be like, I just can really feel that like God put me here right now. And he wants, he wants you to tell me something about yourself that you haven't told anyone before.

• 48:44Speaker 02

  What?

• 48:45Kaelyn Moore?

  What? I just kept being like, I don't know if that's God or if that's someone else. Or like, I don't know what's telling you that, but like, I don't, I don't think that's appropriate. Like we're at a lunch with people. And then he like spent the next 45 minutes trying to convince me that the world was flat. So. I think he had a lot going on.

• 49:00Speaker 01

  I'd be like, my secret, I wanna make out with you right now.

• 49:03Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. I think we should kiss at this table.

• 49:04Speaker 01

  And then watch him die.

• 49:07Speaker 01

  That is so weird.

• 49:08Speaker 02

  Make up something so insane, just to toy with him.

• 49:12Kaelyn Moore?

  I shouldn't have messed with him, but I think it really threw me at the time. Cause I was like there for my friend. I didn't know a lot of the people there. And now this guy is like really dogging on me to like tell him something.

• 49:21Speaker 02

  God told me that you were gonna tell me a secret is-

• 49:24Speaker 01

  Yeah. About you, that's, I'd be like, you're cheating on your wife, aren't you?

• 49:28Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 49:29Speaker 01

  Like that's just so weird.

• 49:31Speaker 02

  No, God told me that you're having an affair.

• 49:34Speaker 01

  I'd be like, oh, you wanna know about me? What, what? Tell me a secret about you. Obviously you have something to get off your chest.

• 49:39Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 49:39Speaker 01

  What?

• 49:41Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, I was so confused by it, but I also wondered if it was like a, just like, you know how some people do, like, did you ever work at a job or like you were in a sorority where they're like, okay, everyone's gonna go around and share a secret? And then like you feel a lot of pressure to share something very big. Cause like people start crying and stuff. It's like, I think people will try to force vulnerability in order to like connect. Get closer, like sometimes I have something on you. I don't know. But like, yeah. So I think, I think it was like a forced vulnerability thing.

• 50:09Speaker 02

  Thank God you didn't share.

• 50:10Speaker 01

  At a lunch?

• 50:11Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. A lunch.

• 50:13Speaker 02

  You know what the name of the restaurant?

• 50:14Speaker 01

  Dinner maybe?

• 50:15Kaelyn Moore?

  We were at a restaurant called Sushi, Sushi Kuchi.

• 50:18Speaker 01

  Isn't that a horrible name for a restaurant?

• 50:20Kaelyn Moore?

  I'll probably cut that because like no, no shame to them, but like sushi kuchi and he's trying to get me to tell him a secret.

• 50:25Speaker 01

  That's like how there's that restaurant, Pink Taco.

• 50:27Kaelyn Moore?

  There. I know. I think they're doing that on purpose though.

• 50:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 50:30Speaker 02

  They are.

• 50:30Speaker 01

  It's sushi kuchi.

• 50:33Kaelyn Moore?

  I think it was like a mistranslation or something, but like-

• 50:35Speaker 02

  Kinda got a ring to it though, when you say it fast like that.

• 50:37Speaker 01

  I'm like, girls, girls lunch at sushi.

• 50:39Speaker 02

  At sushi kuchi.

• 50:40Kaelyn Moore?

  Kinda wanna do it now.

• 50:41Speaker 01

  I know.

• 50:42Speaker 02

  Should do it for the plot. Pretty good too.

• 50:46Kaelyn Moore?

  Okay, so the next one, actually, kind of in line with like weird relationship stuff. This was a story I found, you might have heard it. It's also on Best of Friend or Updates. I'm really gonna search to make sure that there's updates on this one. So this one is, "Me, or my 21 male girlfriend, 20 female, has a creepy box above the wardrobe." And it was originally posted in Relationship Advice in 2019. "We have been together for just over a year, and we've never had any issues apart from minor arguments that are easily resolved. Up until recently, I've never noticed anything strange about her behavior. A few days ago, she left her room at university to go to a lecture in the morning, and she left me there. Up until that day, I've never looked through her things because I've never felt the need to.

• 51:28Kaelyn Moore?

  She has this space above the wardrobe where she keeps boxes and stuff, so I couldn't see inside of them, but boredom got the better of me, and I just wanted to see what she was storing. I found a box at the back, which was like a Ted Baker cardboard box that a handbag had come in or something, and when I opened it, I found so many random things that I used to own. There were odd socks in there that she had taken, a toothbrush that I thought I had lost after a holiday, bits of hair from what I think was my comb, toenail clippings, receipts that I think she stole from my wallet. She even has things like empty wrappers of food that I know were mine. There was a piece of glass in there, but I don't know where that's from.

• 52:10Kaelyn Moore?

  There was a USB charger, a half-used bar of soap, boxer shorts, used gum, a spoon, used plasters from god knows when. Honestly, the things in the box were so random, but I recognize a lot of little bits that had gone missing over the past year. The most worrying thing in this box, though, was a used condom that I found in there. I don't even know how she managed to keep that. And also, a few empty condom wrappers as well. I even found a little tablet in there that looked like my antibiotics that I had taken for my tonsils before Christmas, and I definitely remember losing one of my last dosage. I can't remember what else was in there because I just put it back and left. She does not know I found this yet. "My girlfriend behaves normally, and this is the first time I've seen anything weird.

• 52:53Kaelyn Moore?

  She's never acted obsessive or creepy or anything. I don't want to confront her about it because she's gonna know that I was looking through her things, but then again, what else am I supposed to do? I love her so much, and I am genuinely scared. I have been sat here trying hard to come up with logical explanations as to why she is doing this. Any ideas?" That was the first part. Which, I think I had heard a story like this of a man who was keeping little mementos of his wife, like, in a tile above their bathroom. So I don't know if this is a thing that some people do, like, if it's a weird compulsion.

• 53:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, like, I, I used to, or like, when I was younger, I would keep everything, like, any wrapper, like, I was, like, obsessed with.

• 53:37Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 53:38Speaker 01

  When I think I first started to understand that time was going by, I started to be like, "Oh, my god, don't, like, any homework assignment I had, I'd keep it all."

• 53:46Kaelyn Moore?

  Oh, interesting.

• 53:47Speaker 01

  And there's, like, that, but then there's other people's stuff.

• 53:50Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, yeah. I had a little cousin, it was so funny, she must have been, like, six or seven, and she had this little keepsake box in her closet, and because she's so young, like, her parents go through her stuff, and they opened it, and it was like a dead frog, like, hair, there was, like, muddy stuff from a lake, and the coins, like, it was really just a weirdo. Like, for her, it was probably so innocent, like, "I'm down by the creek, I'm putting stuff in my box."

• 54:14Speaker 01

  And I'm saving my stuff, yeah.

• 54:15Kaelyn Moore?

  To them, it looked like a witch's box of potions or something.

• 54:18Speaker 02

  Yeah. It does sound familiar, but in my head, I was, I was waiting for there to be a tooth in the box, so I'm not, I'm not sure if I've heard this one, I'd have to look in the little archives.

• 54:27Kaelyn Moore?

  Interesting, so you've heard other ones of people doing this, though.

• 54:29Speaker 02

  Ah, god, it's really, it's ringing a bell, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna let you take it away, but just the used condom, where it's like, I get memento boxes.

• 54:37Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 54:37Speaker 02

  But the used condom, bad.

• 54:38Speaker 01

  The condom was tough.

• 54:40Kaelyn Moore?

  That's bad, that's hard to hear.

• 54:41Speaker 02

  The antibiotic.

• 54:42Speaker 01

  Even the, like, I under, I can, like, kind of maybe get my head around somebody being like, "I love my boyfriend so much, I wanna keep his stuff." I don't know, but like, his toenails.

• 54:50Kaelyn Moore?

  Condom is disgusting.

• 54:51Speaker 01

  I love that guy.

• 54:52Speaker 02

  Toenails? I just, my first thought was, a voodoo doll.

• 54:56Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 54:57Speaker 02

  Like, it's just giving, I need all these pieces of him.

• 55:00Kaelyn Moore?

  It does, yes. It does feel like a potion in the making.

• 55:04Speaker 02

  Yeah, because what do you need for a love potion? Have you ever gone to a witchcraft store or not?

• 55:08Kaelyn Moore?

  Drop it in the comments, I'm sure we have people who know, because I feel like we've talked about Etsy witches before.

• 55:13Speaker 02

  Huge.

• 55:14Kaelyn Moore?

  And sometimes-

• 55:14Speaker 02

  I think they got banned recently.

• 55:16Speaker 01

  All of them?

• 55:17Speaker 02

  Etsy took witches off. I would really love a good witch, I really wanna do, like, an umbilical cutting ceremony, a little candle thing. Yeah, I think I need a cleanse.

• 55:25Speaker 01

  Yeah?

• 55:25Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 55:26Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 55:26Speaker 02

  So I'm like, maybe it's, maybe it's, like, a positive thing, maybe she's trying to help him.

• 55:31Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah.

• 55:32Speaker 02

  I don't know.

• 55:32Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah. Maybe.

• 55:34Speaker 01

  Okay, if I'm opening one, I'm, I'm surprised that this person, this OP, didn't open the rest of the boxes, because there's a bunch of boxes.

• 55:41Kaelyn Moore?

  Oh. So, let me go through, I think there's a little bit more to this, there are some of the updates. So, update one, "My girlfriend is currently in the bath, and I took this opportunity to take another look at the box. She has been completely normal and unsuspecting that I know about it, and a lot of people asked to see the contents of the box, so here it is. They took a picture, it is not there anymore."

• 56:00Speaker 01

  I would not take a picture of that.

• 56:01Kaelyn Moore?

  I know, and put it on the internet. But there's a couple of things that we learned about it from the comments on this photo, so, and then they go on to say, "After reading the comments, I'm torn. I don't believe that my girlfriend would hurt me, but I don't know how to approach her with this odd behavior. I feel sick and afraid when I think about the box, and then I think of her cute face, and I can't bring myself to confront her about it. I'm trying hard to think of normal, rational explanations to tell myself that this is not weird." And someone does say, "Why are there three phones in the box?" So I do have a sense that there were three phones in this box. They go, "Whose phones are they, and what happened to the owners?" And the OP says, "I don't know about two of them. There's a smashed iPod in the box that's a first-generation iPod Touch that I owned.

• 56:43Kaelyn Moore?

  I had it somewhere, and it was in the box, and I didn't even notice it was gone." So she must have taken his iPod Touch first gen at some point. And then, someone says, "That looks like more than one dosage of medication." OP says, "There was a single loose antibiotic that you can't see in the image. No idea where that other medication is from. It looks like it might be birth control, but she's not taking birth control as far as I'm aware." And then someone says, "A quick Google search says that it is most definitely birth control. They don't look used, though, which makes it even stranger." And someone said, "Looks like a box of souvenirs, a normal souvenir, a greeting card, or maybe a found coin used, like, but a used Q-tip or anything with bodily fluids taken without

• 57:26Kaelyn Moore?

  permission or agreement is very abnormal. Worst-case scenario, mental illness and Gone Girl-esque plans to potentially frame or trap you if you leave."

• 57:36Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 57:36Kaelyn Moore?

  And then, we do have an update from a couple days after they posted this. Someone, the OP says, "Thank you for all the advice, I really appreciate it. My friend recommended that I post on here, and it really has helped. So I told my girlfriend that I found the box, and she didn't seem bothered in the slightest that I found it. She is quite sensitive, so I expected tears, but got none. She kind of brushed it off, like, it just wasn't a big deal at all. I told her that the gross stuff was unacceptable, and that she was wrong to take my Parker pens that belonged to my granddad, so she was taking, like, really important stuff, too. She said that she had the intention of returning those to me. It was the best-case scenario compared to the other possible explanations. She said that she was keeping them because they made her feel close to me, and I guess

• 58:19Kaelyn Moore?

  I can understand that, or at least try to, because I love her. She said she's gonna dispose of the things in the box. I'm quite satisfied with that. We have agreed that in the future, she will keep things like movie tickets from a date, things that are normal."

• 58:33Speaker 01

  But what are you gonna do with the sinus antibiotics?

• 58:36Kaelyn Moore?

  I know, yeah. And the toenails, like, it still doesn't explain the toenails.

• 58:39Speaker 02

  Do we think she's a klepto?

• 58:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, maybe a little bit of a klepto.

• 58:42Kaelyn Moore?

  But it's weird, because it's stealing stuff that's free, like, kleptos, to me, are stealing money out of purses and, I guess, the iPod Touch, maybe?

• 58:51Speaker 02

  But, like, it's really weird, so I think it is an illness, but my best friend lived with someone who, for three years, kept stealing, like, really small little things, so she'd steal, like, a mascara tube that was, like, dry and about to be done. It was just the power of stealing.

• 59:06Kaelyn Moore?

  Oh, yeah, yeah.

• 59:07Speaker 01

  Klepto, I like that.

• 59:08Kaelyn Moore?

  So- I had a neighbor that stole my lip gloss when I was in the fifth grade, and it was kind of, it was like, used lip gloss, it was like, what is the point of that? But it felt like a, like, oh, just taking it.

• 59:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, so it's like, it's easy stuff.

• 59:17Speaker 01

  Call her, call that neighbor out, I'm kidding.

• 59:19Kaelyn Moore?

  We're still friends, I've forgiven her.

• 59:20Speaker 01

  Oh, really?

• 59:22Kaelyn Moore?

  That's weird. Yeah, I mean, I think she had problems when she was young. No, we all were little.

• 59:26Speaker 02

  Haven't we all taken a lip gloss?

• 59:28Kaelyn Moore?

  So weird when we were little.

• 59:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 59:29Kaelyn Moore?

  Like, and you don't know, you're learning, like, what it, what it means to have stuff, and then take something from somebody else, it's crazy.

• 59:35Speaker 02

  Yes, to be like a 10-year-old girl, to be like, "I'm gonna take this, like, for sure." I mean, one time I went to my friend's house, and we literally cooked dog food into a cake and gave it to her dad, like-

• 59:43Speaker 01

  No way!

• 59:45Kaelyn Moore?

  Yeah, and at the time, we thought it was so funny, and now I'm like, I would be so mad if my, like, son and his friends did that to me.

• 59:53Speaker 01

  Whoa.

• 59:54Kaelyn Moore?

  Anyways, what weird things did you guys do? Don't let me be the only one.

• 59:56Speaker 01

  Okay, wait, I wanna go back to this. No, that's pretty crazy.

• 1:00:01Speaker 02

  Dog food.

• 1:00:02Speaker 01

  Dog food into the cake?

• 1:00:03Speaker 02

  Yeah. I've never done any tampering, but my best friend did put, she did pee in the lemonade that they sold at their lemonade stand.

• 1:00:10Kaelyn Moore?

  That's so much worse, that's really bad.

• 1:00:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, that feels, that feels illegal.

• 1:00:14Kaelyn Moore?

  That's, yeah. I don't trust lemonade stands.

• 1:00:17Speaker 01

  This was really fun, thank you for having me.

• 1:00:19Speaker 02

  This was good.

• 1:00:20Kaelyn Moore?

  Thank you guys so much for doing this, I'm so excited. This is our conclusion to Dark Summer, so thank you for being here.

• 1:00:25Speaker 01

  Dark Summer's over.

• 1:00:26Speaker 02

  Yeah. And it ends with us.

• 1:00:28Kaelyn Moore?

  It's coming to a close. Fall is starting tomorrow, so thank you guys so much for being here. Where can everyone find you both?

• 1:00:37Speaker 01

  You could find me at Morg, at Morgan, I don't know her handle, at Two Hot Takes. And where the, can they find you?

• 1:00:45Speaker 02

  Um, you can find me at Angela Giarratana on everything.

• 1:00:48Kaelyn Moore?

  Perfect.

• 1:00:49Speaker 02

  Beautiful. All right, thanks, everyone, bye.

• 1:00:54Kaelyn Moore?

  Heart Stars Pounding is written and produced by me, Kayla Moore. Our associate producer is Juno Hobbs. Heart Stars Pounding is also produced by Matt Brown. Sound design and mix by Red Rome Creative. Video editing by Creative Step. Special thanks to Travis Dunlap, Grayson Jordan again, the team at WME. Have a heart pounding story or a case request, check out heartspresspounding.com.