Paranormal Activity with Amber Singletary

Amber Singletary joined us for a tale about a blended family that isn't blending, a spectral presence, and a 1-800 late night witch. We are now on YouTube. Be sure to follow us on there at @DefectorMedia https://www.youtube.com/@DefectorMedia where you can watch today’s episode. Subscribe to our newsletter for writing from Rachelle, Se'era, Jae, Alex, and Kelsey, plus blog recommendations and secrets! https://defector.com/normal-gossip-podcast You can support Normal Gossip directly by buying merch https://defectorstore.com/collections/normal-gossip or becoming a Friend or a Friend-of-Friend at supportnormalgossip.com https://defector.com/products/normalgossip. You can also find all kinds of info about us and how to submit gossip on our Komi page:https://normalgossip.komi.io/ Episode transcript here. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1dwszvMJ_Fr4DM0lhDTPNzUsNve9hmHQZohmHV5k3loI/edit?usp=sharing Follow the show on Instagram@normalgossip https://www.instagram.com/normalgossip/, and if you have gossip, email us at [email protected] or leave us a voicemail at 26-79-GOSSIP. Normal Gossip is hosted by Rachelle Hampton (@heyydnae https://www.instagram.com/heyydnae/?hl=en) and produced by Se'era Spragley Ricks (@seera_sharae https://www.instagram.com/seera_sharae/?hl=en) and Jae Towle Vieira (@jaetowlevieira https://instagram.com/jaetowlevieira?igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==). Our audio engineer is Samantha Gattsek. Justin Ellis is Defector's projects editor. Show art by Tara Jacoby. Theme music composed by Hrishikesh Hirway. Normal Gossip is a proud member ofRadiotopia https://www.radiotopia.fm/. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices https://dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

• 0:02Speaker 00

  Oh my god.

• 0:03Speaker 01

  Oh my god.

• 0:04Speaker 00

  Oh my god. What? Oh my god.

• 0:05Speaker 01

  Oh my god.

• 0:06Speaker 00

  Oh wow. Oh my god.

• 0:08Speaker 01

  Oh my god.

• 0:08Speaker 00

  Oh my god. What? Oh my gosh.

• 0:11Speaker 01

  What?

• 0:12Speaker 02

  Hello and welcome to Normal Gossip. I'm your host, Rachel Hampton, and in each episode of this podcast, we are gonna bring you an anonymous morsel of gossip from the real world. Welcome back to season 10, y'all. If this is the first episode you're tuning into, this is our 10th season of Normal Gossip, which means that we are doing all-stars. We're bringing back some of your favorite guests, and we have got some incredible new guests that some of y'all have been requesting for eons. And this season, we're doing something special. We're doing video. Yes, y'all, we are finally joining the modern world. So if you want to watch this episode, head on over to our YouTube page, just search Defector

• 0:57Speaker 02

  Media, and it should pop up. And of course, we'll be linking the video in the show notes. All right, that is enough housekeeping for today. Without further ado, I want to introduce today's all-star guest, the illustrious, the hilarious, the very talented Amber Singletary. Amber Singletary is a comedian, writer, actor, and host of the Judgey series by Now This Media. Most recently, she was a writer on the HBO Emmy Award-winning series, A Black Lady Sketch Show. She is an internet favorite of mine, and I have a feeling that by the end of this episode, she'll be your new fave, too. Hello, Amber. Thank you so much for joining me.

• 1:38Speaker 01

  Thank you for having me. I'm so excited.

• 1:40Speaker 02

  I'm so excited you're here.

• 1:42Speaker 01

  I love gossip.

• 1:44Speaker 02

  Same. Well, that's actually a perfect segue into the question that we ask everyone, which is, what is your relationship to gossip?

• 1:52Speaker 01

  I hate to say this, but I love gossip.

• 1:55Speaker 02

  Don't hate to say it.

• 1:56Speaker 01

  I love gossip. I think it's the best. I think it builds relationships, it builds friendships. Like, I love gossip with people I don't know. Like, when my friends have, like, third-party friend gossip, I'm like, what? Okay, tell me. Tell me about her man. Tell me about her wedding. Tell me about everything, the trip, whatever, whatever. I just love it, because I think people are really themselves when they're gossiping. You can see what people care about. You can see people's, like, ideologies. Like, you see what people judge people for, and you just learn so much in gossip. Gossip more, everybody, please.

• 2:23Speaker 02

  And you're right. I feel like the further away you are from the gossip, the better it is.

• 2:29Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 2:30Speaker 02

  You have to know, I think, at least one person relatively well in the story, but other than that, it's like, I don't.

• 2:35Speaker 01

  No.

• 2:36Speaker 02

  A stranger is perfect.

• 2:37Speaker 01

  A stranger is perfect, because then I can just say, just an unfiltered opinion and be like, I think this.

• 2:43Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 2:43Speaker 01

  But when you're, when you're too close to the gossip, it might, the gossip might be about you.

• 2:48Speaker 02

  No, exactly. It's like, is this play about me?

• 2:51Speaker 01

  Is this play about us?

• 2:54Speaker 01

  No, that is, I hope I've been the topic of gossip. I really hope so.

• 2:58Speaker 02

  Same.

• 2:59Speaker 01

  That would be great.

• 3:00Speaker 02

  Same.

• 3:01Speaker 01

  I don't think I have.

• 3:01Speaker 02

  No one ever tells you if you're the subject of gossip, and it's really irritating. I left a job I had been at for six years. And I was like, there's no way, there's no gossip about me leaving. But every time I see someone from my old job, they're like, you're so beloved.

• 3:16Speaker 01

  We miss you. We're so proud of you.

• 3:18Speaker 02

  You lying ass bitch.

• 3:19Speaker 01

  Say something about me eating salmon in the office. Say something. Treat me like a regular person. Gossip about me.

• 3:26Speaker 02

  Pretend I'm not here and tell me what you would say about me.

• 3:30Speaker 01

  Dude, you know what I miss? I miss the trap phone calls. I miss putting somebody on three-way. You got a secret caller. They're like, oh, so what do you think about this? And then the person is just getting all the gossip with them, like, oh. That, we bring it back. Bring back a, a three-way sneak attack, Regina George style.

• 3:48Speaker 02

  Exactly. No one does it anymore. We're losing recipes.

• 3:52Speaker 01

  Where you, because you got, you merge the call. Back in the day, you merge the call, you're like, did you just put somebody on the phone?

• 3:56Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 3:57Speaker 01

  Now you can do it in secret. I don't know why we're not doing it.

• 3:59Speaker 02

  And you're right. You're right. I remember, I recently merged a call for the first time in years, and I was like, whoa.

• 4:04Speaker 01

  I forgot I could do this.

• 4:05Speaker 02

  No, exactly.

• 4:06Speaker 01

  It's unlimited, too. You can just keep merging and keep merging.

• 4:08Speaker 02

  It used to cost money.

• 4:12Speaker 02

  We could talk about that forever.

• 4:14Speaker 01

  Myspace. I mean, y'all don't know. Y'all weren't there.

• 4:19Speaker 02

  I could go on a tangent about MySpace and the drama of the top eight and the gossip that that inspired, but you actually have some gossip for me.

• 4:27Speaker 01

  I have some gossip for you.

• 4:29Speaker 02

  So please clue me in.

• 4:30Speaker 01

  And I don't work there anymore. So this is the worst thing that could have ever happened to these people. Um, so my previous job, I was running a girls, not running, but doing the social media management of an OnlyFans girl. Shout out to the girls. First of all, a lot of girls. We love the girls.

• 4:46Speaker 02

  We love the girls.

• 4:47Speaker 01

  At the beginning, it was great. No, it was great the whole time. I will say this. It was great the whole time. Great job. It was such a freeing job. I could do it from my bed. It was seven days a week, though, posting on so many pages, answering messages.

• 5:00Speaker 02

  There's no weekends for sex workers. In fact, those are the busy times.

• 5:03Speaker 01

  Those are the busy times. And at night, you have to like, you have to answer people at night and the weekends. Also, the men, the men I've come into contact with, there was a man that every day, my only job was to tell him when he could swallow his own secretion and he would put a belt around his neck. And every day it was like, can I drink it now? Can I drink it now? And I'd just be like, go ahead, just, just go ahead. But the tea was, after a while, I could not do the messaging anymore. I was like, this is destroying my mental health, having to, first of all, be fake to these people because you know, you just want their money. And then also, just the things they say to these women. Oh, my God. Like, it's subhuman. It's disgusting. It's horrible. So I was like, I can't

• 5:48Speaker 01

  do this anymore. We need to hire somebody to do messaging. Why did homegirl hire her own mother?

• 5:53Speaker 02

  Amber, Amber.

• 5:56Speaker 02

  You're lying. Her mother?

• 5:58Speaker 01

  Her mother. Her mother couldn't get the tone down, too.

• 6:01Speaker 02

  And you know what? I'm imagining, let's say a Gen Xer, trying to text on OnlyFans, using the language of, I'm assuming a Zoomer.

• 6:11Speaker 01

  She's saying stuff to men at night, like, I'm about to hit the hay.

• 6:15Speaker 01

  You, sex workers don't hit the hay.

• 6:19Speaker 02

  They don't.

• 6:19Speaker 01

  They don't hit the hay.

• 6:20Speaker 02

  They don't. She's saying, well, by golly.

• 6:23Speaker 01

  It's 8:00 PM.

• 6:24Speaker 02

  It's time for me to go to bed. My minutes have run out.

• 6:30Speaker 01

  She said, "Well, ta ta." I'm like, "No, you have to act like you're just always online." She's like, "I simply cannot."

• 6:36Speaker 02

  Oh my. Wait, so were you training the mother?

• 6:39Speaker 01

  I did not train the mother. Actually, this girl that did ops, she trained her because I was like, "I simply cannot train her. I can't."

• 6:46Speaker 02

  Okay, this is a whole operation.

• 6:48Speaker 01

  This is a... I mean, they have a team. Literally, by the way, we don't work there anymore because she had an agency take over her whole thing. Sorry, guys. Yes, you are sometimes not talking to them. I hate to say it, but...

• 7:02Speaker 02

  Oh, what a surprise.

• 7:03Speaker 01

  I mean, we're talking about a billion-dollar industry.

• 7:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, I know, that makes sense.

• 7:07Speaker 01

  People making 50, 60, 80K a month. There's some girls making three mil a month. I mean, they're top, top dogs.

• 7:13Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 7:14Speaker 01

  I mean, it's a lucrative industry for these agencies.

• 7:16Speaker 02

  This is incredible gossip, incredible tea. I love that you began the story by saying, "This is how it starts." My jaw's already on the floor. And then you said, "And now this is really tea."

• 7:28Speaker 01

  And this is how it ends.

• 7:30Speaker 02

  And I said, "This is the tea?"

• 7:31Speaker 01

  This is the tea.

• 7:31Speaker 02

  This is the tea? I thought the tea started when you said...

• 7:34Speaker 01

  No, the tea was just brewing.

• 7:35Speaker 02

  "I was on the team for the OnlyFans girl."

• 7:37Speaker 01

  "I'm just on the team, no."

• 7:39Speaker 02

  Uh, well, I'm gonna be thinking about this for a while. But now I have something that I think you're gonna be thinking about for a while, which is a little bit of gossip.

• 7:49Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 7:50Speaker 02

  Are you ready?

• 7:51Speaker 01

  I'm ready for the hot gossip.

• 7:58Speaker 03

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• 8:27Speaker 02

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• 9:11Speaker 02

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• 9:52Speaker 02

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• 10:39Speaker 02

  Today's story is about the paranormal.

• 10:43Speaker 01

  My favorite thing. My favorite thing.

• 10:47Speaker 02

  I personally do not fuck with ghosts.

• 10:49Speaker 01

  Really?

• 10:50Speaker 02

  No. Do you?

• 10:51Speaker 01

  Is it because you think they're not real?

• 10:52Speaker 02

  No, it's the opposite. I think they're real and I want nothing to do with it.

• 10:55Speaker 01

  Okay, okay, okay, okay. I don't like not believe in ghosts, but I'm always like, I'm not somebody that's like, I'm gonna go to this haunted place and spend the night.

• 11:02Speaker 02

  Don't take me anywhere that is haunted. No, I'm good. I'm good. I'm good. Yeah, I think I've said this before, but my approach to spirits and demons is like, hear no evil, see no evil, do whatever haunted shit you gotta do, but don't

• 11:14Speaker 01

  Leave me out of it.

• 11:14Speaker 02

  Leave me the fuck out of it. A Ouija board will literally never see me coming.

• 11:19Speaker 01

  Who are the girls getting the Ouija boards and where are they getting them from?

• 11:22Speaker 02

  Well, our friend of a friend is one of these girls, at least at the time that today's story takes place. Our friend of a friend today is named Haley, and I'm actually gonna let you guess the age of our friend of a friend when today's story takes place, but I'm gonna give you a couple of hints. So at the time in Haley's life when this story starts, her favorite activities include, but are not limited to, watching the newly released movie Practical Magic, playing Hanson's MMBop on repeat on her CD player, and over plucking her eyebrows to the point where they will never fully grow back.

• 11:55Speaker 01

  Okay, so this woman was at least 20 in the 90s.

• 11:59Speaker 01

  Okay. I hope your eyebrows grew back, honey. But if not, it's coming back. They're coming back.

• 12:05Speaker 02

  They are, they are. The thin eyebrows are coming back. No, I'm not, I'm not getting involved. My eyebrows are thin enough as this. Yes. Um, you're really close. It is the late 90s, early 2000s, and our friend of a friend Haley is a pre-teen. Specifically, she is 12 years old when this story starts, and the year is 1998. What were you up to in 1998?

• 12:25Speaker 01

  I was four. I was just bopping around. Me and my mom and my sister just bopping around. Going to basketball practice with my dad. He was my sister's coach. I was just bopping around.

• 12:34Speaker 02

  I was two years old, so we were in a similar place.

• 12:37Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 12:39Speaker 02

  So, our friend of a friend Haley was 12, and at the time she lives with her younger brother Dennis, who is 10, and Their dad, George, whose age is not important to the story. What is important to know is that George is divorced from the kid's mom. Not for like a controversial reason. All you need to know about Haley's mom is that she is not present for this story and she is not dead. And George is not an asshole.

• 13:04Speaker 02

  So George and our friend Haley and her little brother Dennis all live together in an old house. About an hour away from the big city of Des Moines, Iowa. I personally never had the pleasure of going to Des Moines. I do love the Midwest.

• 13:19Speaker 01

  I do. I just came back from Kansas and I actually like the Midwest.

• 13:23Speaker 02

  It's calm. It's got that big sky. It's got the cornfields. It's got the cheap property. Which Haley's dad, George, takes full advantage of. Despite the fact that he is a divorced dad of two with a not particularly lucrative job working for a medical supply company. He has a huge Victorian farmhouse with four bedrooms, two bathrooms on a 10 acre lot. Think like massive fireplace and mantel.

• 13:49Speaker 01

  George.

• 13:50Speaker 02

  Think creaky wood staircase. Think a parlor, which in this case has two giant plaid couches. You know the kind.

• 13:58Speaker 01

  Oh, God.

• 13:59Speaker 02

  The family TV.

• 14:00Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 14:01Speaker 02

  A VCR.

• 14:01Speaker 01

  Big back TV.

• 14:03Speaker 02

  And a Nintendo 64.

• 14:04Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 14:04Speaker 02

  So other than electronics, everything in the house is pretty old, including the house itself. Like George spends a lot of time on the weekends.

• 14:11Speaker 01

  Fixing it up.

• 14:11Speaker 02

  Exactly. But Haley loves this house. She calls it a spooky doll house from the very first time that she sees it. And Haley's love for the spooky doll house only grows after she sees Practical Magic. And realizes that the house that Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman live in looks exactly like the spooky doll house.

• 14:30Speaker 01

  Now I can see this.

• 14:31Speaker 02

  Instead of being by the ocean, this house is in the middle of cornfields, which if you ask Haley, makes it even spookier. And the spookier, the better.

• 14:39Speaker 01

  Oh, gosh.

• 14:40Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 14:40Speaker 01

  I'm scared.

• 14:43Speaker 02

  Well, before we get into our paranormal activity, there are some important things you need to know about George Haley's dad. The first is that he is a really good dad. Haley and her brother do eat a lot of Hamburger Helper. But in the little free time that he's not like working or doing repairs on the house, he's spending with Haley and Dennis, who don't really want for anything. George will happily wear the same Converse for years to get his kids an 1064 game they want. And he never once complains when Haley wants to go to Blockbuster to rent, like the Prince of Egypt for the fourth time in a month.

• 15:14Speaker 01

  Nuselja.

• 15:16Speaker 02

  All of this being said, George does have a bit of a past. Who doesn't?

• 15:22Speaker 01

  Like whole past or he's a criminal?

• 15:24Speaker 02

  Well, back in his early twenties, George lived a whole life as a jam band roadie. His current job in medical supplies is not his first time supplying items with medicinal qualities.

• 15:37Speaker 01

  Oh, okay, George. That's how you got the 10 acres.

• 15:42Speaker 02

  Young George loved to commune with nature, other people, machines. Like, he was all about finding the energy in all things.

• 15:53Speaker 01

  George was a freak.

• 15:54Speaker 02

  George and the kid's mom had actually met out on the road. They had both been following a lesser known British ska band on their first American tour. And now in 1998, George is a reluctant capitalist. He's working for the man, as a manager no less. I know.

• 16:09Speaker 01

  George.

• 16:10Speaker 02

  His younger self will be disgusted, but his current self needs to put Hamburger Helper on the table.

• 16:15Speaker 01

  You gotta get that on the table for the kids. They're hungry.

• 16:18Speaker 02

  So he's thankful for his job at the medical supply company, not least because it's where he meets Lisa. Lisa is an account manager at the medical supply company.

• 16:28Speaker 01

  Oh, come on now.

• 16:28Speaker 02

  She is a wizard in Excel. And where George cared more about like the vibrations in the universe, Lisa wanted it all like properly sorted and color coded and preferably in a spreadsheet.

• 16:41Speaker 01

  We need balance.

• 16:42Speaker 02

  Lisa was the kind of person who needed to know not only what time an event was starting, but what time they needed to leave to get there. Unrelatable to me.

• 16:50Speaker 01

  Unrelatable to me. I'm late and I'm tired when I get there. And I'm ready to go. I might ask, when can I leave?

• 16:56Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 16:56Speaker 01

  Like, just being on it, sorry.

• 16:58Speaker 02

  The only unpredictable thing that Lisa allowed in her life is a tiny Pomeranian named Warren, after Warren Buffett. And just like his namesake, Little Warren lived like a fluffy king. Like for his birthday, Lisa would have wagyu shipped internationally from Japan. On paper, George and Lisa would not seem to make sense. Like, the most money George has ever spent on anything was a new boiler for the house, and even that was secondhand. But you know what they say about opposites, right?

• 17:27Speaker 01

  They attract.

• 17:28Speaker 02

  And if there's anything George believes in more than energy and vibes,

• 17:32Speaker 01

  Oh, gosh.

• 17:32Speaker 02

  it's love, which is the highest vibrational energy out there.

• 17:36Speaker 01

  Blessing and a curse, George. Blessing and a curse.

• 17:40Speaker 02

  So about 10 months after George and Lisa start dating, Lisa moves in with George and Haley and Dennis.

• 17:46Speaker 01

  Stepmom.

• 17:48Speaker 02

  How should you expect this to go?

• 17:51Speaker 01

  I'mma say this, when white people start mixing families, it gets a little ghetto.

• 17:58Speaker 02

  Say more, say more, say more.

• 17:59Speaker 01

  We've seen, I mean, come on now, Gilmore Girls, One Tree Hill.

• 18:05Speaker 02

  Step by step?

• 18:07Speaker 01

  Ghetto.

• 18:08Speaker 02

  Well, the first, let's call it a beige flag, comes a few weeks after Lisa moves in. It's Haley's 13th birthday, which is a huge witchy birthday that George had gone all out for. There are like bat-shaped pancakes for breakfast and black balloons all over the house. And the absolute best gift of all is a tiny little black kitten that Haley immediately named Salem.

• 18:34Speaker 01

  Oh, so George is, George is revving up for this activity. Yeah, uh huh. He seems to be a conduit.

• 18:41Speaker 02

  At breakfast, Lisa hands Haley a sparkly pink birthday card.

• 18:46Speaker 01

  Cute.

• 18:47Speaker 02

  And inside is a crisp $10 bill.

• 18:50Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 18:51Speaker 02

  And that's all. Any immediate thoughts on this gift as compared to steak from Japan for the dog?

• 18:59Speaker 01

  I'mma say this, and I mean this, and I'm sorry. Lisa, you are a raggedy bitch.

• 19:06Speaker 01

  You are raggedy hoe. You gave that dog wagyu and you gave that girl $10. Back then, that was the shipping on the wagyu.

• 19:15Speaker 02

  Well, it's $10.98, which is at least $20 now.

• 19:19Speaker 01

  No. Let me tell you something. My mom always told me, you don't let nobody mistreat your kids. So Lisa, you had plenty of time to plan for this. You living in this house. Did she write anything nice in the card?

• 19:31Speaker 02

  It was unsigned.

• 19:33Speaker 01

  That is shade. She's throwing shade and they wonder why one out of 16 white girls, they will kill. So you have to be nice to them.

• 19:42Speaker 02

  Is that a statistical?

• 19:46Speaker 01

  I think I went a little low, actually, to be honest. So you cannot just mistreat them. At 13?

• 19:53Speaker 02

  Especially when they're obsessed with witches.

• 19:55Speaker 01

  That is an orange flag.

• 19:58Speaker 02

  It doesn't help that Warren, the dog, and Salem, the cat, immediately start beefing, which is probably why tensions start to escalate in the house. Like, within a month of moving in, Lisa kicks George out of his own home office because she and Warren need a quiet space to decompress. Even though Warren has an incredibly plush and unreasonably expensive doggy bed that has prime center real estate in the living room. And whenever he decides to nap there, which is all the time, Haley and Dennis are required to observe quiet hours because playing too much Mario Kart disturbs Warren's sleep schedule. And Lisa says that children, unlike dogs, are meant to play outside.

• 20:39Speaker 01

  Ho, hit the bricks. Get out. Get your stuff and get out of my house.

• 20:45Speaker 02

  At what point would you say it is George's responsibility as a father to intervene?

• 20:51Speaker 01

  At the card.

• 20:52Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 20:53Speaker 01

  At the $10 card. So especially with woman to woman, I do think there is an energy, just like with, if you bring a man into your house and you have sons, when you bring a woman into your house and you have a daughter, you do have to protect the energy because, one, she's probably jealous because she knows off the top of her head, you will never love anybody more than you love your daughter, especially a woman. She knows that, and you're not her mother. So it's like, you can't even be like, we made this life and we love it. So she would have had to get out of my house.

• 21:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 21:21Speaker 01

  Instantly. And first of all, a Pomeranian?

• 21:23Speaker 02

  Named Warren? After Warren Buffett?

• 21:26Speaker 01

  And you're telling me that my children need to be quiet? I pay this house so they can be loud in this house. No.

• 21:33Speaker 02

  There's 10 acres of cornfields so no one hears some screenings.

• 21:36Speaker 01

  Send the dog outside.

• 21:37Speaker 02

  Well, one afternoon.

• 21:39Speaker 01

  Oh, God.

• 21:40Speaker 02

  They hear Lisa screaming bloody murder from upstairs. George, who had been working out in the garden, comes sprinting in the house. And once he sees that the kids are all okay, even if they are very freaked out, he sprints upstairs where he finds Lisa, totally unharmed, by the way, if clearly pissed and also soaking wet. Before George can even say anything, Lisa is like, George, I cannot live like this anymore.

• 22:06Speaker 01

  Perfect.

• 22:06Speaker 02

  I told you it was inhumane. Haley and Dennis like peek their heads around the banister so they can see just how confused their dad is. Lisa's like, it happened again. The shower went cold again. Why don't you try bathing in the Antarctic and tell me how you like it? This is not Haley's first rodeo. The boiler, which is in the basement, has been an issue since they moved in. But before George can even respond to Lisa, Haley yells, not it, before racing down the stairs, which means it is only Dennis who is left standing there when George says, alright, who's gonna be my basement adventure buddy today?

• 22:44Speaker 01

  Not the basement.

• 22:45Speaker 02

  Okay, here's where I admit that even as an adult, a dark basement still freaks me. I don't like it.

• 22:49Speaker 01

  I don't go into my parents' basement without my mom.

• 22:52Speaker 02

  I was gonna ask, do you have any basement-related fears? But it seems like the answer is yes.

• 22:56Speaker 01

  You know what's funny? We had a dog and his cage was in the basement. And for some reason, when my mom would be like, oh, can you go let Austin out? I would go down there and it's just an eerie feeling. And you're just like, okay, I would just like open his cage and sprint upstairs and be like, okay, he's up. Like, I can't, I cannot do.

• 23:14Speaker 02

  Yeah. According to Haley, the basement in this house is legitimately terrifying. She loved it, but from a distance. The basement, like the house, is old as fuck. And this is the Midwest, so this is tornado territory. And it's honestly possible that the basement was dug before the house as a standalone storm cellar.

• 23:35Speaker 01

  It's probably like soundproof and all types of stuff.

• 23:37Speaker 02

  It was definitely dug at a time when building standards were low.

• 23:43Speaker 02

  Looser.

• 23:43Speaker 01

  Just loose.

• 23:44Speaker 02

  Probably maybe didn't exist.

• 23:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, they didn't have any.

• 23:48Speaker 02

  So the walls were like old ass rocks, boulders, basically. And at least one corner of the floor was just dirt. And it never got warm, even on the hottest day of the summer. And it smelled like a combination of old wet dirt, cobwebs and potatoes. Though there were no potatoes in sight. Also, one of the previous owners had left behind a gift, which is a life-size cardboard cutout of a man in a top hat, stuck to a wall with some sort of like industrial strength glue that nothing could dissolve. It clearly began its life as some sort of prop for like a school play or something. But after being left in the damp, dark basement for lord knows how many years,

• 24:30Speaker 02

  it looked, um, sort of, we have a photo, actually. I'm gonna show it to you. This is what is in the corner of the basement. For our listeners, could you describe this photo?

• 24:44Speaker 01

  It is, first of all, horrid. It is, it looks like a Lego man with all black. He is absolutely alive. And it's just like a cardboard, it doesn't look like anybody. And it's just a face with circles, no other features, by the way. And he's in a black, obviously black suit. And he used to have hands, maybe? And this is stuck to the wall.

• 25:10Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm. Can't get it off.

• 25:12Speaker 01

  Can't get it off. And also, everybody knows the lore about Top Hat Man.

• 25:15Speaker 02

  I don't know the lore about Top Hat Man.

• 25:17Speaker 01

  I'll tell you this after the story.

• 25:19Speaker 02

  Okay. Well, George, trying to lighten the mood around this, always refers to it as Old Gus.

• 25:24Speaker 01

  We named it.

• 25:25Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm. Yeah. So these are the vibes of the basement, which maybe explains why, as George is checking out the boiler, Dennis remains stationed as close to the stairs as humanly possible.

• 25:36Speaker 01

  If you just saw that corner, the vibes are horrendous in the basement. Horrible.

• 25:40Speaker 02

  Like George has to keep telling Dennis to come closer so that the flashlight Dennis is holding actually shines on the boiler. Exactly. And this is where our story starts to become a classic bit of family lore.

• 25:52Speaker 01

  Oh, God.

• 25:53Speaker 02

  So that while Haley was not technically there to witness this part, she feels like she was. So, the story goes that as George is doing his best to inspect the boiler with some less than steady lighting assistant.

• 26:06Speaker 01

  Some shaky flashlight work.

• 26:08Speaker 02

  From Dennis. Dennis says, "Dad, there's someone here."

• 26:12Speaker 01

  No.

• 26:14Speaker 02

  Now, George is only half paying attention, so he's like, "Of course, Dennis. We've all seen old Gus. He's our friend, remember?"

• 26:21Speaker 01

  No, he's not.

• 26:23Speaker 02

  But then Dennis responds in a voice that is strangely calm, given what he's about to say. Dennis says, "No, Dad, there's someone else." And at this, George sits up. He looks around to check that it's not Haley trying to scare her little brother. And when he sees nothing besides Dennis and old Gus, he's like, "Okay, do you know who it is?" And Dennis shakes his head. And then he pauses. And then he says, "It's a man."

• 26:52Speaker 01

  No, that's enough for me.

• 26:55Speaker 02

  His name is Morris. And then Dennis looks straight at George and says, "Morris wants us to leave."

• 27:16Speaker 02

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• 28:38Speaker 02

  Now, George has been on enough mushroom trips to know that there are mysteries in the world that he does not want to fuck with. So he grabs Dennis by the back of his shirt and hauls his ass up the stairs, carrying Dennis like a suitcase, basically. Which does not stop Dennis from shrieking, "We live in a haunted house!" So loudly that Haley and Lisa and Warren all come running. Haley is thrilled by this ghostly turn of events. While Lisa just wants to know when the boiler will be fixed.

• 29:08Speaker 01

  I'm so tired of Lisa. It doesn't make sense. Make her go downstairs and fix it.

• 29:12Speaker 02

  Okay, so what is your next move upon finding out that your house is potentially haunted?

• 29:17Speaker 01

  Do we have family where we can go?

• 29:19Speaker 02

  Can we leave?

• 29:20Speaker 01

  Can we leave?

• 29:21Speaker 02

  Um, I'm gonna say no.

• 29:22Speaker 01

  So we need a hotel for just maybe a day.

• 29:25Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 29:25Speaker 01

  Because she needs a hot shower, even though I do not like her, but she is a woman that we are trying to take care of. We need to go to a hotel and we might need to leave the cat and dog here. I'm so sorry for the night. And if we can't, if we can take them, great, but if we can't, the cat knows what it's doing. Maybe we bring the dog.

• 29:42Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's a black cat too.

• 29:44Speaker 01

  It's a black cat. The black cat will be fine.

• 29:46Speaker 02

  Well, at that moment, Lisa's wrath is a bigger problem to George. He had been able to inspect enough of the boiler to know that whatever was going on was above his pay grade. So he finds a repairman on the Yellow Pages and then he does what any reasonable father would in the year of our Lord and Savior, 1998, which is go to the local library to find out if there is any historical reason to believe that his house might exactly, might be haunted. This trip to the library helps confirm what George suspected, which is that no one has died a grisly death in their house. Yeah, yeah. At least not recently enough to be recorded in the newspaper archives.

• 30:18Speaker 01

  And that's the scary part.

• 30:19Speaker 02

  What's happening before then?

• 30:21Speaker 01

  We don't know.

• 30:21Speaker 02

  We don't know. But George's biggest clue in this mystery comes not from the library, but from a chance encounter with a neighbor whose family has lived in the same house for going on like a century at this point. George is out cleaning the yard one day when he sees this neighbor, and he thinks to ask him if any of the previous owners had ever mentioned any weird goings on in the house. And the neighbor's like, "Not really." And then he's like, "Well, I guess there was Old Man Morris." According to the neighbor, Old Man Morris was the owner before last of George's house. So it's George, an owner that we don't know, and then Old Man Morris.

• 31:02Speaker 01

  Somebody got the hell out of there after Morris, that's who.

• 31:05Speaker 02

  Old Man Morris had lived in the house for decades. He had no real family, or even really friends in town. Like, he was basically only seen when he was tending to the house or the yard, which he kept doing well into his 90s, when he died in the house of a heart attack. Now, how would you feel about learning someone died in your house? And would it matter how they died?

• 31:25Speaker 01

  Yes. I need to know the state they were in when they died, because did they peacefully transition? That is so important. Like, if they did not, we need to cleanse it. We need to do something for them. We need to throw them a birthday party. I don't know what we need to do.

• 31:36Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:37Speaker 01

  But I need to know how. And a heart attack would confuse me, because what was he doing when he had a heart attack?

• 31:43Speaker 02

  No, you're right.

• 31:44Speaker 01

  Was he happy? Was he mean spirited? I don't know.

• 31:46Speaker 02

  These are all important questions. Haley is really wanting to answer these questions, and is a true child of the 90s, who basically only started watching Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, because her dad would not let her see the craft. Haley volunteers to run a séance.

• 32:00Speaker 01

  Haley, this is a horrible idea. This is horrible.

• 32:04Speaker 02

  And Lisa agrees with you.

• 32:06Speaker 01

  Of course. If Lisa agrees, do not do it.

• 32:09Speaker 02

  At this point, even Lisa is like, "George, you gotta do something."

• 32:13Speaker 01

  We gotta do a séance.

• 32:14Speaker 02

  Because there have been some strange happenings since that fateful basement trip. Like, when the repairman came to fix the boiler, he couldn't actually find anything wrong with it, even though the water still sporadically runs cold in the shower. Windows would slam shut in the kids' bedrooms, though only when it was too cold to have the windows open at night, anyway. Photos and pictures would fall from the walls, but only ones that Lisa had hung. And at a certain point, all this supernatural phenomena starts to become too much for poor little Warren the dog. And this is when Haley and Dennis start noticing little puddles around the house.

• 32:52Speaker 01

  The dog is peeing.

• 32:53Speaker 02

  Lisa insists that Warren can feel the anxiety in the house, which means that she needs to spend even more time devoting herself to him.

• 33:00Speaker 01

  Oh, God.

• 33:00Speaker 02

  And what this means is that it's Haley and Dennis who end up on Warren cleanup duty. So George decides it is time to call in outside reinforcements, which presents its own set of problems because you cannot just look up ghost hunters in my area in the yellow pages. Yeah, and Google didn't exist yet.

• 33:17Speaker 01

  Oh, no.

• 33:18Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 33:18Speaker 01

  X-G's. No, it was before X-G's.

• 33:20Speaker 02

  Exactly. What would you do with 1998? You've got a ghost.

• 33:23Speaker 01

  We gotta go find somebody.

• 33:25Speaker 02

  But where?

• 33:25Speaker 01

  Word of mouth.

• 33:26Speaker 02

  How?

• 33:26Speaker 01

  We gotta go around the town. Also, to be honest, I'm gonna say it, I would have probably went to the church and been like, hey, you got somebody that can get holy water. What do y'all have in here, please? Y'all need to, I need help.

• 33:37Speaker 02

  Yeah. Do you have a particular denomination? Are you going Catholic, Pentecostal?

• 33:41Speaker 01

  I'm not going Catholic. I'm going wherever I can. And to be honest, I need a black woman as quickly as possible. I need her in the, in the space.

• 33:49Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 33:49Speaker 01

  Because she's gonna be like, uh-uh, y'all need to leave.

• 33:52Speaker 02

  Get out. Get out.

• 33:54Speaker 01

  This ain't it. This ain't it. Yeah.

• 33:57Speaker 02

  Well, what happens next is probably my favorite part of this whole story. One night while channel surfing, George is struck by the most brilliant idea. It's almost like fate, and it certainly has nothing to do with the joints that he keeps hidden in a shelf too high for the kids and Lisa to find. Two days later, the doorbell rings. Haley answers, and she is greeted by a vision that she will never forget. At the door is a woman draped in blue velvet and silver necklaces. There are crosses and stars, evil eyes and onks galore. Overall, this is a black lace kimono, and on the woman's head is a jade green headscarf. Think like early Erykah Badu with a little bit of Stevie Nicks.

• 34:42Speaker 01

  She was giving it to the girls at the door.

• 34:44Speaker 02

  Haley screams, "Oh, my God, it's you." Because at her door is none other than Miss Sapphire.

• 34:51Speaker 01

  I'm so sorry.

• 34:52Speaker 02

  The legend of local TV commercials.

• 34:55Speaker 01

  The?

• 34:55Speaker 02

  The Miss Sapphire. She pauses and sniffs the air before crossing the doorframe. She gives Haley a little pat on the shoulder and says, "Come, child. Today you learn how to see beyond the world of men."

• 35:08Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 35:09Speaker 02

  Now, I

• 35:10Speaker 01

  She kinda ate that.

• 35:11Speaker 02

  think George is brilliant for this.

• 35:13Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 35:13Speaker 02

  But would you hire someone to fix your ghost problem off of a late night TV commercial? It is the 90s.

• 35:19Speaker 01

  Listen, we've all wanted to order Peter Popoff's Miracle Water.

• 35:24Speaker 01

  Okay? So I have been a victim of wanting to order the Miracle Prayer Water in the middle of the night. I probably would. Honestly, if she was on TikTok Shop today, she could get me.

• 35:35Speaker 02

  The Florida Water.

• 35:36Speaker 01

  The Florida Water, please.

• 35:37Speaker 02

  People get shit from Etsy witches. I don't think they should.

• 35:39Speaker 01

  I don't think they should, because you don't know what

• 35:41Speaker 02

  You don't know what they did there.

• 35:42Speaker 01

  You don't know what they did to it.

• 35:43Speaker 02

  Also, what if they fuck up your package? What if they just send you something they don't mean to?

• 35:46Speaker 01

  It's like olive oil.

• 35:47Speaker 02

  Or just like, "I wish for a love spell and now I have a death spell." I don't know.

• 35:51Speaker 01

  Everybody dies.

• 35:53Speaker 02

  Exactly. And that's why you should hire off a late night TV commercial, hire local.

• 35:57Speaker 01

  Hire local, and at least she has a commercial. She's putting money into her craft.

• 36:01Speaker 02

  She got money. So the children follow Miss Sapphire as she walks through the house, like knocking on walls and inspecting dusty corners. Haley is too starstruck to talk. So it's Dennis who's like, "Why are you called Sapphire?" And Miss Sapphire is like, "Ghosts despise the color blue. That's how I knew I was called to this work. From a young age, I felt the inherent blueness of my spirit."

• 36:25Speaker 01

  They don't like blue. I need more blue things.

• 36:28Speaker 02

  Lisa, who had been all on board with fixing the ghost problem, now had some questions. She turns like, "You hired the 1-800 late night witch?"

• 36:36Speaker 01

  Yes, I did.

• 36:36Speaker 02

  But George is already asking Miss Sapphire about her process with genuine curiosity. He's like, "Is it okay for my children to watch you work? Will they disturb you?" By this point, Miss Sapphire is like opening every single kitchen cabinet. And with her head under the sink, she's like, "Of course, it's fine. I'm always being watched." That's what it means to be connected to the spirit world. George is like, "Yes, of course. That makes sense."

• 36:56Speaker 01

  Oh, my God.

• 36:57Speaker 02

  He then explains that Dennis is the one who had seen the ghost. So Miss Sapphire crouches down to look Dennis in the eyes. And after a really long moment, she just nods. And then she's like, "Children are naturally sensitive to the spirit world. I was around his age when I started hearing the voices too."

• 37:15Speaker 01

  I'll be like, Dennis, you hear something?

• 37:18Speaker 02

  And then she starts sprinkling salt in the corners of the kitchen.

• 37:21Speaker 01

  Get that salt, baby.

• 37:22Speaker 02

  At this point, Lisa is rolling her eyes so hard that it looks like she's the one getting exercised.

• 37:26Speaker 01

  Lisa, please.

• 37:29Speaker 02

  After Miss Sapphire determines that the kitchen is clear of spirits, she sets up shop right at their kitchen table. She's lighting incense and candles. Exactly. She rings a small bell three times. To gauge the energy of the house. And at this point, it's time for her to go from room to room to room to detect any spirits. This is when Lisa abandons them. She's muttering something about waste of money and she goes up to the office. Meanwhile, George and the kids follow behind Miss Sapphire like it's some kind of church procession. As she goes from room to room, feeling like the walls and the light fixtures, she has this long silver chain with a pendulum at the end. And in each room, she waits for a sign of ghostly movement.

• 38:10Speaker 02

  Dining room, nothing. Living room, all clear. Home office, kids' bedroom, all fine.

• 38:17Speaker 01

  So we're safe. We have some place we can sit, sit around and be fine, I guess.

• 38:22Speaker 02

  It's when Miss Sapphire gets to the upstairs bathroom that she pauses.

• 38:26Speaker 01

  Miss cold water.

• 38:28Speaker 02

  The pendulum starts making small circles above her palm.

• 38:32Speaker 01

  Why is this scaring me?

• 38:34Speaker 02

  Her eyes widen before she says, there's an older gentleman here.

• 38:38Speaker 01

  Oh, God.

• 38:40Speaker 02

  He's very connected to this place. His name is Morris.

• 38:46Speaker 01

  Not other than the.

• 38:49Speaker 02

  This sends Haley and Dennis fleeing back to the kitchen where the salt will protect them. George is dumbstruck because he had never actually told Miss Sapphire about old man Morris. So George is now a Miss Sapphire believer. He is in awe of her talent and sensitivity. Are you in awe of Miss Sapphire's talent?

• 39:07Speaker 01

  I'm in awe. I'm in awe. I'm in awe of her writing. Honestly, she's got a great pen.

• 39:14Speaker 02

  The pen?

• 39:15Speaker 01

  Dude, the pen on Miss Sapphire. Find this woman.

• 39:21Speaker 02

  Well, unfortunately, Ms. Sapphire has actually only made more trouble for George because now his children are now absolutely 100% convinced that there is a ghost in the house.

• 39:30Speaker 01

  So they should have been convinced two weeks ago.

• 39:33Speaker 02

  George is like, okay, what does Morris want? And Ms. Sapphire closes her eyes and then she's like, Morris doesn't want to let go of the house. This house was his life and he's having a hard time here, especially since you brought her in.

• 39:49Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 39:50Speaker 02

  And at this, George feels a chill go down his spine. He's like, you're not talking about Haley, are you? Because George can tolerate a lot of things, but he will not tolerate a ghost fucking with his daughter. Ms. Sapphire is immediately like, no, Morris loves the children. That's why he doesn't like her. Morris doesn't like the way she treats the house or the children.

• 40:08Speaker 01

  Not Morris being actually like an ally.

• 40:11Speaker 02

  And then Ms. Sapphire is like, Morris says he'll leave if she does.

• 40:15Speaker 01

  She gotta go today. I said that she had to pack her bag over the $10, so she gotta go now for sure.

• 40:21Speaker 02

  Well, my next question here is, would you kick out your girlfriend if a TV psychic told you that a ghost didn't like her? And based on the expression on your face.

• 40:28Speaker 01

  I kicked out my girlfriend for less.

• 40:32Speaker 01

  She would have got kicked out over the $10. So the Palmer Rainey and the $10, the screaming in the shower, she, 10 strikes, you're out, baby.

• 40:41Speaker 02

  Well, George definitely respects the hell out of Ms. Sapphire, but he's like, I'm not gonna let a ghost run my dating life. Is there anything else we can do here?

• 40:48Speaker 01

  George, please.

• 40:50Speaker 02

  Unfortunately, Ms. Sapphire actually does have a solution that does not involve breaking up with Lisa. She's like, ghosts are actually a little bit like houseplants. They get sad when you don't talk to them or like include them in your daily life.

• 41:01Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 41:02Speaker 02

  So Ms. Sapphire tells George, every morning when him and the kids wake up, everyone in the house must turn a circle clockwise four times and then greet Morris. Simple good morning will suffice.

• 41:17Speaker 01

  Simple good, hello, Morris.

• 41:18Speaker 02

  But the process has to be repeated at night, except with a counterclockwise circle.

• 41:22Speaker 01

  Okay, now Morris, now you're getting, now you're getting a little bit much.

• 41:25Speaker 02

  And a good night.

• 41:26Speaker 01

  And a good night.

• 41:27Speaker 02

  And a good night. Ms. Sapphire says it should be enough to satisfy Morris, who she says does not seem to be a vengeful spirit.

• 41:33Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 41:34Speaker 02

  Just a lonely one.

• 41:34Speaker 01

  He just wants a family.

• 41:36Speaker 02

  Exactly.

• 41:36Speaker 01

  Oh, Morris.

• 41:38Speaker 02

  We are almost at the end of our story. Would you be okay doing this little ritual for the foreseeable future?

• 41:43Speaker 01

  I would begrudgingly do it every day. I would be like, good morning, Morris, hi.

• 41:50Speaker 01

  Good night, Morris. I'll be like, which way is counterclock?

• 41:53Speaker 02

  That would be the part that would trip me up.

• 41:56Speaker 01

  I'm like, I'm gonna just do eight circles both ways. And if you're still mad, I'm really sorry.

• 42:01Speaker 02

  I'm so sorry.

• 42:01Speaker 01

  I'm literally sorry.

• 42:02Speaker 02

  I don't have a clock on me right now.

• 42:03Speaker 01

  I can't do this.

• 42:04Speaker 02

  I only use electronic clocks.

• 42:06Speaker 01

  I love you. Maybe a family game night and when they let Morris play?

• 42:10Speaker 02

  That'd be sweet. They'd do that. Yeah. This is the best thing that has ever happened to Haley and her whole 13 years of her life.

• 42:16Speaker 01

  I mean, she's having a great time.

• 42:17Speaker 02

  She has a real life ghost in her house. And not only a real life ghost, but one that she is required to communicate with. That's her new homie. So obviously she leads the charge. Every morning she reminds Dennis to say good morning to Morris. She talks to him while she brushes her teeth.

• 42:33Speaker 01

  Now I'm scared.

• 42:34Speaker 02

  She even catches George talking to Morris about like his old roadie days while he's weeding the garden.

• 42:40Speaker 02

  The only person who does not participate in this new ritual is Lisa. Even after George asked her to do it for the kids. Whenever Haley or Dennis mentioned Morris, Lisa just huffs and rolls her eyes and tells George that he shouldn't be encouraging this sort of behavior.

• 42:56Speaker 01

  Encouraging? We're gonna die. This is so you can stay here, babe. They're not paying a bill. This is your rent. Now you spinning your ass in a circle and talk to Morris.

• 43:06Speaker 02

  The ghost wants you gone specifically.

• 43:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, literally. We're doing this so you don't have to get out.

• 43:11Speaker 02

  But maybe this is why Lisa is the only one who the shower continues to run cold for. And little Warren the dog never seems to fully recover from all the paranormal happenings. In fact, Lisa's final straw is when Warren starts doing that thing that cats do where they just stare at nothing. Like one day Warren refuses to stop staring at the basement door. He won't allow anyone to drag him away. He starts yelping if Lisa goes anywhere near the door. And after hours of this, Lisa finally packs her bags and Warren's doggy bed and leaves. And Haley and Dennis never see her again. And that's basically our story. I do have some updates, but I wanted to ask, do you think Lisa is a villain or just a woman driven to the brink?

• 43:52Speaker 01

  So I think both. I think Lisa has a low tolerance level. So I think she is driven to the brink of her tolerance, for sure. Like, I think her tolerance is like this and she was, she tried as long as she could. I do think she was being a bit like a meanie meanie pants. And honestly, Lisa, you're kind of a bitch. So. You could have just turned in a circle. It's not that bad. Do you want hot water?

• 44:19Speaker 02

  Do you want your little dog to be fine?

• 44:21Speaker 01

  And Morris said, and your little dog too. You can get the hell out of my house.

• 44:24Speaker 02

  Literally. I just think a woman who loves Excel spreadsheets shouldn't try to become a stepmom.

• 44:29Speaker 01

  No, you want order. Like, you can't. And I feel like a family, let alone a blended family, can be very chaotic. And also.

• 44:38Speaker 02

  With a preteen?

• 44:39Speaker 01

  She didn't even, I was just about to say, she didn't get into the teenage years of having a stepdaughter. So she should have just packed her bag a long time ago.

• 44:46Speaker 02

  Yeah. Well, the updates are.

• 44:49Speaker 01

  Oh, good.

• 44:49Speaker 02

  About a month or two after Lisa moves out, George invited Miss Sapphire back just to have a check-in with Morris. He and the kids hadn't heard anything from Morris in a while, like not even a slammed kitchen cabinet. And they were honestly kind of sad about it.

• 45:02Speaker 01

  They miss him.

• 45:03Speaker 02

  So George was happy to hear that Morris had, in fact, not moved on yet, but he was just content.

• 45:08Speaker 01

  He's happy.

• 45:09Speaker 02

  He's happy. George had continued his reading on local ghost lore since that faithful basement trip. And he was curious about the color of his aura at this point. And according to Miss Sapphire, their auras matched like two twin flames. And that is how George starts dating Miss Sapphire. Once Haley and Dennis move out, George starts accompanying Miss Sapphire and her ghostly adventures as a spectral videographer.

• 45:33Speaker 01

  Wait, no, he got back to his witchy roots. George, look at you.

• 45:39Speaker 02

  And our very last update. One day when Haley and Dennis are all grown up and George and Miss Sapphire are out on the road. Haley and Dennis are catching up on the phone. It's close to Halloween and Haley brings up Morris the ghost. And for the first time, Haley notices that Dennis looks a little sheepish. And this is when, finally, over two decades later, Dennis confesses. He's like, I have a secret. That faithful day when the boiler broke, Dennis was deep in his Pokemon phase. And instead of spending time with like Charizard and Jigglypuff and Squirtle, as was his God-given right as a child of the 90s, he had to follow his dad down into the gates of hell. So he decided to have his own little fun.

• 46:24Speaker 02

  He made the whole thing up. He had simply come up with the name Morris on the spot. And the fact that it matched the name of the man who died in their house was a freaky little coincidence. Dennis swears Haley to secrecy. So to this day, George still does not know the truth about old man Morris. Although it is worth pointing out, to this day, no one is quite sure just how Ms. Sapphire knew the name Morris. And that is the end of our story.

• 46:50Speaker 01

  That they went to after he said that.

• 46:53Speaker 02

  Do you think Dennis just accidentally tapped into the astral plane and Morris is real?

• 46:58Speaker 01

  I think that Morris is real. And I also think that sometimes it's like when you meet somebody or black people do this all the time. When you look at each other and you're thinking the same thing and you say the same thing. I think that we were all attached to a collective consciousness that we can only access if we are really like into it. And I think that he truly was like, I'm gonna make something up. And then Mr. Morris said, watch this. Watch this. You think you about to make something up? Watch this. Watch this, baby.

• 47:25Speaker 02

  I'm about to change your life.

• 47:27Speaker 01

  I'm about to change your life. Because think about being Dennis and this lady says, oh, his name is Morris.

• 47:33Speaker 02

  I know.

• 47:33Speaker 01

  And you're like, this shit's crazy.

• 47:38Speaker 02

  I know.

• 47:40Speaker 01

  I have chills. I'm scared. Ms. Sapphire knows too much.

• 47:45Speaker 01

  She got her a man. So there you go.

• 47:48Speaker 02

  She got everything she wanted out of it. I do wonder if Ms. Sapphire perhaps conspired with Morris to be like.

• 47:54Speaker 01

  We gotta get this bitch out of here. You know what?

• 48:00Speaker 02

  Game recognize game.

• 48:01Speaker 01

  Game recognize game. I'm get a bitch out of here.com LLC. Get her out of here. Pack her bags. What do we gotta do? And she got paid? And she got a man? And a house? Ms. Sapphire, I'm a fan of your work, girl. I'm a fan.

• 48:16Speaker 02

  The diva that you are Ms. Sapphire.

• 48:18Speaker 01

  Can you imagine coming to the door like that with the silver chains on? Please.

• 48:27Speaker 02

  Thank you for listening to Normal Gossip. If you have a gossip story to share with us, email us at [email protected], or you can leave us a voicemail at 2679 Gossip. If you love this podcast and want to support us, become a friend or a friend of a friend at supportnormalgossip.com. You can follow the show on Instagram and TikTok at Normal Gossip. You can follow me on all social media at HeyDanae. Subscribe to our YouTube channel at Defector Media to watch today's episode. Normal Gossip is written by me, Rachel Hampton, and Jay Tolbierra. This podcast was produced by Sierra Spragley-Ritz and Jay Tolbierra. Our audio engineer is Samantha Gatzit. Emily Cherish is our video editor.

• 49:08Speaker 02

  Theme music composed by Rishi Keshiway. The co-creators and Dowager Queens in Normal Gossip are Kelsey McKinney and Defector's supervising producer Alex Tujong Loughlin. Justin Ellis is Defector's projects editor. Jasper Wang is Defector's business guy. Tom Lay is our editor in chief. This season was made in memory of Dan McQuaid, who ran our merch store, which you can find at normalgossip.store. Tara Jacoby designed our show art. Thank you to Brandy Jensen, David Roth, Catherine Chu, Sabrina Embler, Chris Thompson, Dave McKenna, Patrick Redford, and Ray Rado for your help with this season. Thank you to the rest of the Defector staff. Defector Media is a collectively owned subscriber-based media company. Normal Gossip is a proud member of Radiotopia. I am your host, Rachel Hampton, and remember, you didn't hear this from me.