The Awakening

When Michelle moves into The Gearbox on the Caribbean island of Montserrat, she meets a new dance partner. And in Yauco, the mountain is alive. It knows you. It is aware of you. And when you pass, it will not let you leave unforgotten. This story comes to us from our evil-twin, Spooked https://www.kqed.org/spooked! You can listen to Spooked on any podcast platform, episodes drop weekly. If you want more supernatural fun, check out Spooked on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@spookedpodcast/videos. The Gearbox When Michelle moves into The Gearbox on the Caribbean island of Montserrat, she meets a new dance partner. Produced by Anne Ford, original score by Doug Stuart. Spirit of the Mountain In Yauco, the mountain is alive. It knows you. It is aware of you. And when you pass, it will not let you leave unforgotten. Thank you Adam, for sharing your story with us. Produced by Erick Yáñez, original score by Doug Stuart, artwork by Teo Ducot. Season 16 - Episode 28 Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices https://dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

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

• 0:08Glynn Washington?

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• 0:48Glynn Washington?

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• 1:21Speaker 01

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• 1:55Glynn Washington?

  Okay, so I have a friend who always has the most wacky, ridiculous stories. Stories where, okay, something like this might happen once, but it seems like every time he checks the mail or picks up a box of cereal, something crazy happens. Fires, car crashes, mysterious acquaintances from decades ago pop up, and it's gotten so that lots of people, they think he's full of crap. They don't believe his little tales. I didn't believe his stories at first, but I liked hearing him anyway. Every blue moon, we hang out. Once we go to shoot some pool, just chilling, couple of brews, then just like in the movies,

• 2:39Glynn Washington?

  a bar fight breaks out around us. He doesn't even blink, just misses the eight ball in the corner pocket as we scramble out, ducking punches, trying to find the exit outside. I'm tripping, that was crazy, yo! He's like, "Yeah."

• 2:56Glynn Washington?

  Another time, walking around Lake Merritt in Oakland, and this huge, gigantic wolf dog thing comes bounding at a top speed, snarling like I made a pork chop. Damn, and right before it tears a chunk out of my hind parts, it just flops down in front of my buddy,

• 3:16Glynn Washington?

  who reaches down and scratches this monster between the ears. "Dude, you know this dog?"

• 3:26Glynn Washington?

  "No, man, but we should probably try to figure out where he belongs."

• 3:31Glynn Washington?

  He takes off for a weekend trip, ends up saving some random kid from drowning. It's always something. And that would be one thing if he ran around poking bears or juggling fireworks, but that's not what's going on.

• 3:48Glynn Washington?

  Around him,

• 3:52Glynn Washington?

  the universe bends.

• 3:58Glynn Washington?

  And I want to say, "Stop doing that", but I don't know what he's doing. And part of his magic seems to be that he always emerges unscathed.

• 4:10Glynn Washington?

  And that's great.

• 4:12Glynn Washington?

  I'm just not sure if that same magic applies to whoever's standing next to him.

• 4:21Glynn Washington?

  See, some people are sparks, the first ember of the inferno. Otherwise, the mystery will remain silent because sometimes even magic needs a little push. And today, from KQED Snap Judgment proudly presents The Awakening. Amazing stories from our evil twin Spooked, from people who can scarcely believe it happened themselves. My name is Lynn Washington. Spook starts now.

• 5:38Glynn Washington?

  We begin with a wonder. The first story comes to us from the Caribbean island of Montserrat. 1995, a volcano erupted and destroyed the capital city. But many years before then, Michelle grew up on this island in her grandparents' house. And Michelle lived her own kind of disaster.

• 6:02Glynn Washington?

  Spooked.

• 6:38Speaker 02

  The house that I grew up in was called the Gearbox because it had been owned by a Mr. and Mrs. Gear.

• 6:47Speaker 02

  My grandparents were part of the upper class, so it was quite lavish. The house was filled with beautiful antique furniture, some of it 17th century. The dining room was massive. It was an open plan between the dining room area and the drawing room area. So whenever they would have cocktail parties, everything was taken out and they would have just a huge room where people could dance and mingle.

• 7:20Speaker 02

  We had a chef, a housekeeper, a chauffeur, and a gardener. When my grandparents would have cocktail parties, they would be offered extra hours to help to cater, but none of them ever wanted to stay once it got dark. They always left long before dark. I never understood why.

• 7:50Speaker 02

  Soon after my mother, brother, and I moved in with my grandparents, I was playing with my dolls. It was around maybe 2 o'clock in the afternoon. Nobody else was home except for our household staff, and I heard a woman's voice calling me. She called my name very, very slowly, with a very posh British accent.

• 8:24Speaker 02

  Innocent sounding, sweet, lovely, almost playful. I dropped what I was doing and I went running straight to our cook to ask her, "Yes?" She said, "Yes, what?" I said, "You called me just now." She said, "No, I didn't." So I went running to the housekeeper. She said the same thing. "No, I didn't call you. I'm busy. Run, run, run, play."

• 8:51Speaker 02

  And that was just the beginning.

• 8:57Speaker 02

  I would hear it so often, at least three, four times a week. "Michelle."

• 9:09Speaker 02

  That is what life was like back then in the Gearbox. Strange things happened in that house and nobody spoke about it.

• 9:19Speaker 02

  There were glass windows all around the house. The wind would come roaring down the hills, straight through our house, through all the open windows, howling to the point where it sounds like a thousand women screaming.

• 9:36Speaker 02

  There would be the shadows of trees all along the wall, this wind howling.

• 9:45Speaker 02

  One night, I woke up.

• 9:48Speaker 02

  I was on my way to the bathroom, which is down a long passage. I had to pass by the drawing room and there were glass doors. I happened to glance to my right and the room was filled with all these different couples, eight to 10 couples, all dancing and whirling around, all just gliding silently.

• 10:14Speaker 02

  No music, no nothing, except the sound of the wind. I just stopped and I stared.

• 10:24Speaker 02

  I was in awe. It took my breath away. Because the women were so beautiful. They were all dressed in very old fashioned clothes. Everything was muted, almost like one of these old fashioned photographs that you see. I couldn't understand why there was no music, or talking, or laughing. I knew that there was something not quite right. I can't tell you how long I was there for. It seems as if I was there for hours. When I got tired, I just went to the bathroom. When I came back from the bathroom, nobody, just the sound of the wind.

• 11:11Speaker 02

  I never told my mom what I witnessed, because I knew that I was not supposed to be out of bed at that hour. I never told my grandparents, or my aunts and uncles, I never even told my brother.

• 11:25Speaker 02

  On another night, I went to use the bathroom again, and I saw them again. This time, I opened the glass door. I wanted to see them clearer. Nobody turned to look at me, nobody said anything, they just kept dancing on.

• 11:43Speaker 02

  Then an older gentleman came up to me. He had grey hair, and it was long and swept back. He had a moustache, and a goatee kind of beard, and he was dressing up the same style as the men, very formal. He held his hand out to me. And I took his hand, and he held out his other hand, put my hand in his. They were very soft for a man's hands. And then he lifted me so that my little feet were on top of his shoes. They were beautiful, black, shiny, well polished. He put one arm around my waist, and he had the other hand in his.

• 12:28Speaker 02

  And then he started whirling me around, in and out, all around the couples.

• 12:35Speaker 02

  I was laughing, I loved it.

• 12:41Speaker 02

  Little by little, I started to get tired. And then I noticed his hands started to get colder and colder and colder, until they were almost like ice. Till there was almost this frigid air coming off of him. I didn't like it. It was uncomfortable. It was making my hands cold.

• 13:04Speaker 02

  I just took my hands out of his. As I broke away from him and I turned, just out of my peripheral vision for a second, I could still see them whirling around. And then I ran, and I never looked back. And I just ran, straight through glass doors.

• 13:23Speaker 02

  I don't know for sure who he was, but I can only imagine that it was Mr. Gere. I had a lovely time dancing with all these strange people because it made me feel like an adult. And I fell asleep very, very happy. I knew this wasn't a dream because I saw it more than once. I saw the other couples dancing several times after that night, but I never danced with Mr. Gere ever again because I didn't like his cold hands.

• 14:00Speaker 02

  My mother had a queen-size bed, and then my brother and I shared a twin bed.

• 14:07Speaker 02

  One night, there was a massive thunder and lightning storm. It woke my brother and I up. We got scared, and we jumped into bed with my mother.

• 14:20Speaker 02

  I fell asleep. I had a dream that I was in a small wooden house.

• 14:29Speaker 02

  There was something chasing me. All I could hear was the sound of very heavy footsteps following me.

• 14:37Speaker 02

  I ran into this room. I scamped on the bed. I saw a black boots came walking over to the bed. And they just stood there. I was almost holding my breath, and I was petrified. But then, the feet all of a sudden turned around, and they just walked out of the door.

• 15:00Speaker 02

  I figured, okay, it's safe. All of a sudden, just as I was about to slide out from the bed, the entire bed was just lifted and thrown in the air. Then, two hands were reaching down at me. That woke me up immediately.

• 15:22Speaker 02

  The minute I woke up, I was lying on my back. There was thunder and lightning, heavy rain, wind howling. The windows were open, just a little bit, but it was enough for there to be a breeze. I could feel the wind on my face. I could see my mother on my left side, sleeping. I could see my brother on my right. I looked up, directly above me. The first thing I saw was a figure floating against the ceiling. The first thing I saw was their shoes. The exact same shoes I were imagining, black boots.

• 16:06Speaker 02

  The pants were flapping from the wind.

• 16:10Speaker 02

  My eyes traveled to the face. It was a man. He had long, stringy gray hair. One half of his face looked as if it had been melted. It was just completely melted. It was very similar to burn victims. I had never, ever seen someone burnt to that degree. And on the other side, scowling, sneering. Very, very cruel smile. And the second that my eyes saw his face, this thing launched itself at me. And the two hands circled my neck.

• 16:51Speaker 02

  And just as it started to squeeze, I screamed as loud as I could, and he was gone.

• 17:00Speaker 02

  Immediately, my brother woke up, my mother jumped up. What, what, what's going on, what's going on? And I was screaming and screaming and screaming. And then I started crying and I would not stop. I was hysterical. I couldn't even speak for quite a few minutes because I just could not get the words out. All I had a chance was to tell her about there was something up there. There was a man up there and he rushed down and he put his hands around me and his face and, you know, but I was probably not making much sense.

• 17:29Speaker 02

  I knew it was not Mr. Gear because I knew what Mr. Gear looked like and he did not look like this man. And also, Mr. Gear had never tried to hurt me when we danced together.

• 17:43Speaker 02

  My mom had to be up early and she just didn't have time for it. So she was like, no, no, it's just a dream, it's just a dream, nonsense. I was really, really upset for a very long time that my mom didn't believe me.

• 17:58Speaker 02

  From that night onwards, I grew to hate the sound of wind howling. I was terrified of that house, especially when it got dark. I became so clingy. I had to be with somebody. And I never went to the bathroom once everybody was asleep. I always made sure I did what I had to do before I had to sleep.

• 18:25Speaker 03

  So how did you feel when you moved out of that house?

• 18:29Speaker 02

  Relieved. So happy, so happy, so happy to leave.

• 18:37Speaker 02

  Because I lived in a constant state of terror. But I still heard a voices calling. I still heard a voice calling my name. But I was never afraid of that.

• 18:49Speaker 03

  Um, have you ever been back to the Gearbox since then?

• 18:55Speaker 02

  Yes. My mother and I had to sing at or perform at a recital. And our pianist, he said that there's a beautiful grand piano and it's at the Gearbox. And we had understood years before that they had renovated the Gearbox into a music school. And so he said, I would like you all to come up there so that we can practice. And that was the first time in years that I had been back. But because I knew they had renovated it, I wasn't, I didn't feel anyway, completely renovated.

• 19:35Speaker 03

  And then what, what state is the gearbox in these days?

• 19:40Speaker 02

  It's probably buried under several feet of ash. Because that entire half of the island was completely destroyed and buried under several feet of ash because of the pyroclastic flows.

• 20:00Speaker 02

  So there is no trace of that house or anything around it.

• 20:06Speaker 02

  It's just rubble.

• 20:21Glynn Washington?

  Oh no, ghosts don't care about geography, we're sure. But somewhere down there, underneath all that volcanic ash, Mr. Gear is still dancing, waiting for his partner. Big thanks to Michelle for sharing her story. Michelle still lives in Montserrat and she's got plenty more to say about the freaky things she's seen. So if you're ever on the island, stop by as long as you're ready to be spooked.

• 20:52Glynn Washington?

  Original score for that piece was by Doug Stewart. It was produced by Anne Ford.

• 21:16Glynn Washington?

  Now, after a long slumber, when Snap returns, a mountain wakes up. Stay tuned.

• 21:43Speaker 04

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• 22:04Speaker 05

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• 22:19Glynn Washington?

  Welcome back to Snap Judgment, the awakening episode. Today, we're featuring stories from our sister podcast, Spooked.

• 22:32Glynn Washington?

  Now, for our next story, I want you to meet Adam. As a kid, Adam used to travel a lot to Puerto Rico to visit his family in Yalco, a town surrounded by mountains and jungles. And there, he would spend time with Papito, his great-grandfather. Everyone knew Papito in town. He was almost like the chief of the mountain. Everyone respected him, from his kids to his great-grandchildren, even the animals. Papito held all the knowledge of the Tainio people. He would always tell Adam that the mountain is aware of things. And that was something that Adam was about to find out for himself.

• 23:17Glynn Washington?

  Spooked.

• 23:38Speaker 06

  When I was about nine years old, I spent a whole lot of time in my papito's house, my great-grandfather's house.

• 23:48Speaker 06

  It sits on one of the many mountain tops of Yauco. It's on this little plateau that overlooks the cliff and the valley.

• 24:02Speaker 06

  And there's forest, forest, forest everywhere. It's like a jungle.

• 24:08Speaker 06

  It's very difficult to see a neighbor. The only other neighbors that were near were his brothers and sisters who owned their own houses on this big property in the mountains that was all owned by my great-grandfather.

• 24:25Speaker 06

  So, one day I go up to papito's house, which is a walk from my grandmother's house. I love to hang out there because he had a bunch of interesting, random farm equipment and tons of farm animals, cows and horses, goats. But nearby, there was an enormous bull. And I was deathly frightened by this bull because it was enormous. It was huge, so much larger than me, huge horns.

• 24:58Speaker 06

  So, I was hanging out and playing in the front of his house. And this big bull came nearer to me.

• 25:09Speaker 06

  So I go to my papito and say, "I'm scared of the bull, and it's coming close."

• 25:19Speaker 06

  He laughed because he saw this city kid being scared of the bull that no one pays any attention to. The bull was walking away from the house. And papito did this super powerful whistle.

• 25:40Speaker 06

  Like a, uh, 4th of July firework echoing through the mountains.

• 25:49Speaker 06

  And then the bull just stopped and started coming back towards us.

• 25:56Speaker 06

  That was really scary. This is the last thing I wanted. I was like pulling away from him, but he wouldn't let me go. And the bull is just lumbering over very slowly. And then he says, "No, no, no, no." That's all he said. He said, "No, no, no, no."

• 26:12Speaker 06

  And then he grabbed the bull by the horns and he lowered it down into the ground and made it like bow its head and put its horns towards the ground.

• 26:24Speaker 06

  And so he just grabbed me, picked me up, threw my leg over. The next thing I know, I'm riding on this enormous bull and holding on to the horns. And it was scary, but it was awesome and exciting. I felt much better because I saw that this thing did whatever he wanted it to do.

• 26:55Speaker 06

  One day, I'm in my madrina's house, which was at the top highest peak of all of the hills that we lived on.

• 27:03Speaker 06

  I'm playing with my sister and my cousins. My madrina, my godmother, was taking care of Papito at the time. He was in his late 90s and he had severe sort of dementia.

• 27:21Speaker 06

  Papito is laying in my madrina's room, in her bed.

• 27:26Speaker 06

  And as we play during the day, I start to get the sense that something is happening. Everybody is gathering at my madrina's house. And more and more people keep showing up. People from the town, uncles, aunts, and a priest shows up.

• 27:48Speaker 06

  I peeked into the room and the room was filled with people. Papito is laying in the bed. He looked very small and skinny and pale.

• 28:05Speaker 06

  He looked gray almost.

• 28:08Speaker 06

  I started to feel uncomfortable. I didn't know what was going on. But I knew that I didn't want to be around at that moment.

• 28:20Speaker 06

  So I go to my abuela and I tell her how I feel. She told me that I could go back to her house, that the sun is just starting to set. If I leave now, I can make it before the sun fully sets. And that I could wait for them to be finished what they were doing.

• 28:47Speaker 06

  So I leave my madrina's house and I start on the path to my grandmother's house.

• 28:54Speaker 06

  I can hear the sounds that are fading away from the house. And it sounds like crying.

• 29:05Speaker 06

  And I'm thinking, oh, okay. Whatever it is that I didn't want to be around for is happening right now.

• 29:17Speaker 06

  I'm entering the lower part of the mountains, the beginning of the valley and the forest. And I realized that it's much darker than I thought it was gonna be. There is just so many trees, vegetation, tangly vines.

• 29:36Speaker 06

  I get to my grandmother's driveway, which is a long little road.

• 29:42Speaker 06

  And as I get there, I heard somewhere nearby a very strange sound, an animal sound.

• 29:59Speaker 06

  The first thing I thought of was a cow, because there's cows everywhere.

• 30:07Speaker 06

  And then a moment later, it screamed in a way that I've never heard a living thing scream before.

• 30:19Speaker 06

  It was almost like a human wail coming from an animal.

• 30:26Speaker 06

  I get this cold tingle-iness throughout my whole body, goosebumps going up my neck.

• 30:37Speaker 06

  I immediately just started to run towards my grandmother's house.

• 30:44Speaker 06

  As soon as I start running, I hear another.

• 30:52Speaker 06

  And now I'm sure it's an animal. But it sounded like someone, a person, in pain.

• 31:03Speaker 06

  Then in the distance, a bunch of other animals start wailing.

• 31:10Speaker 06

  The pigs in the valley, the dogs that were randomly all over the mountainside, the cows and the horses and the bulls. Some of it sounded like it was the pigs near the slaughterhouse that were not even on our property.

• 31:26Speaker 06

  They were in agony, as if they were being killed.

• 31:33Speaker 06

  And then the night is just filled with these wails.

• 31:42Speaker 06

  It's an igniting of voices that keep coming out of the darkness because I can't see where they're coming from.

• 31:52Speaker 06

  And so I'm running, running, running to my grandmother's house. And this wailing seems like it's chasing me, like it sounds like it's right in the back of my head, trying to grab at my ankles.

• 32:10Speaker 06

  Once I get to the top of the hill, I'm panting like a madman.

• 32:15Speaker 06

  I pass through the gates of my grandmother's house, slipping and sliding, run up to her patio, grab the door, yank it open and slam the door shut.

• 32:29Speaker 06

  I'm all alone. The wailing is still going strong and it feels like it's completely surrounding my grandmother's house.

• 32:42Speaker 06

  I run into the room where I was sleeping and I lay on the cot. I just started praying.

• 32:52Speaker 06

  I just wanted the time to pass, to wait for my grandmother to come back.

• 33:00Speaker 06

  Eventually, the animal noises finally died down and shortly after that, my grandmother arrives.

• 33:13Speaker 06

  My grandmother comes up to me and asks me if I'm okay and I sort of stammer over my words. I told her that when I was coming back to the house, I heard the animals screaming. And my grandmother said, "Of course, they're screaming. Of course, they're upset." And I asked her, "Why are they so upset?" She said, "Because Papito died. Papito's gone now."

• 33:47Speaker 06

  At first, I'm confused. I didn't understand that. I said, "How could, how could they know that he died?"

• 33:55Speaker 06

  And my grandmother said that all of the animals know these things. They sense his spirit.

• 34:01Speaker 06

  Papito was like their father, their master, their protector, everything to them, their chief. They could feel him leaving. They were sad and scared, so of course, they know.

• 34:18Speaker 06

  That night, I was having a lot of trouble falling asleep. I was up thinking a bunch of things. How could animals know that Papito died?

• 34:34Speaker 06

  And I wondered, do animals have some sense that we don't have? Or do we have that sense?

• 34:59Glynn Washington?

  What happens next? What do you mean, what happens next? Only one way to find out. Stay tuned.

• 35:15Glynn Washington?

  Welcome back to Snap Judgment. My name is Tom Washington, and when we last left, the animals of the mountain were mourning Papito's death.

• 35:26Glynn Washington?

  Snap Judgment.

• 35:29Speaker 06

  That night, I was having a lot of trouble falling asleep. I was up thinking a bunch of things.

• 35:39Speaker 06

  How could animals know that Papito died?

• 35:44Speaker 06

  And I wondered, do animals have some sense that we don't have? Or do we have that sense?

• 35:55Speaker 06

  I was so restless that I got up, I opened up the main door very carefully and quietly, and then went outside into the night.

• 36:07Speaker 06

  There was a place in my grandmother's house that I really loved to go during the day. And it was in the rear of the house where there was a hammock hanging and there was just like a cliffside and it overlooked the valley.

• 36:22Speaker 06

  I went towards the edge of the cliff. I lay in the hammock in the darkness. I'm looking out over the valley, seeing the little bit of stars out there and just the blackness of the mountain. I hear the crickets and the coquis, the little frogs that make a very specific sound in Puerto Rico.

• 36:47Speaker 06

  And I hear an animal sound in the darkness.

• 36:58Speaker 06

  It wasn't a growl. It was more strange and scary than a growl. I don't know what it is, but it sounded scary and it was coming from the darkness in front of me.

• 37:14Speaker 06

  The animal makes this sound a second time.

• 37:19Speaker 06

  It was a strange hyena-like yipping excitement, but not a good excitement.

• 37:28Speaker 06

  It sounded very close and it sounds like something that wanted to hurt me.

• 37:36Speaker 06

  I'm frozen stiff. I can't move. I was just like a deer in headlights.

• 37:44Speaker 06

  The thought crossed my mind. Oh, my grandmother's gonna be so mad if I die. And immediately after, I hear

• 37:58Speaker 06

  this whistle like a firecracker in the darkness, in the valley.

• 38:07Speaker 06

  And that animal sound stopped.

• 38:14Speaker 06

  I'm feeling like I just got shocked by electricity. And I feel a sudden flush of relief.

• 38:25Speaker 06

  And in that moment, I knew, I knew it. I just somehow knew that Papito made that sound.

• 38:34Speaker 06

  Papito was there with me.

• 38:39Speaker 06

  Papito's spirit said goodbye to the animals and even stuck around long enough to protect me. And to say goodbye to me.

• 38:49Speaker 06

  I slowly get up and make my way into the house.

• 38:56Speaker 06

  And I'm thinking, there's something after death. I knew that death was something very, very powerful, very part of life. But Papito showed me that, that death is not the end of our energy.

• 39:32Glynn Washington?

  Thank you, Adam, for sharing your story with Spooked. That original score was by Doug Stewart. It was produced by Eric Yanez.

• 39:47Glynn Washington?

  Remember, if you dig Spooked storytelling, subscribe to the Spooked Podcast. Don't miss a moment. And to see Spooked in a whole new way, go to the Spooked YouTube. Be afraid.

• 40:09Glynn Washington?

  Okay, so Robbins, Rhode Island. Far away from the cobblestone touristy part.

• 40:18Glynn Washington?

  There sits a quiet building. Called Steer House.

• 40:24Glynn Washington?

  Nursing home, it's a hospice, and in this place lived a cat.

• 40:30Glynn Washington?

  Not a purring cuddle machine, no Instagram cutie, no. This cat is cold-blooded.

• 40:41Glynn Washington?

  Name's Oscar. Gray, white, fur, green eyes. Oscar doesn't care about sitting in your lap. Oscar doesn't chase toys. Oscar doesn't even want to be bothered with people much. Unless, and until, you are preparing for your final journey.

• 41:04Glynn Washington?

  And the first time this happens, no one really pays much attention. Oscar slips into the room of a woman who'd stopped speaking two days prior.

• 41:15Glynn Washington?

  Oscar jumps into her bed, and this cantankerous feline actually curls up at her side. And just wait.

• 41:27Glynn Washington?

  Hours tick by, and quiet as mist. The woman passes away.

• 41:34Glynn Washington?

  Your tendons think, "What a sweet moment." What a cosmic coincidence to have the cat as a comfort during her final moments.

• 41:44Glynn Washington?

  In another room, and another patient. Oscar disappears from his usual spot in the hallway, and somehow winds up curled in a ball besides this man. Oscar lies still, eyes half-shut, tail tucked.

• 42:01Glynn Washington?

  And this man too passes into the beyond.

• 42:08Glynn Washington?

  And another person, and another, and again another still. And by the time we arrive at the strange coincidence number 25, people aren't saying, "That's weird anymore." No. Instead, they say, "Call it a family."

• 42:28Glynn Washington?

  Oscar's on the bed. No heartbeat monitors, no vital sign crashes, just a feline signal that the end is nigh.

• 42:42Glynn Washington?

  And Dr. David Dosa, he sees this and he's trying to make sense of it. He's a man of science, but Oscar's, Oscar's thrown off his game plan.

• 42:51Glynn Washington?

  They start tracking him. Oscar, he's right over and over and over again, more than 100 times, more than 100 people, and not just patients in decline.

• 43:04Glynn Washington?

  Sometimes Oscar curls up before anything looks different, before the nurses even notice.

• 43:16Glynn Washington?

  Eventually, they stop questioning. Instead, they start trusting.

• 43:23Glynn Washington?

  Families say that when Oscar enters the room, something changes. It was eerie when daughter recalls.

• 43:32Glynn Washington?

  He gave us time to say everything we needed. Another man, his eyes wet, voice cracking, remembers, he wasn't there for us, he was there for her.

• 43:45Glynn Washington?

  But he helped us understand what was happening.

• 43:50Glynn Washington?

  Oscar didn't howl. Oscar didn't demand, didn't console. He witnessed, still a shadow, when the breath slowed and the room filled with that silence born of absence.

• 44:04Glynn Washington?

  And touched and moved. The good doctor wrote a book about what he saw called Making Rounds with Oscar.

• 44:12Glynn Washington?

  But how do you explain what happened? Is it a trick?

• 44:17Glynn Washington?

  A gift? A miracle? Instincts?

• 44:22Glynn Washington?

  I don't know. But of course, I tell you this story to ask a favor. Because if you have a knowledge of a non-human neighbor, it seems to have a special connection to the inexplicable. Maybe even that special non-human neighbor living in your house that you put food in their bowl twice a day. Well, I'd sure love to know about it. Why? Because, dear friends, there is nothing better than a spook story from a spooked listener. Spooked at SnapJudgment.org.

• 45:07Glynn Washington?

  Spooked is brought to you by the team that makes their own pet food for any animal in their care. Except for Mark Ristich, who always says, "If I can eat kibble, so can they." It's Davy Kim, Zoe Fergino, Ann Ford, Eric Yanez, Taylor Decott, Marissa Dodge, Miles Lassie, Doug Stewart, Elliot Lightfoot, Paulina Kriki, Juan Diego Baltrán, Sasha Wilson, Dan Yashinsky. And Team Snap, the union representative producers, artists, editors, engineers, are members of the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians, Communications Workers of America, AFL-CIO Local 50-1.

• 45:52Glynn Washington?

  The Spook theme song is by Pat Massey Miller. My name is Washington. They say that time is just an illusion. Well, it's a pretty good illusion, right? It's a pretty good trick. Because time is relentless. Everything time gives, time also snatches away. Nothing stays the same, even for a moment. The rules are harsh. Unforgiving only forward, never back. No appeals, no regard, no backdoor, no secret hatch. All the money in the world can't buy a fast pass off this ride, right? Right?

• 46:42Glynn Washington?

  Well, I wonder sometimes if what we experience is supernatural,

• 46:50Glynn Washington?

  is paranormal,

• 46:53Glynn Washington?

  is really just echoes

• 46:56Glynn Washington?

  of those that discovered an escape route. And those that decided that this moment was too important to abandon, and that part of them was going to stay right here no matter what time said about it.

• 47:12Glynn Washington?

  And what is our responsibility

• 47:16Glynn Washington?

  to those lost echoes left behind? I don't have a magic formula.

• 47:26Glynn Washington?

  The best I know to do

• 47:29Glynn Washington?

  is to never, ever,

• 47:33Glynn Washington?

  never, never, ever

• 47:36Glynn Washington?

  turn out

• 47:39Glynn Washington?

  the lights.