Something in the Wall is Sad | Your Urban Legends 121
/We’re beating the heat by giving ourselves chills with your urban legends! From taking a gap year to summon demons to offering the fae the most exotic snacks you can find, we think you’re going to walk away from this episode with more than your fair share of goosebumps!
Content Warning: This episode contains conversations about or mentions of colonization, military, death, and suicide (21:20 - 29:34).
Housekeeping
- Books: Check out our previous book recommendations, guests’ books, and more at spiritspodcast.com/books
- Call to Action: Send in those urban legend emails!
- Submit Your Urban Legends Audio: Call us! 617-420-2344
Find Us Online
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Cast & Crew
- Co-Hosts: Julia Schifini and Amanda McLoughlin
- Editor: Bren Frederick
- Music: Brandon Grugle, based on "Danger Storm" by Kevin MacLeod
- Artwork: Allyson Wakeman
- Multitude: multitude.productions
About Us
Spirits is a boozy podcast about mythology, legends, and folklore. Every episode, co-hosts Julia and Amanda mix a drink and discuss a new story or character from a wide range of places, eras, and cultures. Learn brand-new stories and enjoy retellings of your favorite myths, served over ice every week, on Spirits.
Transcript
[theme]
AMANDA: Welcome to Spirits Podcast, a boozy dive into mythology, legends, and folklore. Every week, we pour a drink and learn about a new story from around the world. I'm Amanda.
JULIA: And I'm Julia.
AMANDA: And today, we are doing our Hometown Urban Legends, Julia. It is the summertime. It is hot here in New York. And I don't know, I kind of want to, like, put my feet in the puddle of an open fire hydrant and whisper some ghost stories under the 9:00 p.m. sun.
JULIA: Ooh. Amanda, you know, there's something about summertime that, obviously, I love. I prefer being warm to cold. That's just a given for me and my personal life.
AMANDA: It's important in friendships to really, like, not let the sort of cross temperature the nature of it stand in your way.
JULIA: Yeah. Exactly. However, one of the things that I love doing during the summer season is I love going to see movies in the air conditioning.
AMANDA: Yes. Me, too.
JULIA: I feel like this is gonna be a really good summer for horror movies.
AMANDA: Tell me.
JULIA: I am hoping to go see Backrooms this weekend. Jake and I went to go see Obsession last week, and oh, my God, so good. So freaking good.
AMANDA: Yay.
JULIA: Like genuinely one of the better horror movies I've seen in a long time.
AMANDA: Wow.
JULIA: And then a couple of weeks ago, we went to go see Hokum, which was very spirits coded. It's all about like, you know, sort of Irish folklore-y sort of stuff going on.
AMANDA: I love that so much. I am excited to also try and do more movies this summer. I'm not joking, Julia, when I said that one of the emails that we got over these past couple weeks reminded me of genuine nightmares that I had in high school. So can I kick you off with this one? Because I'm just saying we need some— we need like black swan for stage managers. I'm standing behind that shit.
JULIA: Okay, explain to me what you mean by black swan for stage managers.
AMANDA: Let's get into Savannah's [2:18] story. Savannah, they/she writes, "The two times our theater ghost got pissed off, and the one time she hugged me."
JULIA: All right, let's do it.
AMANDA: "Hey, Spirits crew, I've been binge listening to your Hometown Urban Legends episode. And as a fellow former theater kid, I figured I would add to the cache of theater ghost stories. I have three to share here. For some background, I grew up in Pleasant Grove, Utah, and our high school is a hodgepodge of new additions and really old sections to the building."
JULIA: Pleasant Grove, Utah does sound like a town name that someone made up for a Buffy, The Vampire Slayer-esque TV show.
AMANDA: Exactly. Or a horror movie where we're about to get something really upsetting.
JULIA: A hundred percent.
AMANDA: "Underneath the school, we still have concrete bunkers added in the '50s due to Cold War."
JULIA: Our high school did too, so shout out.
AMANDA: Yes, we did. Oh, is that what the asbestos room was?
JULIA: Oh, yeah.
AMANDA: Oh, I didn't know that.
JULIA: Yeah.
AMANDA: I just thought it was the asbestos room.
JULIA: No, those were originally supposed to be bunkers.
AMANDA: No shit. Oh, I'm putting it all together now.
JULIA: Yeah.
AMANDA: Oh, creepy. "Well, our theater lies in the old part of the school. The last remodel that section had was in the '70s. And like every other theater, we had a theater ghost. Ours named Vera." [3:26]
JULIA: Ooh.
AMANDA: "I can't remember her original story, but it's not super relevant to our purposes here today. It is important to add that I'm quite skeptical of the supernatural and paranormal, but I'm superstitious for just in case reasons, like a lot of theater people, I think."
JULIA: Yeah.
AMANDA: "I'm very iffy at the idea of ghosts, with the exception of Vera."
JULIA: Hmm.
AMANDA: "The first story happened in my sophomore year, and I get the story somewhat secondhand. It was the opening night of our school's production of Merrily We Roll Along."
JULIA: Hmm, an interesting high school production choice.
AMANDA: Julia, that is the craziest shit I have ever heard in my life.
JULIA: And such a small cast too. Like it's really saying, "Fuck you," except for five other people in the school.
AMANDA: Genuinely.
JULIA: Everyone else, "You know what? Try again next year. Too bad, seniors."
AMANDA: "You can be in the background doing like a '60s dance and then later a '70s dance to show that time is passing." Absolutely wild. No one has ever staged a successful adaptation of Merrily We Roll Along. So I don't know why a high school would be like, "Put me in, coach."
JULIA: Yep.
AMANDA: To be fair, we did The Threepenny Opera, so that's also crazy.
JULIA: It was insane. What a choice.
AMANDA: "Anyway, I was not in this production."
JULIA: 'Cause there's only five characters.
AMANDA: "But came to the show to show my support on opening night, of course. The show was supposed to start at 7:00 p.m. but didn't start 'til 7:30."
JULIA: Unacceptable. 7:08 latest.
AMANDA: Under Amanda McLoughlin's on tour company circa 2006 to 2010. Never. "Well, the reason why the show was so delayed is that none of the lighting was working."
JULIA: Uh-oh. I thought you were gonna say, "None of the actors showed up."
AMANDA: That is a stage manager problem.
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: The lighting would be also an Amanda problem, but you see why this is my specific nightmare.
JULIA: I can see.
AMANDA: "In the first act of the show, they decided to perform without the lighting cues, and instead, just the overhead auditorium lights on until after intermission when they troubleshot again and the regular stage lighting decided to finally mysteriously work."
JULIA: That's certainly a choice.
AMANDA: Bold. "We, of course, blamed this outage on Vera, though no one really thought much of it. It was a very old theater and our lights were older than any of us."
JULIA: I think you then have to ask the question though is, what did you do to Vera to upset her so much? Does she have a problem with Steven Sondheim? What's going on here?
AMANDA: Julia, excellent question. One that Savannah is about to get into.
JULIA: Excellent.
AMANDA: "Later, I learned that one of my classmates in the show, let's call him Z."
JULIA: That's a boy named Zack.
AMANDA: Or Zeke, maybe. We are talking about Utah.
JULIA: Maybe.
AMANDA: "Decided it was a good idea to tell his friends and other members of the cast that Vera wasn't real. And if she was, he asked her to mess with something."
JULIA: Silly. Bad.
AMANDA: "Why he would do this on opening night, I have no fucking clue."
JULIA: Yeah.
AMANDA: "But from then on, all Vera skepticism was discouraged as to make sure we didn't have any more technical difficulties."
JULIA: Understandable.
AMANDA: I would say that the reason why certainly this man named Zack did this is because he's an actor and not a technician.
JULIA: Yep.
AMANDA: "Next story, slightly more spooky. I can't remember if this is my junior or senior year, but as a fundraiser, the school decided to, without any input from the theater teacher/director, raise money by having students pay five dollars to stay in the auditorium with the lights off for five or 10 minutes. And if they stayed the whole time, they got a reward of some kind."
JULIA: Okay.
AMANDA: What in the small budget horror house is this?
JULIA: There's nothing even going on. It's just like sit in a room in the dark for 10 minutes.
AMANDA: "Well, Julia, to add to the scare factor, one of the administrators decided to add a creepy mannequin of Vera with some green string lights to freak out the students."
JULIA: I think it's a bold move that the administrators also know about the ghost.
AMANDA: Yes, I agree. At no point did they say, "Hey, can we do this? Can we use your space? Would this mess up your life?" I— this would piss me the fuck off.
JULIA: That's fucked up.
AMANDA: "Well, Vera was pissed the fuck off. For the next two weeks after the fundraiser, our auditorium acted up. Things fell from our catwalk, despite being secured with safety cables. Lights randomly turned on and off. We checked the breakers and nothing had flipped. Our giant steel cabinet that held our tools, nicknamed Hank the Tank, fell over, sending drill bits, nuts, bolts, and the like tumbling from it, despite nobody being close to it and it never having moved."
JULIA: Wild.
AMANDA: "There were several close calls where things had a Final Destination style coming apart."
JULIA: Uh-oh.
AMANDA: "I'm glad no one was injured, but I'm gonna tell you, it was an intense two weeks. For the rest of my high school career, there was never another time when there were that many mishaps all at once. I have a feeling Vera didn't like to be disrespected. It very much felt like she was the sideshow or gimmick, and I think it's very understandable to be pissed off in that situation."
JULIA: Yeah. I wouldn't want people mocking my ghost if I was haunting a high school theater. And as we know, high schoolers, incredibly mean.
AMANDA: Incredibly mean. And if I were theater ghosts, I appreciate it because the space is empty much of the day, and then you have—
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: —a little burst of activity you can look forward to, and then you have your solitude. I can't think of anything worse than a bunch of mouth-breathing 16-year-olds cycling in and out, being like [laughs] and laughing at some mannequin that's supposed to be me.
JULIA: You're so right.
AMANDA: "This is my last and most wholesome story. Takes place my senior year. Remember how I mentioned those bunkers? Well, this takes place in one of them. This section was now used for storage, for set pieces and props that were not in use. And included in this horde is a plastic, white unicorn that one would typically find attached to a carousel."
JULIA: Oh.
AMANDA: "Our terrifying Milky White from Into the Woods."
JULIA: Yep, of course, naturally.
AMANDA: "There was also the horn chandelier from Beauty and the Beast. Basically, if it was a big or expensive or one off set piece from the last 15 years, that bad boy was in the bunker."
JULIA: Well, that was like our pit. That makes sense.
AMANDA: Uh-hmm. "We were pulling props from this basement area, and I was the last person in the room. Now, this place was already cold, given it was concrete and underground, but as I was milling around, picking up the last things that I needed before heading out and locking up, I felt the room get noticeably colder and a presence come right next to me. I thought I heard movement, so I called out to see if anyone else was coming down, but no one answered. It felt like someone was standing right next to me. And then for a couple of seconds, I was completely enveloped by this cold, humid presence."
JULIA: Ooh, humid makes it a lot— cold than humid is— hmm, don't like that.
AMANDA: "Now remember, this is Utah, so if it was airflow from an unseen vent or from the stairs or something, it would have been dry air, not humid. I was thoroughly freaked out and walked toward the stairs where the space was significantly warmer than where I'd been standing just a few steps away. To this day, I'm a firm believer it was Vera just saying hi. I was shaken because of the surprise, but there were no bad feelings or vibes. It honestly felt like a very cold hug. I'm not sure if Vera's name is Vera or what their story is, but I'm sure that there is very much a presence in our theater, and all she wants is respect and acknowledgement, which I mean, who doesn't?"
JULIA: Word.
AMANDA: "Now, am I sold on ghosts? Not entirely. But there are one too many things that happened during my high school theater career that could not be explained by it being a 65-year-old space. That's all for my stories, but I might check in with my friends to see if they have any tales to add on to the Vera canon. Stay creepy, stay cool. Savannah."
JULIA: Now, Amanda, I'm curious if you think that depending on your location, ghostly presences are just sort of the opposite of what you're experiencing.
AMANDA: Interesting.
JULIA: So, like for example, if you had a ghost in Florida that was gonna give you a ghostly embrace, do you think that would feel like dry coolness as opposed to Utah where it's naturally dry so the hug felt humid?
AMANDA: It's a really good question. My instinct is that it's noticeable because it stands out. If, for example, you're in, like, a drafty, cool room and you get, like, a drafty chill, maybe it is a ghost, but you wouldn't necessarily notice it because it's not that different from the environment around you.
JULIA: Right.
AMANDA: I associate death with a lack of humidity. Like we are— you know, we're spirits or we are, I don't know, like kind of, like, shadows of our former selves. And I don't think of shadows as humid, but I don't know, maybe Vera, like, really manifested to make sure that she was like, "Hey, got a person over here."
JULIA: Gold and humid makes me think of like a misty presence, you know what I mean? So maybe that's what I was kind of picturing there.
AMANDA: I love it. But, you know, if there are any ghosts in Florida that, like, repel the external humidity by just creating a little vacuum, I think that's cool.
JULIA: Now, Amanda, we were in Utah. Do you want to go to pretty much the other side of the world?
AMANDA: Yes, please.
JULIA: So this is from Kay [12:30] from Adelaide, Australia, she/her.
AMANDA: Hey.
JULIA: Titled, "I Was a Creepy Kid, and we named my ghost Henrietta."
AMANDA: Cool.
JULIA: So our through line for this one, Vera, kind of an old lady name. Henrietta, also kind of an old lady name.
AMANDA: Let's go.
JULIA: "Hello, Spirits. I saw your call out for more Urban Legends, so I thought it was time that I told you about being a bit creepy as a kid, and my ghost, Henrietta. Firstly, the creepy stuff. At least once when I was a child, mom and dad would check on me while I was sleeping, and I would sit up, eyes open, and well, I guess you could say that I spoke to them in tongues. It was fluent, and when they asked me questions, I confidently replied in whatever language I was speaking."
AMANDA: Oh.
JULIA: "Now, my family has been white-ass fuck Aussies for generations. So it's not like I picked up another language from hanging out with grandparents or anything like that. Mum also swears that I once saw her aura and I was like, 'Hey, what's that yellow glow around you?' I haven't seen one since, so maybe it was just backlighting from the window. Who knows?"
AMANDA: Creepy as fuck, confirmed.
JULIA: "But Henrietta. My dad built our house in the '80s on the outskirts of our regional South Australian town. While the indigenous Barngarla people lived on and cared for this land for tens of thousands of years, there is no colonial history in this part of town that would make sense for us to have a ghost that fits this story."
AMANDA: Hmm.
JULIA: Now, I'm gonna tell you something that's gonna make you really excited, Amanda, which is the line, "We had a sunken lounge room with some of the couches visible from the passageway that led to the bedrooms."
AMANDA: Let's fucking go. Love a conversation pit.
JULIA: Amanda loves a conversation pit. A sunken lounge room is also a great way to describe that. Makes me think of Atlantis. I don't know why.
AMANDA: It does. It does. Also, just like the British colonial sort of tendency to call like a den a lounge, I think is j just makes me laugh and think of flappers. And a den makes me think of, like, bears and beavers, you know, just kind of, like, nestling in for the night. So it— I'm like, "Ooh, a lounge. We're fancy."
JULIA: Ooh. She continues. "One day, I was walking down from my room and I swore I could see feet as though someone was sitting on the partially obscured couch. They wore white socks with black, clog-like shoes. I tried not to think about it too much. I had just watched Ghost Ship," which is I will say a terrible movie, but has one of the most traumatizing openings to any horror movie that I've ever seen. So shout out to the people who know about the opening for Ghost Ship. It's wild.
AMANDA: Respectfully, Julia, I don't wanna know.
JULIA: Sorry. I had just watched Ghost Ship as part of my post Lord of the Rings obsession with watching everything else that the cast was in. And God, Karl Urban is great.
AMANDA: You know, Julia, I also have been through my Karl Urban phase. I was a— an early stan of the 2009 Star Trek movie and—
JULIA: And no other version of Star Trek, just that version of Star Trek?
AMANDA: Not yet. I mean it's waiting for me. But Karl Urban's filmography to that point—
JULIA: Not a lot going on in there.
AMANDA: Not a lot great in there.
JULIA: So Karl Urban, great. "But then a lot of weird shit kept happening. My dad, ever the pragmatic fisherman by trade, was in the lounge and goes, 'Ooh, I just felt a bit of a cold flutter."
AMANDA: Oh.
JULIA: "Soon after, we were watching a movie and a bunch of dishes piled up on the sink to dry in the neighboring kitchen all of a sudden moved suddenly, startling us, even though no one had been out of the kitchen in nearly two hours."
AMANDA: And when you make the, like, very— you know, medium stakes Jenga—
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: —of stacking your dishes to dry in a drying rack, like if they're gonna move, they're gonna move as you put them down and as they're wet. They get more stable as they sit. So that would also freak me out.
JULIA: She continues, though, "All explainable enough, I guess. But the one thing that really gets me was sitting on a couch, facing the passageway, watching TV." I also hate that you're calling a hallway a passageway, like that feels so haunted to me in a way I can't really describe.
AMANDA: It feels like we're in a ghost ship.
JULIA: "Sitting on the couch, facing the passageway, watching TV, and the passage suddenly goes dark."
AMANDA: Oh.
JULIA: "I went to suss out what happened. Apparently, I'm #TeamInvestigate. And a light bulb had fallen out of the fixture."
AMANDA: Okay, that's not typically one of the ways that a light bulb breaks.
JULIA: So she goes, "What? How does that even happen? It was a bayonet light bulb, the kind that needs to be turned and clicked into place. So I am completely stumped how that could just fall out with no one nearby. So we just blamed the ghost that I saw. Now, when we were telling my auntie all about this, she said, 'Well, the ghost needs a name. How about Henrietta?' And it stuck."
AMANDA: I vibe with this aunt. I vibe with this aunt.
JULIA: "I've moved several times, but whenever anything weird happens around me, I say a friendly, 'Hi, Henrietta,' and just go about my day. Love your work. Stay creepy, stay cool. Kay."
AMANDA: Now, Julia, do you think that Kay is sort of, like, inviting Henrietta to follow her? Because even if Henrietta isn't necessarily the cause of these new happenstance, Kay is sort of, like, welcoming her and invoking her. Or do you think that Henrietta is following and whether or not she's there, it's okay to say hi?
JULIA: I think the latter. I think mostly— it's sometimes helpful to just, like, have something you can blame spooky happenstances on, where it's just like with my weird house stuff, we know we can blame the former—
AMANDA: Gary Yellow. [18:20]
JULIA: Gary Yellow. We know we can blame the former owners, right? So, like, having like weird spooky stuff happen, you can just kind of blame the ghost that you remember from childhood, you know?
AMANDA: And worst-case scenario, it's a bunch of happenstance and that's fine. Or maybe you're like, I don't know, assigning a name and some, like, fondness to a ghost that would otherwise be a little more confrontational. And so they're like, "Oh. Okay, I guess we're friends. Sure."
JULIA: Yeah. No, this makes the ghost perhaps feel, you know, recognized and loved, named and loved.
AMANDA: And isn't that what we all want?
JULIA: Yeah. We all want to be perceived and loved, for sure.
AMANDA: Well, Julia, I think that I'm going to pop into the kitchen and grab us some refills. If any dishes fall, blame Henrietta, not me, okay?
JULIA: Okay.
AMANDA: We'll be right back.
[theme]
AMANDA: Hey, everybody, it's Amanda, and welcome to the refill where folks we are planning something very special. Okay? This is our 10-year anniversary year. Episode 500 is coming up, all right? We're just a few away by now. And we would like, for no particular reason, for you to make sure that if you are a patron of Spirits, if you're a paying patron, make sure your address is on your account, okay? If you're not comfortable, you don't have to, but if you look , you know, you want to get something in the mail, if you want to be excited, if you want to just get a little thank you from Team Spirits, go on into your Patreon account and make sure that your mailing address is up to date. And hey, if you are not currently a patron of Spirits, July would be a great month to become a patron of Spirits, okay? Go on over to patreon.com/spiritspodcast where you can join the likes of Abby English. What a good name, who is our newest paying supporter. Thank you. Abby joins the ranks of folks like our supporting producers, Uhleeseeuh, Hannah, Scott, Anne, Matthew, Lily, and Wil. And our legends, our legends, our legends, our legend-level patrons, Captain Jonathan MAL-uh-kye Cosmos, Audra, Sarah, Bea Me Up Scotty, Morgan, Rikoelike, Chibi Yokai, and Smolive. Lots going on over at Multitude. I have really been enjoying Tiny Matters recently. They had a very moving episode recently about the Space Flight Challenger. And what went on behind that, talking to some of the folks who knew the team really well. And this is a show about how science shapes our lives. Even— and maybe especially if you don't think of yourself as a science person. A lot of the influence of how science affects your everyday life can be hard to understand. But Deboki Chakravarti and Sam Jones make it incredibly easy. These are scientists who are now hosts of this podcast, telling us about how the messiness and awe and significance of science affects stuff like how IVF was invented, if humans will ever live on Mars, no, they won't. If smallpox is the only human infectious disease we have eradicated, and why? Go on over to Tiny Matters in your podcast app and listen. They are fabulous. New episodes every Wednesday. A great chaser for Spirits.
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PAYNE: They told us it was a weather blip, just a glitch. It was a drone. Now it's just AI, I guess. The explanation keeps changing, but the stories don't go away.
SPEAKER 11: Videos appearing to show UFO is flying through the air are real.
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[theme]
JULIA: Amanda, we are back, and what has been your drink of choice lately? What you been drinking, girl?
AMANDA: I have been continuing my habit of having weed and then drinking just a normal seltzer, and it feels like I'm on a roller coaster. But I recently got, like, THC drops that you can actually put into a civilian beverage and turn it into a THC beverage. So I have been taking a page out of your book, Julia, and adding some herbs to my—
JULIA: Ooh.
AMANDA: —seltzer. I'll muddle them a little bit. I had some strawberry and some basil recently, and I just muddle that up in the glass, put some ice in there, and then pour some, you know, Trader Joe seltzer over the top, and so refreshing.
JULIA: This is the time of year where a lot of, like, fruit tends to be on sale because they're just trying to churn through it, especially like berries and stuff. And a lot of times, we'll, like, have people over and they will bring a fruit salad that, like, barely gets touched, right?
AMANDA: Hmm.
JULIA: But hey, you know what you can use almost rotten fruit for? Simple syrup, baby.
AMANDA: Oh, yeah.
JULIA: So I've been doing a lot of, like, simple syrup, like fruit simple syrup-flavored margaritas. That has been my drink of choice.
AMANDA: Very cool.
JULIA: It's good.
AMANDA: I actually have some strawberries that are a little bit off in the fridge right now, so I might do that tonight.
JULIA: It's also great for— if you're not gonna have it with cocktails, I add a little bit of that simple syrup to my cold brew in the mornings and that is a real winner.
AMANDA: Yes, you do. God, you're so smart.
JULIA: Hey, listen, it's better than having to buy those like big flavored simple syrups like they have at most of the coffee shops.
AMANDA: Julia, I'm going to bring us back with an email from Jesse, she/her, titled, "What Can Scare a Drill Sergeant and Singing Soldiers?"
JULIA: Uh-oh.
AMANDA: This email does mention suicide, so we will put a timestamp in the description if you prefer to skip this story and go on to the next. Jesse writes, "Hey, Spirits, this is actually my second time writing into the podcast. The first time you read my story about working night shift alone in a funeral home with my sweet dog Ballad."
JULIA: Yep.
AMANDA: Remember this? I loved this story.
JULIA: It's so good.
AMANDA: And a disappointing question mark, lack of ghosts. "I also promised to tell you the stories of the haunted AF military posts that I became familiar with during my time in service."
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: "That was about five years ago. My life has changed a lot. Ballad has passed. I have a kid now, and I've gotten as far away from the army as I possibly could."
JULIA: Oh, no, congratulations, and excellent.
AMANDA: I'm proud of you here.
JULIA: Yep.
AMANDA: "I came back to tell some of these stories anyway, because something good has to have come out of that time in my life."
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: "So these encounters started when my career did. On my very first night of guard duty, on my very first night of basic training at Fort Jackson, South Carolina in late 2020. Lights were off and new trainees were in their bunk sleeping or crying. We all tackle challenges in our own way. I wandered quietly between bunks, scanning the room with my red flashlight. No white lights while on guard duty." And Julia, I'm certain this is because of, like, how your eyes adjust to the dark, but God, what a creepy fucking thing.
JULIA: Yeah, like you don't wanna wake anyone up when you're kind of, like, going through the bunks and everything. Totally makes sense to me.
AMANDA: Precisely.
JULIA: Horror movie shit.
AMANDA: "It was me and my red flashlight, listening to sniffles, deep breathing, and some nervous whispers in the dark. And then a distant but very clear cry cut through the noise. I froze, my red light illuminating nothing. It wasn't just me. The silence that now owned the room told me everyone awake had heard it, and they were all waiting for the same confirmation I was. And we got it when a second wail sounded. Now, I crept alone into the latrine. I apologize to Team Ignorance. I was once a young and motivated soldier, but no worries, all of that's behind me now."
JULIA: Hey, girl, Team Investigate, I'd love to see it.
AMANDA: "Let me set the scene. These barracks, like everything in the south, are old. The latrine looked a lot like our sleeping quarters with faded cracked linoleum and yellow paint chipping off metal features. Chernobyl chic. The mirror over the broken sinks, which was barely clinging to the walls, was speckled with black, and I stared at myself in it when the third cry called out. It was soft and loud at the same time, full of grief, you could just tell, and certainly came from inside the bathroom walls."
JULIA: Oh. Okay. My initial thought was like, "Well, you're in South Carolina. There is a lot of, like, woods in that area, for sure. And there are a lot of animals that in the night make sounds that sound like crying people."
AMANDA: Owls for one, and—
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: —many others.
JULIA: But in the wall. I mean, could be like, I don't know, a raccoon got in there or something, but, uh—
AMANDA: "You can't really press things further than a concrete wall. So faced with options like bringing our concerns to our drill sergeants, again, this is night one of basic training. We made the only logical decision and shut the hell up about it."
JULIA: Uh-huh.
AMANDA: "Almost every night, four weeks."
JULIA: For weeks? What?
AMANDA: "While we heard the wails and they shut us in, even when the moaning started in the classroom down the hall."
JULIA: Not the moaning!
AMANDA: "We said nothing until the night that two guards left their post and a drill sergeant found them uneasy and trembling, explaining they were too creeped out to stay in that room."
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: "Now, this was a serious offense, right? They abandoned their post. So I didn't actually expect them to survive their jobs. But instead of losing his shit and turning on all of the lights, screaming, tossing our beds and belongings, the drill sergeant just brought them back."
JULIA: That drill sergeant went through the same shit, calling it now.
AMANDA: I'm certain.
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: "'Trainees,' another drill sergeant was telling us days later as we failed to focus in the classroom because something in the wall was sad, 'It's okay. It's just Thomas. And he scares us, too.'"
JULIA: Oh, no. Oh, no, sir.
AMANDA: "'Thomas,' she explained, 'had been here longer than she had, and all the cadre knew him.'"
JULIA: Oh, God.
AMANDA: "'His presence was heavy, and even veteran NCOs with all their combat patches have, 'Fuck that. Out of there,' when they've heard his footsteps following them up the stairs.'"
JULIA: No, there's footsteps that follow you, too. It's not just sad moaning?
AMANDA: "'We think it's Thomas anyway,' she continued. I was told all of this started six years ago when he died as a trainee the day before graduation, but I can't confirm that it's true."
JULIA: Great.
AMANDA: "But I can. See, I was from the area. This fort was in my hometown."
JULIA: Oh, shit.
AMANDA: "So I remembered the story in the news from so many years ago. Sadly, Thomas, whose name I have changed out of respect, was a real person who died by suicide as soon as he completed training and apparently, never left."
JULIA: Oof.
AMANDA: "I spoke up a little trepidatiously and assured my drill sergeant that it was true. And it's the only time I feel like I ever made a drill sergeant as nervous as they made me."
JULIA: Uh-oh.
AMANDA: "Thomas wasn't the only ghost in the barracks. And I guess they all love to fuck with guard duty. I was making my rounds at 2:00 a.m. when someone started singing a cadence, AKA a marching song, to me. Totally normal to catch someone awake and crying at 2:00 a.m., of course, but ain't nobody staying up to sing."
JULIA: Nope.
AMANDA: "I looked for the source, checked every bunk, but I, and probably Thomas, were the only ones awake. This deep into basic training, a haunting was barely noteworthy, so I didn't even trouble anymore with it until a few days later when we were rushing to get dressed in the morning, and the guard from the previous night's 2:00 a.m. shift said, 'Oh, did anyone else hear that girl singing cadences?'"
JULIA: Uh-oh.
AMANDA: "The cadence, if you were wondering, was about leaving behind a lover."
JULIA: Oh, shit.
AMANDA: Fascinating.
JULIA: When it becomes so commonplace, I feel like at that point you're like, "Oh, we're mixing it up. It's not crying or screaming or moaning this time. I actually kinda like a song, even if it is a spooky sad one."
AMANDA: Fascinating. I can get behind it.
JULIA: Yeah. There we go.
AMANDA: I can get behind it. I had to stay up right now. Julia, it's not quite done. All right, one more story here. "To bring this account of Fort Jackson full circle, years later, right before separating from military service, I myself was the cadre of a basic training unit. Cadre pull guard duty two with a list of tasks that must be dealt with throughout the night. Not on the list, but always my favorite, was to walk into the bottom of the echoey stairwell that opened up into all four halls of sleeping quarters, take a deep breath, and let out a series of the loudest, most blood-curdling, gut-wrenching, nightmarish screams that I could possibly produce. Then go right back to sitting with my feet up, ready to respond to any panicked calls on the walkie with a, 'I don't know, trainee, go back to bed and hope it doesn't get you.'"
JULIA: Oh, no. Were they doing that to them the whole time?
AMANDA: "I asked every cycle of trainees I ever had if they thought the barracks was haunted, and every single one said yes.
JULIA: Oh.
AMANDA: "I know that at least some of the time, but I don't think all, I was the one doing the haunting. That's all for now. Thank you for listening. Those aren't all the spooky Fort Jackson experiences I can tell you about, but who has the time?"
JULIA: Who has the time?
AMANDA: "Let me know if you want to hear about the ghost in the road or any of the haunted forests in Georgia, or maybe the specifically bad ghosts of Fort Gregg-Adams. Stay safe, stay spooky, and take care of yourselves 'cause the government ain't. Jesse."
JULIA: Girl, I wanna hear all of them.
AMANDA: I am very glad that you made it past your military service, and I'm glad that something good can come out of that by giving us some spooky-ass stories.
JULIA: Well, Amanda, speaking of spooky-ass stories, I noticed looking at our inbox here that you have a email from Milo. [33:31] I also have an email from Milo. Do you want to read both of them?
AMANDA: We can have the promise of a two-parter completed all in one episode?
JULIA: I know, right?
AMANDA: Oh, my God, I love it. Yes, please.
JULIA: Okay, you first.
AMANDA: This first one is from Milo, they/them in April, and it is titled, "Weird Demon/Ghost at School." Milo says, "Hey, Spirits team, I'm a person from Norway who has been listening to you for at least six years now. I've been thinking about writing in with one of my stories and haven't been able to decide if it was real or not quite worth writing in. But I was just at the place where the stories are from and got reminded of the experience. So here goes. Some important info. Here in Norway, we have something called the Folkhögskola or People College. It's basically a gap year to figure out what you want to be doing. I went to one from 2023 to 2024 and had a lot of stuff happen while there that I've never really been able to explain. First, the week I was there, I always felt like someone was watching me while I was in the living room of the dorms. It took a couple weeks of me ignoring it and going to bed right before 3:00 a.m. for me to figure out what it was. One weekend, almost a month in living there, I was sitting and talking with some friends when suddenly a hand came out from under the sofa and reached right for my ankle."
JULIA: Uh-oh.
AMANDA: "I, of course, freaked out, ran to my room, hid there for the rest of the night."
JULIA: You were hanging out with someone. What did they react?
AMANDA: Nope. Milo noped out of there.
JULIA: Milo said, "Nah, don't care. You're— I'm leaving you alone with the hand."
AMANDA: "I later talked to a different friend that went to the same school a couple years before me to totally understand what it was that I'd seen."
JULIA: Oh, shit.
AMANDA: "And they said that it was most likely the demon that one of his classmates had summoned—"
JULIA: What?
AMANDA: "—without closing the summoning circle directly afterward."
JULIA: What's going on in Norway?
AMANDA: Norway, love that you have an institution for people to, like, take gap years while staying in, like, a structured sort of college, figuring out what they want to do.
JULIA: Listen, I also don't think that during that gap year though you should be spending that time summoning demons.
AMANDA: I agree.
JULIA: Hot take.
AMANDA: Milo continues, "I think Bob, as I called him—"
JULIA: Uh-oh.
AMANDA: "—just wanted to say hi and not get ignored anymore, considering he never did that again. But we still blamed him for stealing all the snacks that we lost on the floor and glared at me whenever I was the one who had to clean out under the sofa."
JULIA: Uh-uh.
AMANDA: I assume, Milo, that you sort of felt the glare more than you saw it. I should hope that you were not just, like, locking eyes with a demon every time you clean under the sofa.
JULIA: We'll see when we get to my email.
AMANDA: "Well, I have a couple other stories from that same school and my friend has a possession story that I'm happy to tell you some other time."
JULIA: Well, luckily, they immediately did. Or at least a month later.
AMANDA: Yay!
JULIA: Because this email is from May 31st of this year.
AMANDA: Ooh, hot and fresh.
JULIA: So this is Hauntings and Demons in Norwegian Nerd School.
AMANDA: There we go.
JULIA: "I said I had more stories in my last email, so here is the one from my friend. At that school that we both went to, they have an old blacksmithing building at the edge of the property."
AMANDA: Whoa!
JULIA: That sounds pretty cool, actually.
AMANDA: Cool.
JULIA: "The building is really old and has some stuff from World War II and even before that. It is a really cool place to take pictures, so that's why he was in the building where he found a really cool-looking key that he took with him."
AMANDA: Oh. Now, respectfully, Milo, your friend fucked up, okay?
JULIA: "Later that night, he saw two floating red lights, almost like eyes, that were looking at him. Now, there was nothing there that could have made those lights or, like, reflected them. The day after that, it was like he was being followed by someone or something the whole time, and he was getting annoyed for no reason. Many people, at a later date, said that he was not acting fully like himself, but after a day, it seemed like he was back to normal. But the feeling of being followed kept him from getting rid of the key until two years later."
AMANDA: Oh, my God.
JULIA: That's too long.
AMANDA: And also, I'm pretty sure this is a one-year college program. So it— like you graduated, left it another year and then came back?
JULIA: Yes. Milo also says, "Way too late if you ask me."
AMANDA: Yeah.
JULIA: I agree, Milo. You're—
AMANDA: Yeah. Milo, we're not blaming you. You're doing fine.
JULIA: "The way that he got rid of the key was he and some friends drove it to an abandoned house and left it there in a protection jar."
AMANDA: Okay. I think this is worse.
JULIA: Uh-huh.
AMANDA: Because instead of taking a key from a location where clearly there was some kind of like stasis, everyone was in balance, everything was fine. You bring it somewhere new.
JULIA: Secondary location now.
AMANDA: Exactly.
JULIA: Or tertiary location even.
AMANDA: Yes! And then you leave it in a protection jar, so whoever needs it on the spiritual plane can't even get to it.
JULIA: Yeah.
AMANDA: This is taunting, not just haunting.
JULIA: "So the day after they did that, the car that they used to drive to the abandoned house broke down and no one could fix it."
AMANDA: Oh, shit.
JULIA: "He also took some photos there that at later dates have now since gone blurry or have something in them that was not there when the photos were taken."
AMANDA: Yo.
JULIA: I need to see those. I need to see those photos.
AMANDA: Same.
JULIA: "I don't know about you guys, but I feel like my friend should have gotten rid of the key the day after he saw the eyes. But he didn't tell me this before he drove the car to the house, so I could not tell him to do that situation."
AMANDA: Yeah, Milo, you would have given great advice, but your friend did not ask for it. I think, Julia, that the only right move here is to return it to where you found it. And apologize and get the fuck out.
JULIA: Milo also says, "It's a win for us because maybe whatever is haunting that object is now stuck in the jar."
AMANDA: But the car thing happened after her.
JULIA: Yeah, I know.
AMANDA: I'm sorry, I don't think— I think the jar is just pissing it off.
JULIA: Now, Milo continues, "I also have a story from that same building where I was the one that made the stupid decision. I was there with some friends to take some pictures, like you do." Of course, apparently this is a very cool place to take pictures.
AMANDA: And Julia, you and I have this version. People would go to the abandoned waterworks to take their band photos. We're— we've all been there.
JULIA: They continue, "It was someday between October 23rd and November 3rd in 2023, to be as specific as I can," which, as we know, specificity is creepier.
AMANDA: Thank you.
JULIA: "We were just looking around and suddenly, we saw a shadow in the stairwell that has this door out of it, and the shadow walked out of that door."
AMANDA: Uh—
JULIA: "But everyone that was in the house was in the same room as me. And I was not the only one who saw it there."
AMANDA: Damn.
JULIA: So it wasn't like just another person in the group that you saw a shadowy figure, and you're like, "Oh, but no one knows where Steve is right now."
AMANDA: Yes.
JULIA: "Later in that week, we decided stupidly enough to take out a Ouija board to that house, and we're going to use it as a prop, of course. No summoning stuff for us."
AMANDA: Uh-hmm.
JULIA: "But we left it on the floor to do something, and when we got back to it, it was moved, like someone had picked it up and started using it before letting it go."
AMANDA: I mean, I'm not in the practice of victim blaming, but that one is on you.
JULIA: That one's on you. Why would you leave the Ouija board?
AMANDA: Nope.
JULIA: Why would you do that?
AMANDA: They come in boxes for a reason. Keep it in the box.
JULIA: A Ouija board needs to have adult supervision at all times.
AMANDA: Yeah, like you know when the game says, like, for ages, like, eight plus. It should be like, "Whatever, man, just have an adult with you." That's what the label should say.
JULIA: "Now that was the last time we ever took that to the house, but not for lack of trying from one of my friends." Listen, Milo, I don't want to say you need to make new friends, but I think maybe some better decisions would be happening with a different friend group. I don't know.
AMANDA: Y'all are young. That is perfectly okay, but you have a good head on your shoulders and you've been going to the University of Spirits for the last six years, so—
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: —I know you know better. And at a certain point, if people won't follow your very good advice, you maybe want to hang out with new folks.
JULIA: So they finish with, "I have more stories, of course, but I will send them in another time. Stay creepy, stay cool, Milo."
AMANDA: Well, Milo, I look forward to getting a roughly monthly email from you because these are giving us a lot to talk about. Thank You.
JULIA: They are, indeed. Well, Amanda, to finish us out, I have an email that I think like it has visual imagery, and we will include this on our socials for this episode. So this is from Jessica, who is Westie Imposter on the Multitude Discord, and she has sent in a creepy photo that, "My friend sent to our group chat. That is perplexing."
AMANDA: All right, let's go.
JULIA: So she writes, "My friend is a horse riding instructor and she was taking someone on a trail ride in the woods. They came across the weirdest thing." Now, I'm not gonna describe it to you just yet.
AMANDA: Okay.
JULIA: But the friend did share the photo in the group chat, and I'm gonna share it with you now, Amanda.
AMANDA: Oh, what is that? Why is there a runoff pipe coming out of the dirt?
JULIA: Well, sometimes they do that on— that's not even the weird thing about this photo. What do you mean?
AMANDA: No, Julia. The weird thing about this photo is an unripe pineapple and an apple just sitting on a rock.
JULIA: So the email continues, "They came across the weirdest thing. A whole pineapple and a whole apple. Fresh, not rotted, sitting on a rock by a stream."
AMANDA: Julia goes, "Bitch, there's drainage all over the place. Look at the pineapple!"
JULIA: They're in the middle of a forest! Why is there a pineapple and a regular apple?
AMANDA: And a very underwrite pineapple at that.
JULIA: "She snapped a photo and left it alone and then sent us the photo when she got back." Definitely a Team Ignorant thing happening here, probably the smartest move.
AMANDA: Don't eat the fairy food.
JULIA: "My first thought was, 'That's some fae shit, don't you dare touch it.' And she had very similar vibes. We brought up possibilities of the fae, some weird cult/ritual sacrifice, or maybe just someone's forgotten picnic. All of it strange and creepy. So I ask you, what do you guys think was happening? Would you be Team Ignorant or Team Investigate? We'd love to hear your thoughts."
AMANDA: I have so many thoughts, but Westie, thank you so much for sending this in. My first thought was, "Well, if this is a trail frequented by people on horseback, maybe someone had brought snacks for their horses." Very common to feed a horse an apple. Never in my life have I fed a horse a full, uncut, underripe pineapple. That would hurt their little mouths.
JULIA: I don't know if they can eat that.
AMANDA: I feel like pineapple might be one of those things that just, like, surprisingly, like, toxic to animals, like grapes and dogs.
JULIA: Apparently, horses can safely eat pineapple in moderation.
AMANDA: Okay, well, I would probably cut it up and not let the external shell hurt their little mouths.
JULIA: I'm sorry, I'm lying. Another website said, "Many people assume that pineapple is an exotic fruit which is poisonous to horses. However, this sweet fruit is a treat horses love and an excellent source of vitamin C for them, too. When feeding your horse pineapple, take time to remove the core and the outer skin so that your horse does not choke on anything. Next, cut the pineapple into small quarters before feeding it to your horse."
AMANDA: Thank you very much, the internet. So I don't think this is someone's like leftover horse treat, if— that would be a carrot and some apples. I also don't think, Julia, it's a picnic because who the fuck brings an underripe pineapple, the thing that is almost the most laborious, commonplace fruit to peel and cut and get ready for a picnic. You bring it in a container.
JULIA: Yeah, you do that beforehand.
AMANDA: Yes!
JULIA: For sure. So that leaves kind of like fae/woodland creature maybe offering or sacrifice, right?
AMANDA: I mean, I would have to think.
JULIA: I don't wanna dox Westie, but I don't think that she lives in an area where pineapple is native to the land necessarily.
AMANDA: No, certainly not.
JULIA: And so my thought is like what nature spirit or fae is like, "Yes, the sacrifice that I want is a full ass pineapple"?
AMANDA: I thought, Julia, it might be a fairy trap. What if fairies are also horse girls?
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: And they really want to make sure that a horse comes in, right? Horses are going on this trail. They're passing by all the time. And they're like, "Oh, I've seen horses get fed apples before. You know what else humans eat in terms of fruit?" Pineapple. It's regal, right? Maybe it is like the ultimate lore because it is historically a regal fruit. And so they're leaving it out like, "Hello, queen of the mammals," horses, not people, "come eat the pineapple and dance with us forever in the grove."
JULIA: Well, you know— and also like time is weird for the fae, so they're like, "Ah, the status symbol of buying a pineapple and leaving it out as an offering, meanwhile I'm like, "I can buy one of those for four dollars at the grocery store, fae."
AMANDA: Yeah, but in— it's the blink of an eye in a fae lifetime that, you know, a hundred and fifty years ago, a pineapple was the equivalent of like a gold bar or something. And maybe they specifically chose an underripe one because they're like, "I don't— time passes so quickly out there. I want to make sure it is a fresh and good offering for, again, the queen of the mammals, the horse."
JULIA: Now, just as a reminder for people at home, the way that you can tell if a pineapple is ripe is if you take one of the inner leaves and you pluck it out and removes easily, that's a ripe pineapple. Also you can sniff the bottom of the pineapple, and if it smells particularly sweet, that means it's gonna be a sweet pineapple.
AMANDA: I mean, I'm just saying, if I were a horse and I came across that sweet treat, I'd certainly, like, nuzzle in to investigate before realizing that it— it's too prickly for my little mouth.
JULIA: Yes, and then I think there was also the regular apple that is available there. So they're like, "We know that perhaps you need human assistance in order to eat this pineapple, but in the meantime, let me assuage your hunger with a regular apple."
AMANDA: That's what I'm saying. If I were a fae and I saw a horse, I'd want that horse at my tea party. I don't know what to tell you.
JULIA: "If I were a fae and I saw a horse," is a wild statement that I never thought we'd make on this podcast.
AMANDA: Woo!
JULIA: But hey, wa-hoo!
AMANDA: Westie, I love that you brought this to us. I would be very curious what your equestrian instructor friend thinks of our theories and if they have seen any other tempting offerings for the horses in the trail.
JULIA: I also want to say this was fantastic information, and I am really appreciative of it. She does finish out with, "I'll be back with more later, as I am currently working on collecting evidence that the dog training club that we all belong to is indeed haunted."
AMANDA: Oh, shit.
JULIA: "It's a new property built in 2020, but someone did unfortunately die on the property before it was finished. But I need concrete evidence first. Stay creepy, stay cool. Don't eat the fae fruit in the woods, Jessica."
AMANDA: Could not be more true. Jessica, I trust, love, and believe that you will get the evidence that you need. I highly, highly look forward to it.
JULIA: I'm very curious.
AMANDA: Julia, fascinating. From ancient theater ghosts from the '60s in Utah, all the way to Norway and back. I feel like we really took a journey in this summer Urban Legends episode.
JULIA: We really did, and I love that for us. And hey, whether you're beaten the heat by going to see some horror movies in a airconditioned theater this summer, or if you're telling ghost stories by the fire, remember, stay creepy.
AMANDA: Stay cool.
JULIA: Later, Satyrs.