[00:00:00] This podcast contains adult language and content. If you have a story to share, send it to letsnotmeetstories at gmail.com. Enjoy the show. My name is Andrew Tate and this is Season 8, Episode 19 of Lets Not Meet, A True Horror Podcast. Let's get started.

[00:00:49] One night, back when I lived in my car with my husband and two dogs, some strange shit happened. It had been at least 8 nights since I had been able to sleep well, so I was pretty damn tired and grouchy.

[00:01:05] As I lay down in the makeshift bed in the back of the car that night, I pretty much immediately started falling asleep. Since it was almost midnight, it was pretty quiet at the vista point by then.

[00:01:21] Just as I was barely starting to dream, there was an urgent shaking to my shoulder. Loudly, I startled awake and demanded, what? Upon doing that, I opened my eyes and quickly realized that our car was illuminated in a very bright light.

[00:01:39] Since it was a popular vista point, it wasn't that unusual to see other vehicles with people pulled over beside you. Plus, it was so dark that the light was necessary. By then, I heard this strange male voice.

[00:01:57] It said, sorry, I just thought maybe you needed some light since your car was so dark over there. My husband immediately responded with, no thanks man, we're actually trying to sleep. That's why we have it so dark over here.

[00:02:14] For a few seconds, I heard only silence, until the stranger answered, well, what if I needed more light or something? It was an odd thing to ask, seeing as how he was the one with the bright light, which he was pointing at our car.

[00:02:32] So I spoke up, finally replying with, we don't have any good lights. The stranger simply replied, oh. So once again, I rolled my eyes, hard that time, putting my earbuds back into my ear and rolling back over, once again trying to sleep.

[00:02:54] I noticed the bright light that the guy had on our car quickly turned off, and I heard his vehicle start up and pull out of there. So naturally after that, I start to drift off.

[00:03:08] To my great dismay, not even 20 minutes later, I get another, more frantic feeling shake my shoulder. That time though, I was getting pretty pissed off, so I sat up and glared at my husband angrily hissing out, what? Through clenched teeth.

[00:03:27] They're back again, and they're walking around out there, he said with panic creeping into his tone. So again, I pulled the headphones out of my ears and listened for a second. I hear footfalls on the blacktop as I keep listening, though I noticed that these footsteps

[00:03:50] sounded like they were headed to one of the two RVs that were also parked there for the night. The two RVs were parked directly across the circle of the vista point from us. Seriously pissed off at that point, I hissed at my husband, I'm pretty damn sure that

[00:04:11] it's just someone trying to get back to one of the two RVs after they're going pee or whatever. Now please, just let me get back to sleep. I guess now would be a good time to explain the layout of the vista point.

[00:04:25] It's basically a large cul-de-sac that overlooks a large man-made reservoir. In fact, it's the sixth largest in my state. It also happens to be the location of one of the Kerry Stainer murders, aka the Yosemite Serial Killer.

[00:04:41] Anyways, people often trek across the large cul-de-sac in order to use the bathroom, so to speak. But for real, yet again not even ten minutes later this time another freaking shake on my shoulder. That time I just sat up and yelled, pretty loudly, What the hell now?

[00:05:03] My husband began to whisper to me in a panic, another car just pulled up and when it did, two guys came out of the RV and met up with the dude in the car. I tried to angrily cut in, but my husband interrupted me with,

[00:05:20] Then they were talking, and then all three of them looked over towards our car and started walking towards us with their flashlights on. But then they turned them off when they were about halfway to the car.

[00:05:36] Since I had one of my headphones in still, I didn't quite catch all of what he said this time. So now I should also tell you that I'm the kind of person who when being woken up gets pretty pissed off pretty quickly.

[00:05:50] So I kind of lost my shit on my poor husband and started basically yelling at him. My husband responded by hissing at me to either get up front so he could start loading the

[00:06:03] car back up or to stay where I was, in the back and he would pretty much just pile shit on top of me. I yelled some more, but I did eventually get up to the front. Thankfully we got out of there safely.

[00:06:16] My husband told me on our way out that the first dude with the bright light on our car had a huge hunting knife strapped to his waist. My husband also told me that when I started yelling after being startled awake several

[00:06:30] times that all three guys turned around and slowly dispersed. We'll never know if the incidents were related, but that's one hell of a coincidence that those three guys were coming at our car less than 20 minutes later. Don't you think? Creepy Vista Point stalkers let's not meet again.

[00:07:02] I met this guy in a child welfare home. We'll call him Tim. We didn't meet often since Tim was older and was already living in his own apartment even though he was still in surveillance and visited our home often.

[00:07:19] I liked him a lot and we got along very well. Tim was one of those guys who had been bullied in school and had trouble trusting people so I felt the right thing to do was to be friends with him. Time passed by and I had finally turned 18.

[00:07:37] Tim contacted me and invited me to the place that he had moved to recently, one of those warm sunny countries where people usually go for vacationing. I had never been on a plane or outside of the country so I was thrilled.

[00:07:53] After a few days of talking, Tim said that I needed to get on a plane and he wants me there as soon as possible. I told him I couldn't afford it right now but he insisted on paying all of the costs.

[00:08:05] I was so thrilled a vacation was needed indeed but why did I have this gut feeling that I shouldn't go? In the past, I had made some bad decisions which were the reasons for living in a child welfare home.

[00:08:21] This time I really tried to think, is this a good idea? What could happen? He is my friend and is willing to pay a lot of money to have me there. Am I even worth it?

[00:08:35] I hesitated for so long that he informed me that he had already paid for another friend so I sadly couldn't go. I guess he made the decision easier for me. This will be the happiest and saddest point of this story.

[00:08:52] A few months go by and my boyfriend at the time says that his friend Lisa is missing. She has been missing for many weeks now. All of the news media is talking about it.

[00:09:03] To help out my boyfriend, I read all of the information that I could from online and told him all of the littlest details about the ongoing case. Then I find an article that references who Lisa was with before disappearing. It was Tim and his friend.

[00:09:21] I immediately texted Tim asking him if he knows anything because my boyfriend was very worried. Tim says that Lisa just left his home and never came back and that they were doing everything they could to find her.

[00:09:37] Maybe a week later my boyfriend got a call from one of his old friends. Lisa's body had been found in the woods behind Tim's house. Tim was taken into custody. He was then found guilty of Lisa's murder.

[00:09:52] Time reveals that he tried to smuggle drugs into my country using Lisa and since she didn't want to do it, they killed her so that she couldn't talk to the police. I got called to testify and tell my story in court.

[00:10:08] It took a long time to process, but I realized that one wrong decision could have ended my life. My boyfriend and I were astonished at how this drama could involve both of our friends. Not knowing it beforehand since we had not previously met each other's friends yet.

[00:10:28] So my old friend Tim, let's never meet again. For some background, I live in Australia. I grew up around gangs. I moved to Melbourne when I was 12 since my parents missed my hometown in the Bay Area

[00:10:58] in California so much that Melbourne reminded them of a safer San Francisco. I'm used to the antics of both Melbourne and Sydney. I seem to attract crazy people. Not in a fun way though. I've had a lot of scary and threatening experiences, but my mom, a fearless 5'1

[00:11:19] X fitness trainer, brought me up confident in defending myself. I'm not scared to swing back at anyone despite being 5'2 and barely 100 pounds. I've been in street fights. I've screamed back at people who have started issues with me or my friends.

[00:11:37] However, this particular situation happened in December of 2021. My parents and I, all roller derby skaters, went on a skate along the beach and returned to get some ice cream near my house. After standing around for a bit, I decided to walk home while they finished their ice

[00:11:55] cream and went grocery shopping. The corner I turned was maybe 100 meters from the ice cream shop where my parents still stood. There was one woman right in front of me who walked past an older guy, who was clearly homeless and didn't smell very good.

[00:12:15] She walked by and he ignored her, but he looked at me and started to speak some kind of gibberish at me. He then walked towards me. I'm not too freaked out by men being weird.

[00:12:29] I get told I have a resting bitch face a lot, especially when I'm walking alone. If you walk with purpose and look generally pissed off, most weirdos will leave you alone. But what bothered me was that in my attempt to ignore and move on, he stepped in front

[00:12:46] of me and blocked my stride. He was definitely touching himself at that point. I then made the quick decision to turn around and head back towards my parents and of course, he started to follow me, trying to keep pace. I sped up.

[00:13:05] Now, I may be small, but I have long legs and I can walk fast. Apparently fast enough that he started to jog to keep up with me. I had reached the main street again and was getting closer to my parents.

[00:13:19] I called out my dad's name and he turned around. He seemed confused, later telling me that he assumed I forgot my keys at home and was coming to borrow his. However, when I called out for my mother, she heard the panic in my voice and started

[00:13:34] running towards me. She reached me before the man did and shoved me behind her. He reached out, asking me to hold his hand and my mom started to tell him to fuck off and get away. He was very insistent and my dad called the police.

[00:13:55] He kept stepping around my mom to try and touch me and every time I stepped forward to meet him with a punch, my mom shoved me backwards. My dad stepped in and the guy got angry, screaming at my dad while my mom pushed me into this

[00:14:12] chemist warehouse and ran me down the back where the pharmacists were. There was a security guard there who she told and a lovely worker came up to see if I was okay. I wasn't particularly scared, but any adrenaline come down with me is often followed by tears.

[00:14:29] So I was vaguely crying and vaguely pissed off. The police came and by that time he had crossed the street and started yelling at everyone that he saw. He was taken away and I came back out.

[00:14:43] I gave the police my number and email and they contacted me later when I was at home to come into the station and meet with the sexual assault head of office. I gave my statement and that was that.

[00:14:57] I knew that he went to jail, but not for long. They told me that he was severely intoxicated with methamphetamine and had pre-existing mental issues. He already existed in their system for violence and sexual crimes. He was charged with sexual activity and attempted physical assault.

[00:15:17] I was stressed after that. I still am. I have already been diagnosed with PTSD for a sexual assault earlier that year. I'm glad that I had that previous experience though because I was determined to not let it happen again. Months later, I get a call while I'm working.

[00:15:35] I walk into the break room and the same woman who got my statement before was calling to let me know that not a week after he had been released from jail, he was again arrested

[00:15:47] for attempting to assault a young homeless girl who he had dragged into an alleyway. The words of that constable on that call stuck with me. That could have been you and I'm glad that it wasn't. I'm glad you're okay and that she ended up okay too.

[00:16:05] He's going to have a serious trial this time and the state is trying to get him put in prison. I was told this because I might have to make a victim impact statement for the court at his trial. Still no confirmation on that.

[00:16:20] I still get anxious turning that corner since I walk around in that area to shop quite a bit. So to the man who chased me down the street with very bad and disgusting intentions, let's not meet again.

[00:16:47] I grew up in the Bay Area and I've spent a lot of time in cities. I consider myself street smart and independent. As a young single woman living independently in a big city, I have narrowly avoided my fair

[00:17:01] share of shady situations but this incident shook me to my core in a way that was different from drunk men and dark streets. It was bizarre and it happened while I was surrounded by other people.

[00:17:17] Some background information to set the scene, I had recently graduated college and had moved back to the Bay Area to start my career. My friends from college had also moved around after graduating.

[00:17:29] We missed each other and a group of us planned to meet at a friend's house in San Diego to celebrate Halloween together and to get in some quality girlfriend time as well.

[00:17:41] I had a real paycheck for the first time and I was excited to jet set to meet up with some of my friends. Fast forward to the day of travel, I put on my Giants hat, we had just won the World

[00:17:54] Series and I needed to rub it in to my LA friends, and I lugged my suitcase down two stories of old Victorian stairs then rolled it down the streets to the BART station near my San Francisco apartment.

[00:18:09] BART is the train station that transports riders all across the Bay and I was taking it directly to SFO to catch my flight. I took BART to the SFO airport and boarded the tram to connect to my departure terminal.

[00:18:24] This tram is where I think he first spotted me, but I can't be too sure. It's possible he started following me earlier, but I have no way of knowing, even with all the sharpened street smart skills I possessed, I missed him at first.

[00:18:40] He blended in quietly with the hustle and bustle of the crowd. I have the type of friendly face that strangers feel comfortable approaching for help. I struck up a conversation with an elderly gentleman who needed help understanding the map in the tram.

[00:18:55] Coincidentally, he and I were going to the same terminal. We made small talk for a few minutes. We were riding together. Then we deboarded the tram with a group of travelers heading to our terminal. As we stepped off the tram, my new friend whispered me a warning.

[00:19:15] He said, Watch out for that man with the hat. He's been staring at you, and there's something off about him. Surprised, I looked behind me and noticed a young man wearing a sun hat who looked about the same age as me.

[00:19:33] He was staring me right in the eyes and smiling. When our eyes met, I can't explain why, but it gave me the chills. I gave him my best fuck-off look to squash the situation, thanked the elderly gentleman

[00:19:49] for bringing it to my attention, then headed to the airline desk to check my bag. I forgot about the creeper and the hat for a bit while I was busy handing over my bag to the airline.

[00:20:01] Not surprisingly, I had tried to fit too much shit into my bag and it was slightly overweight, so I had to go over to the side to take some of the heavier items out of my suitcase and switch them into my carry-on backpack.

[00:20:17] It was then that I felt someone staring at me. I looked up from my suitcase to see the young man in the hat standing about 200 yards from me, just looking straight at me with this huge dopey grin on his face.

[00:20:34] I got a better look at him than before. His style felt more European than West Coast. He had medium-length curly hair and these chiseled features. He could have been handsome in a different situation, but his eyes were just so dark and empty. My throat closed up a bit.

[00:20:54] He wasn't doing anything, not even moving a muscle, but his eyes made my heart race. Okay, I think I can handle this. I finished dealing with my suitcase and went back to the counter to finish checking my bag,

[00:21:11] hoping this was all just a big coincidence and that the creepy man would be gone when I turned around to go to security. But no such luck. He had latched onto me and he was not letting me go.

[00:21:26] I started walking towards the security, and I took a peek over my shoulder to check for the creeper, and sure enough, there he was walking right behind me. This is the moment that I started panicking inside, but I kept my demeanor calm.

[00:21:41] I stopped walking, hoping that he would pass me. But he stopped walking as well. I started walking and he started walking. He remained approximately 200 yards behind me at all times. Whenever I looked back, he always had the same blank, staring eyes and a big grin below

[00:22:01] the brim of his hat. Speaking authoritatively with confidence has always gotten me out of shady situations in the past, so I mustered up my most gangster-ass voice and stopped, turned around, looked him straight in his weird eyes and said, I know you're following me.

[00:22:19] Stop or I'm going to report you to the police. He didn't say anything. He just kept staring me in the eyes and smiling. I decided to test his commitment. I turned around and kept walking. He kept walking. I stopped and he stopped.

[00:22:38] We did this a few times with the same results. My anxiety kept rising with every step. I arrived at the security check and showed my ID to the first TSA security agent where they made sure you were in the right line.

[00:22:53] I said, I think I'm being followed by this man and I feel unsafe. Where do I report it? I said this as loud as possible, hoping that he would hear me. Unfortunately though, the TSA agent didn't speak English and wasn't able to understand or help me.

[00:23:09] Frustrated but not wanting to miss my flight, I joined the line to wait for the security check. The line snaked back and forth at least five times. The man joined the line behind me, closing his distance to stand right behind me.

[00:23:27] Throughout this entire interaction, he never stopped staring at me while silently smiling. The line felt like it took one million years. My intuition was telling me to run. I tried to talk to him again while we were inching forward through the line.

[00:23:43] I said, please stop looking at me. You're making me very uncomfortable. Nothing I said made a difference though. By the time I got to the front of the line, I was thoroughly scared.

[00:23:55] I arrived at the TSA check where the agent reviews your ID and boarding pass then routes you through the x-ray machine. The agent was a younger man and I was hopeful that he would understand that I needed help.

[00:24:10] I asked him, where do I report someone who's stalking me in the airport? He looked up from my ID. Is someone stalking you ma'am? Yes, the man right behind me. The TSA agent asked the man, are you following her?

[00:24:29] To which he gave the same creepy, silent smile as when he stared directly at me. The TSA agent must have felt the same intuition because he immediately pulled us both aside separately and told me that he called the airport police. A few airport police officers arrived shortly after.

[00:24:51] This is when the situation exploded. They decided to separate us even further and asked me to step behind a large pillar while they talked to the man. Immediately after I stepped out of the man's locked gaze, his silence finally broke.

[00:25:06] He started screaming, letting out loud, panicked screams that didn't make up words. The sounds that he made, they felt primal like an animal that was caught in a trap. I was terrified but thankful that other people were finally noticing how crazy this situation really was.

[00:25:25] I tried to move to see him around the pillar but the police officers restrained me. He struggled and screamed for a minute more before they were able to calm him down, but it felt like an eternity. He still never said any actual words.

[00:25:40] About 10 minutes had passed and the officers were writing up the incident report and wanted me to ID the man for records. I told them my experience with the man and they recorded all of the details.

[00:25:52] They had me take off my hat and jacket to change my appearance, then do a walk by of the area that they had handcuffed the man at. I told them yes, this was the man and he had been stalking me.

[00:26:04] The officers told me that they had several reports from other women about a stalker in the airport over the last few days. However, they hadn't been able to catch him in action. They thanked me for reporting the incident quickly and let me know that they would be

[00:26:18] arresting the man. They then escorted me to my flight gate on a security golf cart. I was visibly shaken after the experience with two guys my age in line in front of me who were like, what's up with getting dropped off here by the police?

[00:26:37] They ended up being super nice though. When I told them what had happened, they sat near me on the plane so I didn't have to be alone and bought me a drink to help me calm my nerves.

[00:26:47] Usually I would not be and do this kind of attention, but for some reason it felt right. I appreciated their kindness. Should the creepy stalker that had a stage 5 meltdown when I reported him, let's not meet again.

[00:27:02] I wish I knew what happened to him, but I'll never know. I gave my number to the police to follow up, but they never did. I try not to imagine what his intentions were.

[00:27:10] I'll never know if he got released, if he lives in the area or anything more about him. I hope wherever he is that he got the help that he needs to stop his behavior and that he never meets another woman to creep out again.

[00:27:42] For this story to make sense, I need to explain where we lived. My husband is in the military and this was our first time moving as a family somewhere for his schooling with them. It was my husband, our then 3 year old, our two dogs and myself.

[00:27:59] We lived in base housing, which were townhouses. Our specific court was in a U shape, however the bottom of the U was not connected to either side. We lived in the bottom of the U on one end.

[00:28:14] Between our townhome and the other end house on the side of us was an opening to a large grass area that separated us from other courts. There were a few benches, a playground and a lot of space. This area also looked into our backyard and living room.

[00:28:34] So now onto the story. My husband was often out of the house until around 8 or 9 pm, sometimes later, most nights working. This night in particular was a late night for him. Our son had been sick with an ear infection, which was causing him issues with sleeping.

[00:28:53] It was around 8.30 pm and I had finally gotten him to sleep. All of the lights in the house were off and I was on the recliner with him asleep on me watching the television. His room was upstairs, so I had just not felt like carrying him upstairs yet.

[00:29:11] All of a sudden I hear this banging on the front door. Thinking it was my husband, I became irate because he was completely aware that our son was most likely sleeping. We had two large dogs at the time that were going absolutely crazy, barking at the front door.

[00:29:31] I yell at who I believe is my husband to stop and to wait for me to put our son up because I thought maybe he had forgotten his keys in his bag and he was being lazy and not wanting to get them out.

[00:29:45] The banging continues so I hurry to the stairs to go up and put my son in his crib. As I am running up the stairs, the banging stops but the dogs continue to bark.

[00:29:57] I look out into the parking lot from my son's bedroom and I do not see my husband's car or him. I immediately call him, ready to lay into him for almost waking our son up.

[00:30:12] He answers his phone and tells me that he is just now leaving the schoolhouse and was dropping a classmate off. I tell him to stop joking and just admit that it was him, in which his friend then comments that no, they are definitely in the car together.

[00:30:32] I explain what happened to my husband and he states that he would drive around the housing to see if he could find anyone. At this point I am very nervous but I stay upstairs until he gets home because remember,

[00:30:45] you can see into our living room from the open grassy area behind the townhouse. After about 10 minutes my husband comes into the house. He stated that he drove around but didn't see anything. Some of our neighbors were outside but they were at the beginning of our specific court.

[00:31:05] After talking to them, he said that they didn't see anything or anyone walk by. However, if this said person came from around the back and between our townhomes and our neighbors they would not have seen anyone.

[00:31:24] This made the chills and paranoia get even worse because the only explanation I could think of was that they were watching us from out back and they knew that my husband was not home. The situation always bothered me.

[00:31:39] We never did figure out who it was or why they were there. Fast forward around 2-3 months, it was time for us to move out. I left with my son on a Sunday following my husband and our dogs on the 16 hour drive to where we are now.

[00:31:57] My husband and his friend turned around the next day to go back and load up a U-Haul with all of our belongings. They stayed two days, which had them leaving to come back on Thursday.

[00:32:12] That following day, Friday, I received a notification on social media from our housing page regarding an emergency. This ended up being a terrorist attack where the shooter killed three men, injuring eight others before he was killed.

[00:32:30] This man and his friends lived in the court across from ours and would always walk around ours and sit on the bench directly behind our backyard. I will never know if this was related at all, but after the information came out regarding

[00:32:47] the situation, it is something that has always stayed in my mind, regardless of who it was though. I hope that we never meet again and to the three men that lost their lives that day, they are truly heroes.

[00:33:17] This happened about eight years ago in a mountain town in North Carolina, a time when home security cameras were not as common and affordable as they are now. My neighborhood was near some train tracks that homeless and drifter types would walk

[00:33:31] to to get to town or out of town, but was generally safe. I lived with a male roommate in a house that I owned at the time and had two medium sized dogs.

[00:33:43] For context, the house sat a bit off the street and had a small gate to access the front porch. My room was at the end of the hallway and faced the street.

[00:33:55] On a rainy night, I was awoken around 4am by my dogs who were in bed with me. They did that mini bark, you know the kind where it's just a bit of a gruff quietly, but I could tell that they were curious about something, probably outside.

[00:34:14] My bathroom window faced the front of the house and looked out onto a covered front porch. Curious myself, I got up and half asleep, looked out the blinds of the bathroom window not expecting to see anything thinking they just heard an animal or something.

[00:34:31] To my shock, there was a large man sitting at the table and chairs on my porch right in front of the window, literally inches away from where I was standing on the other side of the wall.

[00:34:44] He must have seen the blinds move out of the corner of his eye as I peered through them because he turned his head to look in my direction. I quickly stepped back from the window and began to panic. What the hell is he doing here?

[00:35:00] Was he wanting to break in? Was he looking for someone who was already in my house? Wait, did I just hear something in the living room? All these thoughts were going through my head. After a few seconds of panicking, I called my roommate's cell phone and luckily he

[00:35:13] groggily picked up. I whispered that someone was on our front porch and I didn't know what the fuck to do. He said that he would come out and check it out. We both opened our bedroom doors at the same time and the dogs ran out and started barking

[00:35:27] at the front door. My roommate ran into the living room, half asleep in his underwear, which was pretty funny looking back now. We flipped on all the lights and my roommate, in his best husband voice, mind you he was

[00:35:41] probably 130 pounds soaking wet, yelled through the door for the man to get the fuck off our front porch or we'll call the cops. The man responded that he just needed to dry off and wasn't going to leave since it was raining.

[00:35:58] We yelled, yeah, no, you're going to leave now. After a bit of negotiating, he finally agreed. I happened to have an umbrella on my porch and I told him to take it and get the hell out of here to help things along.

[00:36:12] As a creepy last gesture, the man asked if we could open the window curtains so that he could thank us for the umbrella to our faces. We both screamed in unison, no, just go, and he was gone. We didn't call the cops since he finally had left.

[00:36:32] Later I posted about it on our neighborhood forum and got several responses that other people had seen a man walking the neighborhood several nights. I never saw him again, and I didn't see any additional neighborhood posts from then on,

[00:36:47] but to the man on the porch who I never saw face to face, let's not meet. I had recently moved to the city to attend university. As a small town person, I was very new to taking transit and hadn't figured out my way around downtown just yet.

[00:37:16] I was about 19 years old at the time. The previous night I had gone downtown to go out with some friends and ended up spending the night. It was about 8am and I was hungover, needing to get home and desperately needing food.

[00:37:30] I left my friends place looking a little rough, still wearing my clothes from the night before. I thought that it would be easy to find a McDonald's or something because I was right downtown but I was honestly very disoriented.

[00:37:43] I go to what I think is a bus stop and soon a man approaches me. He was older. He started up the conversation. I said that I was looking for food and he says, I know where a McDonald's is, come on. He grabs my hand.

[00:37:59] It was kind of funny at first, it felt so disorienting that I was now being pulled down the street with this man holding my hand. I don't know why but I took a picture of him holding my hand and sent it to my roommate.

[00:38:13] I asked the man where it was and he said, oh we just need to get on this bus. I don't know why I got onto the bus, it just pulled up and he was holding me at this point. We got on and it was packed.

[00:38:28] He was pushed up against me and I caught myself in the bus driver's rear view mirror looking bewildered and feeling very exposed in my last night's clothes. I was starting to feel very uneasy. It felt like we were driving forever and I had no idea where we were.

[00:38:45] We finally got across from the McDonald's but it was far from where I had started. We're now on the McDonald's line. He asks me what I want. He says that he'll pay. I'm looking at the menu and I notice him look behind us and nod his head.

[00:39:01] I turn around and I see that there is a man sitting at a table and he gestures back. I feel my stomach sink and I'm starting to get freaked out.

[00:39:10] I take out my phone and I text my friend but I'm a bit more concerned now trying to tell her where I am and giving her as many details as possible. I didn't have Google Maps or anything on my phone and I just needed her to know the

[00:39:25] situation. I tell him I really need to go home. My roommates are worrying about me. He tells me, don't worry we'll get you home. The subway is just across the street. We leave the McDonald's and the subway is across the street like he said.

[00:39:41] We walk over and I'm really nervous at this point. We go in and he says, stay right here ok? Right there. I just have to go get something. I stood there and watched him as he walked away. I thought to myself, you cannot just stand here.

[00:40:00] So I bolted. I ran down to the train not knowing if it was even the right platform I just wanted on that train and away from him. I was anxiously waiting on the platform thinking, come on train, come on. Finally one pulled up and I got on.

[00:40:16] I went in and took a seat next to the window. In the subway you can see reflections in the windows very clearly. I was looking to my left out the window as the train started moving and that's when I see him walking down the aisle towards me.

[00:40:31] I cannot describe the terror that I went through. How? How had he found me? I had to run away from him. What's he going to do now? I kept looking the other way out the window. I didn't want it to be real.

[00:40:47] I felt him sit next to me and I had to turn and look at him. He laughed at me. He asked, why did you run off? There weren't people on the train because it was really early. We had got on the last stop of the line.

[00:41:07] Trying to be as calm and natural as possible, I apologized and again said that I really had to get home. I was very afraid of angering him. He asked what I was doing that night. Did I want to party with him? Maybe with his friends?

[00:41:22] Mind you, he had to be at least 40. I kept saying no and laughing because I'm very uncomfortable and I don't want to upset him. I knew my best option was to get off at the next main stop. There would be people there.

[00:41:35] I tell him I have to get off and transfer trains. He gets off with me. But there are a lot of people around. I'm feeling safer. I can make a scene if I need to. I was starting to get hot.

[00:41:50] Just mad really that this man wouldn't leave me alone after I was so clearly uncomfortable and uninterested. No matter how many times I said no, he wouldn't stop. Will you come out tonight? No. Can I have your number? No.

[00:42:08] He wants me to take his number down, so I say fine. I say that I really have to go. He grabs me again and then hugs me tight. My arms were down to my sides and he's just holding me as I'm getting hotter, more furious

[00:42:24] at how naive I had been. Furious at how fucked up this whole situation was now. I said let go of me I have to go. Not really worried about hurting his feelings anymore or angering him. I pushed away and practically stomped up the stairs.

[00:42:40] I deleted the number immediately. It took me almost an hour to get myself home, looking back every now and then to make sure that he wasn't following me. I felt embarrassed about the situation for a while.

[00:42:54] It was my shy, naive nature that let me agree to go with him. But that has long since passed. It's crazy how often women have to laugh off these advances, just trying to keep ourselves safe. To the man that grabbed my hand, let's never meet again.

[00:43:13] Don't forget if you're a patron stick around after the music for your extended ad-free version of this week's episode and if you want to get access to that as well as all the previous episodes and bonus content as well as exclusive merch head over to patreon.com

[00:43:40] forward slash let's not meet podcast to support the show today. This show is not possible at this point without all of the wonderful patrons and their support And don't forget if you want to check out the new episodes of my other podcasts, Odd

[00:43:53] Trails as well as the Old Time Radio cast head over to crypticcountypodcasts.com or search for either of them wherever you listen to your podcasts. This week you have heard Strange Vista Point Stalker by SoNora Trust Your Intuition by Katya Crazy Dude in Broad Daylight by Venus

[00:44:12] Airport Stalker by Karen Who Was Banging on My Door by Andrea Man on the Porch by Lauren And finally Hand Holder by Emma All of the stories you've heard this week were narrated and produced with the permission of their respective authors.

[00:44:29] Let's Not Meet, a true horror podcast is not associated with Reddit or any other message boards online. And as always if you had a story to share send it to letsnotmeetstories at gmail.com I'll have some exciting announcements at the top of next week's episode regarding

[00:44:45] the progress of the TV pilot that I'm shooting with some of my friends from the East Coast as well as some prospects for some live shows in the next couple of months. Oh and don't forget Brandon and I will be at the Midsummer Scream Horror Convention

[00:45:01] in Long Beach California at the Long Beach Convention Center on July 30th. I'll put a link in the show notes for that. Thanks everyone, I'll see you next week. Stay safe.