I'm Liz Sower and this is ghosts in the burbs, a podcast of ghost stories from Wellesley, Massachusetts a warning: adults who use adult language told me these frightening tales, these ghost stories aren't for kids, the high holy season has arrived and I wish you all the spooky pumpkin spice drenched horror you can handle. I have suggestions kick it off by listening to the horror fiction podcast sessions X there you'll find over 60 tales of subtle chilling horror.
Then read everything by Grady Hendrix and then read the fisherman by john langan, watch the Nostradamus End of Days, series on discovery plus and then watch the ritual, the 2017 movie based on the book by paul Tremblay. Then I guess you should probably read everything paul Tremblay has ever written and I know damn well some of you haven't read come closer by sarah grand yet, so you've got to do that. Okay, I'll stop now, but stay tuned after the story for some news and such.
Okay, so what now, what happens next in our last dozen or so stories? We flashed forwards and back through spooky Wellesley events. But I assume some of you were left wondering what happened after you met that alexander Skarsgard esque Master Demon in the basement of that poor couple's home. Hmm, well a whole lot and not much in all honesty, I mean, as for the demon, what could we do? Who can we call?
We threw a ton of ST Benedict medals at the situation and had the catholic church come, take a look see and they did their thing as best they could, I suppose. But the demons intentions have knitted themselves into the very fabric of this town. This isn't a movie. We couldn't burn the place down in high five. I have to live here, I can't move. I mean I could move but the girls school is incredible and as I've mentioned in the past, we run with some pretty heavy duty I. E. P s around here.
So the dumb luck that landed me in Wellesley comes with a lot of benefits. My life remained pretty much the same after meeting that demon claire comes and goes, I'm not so split wide open as I was back then, I've learned to tune out the world that is layered alongside ours. I can open right back up to it and sometimes it even manages to sledgehammer its way through and grab my attention. I will say though, meeting a demon puts things in stark focus. Honestly, it was a real slap in the face.
I came to the realization that my inner nancy drew had been running the show for too long and too ill effect chasing the spooky, cozy feeling I found in Christopher pike books as a kid found me in a situation far above my pay grade. As an adult. I traded the situation in Wellesley like a paranormal themed, cozy mystery. It was anything but they want me to be described. I'll be the goddamn scribe.
I truly love writing so I'll happily continue to share these odd little stories about this strange little town, but I won't be led on a wild goose chase again. I'm not the only one who's changed. In Betty's case. The scales fell from her eyes, you might say. And she cut the catholic church loose. She no longer does background research for them to help determine whether people are in need of their demon exercising services.
Her suspicion had been growing for a long time, wondering if perhaps the church itself had been demonically influenced? What with all the pedophilia, hypocrisy and prejudice. The recent discovery of the indigenous Children's unmarked graves in Canada and elsewhere put her over the edge. Now she is certain the church isn't simply influenced. It's a breeding ground in a safe place for the demonically charged and uncompromisingly evil. But then why are they so good at getting rid of demons?
You might ask. To which biddy would reply. Takes 1 to know one that story of hers that I keep teasing. Just isn't to be she isn't up for sharing it. So, two neighbors, we must turn for our scares the coming stories there. The after to the before there witnessed and recorded by me. Now the me who's been taken down a peg or two by the reality of the situation here in Wellesley, me then was so un boundary. People please be flailing and a little drunk. It's a bit of a cringe.
In some cases a lot of a cringe me now takes in my neighbor's stories with more empathy and trepidation and an honest dose of caution. This next batch of tales lands us here and now. I think we've got a good head on our shoulders a much tighter, less flaky inner circle were less awed by the flash and pop of wellesley excess and we're boundaries as fuck. We're on a Ghost Story # 60. The nanny. Mm hmm. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I googled you. It took me a moment to process the words.
I've been deep into editing the book. That book. The one that I've been working on forever. The one I am so, so very hopeful will reach you all wrapped in a pretty hard cover package. Someday I've been reworking a conversation between two characters trying to make it read like a realistic discussion about incredibly unrealistic event. So it took a beat to leave that conversation and actually see the young woman before me. I pushed my cheaters up and smiled at her.
Oh, I wasn't trying to stock you. But you said you were a writer I write to cool, what kind of writing do you do? I asked, filled with that particular sense of loss I get when I am pulled out of my make believe world into the present. I'm just a freelancer. I contribute to a couple online magazines, wow. What do you write about? Just like social commentary stuff. That's awesome. You know, it's nothing. No, it's not. It is super hard to get paid writing gigs.
I had to make up an entire podcast to get anyone to read my stories. You must be good. I encouraged. I guess that Annika was in her mid 20s, a time of life. You couldn't pay me to repeat. I totally don't want to bug you at all. So just tell me to go away if you're in the middle of something. But um, I nah need in Wellesley for a few months. No way. Yeah, not last summer, but the summer before I, she hesitated. Wait, I said excitedly, realization dawning was the house haunted.
Anika smiled, sort of, I closed my laptop. Tell me everything giggling. Anika pulled the chair out across from me and began to sit down but stopped short when a man walked through the main door and stood at the front desk. Shoot, I'll come back later. I have a break at 12:30. Is that okay? I checked the time. That would give me about two uninterrupted hours of editing. Perfect.
It was early summer and I was at a local shared workspace which I'd recently joined with the help of the very generous support of listeners like you set up at my very own six person table in the cafe area, close to the bottomless coffee and sparkling water bar. I had finally given in to the fact that I needed a space separate from home to finish the book.
Save for the past year, pretty much all of my writing was done in Starbucks or care arata or cafe Nero or the library a year into at home life and home became far too distracting.
I found myself obsessively tidying when I should have been writing, putting on old ghost adventures episodes is background noise and lying to myself that they might provide spooky inspiration when all they did was make me sleepy and wonderfully distracted, loading and unloading the dishwasher, con marrying the cabinets, walking down to the mailbox, karate, chopping the pillows, anything but actually sitting down to write,
I was as my favorite instagram parody account of privileged life at Caroline. Unbox is hashtag blessed that the girls were in school four days a week and remote learning only one. So I had wonderful chunks of time to take care of all of my responsibilities, plus time to devote to writing. And yet I tinkered and toggled around the house instead of taking advantage of alone time.
I knew so many other working parents would kill for I wandered around racked with guilt that I hadn't answered emails or DMS for the ghosts in the Burbs account, even though I've set a boundary for myself that I simply don't answer emails or DMS usually I can't even read them when I do.
I end up obsessing over the messages, most of which are incredibly nice, but I never know when I'm going to stumble upon a landmine, those sneaky notes that start out kind and then sort of end up with a gut punch of passive aggression. So I never know what I'm going to get into. And my fragile little snowflakes self obsesses over both the compliments and criticisms.
I know I'm strange and my anxiety weasels its way into the weirdest fucking things, but if I want to keep writing and I do then email and D. M. S have to wait for now. I sincerely apologize if you've reached out. I just can't seem to reply to messages at this point in my life, except sometimes I can, which is weird, but I sincerely hope this is something that changes in the near future for now, it is what it is.
I remind myself over and over to come back to my highest intention to write stories that distract people who like the same sort of distraction, I do, blah, blah, blah. Self help book regurgitation, blah, back to the stupid chaired Office deal. I finally gave up on the idea that I should be able to sit still and work at home and admitted that I simply couldn't I had a choice to make, I could sell sabotage.
I could let the opportunities suddenly lining up before me slip away or I could make an investment in my career and rent a table in a shared office and get over myself. I chose the latter the first day I got more done than I would have been a week at home. Why I dragged my feet on these things is beyond me. Anyway. Annika is the office manager at the shared office space. From our interactions.
I gathered that she was smart and driven and appeared to have genuinely nice interactions with the people utilizing the office. As I waited for our 12 30 PM chat, I cringe at the idea of a wellesley mom having this kind young woman in her clutches. But before we hear her story, I thought it might be fun to geek out on some paranormal phenomena theory.
We've explored the idea of poltergeist here Before jen was plagued by that particularly spooky paranormal situation brought on by trauma and that whack a do who broke into her house and attacked her family. Text in brackets, scooch back to episode five, The Home Invasion. If you want to hear more about that particular nightmare and brackets. But let's dig deep into the traditional definition of poltergeist with the help of Wikipedia and Britannica dot com.
I think we've all heard the noisy ghost bit. This type of spirit seems to be a real attention whore tossing things about moving furniture and banging on the walls. They've even been known to pinch bite and hit, which sounds a lot like living with an invisible toddler, poltergeists typically haunt people rather than locations and often they set their sights on one person in particular. Usually a young adolescent woman.
Now here's where things get interesting because there is a chance that all of this activity isn't caused by a ghost at all. Some people believe these things are caused by a person with a gift of psychokinesis, the psychic ability to influence the physical world with their minds or perhaps with the strength of their emotions, the science people say. Yeah, no. And yet the phenomena of poltergeists and psychokinesis remain linked in the paranormal world.
All of this to say, I think Annika witnessed just such a person, someone whose emotions were so repressed that they had to find an outlet and did so by creating a haunting. But that's just my opinion. Here's what she told me. It was the summer after I graduated and I hadn't found a job yet. So I was a little desperate. The Nanning gig was only part time and I was living at home so I still had a ton of time to look for jobs and go on interviews and stuff.
The Mom Wanted Me to Watch The Kids four Mornings A Week. They belong to the country club in your town. So I was mostly supposed to take the girls to the pool, feed them lunch and bring them home around two o'clock when she usually had play dates set up for herself with her friends, kids, the girls were sweet, but they were willful, you know, Oh I said as if I didn't know exactly what she meant. I just mean, they were like really comfortable talking to adults as equals. Does that make sense?
Which like whatever I'm not saying they should respect their elders or anything, but they expected to call the shots like all the time. Gotcha. So I didn't know exactly what she was talking about. My kids are a little older now, thank God, but play dates when they were younger with Children, like the ones she was describing or a draining nightmare. There's a popular parenting style here, one that I hadn't encountered before moving to Wellesley.
Its central tenant appears to be the act of consistently telling a child no to request five or so times only to eventually give up with a yes or more accurately and exhausted. Okay, fine, Honey on the 6th, it's the consistency of the inconsistent communication style that really drives it home, we've all given in. But it turns out from what I've gathered anyway that when you do it over and over without fail, it produces a relentless off putting terror of a child. I've met many of them.
Trust me, it's brutal. Like I know my experience with kids is limited, but I was around a lot of that family's friends that summer and it was like they all had this unspoken agreement to never say no to their kids. I mean, find whatever Annika continued, but it created the biggest freaking cry babies, the kids were wicked mean to each other and then the second another kid gave it back to them or they didn't get their way, they just couldn't cope like at all.
They were like little ticking time bombs. I had to be so careful not to pass them off. It was just a summer gig. So I took the easy route and basically let them do whatever as long as they weren't being mean to each other. But it wasn't just the kids being in their house was like walking on eggshells.
The mom mom was an ice queen but not at first in the beginning she treated me like I was her little sister or something always wanting to know who I was dating and what my friends and I did for fun but slowly it was like she just lost steam and couldn't be bothered and her friends were just like a lot they go on and on about all the expensive ship they got but they were like really cheap.
I watched all their kids one time when they went out to dinner and they came home two hours late and paid me only 80 bucks. I used to charge $20 an hour for three kids and here I was watching seven. Annika went silent. I could tell she was worried she said too much. Look I don't mean to sound no, no I assured her I get the picture right, sorry, I didn't mean to sound all judgy.
The kids were really sweet when we were out of the house for a while and I got their minds off trying to control everything and just be kids. It was their mom who I think like brought everything on how so Annika picked it a hangnail. She was the most like frigid woman I've ever met. She tried to be friendly, but I think she just didn't want to be. It was more like she knew that it was expected.
Like how I was saying at first she acted so interested in me and my life and then it was like a switch flipped. I was just another person who no, like another cog in the machine of her perfectly curated image of her life and once she got me spinning the way she wanted me to, she didn't have to bother pretending with me anymore. Yikes. Yeah, it was almost like she didn't have any real emotion now. It was more like she wrapped them up or something.
She did laugh with our friends and it seemed genuine, but it was mostly because they were making fun of other women they knew or of each other behind their backs. It's so hard to explain. I sound like I'm just explaining a mean girl, but she was more than that like their house. It was sort of void when she didn't have anyone there to impress. It wasn't a happy house.
It just wasn't really anything and she was the same way even when her youngest would tantrum and let me tell you that little girl could scream. This woman was like a statue. No one is that calm. But that was just it. It wasn't like she was calm, she was scary calm, like clocking it, storing it away or keeping track or something. Did dad live at home? Oh sure he was a nice guy. I actually kind of felt bad for him.
I only saw him a handful of times because unless I was babysitting for them at night, I was gone by early afternoon, but the interactions, I did see that between them sucked anyway, the first time something freaky happened, we were in the kitchen, it was one of those nights I was there to babysit, she'd just gotten a new rug and was having friends over for cocktails to show it off. So I was supposed to get the kids fed bathed into bed.
Her middle kid, the six year old little girl had one, this tiny little stamp at swim class that day. She was so proud and had been carrying it around with her since she got home, their kitchen and family room. We're all that like, wide open concept thing. So their kitchen table was kind of close to where the new rugs stopped. Holy sh it, I did everything I could to try quietly to get that ink out before her mother saw it.
Honestly, it barely left a freaking mark, but you would have thought her daughter put a fucking cigarette out on that carpet. Annika hesitated. The thing is right before she lost it on brackets, child's name omitted and brackets. There's this moment when she realized what I was doing and we all froze the kids and I I mean sort of bracing for her to freak out. But before she could even react, there was this loud popping noise and two of the pillows on the couch flew across the room.
The kids and I saw it, but none of us dared say anything because she went off on Iran. I don't think she even noticed it. Whoa! I said excitedly, poltergeist. Right, That's exactly what I thought. Did you see anything else happen? Are you kidding? That was just the start. One morning I was making them breakfast and the dad hadn't left for work yet. So he was having coffee at the table with the kids.
He was being silly and they were all laughing and the middle girl was making funny faces and snorting, just happy little kid stuff. The place actually felt normal for a minute. And then she walked in, I was at the table pouring more juice into the kids cops. And she started wiping down the counters and piling the pans and stuff. I used to make pancakes into the sink.
I was like, sorry, I was just about to do that and she goes, I don't want them to be late for their swim lessons and this is quite the mess. I started to help clean up and then he made the mistake of speaking up. He goes, thank you Annika for making such a nice breakfast. Oh my God, he might as well have called her an unfit mother. She goes, maybe if you were here more, you'd know that Annika does this every morning. Oh I grimaced. I don't want to scare you off from having kids if you want them.
But honestly what you're describing is just like the first 5 to 10 years of marriage after parenthood. Anika laughed. I totally get that and no I don't want to have kids but like I totally get that sniping at each other as normal. I remember my parents totally did that. That's not what was weird about the morning. The thing is after she said that thing about him being around more, the dad goes good morning to you too and every single glass on the table shattered at the same time. No way.
Yeah, it was all chaos and she was just like, get the kids out of here, I'll take care of this. So I rushed them out of the house. But oh my God, I was so freaked out when I brought them home that afternoon she had a migraine and asked if I could stay until the husband got home from work. I took the kids on a bike ride and kept them outside as much as I could. But we went in around four for a snack and I had them all set up around the kitchen island.
Annika paused remembering I cut up an apple for them to dip in peanut butter. It was one of their favorite things, brackets name omitted and brackets started to get silly, trying to make the other to laugh. It was really cute. It got us all giggling but I was trying to keep them as quiet as possible and then the television turned on by itself and the volume was literally up as high as it could go.
I rushed over but couldn't find the remote control right away and by the time I got the thing turned off she was standing in the kitchen looking furious like scary mad. She goes, thank you, you can go now. Annika shivered at the memory I tried to explain but she was just like completely iced out. Which whatever. But then I couldn't find my keys anywhere. It was so fucking awkward. I always left them in my shoes in the mud room because she didn't like anything to clutter up the counters.
They weren't there, they weren't anywhere. I had to call my mom to bring the extra set of keys. It was so awkward. Oh no, I laughed. Did they ever turn up? She blew out a breath. Yeah. Their housekeeper found them in the master bathroom, in the laundry bin. Weird, totally. But thank God she'd been home all day and knew there was no way I could have gone upstairs into her room, right, she would have thought I was up there snooping around or stealing. Oh good point.
Things just ramped up after that. The electricity in the house went nuts. We came home from the pool one day and the microwave was on with nothing in it. She was upstairs trying to nap her. Migraines had gotten really bad. Then the girls, ipads totally glitch tout and the washing machine flooded their laundry room. It was crazy and then stuff started happening at my house. Get out of here. No, really.
I know it sounds totally strange but things began disappearing and reappearing at home just like they did at their place and my lights would dim randomly. Maybe I was being totally paranoid, but I just had this feeling that I was dragging home the energy from their house so spooky. I never even thought of something like that happening.
Me either, my last day babysitting for them, there were thunderstorms so we couldn't go to the pool, we were stuck inside for the morning, so I tried to come up with games for them to play in the basement. I did an obstacle course and we built a four and played, what time is it? Mr Fox, She smiled at the memory. The girls were totally having fun, she had a friend over for coffee.
I'm not sure what they talked about but before the woman came over she seemed like she was in a fine mood at least a neutral one. Anyway but after a friend was gone she stormed downstairs and was like I can't even hear myself think with all this racket I settled the kids down and put on a movie. They weren't supposed to watch barbie movies but I let them because I knew it was such a treat, they would be totally mesmerized.
I started cleaning up the basement just putting away all the things we played with. That morning. I was organizing their art table when I found a pile of drawings beneath some coloring books. I could tell the oldest little girl had done them and seriously they were super freaky. There were three pictures, one of her bedroom, one of the whole family around the kitchen table and one of their little swing set in the backyard.
And that one, she was pushing her little sisters on the swings without that dark scribble cloud, they would have been totally normal drawings. Uh huh. Annika have wrinkled her nose, she drew this cloud hovering above the people. In each photo. The cloud was in black and blue crayon with yellow squiggles coming out of it. But the freakiest thing was that in the drawing of her bedroom she had written ghost with an arrow pointing to the cloud thing. It was so cute and sad.
She spelled it G. O. S T wow, I couldn't get her to tell me anything. The one that really worried me was one of her all alone in her bedroom. Like that poor thing. Right. I asked her if she'd said anything to her parents and she got totally freaked out and was like, don't tell mommy. Oh man. I sighed. Right. So, but like I had to say something to the mom when it was time for me to go. I put on another barbie movie for the kids and brought the drawings up to the kitchen.
She was drinking coffee at the kitchen table, just sitting there in silence by herself. I showed her the drawings and she breaks out but not like mad. No, she was scared. I told her I asked brackets name omitted and brackets to tell me about the pictures and that she was worried about brackets. Mom's name omitted and brackets knowing about them. She got totally defensive and she was like, you know name omitted has always been strange.
She grabbed the drawings off the counter and crumpled them up and right as she did the kitchen sink turned on full blast. We stared at it and then it just like turned off by itself. She started to say something but then we heard the door to the garage and the mud room open and close and footsteps head toward the kitchen. I thought maybe her husband had come home early but the footsteps stopped right before the doorway. She called out, hello? But there was no answer.
I was completely creeped out and I was about to run down to the basement to get the kids out of the house when she crept over and jumped through the doorway into the mud room to like startle whoever it was. I guess I listened as she unlocked and re locked the door out to the garage. Then she just came back in the kitchen and all calm goes, I can't believe this is happening again. Uh huh. Yeah. She filled up a glass of water at the sink and chugged it and then goes, I apologize.
I thought I'd taken care of this before he left new york. Anika shook her head sadly. She was actually like a real person for a second and then the ice wall went right back up. The next thing she said was I think we can both agree this isn't working out anymore. Wait, she fired you. Yeah. I considered all that. Annika had said the ticking time bomb kids, the seemingly perfect house and friend group obsessed with expensive belongings and the number on the scale.
The migraines, The women at the center of it pulling the strings on a life. She wasn't really a part of. She sounds so unhappy. Annika nodded in agreement. I get that. But like they were richer than anyone. I know their kids were totally normal and healthy and she could have or do whatever the hell she wanted, totally. But sh it's complicated, right? Being a mom, especially in a place like Wellesley is a mind fuck.
I was an utter wreck when my kids were little, I didn't want to be a controlling bitch, but it felt like the only way to survive was brutal. Annika picked at her nails. I'm never having kids. I just laughed. I have to ask. I can't tell you her name. Could I guess. Sure, but I still don't think I should tell you. Was it text in brackets, name omitted and I will take it to my grave and brackets. An eagle looked panic stricken. Oh my God, you know her. I am so sorry.
You must think I'm such a judgy bitch. No, no, no. I just had to know I won't tell a soul besides my husband. But is it still okay for me to share the story on the blog? You will totally change all the names of course and I will leave out text in brackets, certain description of an event that I most certainly did cut from the story and brackets because I don't think I'm the only one who would recognize the players in that situation. Shit. I should learn to keep my mouth shut. I shrugged.
Look, we're bottling everything up. Got that woman. Yeah, I had an idea and I don't know if it will result in anything, but I'd like to give it a shot and to do so I need to enlist your help. I get interesting emails sometimes filled with interesting spooky things that happened to all of you. So I've decided it might be time for your turn, your turn to share some spook, head over to ghost in the burbs dot com and click that, tell me a story tab at the top of the page.
Follow the instructions and do your worst. If I'm able to, I might put out a couple of episodes chock full of your stories and probably my reactions and commentary. I've made a little commitment to myself to keep our space ad free from now on. But if you are interested in doing something priceless to help the show, please tell a spooky like minded friend about it. Rate and review it wherever you listen and follow me at ghosts in the burbs on instagram. Those three things are incredibly valuable.
And while you're at it, do it for another podcast you enjoy. That's all for now. I'll meet you back here in two weeks, Good night, sleep tight. And don't forget your nightlight. Mm hmm. Yeah,