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[SPEAKER_00]: How would you react if a stranger stopped you as a child and seemed to recognize something truly terrifying in you before you even understood it yourself?

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[SPEAKER_00]: What would you do if a phrase you once heard in childhood returned years later in the middle of an impossible haunting?

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[SPEAKER_00]: How would you explain a presence that appears very rarely?

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[SPEAKER_00]: Years apart?

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[SPEAKER_00]: but knows exactly where you are each time.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And how would you cope?

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[SPEAKER_00]: If the thing you feared was following you, might not be outside your home at all.

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[SPEAKER_00]: As always, we never promise any answers to those questions, but we will do our very best to look down each and every path on episode 7 of the Dark, paranormal.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Live from Liverpool, the Dark Paramount, with Kevin Duce's.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Hello everyone and welcome to Episode 7 of Season 24.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And now I have not gone mad or forgot about the new intro, I thought the episode 7, we would just throw in a piece of nostalgia at the start, and why not, the number 7 is historically linked with magic, mystery, and things that we generally can't explain.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And things that cannot be explained is what this episode quite literally encompasses,

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[SPEAKER_00]: But there's also that superstition of things taking place in threes, and we touch on that in this episode also.

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[SPEAKER_00]: As always, a huge thank you to our Patreon team who allow this show to go out each and every week for free to everyone.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Now, if you wish to become a patron, the link is in the show note as is the link to submit your own experience.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I'll give more details on the perks of being a patron at the end of this episode to do stay tuned.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And we are giving a free week away when you go to that link.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But right now, it's time to say what I say each and every week, which is please, lobby your lights, make yourself comfortable and most importantly leave your disbelief at the door.

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[SPEAKER_00]: As we hear, what it's like, under the black star.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And I finally built up the courage to sit down and get this over to you.

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[SPEAKER_00]: To completely honest, I'm feeling a bit sick, even looking at the keyboard.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I don't think I've ever told the full scope of this to anyone.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Not even my husband.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Part of it, sure.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But never the whole chronological thread.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Before I do dive into things, I think it's important to let you know things about me.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Because I'm not really the type of person who goes looking for ghosts or spirits.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I'm 36 now, and I work as a senior project manager for a civil engineering firm here in Toronto.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Although I was born and raised in the UK, not too far from you,

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[SPEAKER_00]: My entire day-to-day life is dictated by spreadsheets, structure, integrity, budgets, and hard, provable logic.

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[SPEAKER_00]: If you can't measure it or test it, it generally doesn't factor into my worldview.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I don't do horoscopes, I don't do taro cards, and not a particularly religious person.

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[SPEAKER_00]: In particular, three distinct isolated events spaced years apart have left a dent in my rational mind that I simply can't smooth over.

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[SPEAKER_00]: My mother's side of the family has always had a strange reputation back in England.

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[SPEAKER_00]: My grandmother was Irish from a tiny village in County Mayor, and my mum used to joke

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[SPEAKER_00]: As a kid, I thought that just meant she was unusually good at knowing things before they happened.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I treated it like she had some quirky generational intuition, but looking back now, I wonder if there was a heavier, darker, weight to it all, and they just didn't want to frighten

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[SPEAKER_00]: But my very earliest memory of anything unexplainable happening was when I was around 70 years of age.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It must have been December, 90s or 97.

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[SPEAKER_00]: My mum had taken me shopping in Manchester City centre for Christmas.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The hour was freezing.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It smelled a roasted chestnuts, diesel fumes and damp wool.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I'm small now, I'm five foot six, back then I was small for my age of course.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So my view of the world was basically a forest of adult hips and shopping bags.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I held tightly to my mom's glove hand, my little legs working double time just to keep up with her as we swept along towards Market Street.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Even amongst the overwhelming noise of the city, I suddenly became aware of a commotion a few yards ahead of where we were.

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[SPEAKER_00]: People were stopping or stepping aside awkwardly, turning around with annoyed faces.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Someone was clearly moving rather aggressively against the flow.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Through a brief gap in the crowd, I caught a glimpse of what was causing it, or should

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[SPEAKER_00]: It was a very small, very old woman.

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[SPEAKER_00]: She couldn't have been any more than five foot herself.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Completely draped and dark heavy layers, a stark black head scarf tied tightly under her chin.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Her face was incredibly lined, honestly like cracked leather, although her movements were surprisingly frantic and determined.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The moment she cleared the final row of people, she headed directly for my mother and me.

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[SPEAKER_00]: She stepped directly into our path, physically blocking us.

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[SPEAKER_00]: My mom startled, but maintaining her polite British reserve, frowned down at this lady.

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[SPEAKER_00]: but the old woman didn't look at my mom, because from the absolute second she'd burst through that crowd, her eyes had been locked onto me.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They were dark, watery, and intensely focused.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They weren't angry.

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[SPEAKER_00]: They were filled with a terrifying, urgent recognition.

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[SPEAKER_00]: My

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[SPEAKER_00]: But this woman still staring directly at my face, shot her arm out with unbelievable speed and grabbed me by the forearm.

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[SPEAKER_00]: My mom froze.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Before she could even demand to let me go, the old woman whipped her head around to my mom, looked up at her, leaned in slightly, and hissed through cracked lips.

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[SPEAKER_00]: She was born under her back star.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I've replayed how this woman said it over and over again ever since that moment, and her tone wasn't a curse or a threat.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It sounded like an absolute dreadful statement of fact.

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[SPEAKER_00]: My mom's face went pale, I mean entirely pale.

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[SPEAKER_00]: she yanked my arm free from the woman, then she grabbed both my shoulders and pulled me in front of her, pushing me past the woman and back into the moving crowd.

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[SPEAKER_00]: As my mum pushed, I couldn't help but turn around to look back at the woman, who, as I looked, was again looking me in the face, and she made the sign of the cross over her chest with a very trembling hand.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Her eyes tracked me as I was dragged away.

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[SPEAKER_00]: My mum was walking incredibly fast now, her breathing shallow.

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[SPEAKER_00]: There are some absolute not as out today, bloody Christmas, she mutted, squeezing my hand so tight at her.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I looked up at my mum and she had a stony fixed gaze straight ahead, desperate to brush the entire thing off.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But I couldn't let it go.

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[SPEAKER_00]: As we move further down the street, I kept glancing back over my shoulder.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The street was still packed, dozens of tall adults, however, now and again I'd catch a glimpse of her, even for a fraction of a second, and she was still stood perfectly still in the middle of that pavement.

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[SPEAKER_00]: People swirving around her side with like water around a stone, and no matter how far we walked or how much my position changed, if I did make eye contact, it was immediate.

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[SPEAKER_00]: As if she didn't need to see me to know exactly where I was.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Finally we turned a sharp corner into a side street, and the visual contact, and the woman was gone.

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[SPEAKER_00]: When we finally got home, I thought mum would immediately bring it up with my dad, but she didn't say a word.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So I brought it up a few days later.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And my mother snapped up me rather uncharacteristically, telling me to stop thinking about such silly things.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So I buried it.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I convinced myself it was just a strange isolated encounter with some poor old-demented lady who had no idea what she was saying, and that was that.

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[SPEAKER_00]: 10 years passed, I grew up, I went to university, and I completely forgot about the black star woman.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It became nothing more than a weird anecdote I'd occasionally think about if I ever went home or I passed through Manchester.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The second incident happened when I was 19.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It was the first summer after my first year of university.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I went back to stay with my parents and their semi-detached in a quiet suburb just outside of Cheshire.

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[SPEAKER_00]: nothing old and nothing historic.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It was a Tuesday night around 2am.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I'd been up late studying for a retake exam and the house was dead silent.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I turned off my desk lamp and I climbed into bed.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I lay on my side facing the window.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The curtains were closed, but the street lights from the front of the house were casting a very faint ambient orange glow along the top edge of the ceiling.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Now I was just on the precipice of falling asleep, that heavy, comfortable state, where you can still see with your eyes, but your thoughts have started to drift into nonsense.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It sounded exactly like someone knocking their knuckle against a hollow wooden panel, coming from the corner of my room where the built-in wardrobe was.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I lay perfectly still listening.

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[SPEAKER_00]: After about 10 seconds of silence, it's happened again.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I reasoned it was the central heating pipes cooling down, but then realizing how hot it had been that summer, and we hadn't had the heating gone.

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[SPEAKER_00]: My brain moved to a mouse behind the plasterboard, annoying, but not terrifying, so I rolled over onto my back, intending to pull the duvet over my ears.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But the moment my back hit the mattress, the temperature in the room plummeted.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I do not mean a chill, I mean an instantaneous, unnatural drop that made the breath catch in my throat.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Within seconds, and I do mean seconds, I could see the faint mist of my own breath rising in the dim light, a wave of intense, primal dread washed over me.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The kind of fear that doesn't come from your brain, but from your animal instincts.

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[SPEAKER_00]: In its place, came a sound that made my stomach dry to a bottomless pit.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It was the sound of a long, slow, deep inhalation of breath, but it didn't sound human.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It sounded heavy, wet, raspy, like air being forced into fluid fill lungs, and it didn't come from the wardrobe.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It sounded like it was originating from the empty space, directly above my face.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Two inches from my nose.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I tried to scream, but my throat was entirely paralyzed.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I couldn't move my fingers, I was paralyzed, I couldn't even blink.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I lay there, staring wide-eyed at the dark, ceiling, my heart hammering so violently,

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[SPEAKER_00]: As I stared up with, the faint orange light bleeding in from the curtains began to distort.

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[SPEAKER_00]: A shape began to manifest directly above my bed.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Not a solid figure, not a phantom in a sheet.

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[SPEAKER_00]: A localized patch of absolute impenetrable blackness.

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[SPEAKER_00]: darker than the darkest part of the room, a dense swirling void about the size of a beach ball that seemed to absorb whatever light remained in the room.

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[SPEAKER_00]: That raspy breathing was still there.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It seemed frantic.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The air around my face began to churn cold, smelling this faint static electricity stagnant water type smell.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The void began to stretch downwards, elongating towards my chest.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I felt an immense physical pressure settled onto my sternum, like a heavy unseen hand, crushing the oxygen out of my lungs.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I was suffocating, staring directly into this twisting faceless mass of pure darkness.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But inside it, I couldn't see eyes or a mouth, but I could feel a consciousness, an ancient predatory awareness that just didn't want to scare me, it felt like it was recognizing me, like it had been looking for me.

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[SPEAKER_00]: In my mind, a sudden vivid image of the old woman in the blackhead star flashed.

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[SPEAKER_00]: With a monumental agonizing effort of my will, I managed to twitch my right big toe.

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[SPEAKER_00]: This physical movement broke the paralysis instantly.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I gasped for air, bolted upright in bed, and slum my hand onto the bedside light.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The room flooded with the warm yellow light, and the pressure was gone.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The cold evaporated with it, and everything seemed back to normal.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I hooked my knees and rocked back and forth, uncontrollably until the soon came up.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I tried to tell myself it was the textbook case of hypnagogic hallucination.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Sleep paralysis, REM intrusion, the night-hag phenomenon.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It was a comforting, scientific explanation, and believe me, I clung to it like a lifejacket.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Telling myself, my brain had simply plugged into the memory of the old woman into a standard nightmare through my hip-negogic state.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And I managed to believe that logic for nearly 15 years, until two years ago.

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[SPEAKER_00]: By 2024, I'd moved to Canada for my career.

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[SPEAKER_00]: My husband and I bought a renovator townhouse in a quiet, elder neighborhood in Toronto.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Life was good, busy, and completely normal.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The events of my youth were buried deep in my past.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It was a Friday evening in Lake November.

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[SPEAKER_00]: My husband was away in Montreal for a business conference.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So I was home alone with our golden retriever, Booster.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Now, Booster is the most laid-back, unbothered dog you would ever meet.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He doesn't bark at the mailman, he doesn't chase squirrels, and generally he sleeps about 18 hours a day.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Around 11.30pm, I was in the kitchen pouring myself a glass of water before heading to bed.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Gusto was called up on his mattress in the corner of the living room, snoring softly as usual.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But then he stopped snoring.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He quickly sat bolt upright, his front legs completely rigid, his ears pinned flat against his head.

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[SPEAKER_00]: All of the hackles along his entire spine was stood on end, and he was staring intensely at the narrow hallway that led from the living room to our front door.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Buster, what is it?

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[SPEAKER_00]: I asked, by voice sounding thin in the quiet house,

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[SPEAKER_00]: He didn't look at me instead, he let out a sound I'd never had from him before.

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[SPEAKER_00]: A low, guttural, trembling growl that vibrated through the floorboards.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Not a defensive bark.

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[SPEAKER_00]: A sound of absolute frantic terror I would imagine from a dog.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He began to buckle slowly.

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[SPEAKER_00]: His paws slipping on the hardwood floor.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Keeping his eyes locked on the dark hallway.

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[SPEAKER_00]: A familiar icy dread began to creep up my neck.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Our front door has a small arched decorative window near the top, about six feet off the ground.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The hallway was dark, but the streetlights outside illuminated the frosted glass, casting a pale textured square of light onto the wall.

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[SPEAKER_00]: As I watched, the shadow moved across the frosted glass from outside.

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[SPEAKER_00]: someone was standing on our from porch.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I panicked.

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[SPEAKER_00]: My immediate thought of course was a burglar.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I grabbed my phone off the counter and took a few cautious steps backward into the living room.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So I could still see down the hall, but I was more or less hidden.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Hello.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I called out, trying to sound authoritative.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Who's there?

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[SPEAKER_00]: I'm calling the police.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But this shadow didn't move away, it stood perfectly still.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But as I stirred it through the frosted texture, I realised the proportions were completely wrong.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The shadow was positioned far too high up on that blast, as though, whoever or whatever was out there, was hovering, pressing their face directly against it.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Then, just like my paralysis in my bedroom, the temperature in the kitchen plummeted.

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[SPEAKER_00]: One second it was nice and warm, the next I was covered in goosebumps and I could see my breath in the dim light.

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[SPEAKER_00]: God loved him, but my poor buster let out a sharp, terrified yell, turned tail and scrambled frantically into the downstairs bathroom.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Whether it was him or something else, I'm not sure but the door slammed shut behind him.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I backed up so I was left stood alone in the middle of the living room, and then, from the front door, a sound began to echo down the hallway.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Slow, deliberate, I'd move back to the doorway and was looking at the glass and I was completely frozen.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I kept my eyes locked on that glass window at the top of the door.

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[SPEAKER_00]: As the knocking continued, the shadow against the glass began to shift.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The edges didn't look like a face or a head anymore.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It began to twist and swell, losing what would have been its neck.

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[SPEAKER_00]: So it was like a slow, more-fing circle, a shifting mat of absolute darkness again that seemed

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[SPEAKER_00]: And then, a voice drifted down that hallway, not allowed shout, a faint, raspy, wet whisper, that sounded as though it came from someone whose lungs were filled with fluid.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And it didn't come from the porch.

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[SPEAKER_00]: If felt as though it vibrated directly inside the walls of my house,

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[SPEAKER_00]: or maybe inside the space behind my own ears.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It didn't say my name, it didn't threaten me.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It just repeated a single phrase in a rhythmic, monotonous cadence that matched the knocking.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The sheer and natural wrongness of the entire situation broke me into a panic I didn't know I was capable of.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I flung the door open where Buster was, I threw myself inside with him and I slammed that door shut, turning the dead out.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I huddled on the tire floor with my arms wrapped tightly around Buster's neck.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I pulled out my phone with trembling hands and called the police, and they arrived fast, no more than 7 or 8 minutes, and the moment I heard the sirens approaching, the freezing cold in the house, that back to normal.

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[SPEAKER_00]: The whispering stopped entirely.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Two officers said to the entire perimeter with high-powered flashlights, they found absolutely nothing.

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[SPEAKER_00]: No one on the porch, no sign of footprints, no forced entry attempts.

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[SPEAKER_00]: One of the officers paused at the front door.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He shunned his torch, closely at the wood, it just below the small frosted window.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Excuse me, Miss.

24:36.739 --> 24:39.521
[SPEAKER_00]: He said, turning to me with a puzzled expression.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Did you or your husband have some work done on this door recently?

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[SPEAKER_00]: Or maybe have some kids messing around with charcoal?

24:49.686 --> 24:51.967
[SPEAKER_00]: I shook my head and asked why.

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[SPEAKER_00]: He pointed at the door, I headed over.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Directly below the window, etched into the wood, was a mark.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Not a deep scratch, made by a tool.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It looked as though someone had taken a piece of heavy, greasy sort, and drawn a symbol onto the grain, crude, uneven, but unmistakable.

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[SPEAKER_00]: a solid, five-pointed star, completely filled in with dense, matte black residue.

25:26.716 --> 25:33.817
[SPEAKER_00]: I told the officer it must have been neighbourhood kids playing a prank, they took a report from me and they left.

25:34.958 --> 25:43.400
[SPEAKER_00]: The second they pulled out of the driveway, I ran to the kitchen, I got a bucket of hot soapy water and a scrub brush and I went to work.

25:44.459 --> 25:49.120
[SPEAKER_00]: I scrubbed at that mark for over 20 minutes until my knuckles were red.

25:49.960 --> 25:53.341
[SPEAKER_00]: But that residue seemed to have sipped into the wood itself.

25:54.162 --> 26:06.485
[SPEAKER_00]: Despite me spending nearly an hour on it that night and a good 30 minute for the next 5 or 6 nights, then two coats of paint, done by my husband about a month later.

26:07.458 --> 26:14.521
[SPEAKER_00]: You can still see that star, especially if the soon catches the door in a certain light.

26:15.461 --> 26:17.222
[SPEAKER_00]: And this is two years later.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Within those two years though nothing has happened.

26:22.664 --> 26:32.027
[SPEAKER_00]: My life went back to normal, structured, spreadsheet driven, same house, same dog, same quiet evenings than God.

26:33.572 --> 26:42.855
[SPEAKER_00]: something changed last week, which led to me deciding to put all this in an email to you.

26:42.875 --> 26:54.839
[SPEAKER_00]: I twice a year now, come and visit my mother in Cheshire, my dad passed away six years ago with a stroke, but although my mother is still alive, she's suffering from early stage dementia.

26:55.539 --> 26:59.240
[SPEAKER_00]: Her memory's been slipping significantly over the last two years.

27:00.138 --> 27:03.760
[SPEAKER_00]: And when I fly back she often mixtures up the past with the present.

27:04.581 --> 27:13.947
[SPEAKER_00]: Just before my flight back to Canada last week, when I'd been to visit my mother in the assisted living facility, I was set by her bedside holding her hand.

27:14.928 --> 27:24.474
[SPEAKER_00]: We were talking about nothing in particular, and as you do with people who have dementia, I was agreeing with anything she said, even if it made no sense.

27:29.656 --> 27:32.998
[SPEAKER_00]: Then suddenly, she turned her head and looked at me.

27:33.979 --> 27:38.041
[SPEAKER_00]: And when I say, look, I mean, she wide-eyed stared at me.

27:39.322 --> 27:41.223
[SPEAKER_00]: Her eyes looked completely clear.

27:42.164 --> 27:44.365
[SPEAKER_00]: The way they used to look when I was a little girl.

27:45.106 --> 27:49.449
[SPEAKER_00]: She squeezed my hand so hard I thought she'd break my fingers.

27:50.049 --> 27:53.151
[SPEAKER_00]: I even said, ow, and tried to remove her hand.

27:54.232 --> 27:54.892
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm sorry, love.

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[SPEAKER_00]: She whispered, her voice cracking.

27:58.765 --> 28:01.466
[SPEAKER_00]: I shouldn't let it touch your arm in Manchester that day.

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[SPEAKER_00]: My breath caught in my throat.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It was the first time she'd acknowledge that day in almost 30 years.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Mum, I said, leaning in gently.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Don't beat that.

28:15.949 --> 28:18.949
[SPEAKER_00]: It was some lunatic woman like you said at the time.

28:20.150 --> 28:21.510
[SPEAKER_00]: My mother shook her head.

28:22.450 --> 28:26.491
[SPEAKER_00]: I look of profound, agonizing sorrow washed over her face.

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[SPEAKER_00]: And then Tears started rolling down her cheeks.

28:31.357 --> 28:33.519
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, she whispered.

28:34.460 --> 28:39.665
[SPEAKER_00]: Her voice dropping so low I could barely hear it over the home of the medical equipment in the corridor.

28:40.566 --> 28:41.526
[SPEAKER_00]: You don't understand.

28:42.868 --> 28:45.610
[SPEAKER_00]: She wasn't looking at you because you were special darling.

28:46.751 --> 28:50.895
[SPEAKER_00]: She was looking at you because she knew what was already inside.

28:52.776 --> 28:53.277
[SPEAKER_00]: Waiting.

28:55.392 --> 28:59.653
[SPEAKER_00]: But before I could ask what she meant, the clarity left her eyes.

29:00.653 --> 29:06.154
[SPEAKER_00]: She blinked, looked away, looked at me in smile, and asked me if the milkman would be.

29:07.894 --> 29:13.795
[SPEAKER_00]: Feeling almost concurst, I just said, yeah mum, he's been.

29:15.116 --> 29:21.297
[SPEAKER_00]: This is my fifth day back in Toronto, I haven't had a full night sleep since.

29:23.052 --> 29:26.995
[SPEAKER_00]: I keep looking at that faint, faded black star on my front door.

29:28.056 --> 29:36.482
[SPEAKER_00]: I think about every single one of those experiences and how they happened almost exactly 10 to 15 years apart.

29:37.983 --> 29:44.448
[SPEAKER_00]: I keep thinking about the fact I'm 36 now and the timeline is stretching out again.

29:46.209 --> 29:52.574
[SPEAKER_00]: I used to think whatever this thing is, it was following me, hunting me down from the outside

29:54.238 --> 30:01.120
[SPEAKER_00]: but ever since my mum whispered those words, I can't shake this intrusive thought out of my head.

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[SPEAKER_00]: What if that old mad woman in Manchester wasn't making a prediction?

30:10.102 --> 30:14.783
[SPEAKER_00]: What if she was just stating a fact about what I am?

30:16.323 --> 30:20.384
[SPEAKER_00]: And what if the things that keep coming to my door aren't trying to break in?

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[SPEAKER_00]: They're just waiting for whatever is inside me to wake up and let them in.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I apologize for this incredibly long essay cave.

30:34.926 --> 30:43.908
[SPEAKER_00]: If you do read this on your podcast, it will be interesting to know if anyone else has ever heard of this phrase, this bone under the black star.

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[SPEAKER_00]: or if anyone knows exactly what it means, because I haven't got the courage to google it.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, me, who doesn't believe in any of these things.

30:54.811 --> 31:00.694
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, me, who's just sent you an email containing nothing but these things.

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[SPEAKER_00]: I'm getting very, very tired of looking into the dark corners of my house every night.

31:07.416 --> 31:10.977
[SPEAKER_00]: Wondering when the next cycle will begin.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Hopefully, it won't.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But if it does, I'll try to let you know.

31:18.684 --> 31:20.785
[SPEAKER_00]: Hopefully you don't hear from me again.

31:21.705 --> 31:24.946
[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks for reading and keep up the amazing work with the show.

31:25.727 --> 31:28.387
[SPEAKER_00]: Sarah Toronto, Canada.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Well, Sarah, thank you so much for your submission.

31:40.992 --> 31:42.192
[SPEAKER_00]: And when I say thank you,

31:43.453 --> 31:45.054
[SPEAKER_00]: part of me doesn't mean that.

31:46.555 --> 31:55.681
[SPEAKER_00]: Because genuinely, this episode may just be 32 to 34 whatever minute in length.

31:56.861 --> 32:01.264
[SPEAKER_00]: It took me 8 hours to record so far.

32:02.825 --> 32:10.050
[SPEAKER_00]: And the reason for that, and I'm not putting it down to your story or experiences, but

32:11.714 --> 32:24.318
[SPEAKER_00]: there has been a series of incidents around me recording this, that I wouldn't normally encounter in a year of doing any podcasts.

32:25.478 --> 32:38.161
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm talking about going, sorry as I'm just talking, the mouse has literally just moved from a perfectly straight desk to the floor, so there

32:41.962 --> 33:04.657
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm back now, and I've literally had a cigarette in between, you just hearing my voice, and now, because I saw that out of the corner of my eye, moving, sliding, and falling, and it's a wireless mouse, it's not like something could have pulled it off, perfectly straight desk, I can't explain it, but that,

33:05.833 --> 33:17.500
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I'm almost almost happy that that happened on the recording, because that is almost emblematic of what's gone on throughout this recording.

33:18.400 --> 33:27.706
[SPEAKER_00]: There have been, for example, music files that you can hear in the background, that for some reason, mid-recording decided to change to double speed.

33:34.682 --> 33:37.104
[SPEAKER_00]: The laptop's tended self-off several times.

33:37.745 --> 33:40.287
[SPEAKER_00]: I've used a different laptop, it's done the same thing.

33:42.029 --> 33:46.313
[SPEAKER_00]: Now also, we're in the middle of a heatwave here in the UK, as I record this.

33:47.154 --> 33:52.259
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm literally sat recording just in short, not that you needed to know that, but I am.

33:54.200 --> 33:58.965
[SPEAKER_00]: Halfway through recording this episode, I became ice cold.

34:00.076 --> 34:04.659
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, I'm in the attic to record where the studio is, it's the hottest room in the house.

34:05.259 --> 34:06.860
[SPEAKER_00]: That's why I was wearing shorts.

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[SPEAKER_00]: But for a good, maybe five minutes, I became ice cold.

34:14.645 --> 34:17.907
[SPEAKER_00]: I literally had to leave the room to warm up when I came back.

34:18.347 --> 34:20.749
[SPEAKER_00]: It was back to a usual stifling self.

34:22.530 --> 34:29.254
[SPEAKER_00]: So when you say you hope I never hear from you again, I think I'm with you on that one,

34:31.800 --> 34:52.853
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not going to personally look into what that means, the black star thing that is, just because, although it is 3pm in the UK, it is blistering the hot outside, the sun is shining, beaming through into the studio, I am terrified, I'll be perfectly honest.

34:54.955 --> 34:59.498
[SPEAKER_00]: Now usually I would tell you all about the perks you get from on Patreon's right now,

35:00.390 --> 35:02.371
[SPEAKER_00]: I would say, please check out the show notes.

35:02.511 --> 35:07.114
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a full explanation in there about what you can receive by becoming a patron.

35:07.495 --> 35:09.776
[SPEAKER_00]: Believe me, it's an amazing place to be.

35:10.216 --> 35:14.639
[SPEAKER_00]: And if I wasn't the host of the show, I would definitely become a patron.

35:15.340 --> 35:18.582
[SPEAKER_00]: So check out that link in the show notes where you can get a free week trial.

35:19.737 --> 35:34.108
[SPEAKER_00]: And speaking of which there is a show I do on Patreon, called After Dark, where I try to disseminate episodes, this one will be a hell of a one to watch as it's a video one unedited.

35:35.329 --> 35:40.514
[SPEAKER_00]: Also there is of course the link to send your story in and please do so if you have one to send in.

35:41.691 --> 35:56.219
[SPEAKER_00]: But right now, I'm going to end this episode, so I can leave this room, and I can shake off this experience, because I genuinely do not like it, not one bit.

35:57.280 --> 36:07.066
[SPEAKER_00]: And I know this isn't the worst experience that we've had in terms of evil or things such as that, but I will say one thing from the bottom of my heart.

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[SPEAKER_00]: this is the one experience which feels like it's in the room with me as I speak.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Now I know it's not.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Believe me I know that.

36:18.051 --> 36:25.072
[SPEAKER_00]: I know my mind is playing tricks on me but playing tricks on me a 3pm in the afternoon on a very sunny day.

36:25.792 --> 36:27.513
[SPEAKER_00]: Not at midnight in an empty house.

36:28.713 --> 36:31.214
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm gonna call it a day for today.

36:32.241 --> 36:36.662
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you all for joining me for Episode 7 and you it was going to be different.

36:37.223 --> 36:59.810
[SPEAKER_00]: I just didn't expect this different And I got a way to speak to you all again next week for Episode 8 and there's hoping it's less available Until then remember whenever you discuss the paranormal always try and leave some of your disbelief at the door and stay safe take care and good bye