Archive 81 Presents... The No Sleep Podcast

Episode: "A Body In A New Place"

Release Date: November 19, 2025

Overview

This episode is a crossover between Archive 81 and The No Sleep Podcast, two of the most respected names in modern audio horror. Hosted by Dead Signals, the episode features “A Body In A New Place,” a haunting original story written by Jamie Flanagan and performed by a full cast, including Archive 81 favorite Kristen D. Mercurio. The tale follows Moira, a young girl gifted a mysterious diary from her grandmothers. The diary is peculiar: it comes pre-written and bound by strict rules—rules about reading only one entry per day and never skipping ahead. As Moira inevitably breaks these rules, her life is pulled forward in time by forces beyond her control, exploring in chilling detail the price of peeking into the tomorrows we’re not meant to know.

Key Discussion Points & Story Breakdown

1. The Gift of the Diary & the Rules

(00:02 – 05:51)

• Introduction to Moira's world: Raised in a cottage filled with books and three indistinguishable grandmothers—Cleo, Lockley, and Addie.
• The Diary’s Legacy: Passed down generationally, with materials and rituals deeply rooted in family and the supernatural.
• Rules Set Forth:
  • “Each day you may read one entry, but only the entry for that same day. Don't bother with what happened yesterday or the day before. Life moves forward... never skip ahead to tomorrow or after. Promise?” (Mother, 05:19)
  • Notably, the diary must never be sold, given away, or lost—it is unique and irreplaceable.
• Immediate Defiance: Moira breaks the rule nearly instantly, longing for reassurance on her birthday presents by reading ahead.

2. The Consequences of Reading Ahead

(05:52 – 11:52)

• Temporal Displacement: Moira experiences lost time, suddenly finding herself with only hazy, second-hand memories of moments she missed living.
• Grandmothers’ Explanation:
  • "If you read tomorrow or any further ahead, you'll find yourself wherever you leave off." (Grandmothers, 08:24)
  • Time is described as fickle, “shy about the future and insufferably blunt about the present and a disaster at record-keeping.” (Grandmothers, 08:45)
• Pain as a Means of Stretching Time: Moira stuffs bones in her shoe during joyful moments to make the pain stretch precious seconds into minutes.
  • “Because pain makes a moment seem longer.” (Moira, 11:47)

3. The Diary’s Power Escalates

(11:53 – 15:31)

• Loss of the Diary: Moira’s bag (and the diary) is stolen at school, and when others start reading it, her life is forcibly fast-forwarded, skipping not just hours but entire weeks and months.
• Fragmentation of Memory and Experience:
  • Moira’s life slips away uncontrollably—her mother’s illness and death, her father’s descent, cycles of pain and institutionalization—all delivered in a series of jarring, skipped passages signaled by “pages flutter.”
  • “Wearing a thin gown, I seem to float through a hallway lit by halogens...I'm 12 years old and I'm still screaming.” (Moira, 16:46–17:08)

4. Coping with Fractured Time and Trauma

(17:09 – 22:13)

• Moira’s Adulthood:
  • Attempts at normalcy—a roommate named Lottie, moments of genuine connection, fleeting happiness paired with longing to hold onto good times, sometimes by invoking pain.
  • Repeated cycles of love, loss, and isolation—often accelerated or eroded by the diary’s curse.
• Art as Survival and Restoration:
  • Moira becomes a restoration artist, trying to preserve fragments of the past for others, reflecting her own shattered experience of time.
  • “I breathe and let my skipped life bloom, develop in me like a Polaroid.” (Moira, 17:47)

5. The Long View: Legacy, Regret, Acceptance

(22:14 – 28:44)

• Aging and Reflection:
  • At 45 and beyond, Moira is mostly alone—her lovers and friends distanced by the gaps in her time, her art now surrounded by “portraits of the dead.”
  • Moira’s father, now frail, tells her, “He is so, so very proud.” (23:31)
• Philosophical Acceptance:
  • Teaching a young girl about restoration, she notes: “It'll never be as it was... There’s damage changes, even in repair … That’s what makes them beautiful and a little sad, and that’s okay. That’s the way of things.” (25:17-25:59)
  • Her regrets center on waiting for external rescue rather than forging meaning herself:
    • “I should never have waited so long for something to come along and save me, for someone else to make me feel safe. Tomorrows are frightening until you start to run out of them.” (Moira, 27:25)
• A Final Request:
  • Moira asks the listener—implied to be the diary’s current reader—to return her, even if just for a moment, to the innocence of childhood:
    • “Draw a sunflower in the margins so I'll feel held before beginnings beyond ends. Always.” (28:37)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Each day you may read one entry, but only the entry for that same day... never skip ahead to tomorrow or after. Promise?”
  — Moira’s Mother to Moira, (05:19)

• “Time’s a fickle relative, shy about the future and insufferably blunt about the present and a disaster at record keeping.”
  — Grandmothers, (08:45)

• “Because pain makes a moment seem longer.”
  — Moira, (11:47)

• “All you did was find a diary, and pages are meant to be turned, so read on. There’s comfort in endings.”
  — Moira, (27:42)

• “Draw a sunflower in the margins so I'll feel held before beginnings beyond ends. Always.”
  — Moira, (28:37)

• “Tomorrows are frightening until you start to run out of them, and what’s left of my book is thin.”
  — Moira, (27:25)

Timestamps for Key Segments

• [01:15] — Introduction by David Cummings; premise of the diary
• [03:17] — Description of the magical diary and its construction
• [05:19] — The crucial “rules” for reading the diary
• [06:45] — Moira breaks the rule, reads ahead, and skips missing her birthday
• [08:24] — Grandmothers explain the nature/consequence of the diary
• [11:43] — Bones in the shoe; using pain to slow down happy moments
• [14:29] — The diary’s theft; Moira’s life is fast-forwarded by others’ reading
• [15:12] — Loss, trauma, and fragmented time; experiencing her mother’s death in an instant
• [17:09] — Coping mechanisms; art school, struggles with mental illness
• [22:13] — Alone in mid-life, reflecting on what was lost and who she’s become
• [25:13] — Restoration artist analogy; teaching the next generation
• [27:25] — Moira’s philosophical acceptance of her life and fate
• [28:37] — Moira’s closing request and parting words

Tone and Style

• The narration is bittersweet, wistful, and deeply haunting.
• The story uses a blend of poetic language and stark, honest dialogue to capture the peculiarly tragic way the supernatural and the mundane intertwine in Moira’s life.
• There’s a persistent sense of longing to hold onto fleeting joys, and grief at the realization that most things—and people—cannot be preserved.

Final Thoughts

This episode of Archive 81 x No Sleep Podcast uses the diary as a metaphor for regret, memory, and the inexorable march of time. It explores the dangers of seeking comfort in forbidden knowledge, the pain of missing life’s formative moments, and the bittersweetness of art and personal legacy. The story flips the horror genre’s typical “cursed object” trope on its head, blending it with a meditation on family, illness, change, and acceptance.

For more haunting stories, visit thenosleeppodcast.com.