C (23:31)

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B (24:05)

In April of last year, my boyfriend and I were coming home from our friend's house. I had just finished my first year at college and we wanted to go out and celebrate and have some fun. We live in a rural town and our friend lived on the far side of it so our walk was about a half hour or so. I had a drink or two and smoked some of the joint they had rolled. Smoking makes me paranoid and this night was no different. Anyway, we left at maybe 10 or 11pm and everything was perfectly normal until we got to the end of the long street that would eventually lead to my house. This street always feels so long to walk, like hours can pass and you barely make a dent in the amount of steps made. The street we turned on to this road was maybe 10 blocks from my house. A few minutes after we turned onto this road I felt like something was off, but my boyfriend said that I was stoned and reminded me that I'm a pretty paranoid person to begin with. I really am. This white pickup truck that was parked in front of some house turns on and begins to drive slowly away and would then park. I watched it to see if it was just me being paranoid or not, but it proceeded to stop a couple of houses down and sat there with the car still on. As soon as we would get close it would drive away, parking a little further away. This continued until we got to the end of my street. At this point I kept telling my boyfriend that I am not paranoid, that this truck was following us and he had gone quiet. A couple houses down from mine this truck drives to the end of the street, my house on the corner. There's a dead end right by my house because we live near a river. The truck stops for a moment at the dead end and proceeds to turn and turn on their high beams and begin to slowly drive towards us. My boyfriend sticks his arm out in front of me stopping me from walking any further as this truck continues to approach. My house is so close yet so far. This truck slowly drives by us. The windows are tinted but we can see two silhouettes and because they have blinded us we didn't think to look at the license plates or even the model of the truck. I swear I felt like that was the night I was going to die. My thoughts hurled around in my mind and I could see that my boyfriend was in the same mindset My boyfriend, being pretty quick on his feet, waited until the truck disappeared from sight and took my hand before racing to my house and locking the door. He had thought about turning down one of the other streets so that we could try to lose them, but he figured he would wait until they were out of sight to book it to my house so they wouldn't see which house we went in. We looked out one of the front windows very carefully and saw this truck come back into view and began to drive around the block, presumably looking for us. This went on for 10 minutes. I called the police to inform them that we had been followed, but without the license plates or model, they could only keep their eyes open for suspicious white trucks. I was adamant that these people had to know one of us, if not me, because they drove until they were beside my house. Whether they actually knew it was my house or not, I don't know. My boyfriend tries to insist that it was probably a bunch of kids trying to mess with us, but I don't believe that. A few days later we heard that someone was picked up and was last seen in a white truck. Since this night, there have been stories in the paper and online that people have been grabbing people and these people were trafficked in the area. I am still seeing reports even today, which prompted this unsettling memory. It makes me wonder if they were some of these people and if they were. Were they after both of us or just one of us? Or were they truly just a bunch of jerks trying to mess with us? Either way, I don't care to know. Whenever I see a white truck, I become on edge. It may be silly, but the events of that night are still fresh in my mind years later. This happened when both me and my friend Jay were 15. I was spending the night at his house, as I often did. It was a normal enough night. We watched movies, played a couple video games and stayed up way too late. It was about 2am I think, when we heard a loud banging coming from the front door. Luckily, at the time, we were in his kitchen at the back of the house so no one could see us. We were spooked because there shouldn't have been anyone at the door at this hour, but we figured it was just some drunk person and they would go away soon enough. After 30 seconds, there was more banging on the door and yelling that neither of us could understand. It sounded like an adult man and he sounded angry, so we were both scared. He texted his mom, who we thought was upstairs, but she said that she had left a bit before without saying anything. She did that often enough. She liked to go to her friend's house in the middle of the night so we didn't pay any attention or notice. When she left, we didn't know what to do as we were scared to call the police based off past experiences with cops in our small town being not the best. At this point we turned off the kitchen light and we're ducked down on the ground. We heard the banging and yelling get louder and I decided to see who it was if it was anyone we knew. I army crawled through the dining room which was also dark and peeked through the door to the living room which is where the front door was. There is also a huge window by the door that you can see right into the dining room through, so I was very careful not to be seen. I couldn't see any details of the man, but he looked to be about 6ft tall and had gray hair. I crawled back to Jay and we quietly decided what to do. The banging stopped so we decided to wait a bit before seeing if it was safe. We also decided to go under the table in the dining room in case he tried to come around back which is where the kitchen was. After around 10 minutes of silence we rock paper scissored for who had to check if he was out there and of course I lost. So I again army crawled to the dining room door. I saw the man staring through the window, hands cupped against the glass. I made eye contact with him the moment he saw me and I loudly said crap. Causing my friend to panic and crawl behind me. I saw him pull out his phone. He told me later that he was texting his mom to come home and save us. The man started yelling again and this time we could make out a bit more of what he said. It was mostly cussing, although I definitely heard the phrase I'm going to kill you in there a couple times. I quickly looked past the man to see if the neighbor seemed to notice him but no luck. I crawled back out of his sight and again discuss what to do with my friend. We decide to go into the basement for safety, which you could get to by moving the fridge. Confusing house, I know, but it was really old and not meant for modern sized appliances. We pull out the fridge and get into the basement, feeling mostly safe but still terrified. I start having a panic attack, although I'm trying to hold it together the best I can for Jay, who is also on the verge of a panic attack. We hear a gunshot and shattering glass from above us and I cover My mouth so I don't scream. Jay and I look at each other terrified. We hear loud footsteps and yelling above us. The man asking where we were. We hear him going upstairs and moving around up there for a bit. He eventually comes back down and starts turning over furniture. I'm assuming to find us. After what felt like after hours, but was probably only minutes, Jay's mom pulls into the driveway, which scares the guy as he runs out the back door. In the kitchen, Jay and I get out of the basement and run to greet his mom, never happier to see her. She was shocked by the state of the house and hugged us, happy that we were safe and scared by how close we were to being hurt. We were all very scared after that night. They had better security installed and we went over safety protocol if anything ever happened again. Luckily, it hasn't happened again yet. Although when I go to his house, I'm still a bit scared. We never called the police because we knew there wasn't much they could do. We just cleaned up and moved on. I live in a fairly large town and the crime rate is pretty low. I am a teenager and due to this quarantine, I haven't been able to get out and meet my friends as much as I would like to. So when my mom told me that she was going out and she wouldn't hate company, I jumped at the chance. I'm fairly popular in my school and I do have a lot of friends and not seeing them has taken a toll on my life and I would love to meet with them once all of this was over. But the rules in town regarding quarantine are pretty strict until the total count of people affected in our area goes down. We have a lot of grocery shops in this town and the one where we go to is pretty big. My mom and I decided to go there and I waited in the car because I didn't really feel like going in. I am kind of a germaphobe. I have no problem roaming around in the streets where I live, but going to a shop where so many people have been during this pandemic seems very weird to me. I know I might be coming off as a spoiled brat, but that's just how I am and that's just how I've always been. My mom went inside the store and she's being the most overprotective mom, taking the car keys with her and locking the car, which now I am very thankful for. So as most cars have very thick windows and you can't really understand what somebody on the other side of the window is saying, unless they're shouting. Our car was no different, and this is important. My mom told me that it would take her about 15 to 20 minutes to get all of the supplies that we needed. I didn't mind that because I got to blast my music in the car, which she does not allow when she's in it. About five minutes after she walked away, I was blasting the music and she called me. She told me that there was a big line in the store so it would take her extra time. And again, I did not mind because I got to listen to music the way I wanted, and that's all I wanted. Ten minutes after that, I had my eyes closed and I hear this tapping. At first I dismissed it at some part of the song that I had never caught before, but then the tapping got frantic and I realized that someone was tapping on the window on the driver's side of the car. I thought it was my mom, and she dropped her keys somewhere and she couldn't get in or she wanted something. But when I opened my eyes to see who it was, it was a tall man, about 6ft and looked like he was high on drugs. I turned off the music and shut shouted, can I help you? He didn't respond, but then abruptly started shouting at the top of his lungs, let me in. I said, let me in. I was in such shock because I had never seen this man in my entire life. I already had my phone on me, and I was starting to dial my mom's number. Then what he did next will give me goosebumps for the rest of my life. He suddenly lowered his voice, looked me in the eye and said, honey, let me in, darling. I promise I won't hurt you. Let me in. Let me in, sweetie. In a very calm and sweet voice like how you would talk to a toddler when they're making a mess. I was shaking so hard that I could not dial the correct number to my mom's phone, and I started searching for her contact on my phone. I know, very dumb, considering there's a psychopath that's about to kill me outside my window. Then he started screaming, I will kill you. You are going to regret not letting me in. And starts banging his whole body against the car. I know he couldn't get into the vehicle because the windows are very secure and he was relatively thin and looked to be in his late 40s. And I was pretty sure that he did not have the power needed to get inside the car without me unlocking it. I dialed My mom and he was still screaming at the top of his lungs, calling me every swear word in the book. My mom answered the phone and heard what was happening and she came running outside and saw the psychopath trying to hurt her daughter and she went off. She started hitting him with the stuff that she had just bought from inside. And then when the employees heard the commotion and decided to step in, the police were called and one employee held the man in place. I was crying and shaking and having a full on anxiety attack. The police showed up in about five minutes and he was arrested. We later found out that he had taken large doses of Heroes. It was the scariest thing I have ever experienced in my life. The way that he said it, that he wouldn't hurt me if I had let him in the car. Man, he's in jail now and I couldn't be happier about it.

D (38:30)

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B (39:04)

This happened about two and a half years ago in the winter of 2017, early 2018. My partner and I were living in the center of a popular and busy city in England at the time in a ground floor flat. The street we lived on was just off a very busy road that had about a thousand pubs on it, so it was normally quite populated at all hours most days. The flat we lived in was one of about seven in an old conference converted bakery. There was a very large locked wooden gate with a buzzer and the flats were all in a courtyard behind the gate. We shared the flat with my mom. Our bedroom windows both faced directly onto the street where people would walk past on the pavement. On this given night it must have been around 2am My girlfriend and I were laying on my bed watching films on my laptop. My bedroom was a tiny shoebox sized room with a bed and a wardrobe and about 5 square feet of extra floor space. Tiny. My window was right next to my bed and faced out onto the street. As we were laying on my bed, someone knocked on my window. That wasn't unusual as I had quite a few friends that lived and worked near my flat, so we didn't think much of it we continued watching our film and settled down. About half an hour to 45 minutes later there was a massive bang on my window that sounded like someone had slammed their fist against it and ran off. We were a bit startled and decided to go take a look outside as it was evidently not one of my friends at this point. We went into the courtyard and opened the main gate and couldn't see anyone on the street at all. It was freezing and snowing but still unusually quiet. We stood there for about five minutes just looking around. I noticed a man on the other side of the street wearing a mid length trench coat and heavy boots, but as my eyesight is awful and I never wear my glasses, I didn't see any discerning features. He was on the opposite side of the street and was walking along the street from the main road from left to right up towards our flat. I got a bit of a strange vibe from him and pointed him out to my girlfriend. We both just stood and watched for a few minutes and as he passed he didn't turn to look at us or anything. After less than a minute I looked to my right and saw this same guy had now crossed over to our side of the street and was now walking towards my girlfriend and I watched for a minute and then proceeded to panic and shut ourselves behind the gate. Instead of going back into our flat, we crouched down out of sight so that we could watch through the gap under the gate to see if he passed by. The thing I remember the most vividly is the sound of his boots creaking on the snow and watching him come to a deep stop directly outside the gate. My girlfriend and I were both now suitably crapping ourselves and we quietly hurried back inside. Our flat had an open plan kitchen and living room with a door that led into the straight hallway. My bedroom was right at the end of the hallway and my mom was off to the right. All of the lights were off and I poked my head into the hall as I had a clear line of sight into my bedroom from there. When I looked I could see the silhouette of this man pacing up and down slowly outside my bedroom window. My mom had slept soundly through all of this, but I decided to go in and wake her up to let her know what was going on. She brushed it off until I told her to look outside and she saw this man now pacing back and forth outside her window and mine. Knowing that at the right angle angle you could see through my blinds from outside, I pressed myself up against the wall and scooted my way down the hallway back to the living room and rang the police. My girlfriend and I weren't really sure what to make of the situation, but it felt pretty ominous. The Police arrived about 10 minutes later and met me outside. They said they found him and he claimed to be homeless looking for a place to stay day, but that he was very well dressed and clean shaven and had no other possessions with him. The police officer offered forth the fact that it's more likely that he was intrigued by the fact that there were two obviously queer young femmes in bed together and was having a little snoop. Who knows. The next day I was outside having a cigarette with my girlfriend and I noticed a very prominent sticky handprint on my window, as if someone had their hand pressed up against it looking in. No thanks. My girlfriend swears she saw him at the train station a few months later. This happened a few years ago in my old one person flight flat. I had a strange feeling that something wasn't right for a few days. Like I was sure that food in the fridge was less than I put back the last time I found pillows from my couch on the floor, stuff like that. I lived alone back then so there wasn't anyone else with access to my flat. Or so I thought. One night I woke up around one in the morning sweating and even though I didn't remember, was sure I woke from a nightmare. Since I was drenched in sweat. I decided to take a shower. So I put my phone up in the bathroom for music, turned on the water and enjoyed my shower. A few minutes in I heard the door move. I never close it but it still never moves. I took a look at the shower curtain and saw a shadow appearance against it and a look at my phone confirmed someone was there. Since I could clearly see a reflection on my screen that showed someone was standing next to the shower curtain. It took me a lot not to scream and to keep acting like I didn't notice anything while silently taking the shower head off and holding and turning the water all the way to hot. I am still kind of impressed with that quick quick thinking. Our water got really hot when you cranked it all the way up and a few seconds later steam was rising and the water was hurting my feet flowing to the drain. I turned around, ripped the shower curtain open and held the shower head right at the person behind was a woman. She screamed in pain. I whacked her in the face with the shower head, jumped out of the shower and ran to the door, taking the key out of the lock and locking it close behind me. A little bit later she started to bang on the door but the door didn't give. Thank God for German quality work. I called the cops and went to the kitchen to get my big kitchen knife just for safety. I felt like my throat was closing up when I saw that the knife was missing and realized there's only one place where it could pop possibly be right now. The police came and arrested the woman who turned out to have been the former person living in the flat and was evicted after not paying rent. Seems that she made a copy of the key and came into the flat when I was at work and sometimes at night. It is possible that what woke me up in the first place was her and honestly, I don't even want to think about it. Ever since then I always insist that the locks are changed when I move into a new place.

E (47:08)

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B (47:38)

If you run, you're a runner.

F (47:43)

However you choose, choose to do it.

B (47:48)

Because when you're not worried about doing things the right way, you're free to discover your way.

F (47:56)

And that's what running is all about. Run your way@newbalance.com Running.

G (48:04)

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B (48:28)

Fast.

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D (48:33)

Mint is still $15 a month for premium wireless. And if you haven't made the switch yet, here are 15 reasons why you should 1. It's $15 a month.

E (48:43)

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D (48:44)

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B (48:48)

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D (48:48)

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B (48:49)

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D (48:49)

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G (48:57)

Payment of $45 for 3 month plan $15 per month equivalent required New customer offer first 3 months only then full price plan options available, taxes and fees extra. See mintmobile.com she's made up her mind.

A (49:06)

To live pretty smart, learn to budget.

B (49:09)

Responsibly right from the start. She spe less, inputs more into savings, keeps her blood pressure low and credit score raises boring money moves. Make kind of lame songs, but they sound pretty sweet to your wallet. The NC bank brilliantly boring since 1865. It's.

F (75:16)

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