Scary Stories For A Rainy Night - Ep. 243 - "Fresh Frights"

Podcast: Scary Stories and Rain
Host: Being Scared
Date: September 29, 2025

Episode Overview

In Episode 243 of “Scary Stories and Rain,” listeners are treated to a fresh collection of unnerving true accounts, each told with the podcast’s signature calm narration and a soothing rain backdrop. Stories include encounters with stalkers, childhood dangers, unexplained threats in public places, and a chilling riverbank discovery. The episode’s unifying theme is the ordinary turned ominous—everyday locations and people revealed in sudden, frightful light.

Story Summaries & Key Moments

1. The Creepy Restroom Encounter

Timestamp: 01:41 – 05:38

• Setting: Employee restroom at a home improvement store
• Narrator describes boredom on shift, leading to long, uneventful bathroom breaks. This time, another individual occupies the neighboring stall.
• The neighboring stall occupant stretches his hand under the divider in a disturbingly close way, remaining silent even when ignored.
• The situation escalates when the man tries peering into the narrator's stall, prompting intense discomfort:
  • Quote: "Just like a scene from a horror movie, our eyes connected. He was barely an inch away from my door, trying to peek inside." (03:00)
• The man begins whispering inappropriate things about the narrator's "unflushed toilet paper." Only with the arrival of another person does the stalker back off.
• The narrator escapes, still puzzled and unsettled, and notices the man didn't wear a work uniform, raising questions if it was a targeted act.
• Emotional note: Creeped out, the narrator spends the rest of the shift scanning for the perpetrator, made more anxious by poor facial recognition.

2. The Malicious Nurse

Timestamp: 05:39 – 06:53

• Setting: Hospital, night, after narrator’s suicide attempt
• The narrator recalls waking up as a nurse attempts—and seemingly fails—to insert an IV, increasingly convinced the pain is intentional.
  • Quote: "He is pushing and wiggling the needles around under my skin, saying he is trying to get the vein…By the seventh or eighth needle, it registers that he is intentionally trying to hurt me." (06:00)
• When asked for an explanation, the nurse coldly responds: "It's your own fault that you're here." (06:11, nurse paraphrased)
• The next day, another nurse is horrified, revealing an oversized needle was used.
• Impact: The story underscores the terror of being vulnerable, with supposed caretakers actively wishing you harm.

3. The Persistent Restaurant Stalker

Timestamp: 06:54 – 11:51

• Setting: Restaurant and city streets
• Narrator (aged 15 at the time) sits at a separate table with friends during a family dinner. A man in his 30s fixates on her throughout the meal.
• The unnerving behavior continues: the man leaves the restaurant but lingers outside the window, then follows the narrator’s group outside.
• Months later, shockingly, they encounter the same man downtown; he recognizes and follows them, now with a friend.
  • Quote: “We were standing on a street corner…when I felt Gabby tapping my shoulder…It was the same guy from the restaurant…he started to follow.” (09:44)
• The group manages to evade him after ducking into stores, never telling their families, but the episode lingers in their memories as an unsettling coincidence.

4. The Ocean Fright at Prince Edward Island

Timestamp: 11:52 – 21:41

• Setting: PEI family vacation beach
• At 12, the narrator enjoys a beach holiday, reassured by parents that "the water is too cold for sharks."
• While swimming, he drifts out—unaware of riptides—before realizing his family are far away and motioning for him to come back.
• Quote: "Being a 12 year old child, I had no idea anything about undertows or riptides. I just knew I had to get back to shore like my life depended on it." (14:33)
• Panic as something immense and slippery brushes against his leg—then a dark shadow, possibly a massive sea creature, passes nearby.
  • Quote: "Something was in the water with me and it was gigantic. Soft but gigantic and terrifying at the same time." (17:20)
• Survives the experience, but is shaken. Days later, local radio announces the discovery of the largest white shark recorded off PEI, confirming his fears.
• Notable reflection: Despite parental reassurances, nature’s unpredictability proves more frightening than fiction.

5. Night Jogging and a Figure in the Park

Timestamp: 22:09 – 28:31

• Setting: Suburban Ottawa park at night
• The narrator jogs through a childhood neighborhood, entering an unlit park.
• A man in a black sweatsuit and hospital mask is spotted raking the sandbox under a play structure at nearly 11pm.
• The jogger waves awkwardly but is unsettled when the man turns off his flashlight and footsteps indicate he’s being chased.
  • Quote: "My heart jumps into my throat…it's crazy what fear and adrenaline can do cuz I went from 0 to 100 real quick." (27:08)
• The narrator sprints to safety, unsure of the stranger’s motives.
• Later learns the park is near a homeless shelter, but remains haunted by "what ifs."

6. The Unnerving Hotel Guest

Timestamp: 28:32 – 36:41

• Setting: Housekeeper at a top-rated hotel
• While preparing to clean a guest’s room, the narrator finds an odd number of prescription pill bottles and two chilling handwritten notes.
• Notable details from the notes include: "You don't have to forgive her, you just can't kill her... Get over having to kill her and you can safely leave." (32:55)
• A to-do list contains disturbing entries ("there will be a day of reckoning").
• Overcome with dread, the housekeeper snaps photos and refuses to re-enter the room. Management agrees, evicting the guest for staff safety.
• Quote: “I spent a few minutes in the laundry room trying to calm down…for the first time in all these years I am not comfortable being in a guest room.” (35:15)

7. The Watchtower Creep

Timestamp: 36:42 – 46:31

• Setting: Industrial area, late 1990s, pre-cellphone era
• A nine-year-old girl visits her father’s work—or an adjacent company’s watchtower—to use the phone.
• A new guard becomes fixated on her, asking personal questions, offering tea, then escalating to attempting to block her from leaving and discussing dating.
  • Quote: “He kept on asking me his weird questions whilst I was terrified to move because I didn’t want to move my body against his, if that makes any sense. So I just froze.” (40:59)
• The girl fakes seeing a relative to escape. Later, the man shows up at her home late at night with friends, calling to her.
• Fathers confronts and threatens the man. The girl never sees him again, but the memory persists—especially after catching someone watching her at night through a window.

8. The Riverbank Cave and the Horrific Discovery

Timestamp: 46:32 – 64:10

• Setting: July 1982, a group of boys build a “Temple of Set” cave on a riverbank.
• The kids enjoy weeks of play, eventually discovering their hideout is being used by older teens.
• One day, after a group of local bullies passes by river noodling for catfish, the narrative takes a gruesome turn.
  • Gerald, one of the teens, describes:
    • “I reached into that hole and felt what I thought was a tail and pulled on it and came up with a damn sock and shoe.” (61:04)
• Police are called; divers recover a decomposing corpse from the river, with details haunting the boys.
  • Quote: “This was the first time I had ever seen an actual dead person…bad dreams for a few weeks afterwards.” (63:09)
• The site—and the boys’ innocence—is irrevocably lost.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On dread in the mundane:
  “It’s better than standing around trying to look busy…[until] the guy in the next stall had his hand stretched to the ground.” (02:00)
• On vulnerability and trust:
  “Being alone, helpless, and knowing that the person…supposed to care for you, hated you.” (06:50)
• On odds and fate:
  “All these years later, my friends and I think back…we still think about how crazy the odds were to meet the same creep more than once in two completely different random places.” (11:40)
• Chilling discovery:
  “He told us that just as it was getting close enough to the surface…he noticed it was white instead of the dark gray color. Then he saw the sock and shoe.” (62:49)

Timestamps for Important Sections

• 01:41 – Store Bathroom Encounter
• 05:39 – Malicious Nurse in Hospital
• 06:54 – Restaurant Stalker and Aftermath
• 11:52 – PEI Ocean Terror
• 22:09 – Night Jogging/Man in the Park
• 28:32 – The Hotel Guest’s Ominous Notes
• 36:42 – The Watchtower Creep
• 46:32 – Riverbank Clubhouse and Body Discovery

Episode Tone and Atmosphere

As always, narration is measured and calm, with steady rain adding to a sense of late-night intimacy and tension. The stories, though varied in scope and age, all share an undercurrent of vulnerability and the fear lurking in everyday places. The host’s gentle delivery amplifies the eeriness by contrasting against the disturbing tales.

Final Thoughts

“Fresh Frights” delivers on the promise of unsettling true tales, each leaving listeners with images that may linger long past the episode. The focus on real-life scenarios, accidental danger, and predatory figures, coupled with an ambience of rainfall, makes this an excellent selection for horror fans seeking a quiet but chilling experience.

For more immersive stories, check out the other Scary Stories series listed in the episode description.