Signs

Summary

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Sightings – Episode: "Signs" (January 19, 2026)

Episode Overview

This episode of Sightings, hosted by McLeod Andrews and Brian Sigley, dives into the idea that many supernatural encounters begin not with terror, but with subtle, strange signs. In a refreshed format for 2026, the hosts bring listeners four chilling firsthand stories from around the world, each highlighting mysterious, paranormal—or even cryptid—encounters. With authentic reactions, humor, and wide-eyed curiosity, McLeod and Brian explore the uncertainty that lingers between reality and the unknown.

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Format Update & Call for Stories

[00:48 – 02:52]

• The show is moving to a monthly schedule (except for Spooky Season in the fall, which will return with full “Monster, Alien, and Ghost” stories).
• Focus for now: listener-submitted stories, brought to life in dramatic readings and conversation.
• Listeners are encouraged to send their own supernatural accounts via email or Instagram.
• Notable banter:
  • McLeod: “So join us now as we explore four listener stories that will have you looking over your shoulder in the night.”

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Story 1: "Footsteps, Balloons, and Time Loops" — Gretchen in Australia

[05:02 – 13:06]

Summary

Gretchen recounts her childhood in a rural, nondescript rental house in Australia—built on land that used to be a slaughterhouse—which gave rise to increasingly bizarre and frightening occurrences. The story unfolds through a skeptical child’s eyes, as footsteps at night escalate to overt poltergeist activity: blinds snapping, hangers scraping, and a balloon eerily stretching itself. The family’s reactions run the gamut—from nervous breakdown to calm observation—culminating in a philosophical debate about hauntings, memory, and the nature of time.

Highlights & Quotes

• “At first it was just footsteps, long and slow on the concrete footpath beneath our second story bedroom window.” (Gretchen, [05:55])
• The most tangible incident: a balloon stretching and snapping on its own, coat hangers scraping in a closed wardrobe, and moving shadows cast by blinds.
• Gretchen’s mother: “She told us she thought the house didn't want us to go and whatever was there was trying to communicate and just didn't realize how frightening that would be to us." ([12:07])
• Philosophical reflection: “We don't know how time works… Who knows how many layers of reality are at play in one place at one time?... Maybe...it was us who haunted them.”

Host Reactions

• Brian: “She would be the one wielding a shotgun, kicking down doors… doesn’t bother me, I’m not interested.” ([13:29])
• McLeod: “This woman goes on my, like, who do you want to be in your, like, crew in the zombie apocalypse?” ([13:24])
• Both hosts draw parallels to the film The Others and express awe at Gretchen’s calm under pressure.
• Open question: What did Gretchen’s brother experience?

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Story 2: "Mimic in the Trees" — Christopher, Pacific Northwest

[17:49 – 24:30]

Summary

Christopher, an experienced firefighter and S&R volunteer, is dispatched to search for two missing hikers in the rainy forest—accompanied by his 85-pound black Lab, Tiberius. Events take a sinister turn as Tiberius—well-trained and unflappable—suddenly freezes, growls, then whimpers in terror. Christopher sees huge, pale blue eyes reflecting from high in a tree, describes a creature with human-like features and gray fur, and then hears his own voice mimicked back at him perfectly from the dark before fleeing in terror.

Highlights & Quotes

• “The thing moved. Not down. Sideways. It leapt from one tree to another with a speed that made my stomach drop. I caught just enough detail to register something deeply wrong. It looked almost human.” (Christopher, [19:35])
• “From above me, my own voice answered, ‘what the hell?’ Perfectly. Same tone, same inflection. Then it repeated it twice.” ([22:13])
• "The forest doesn't feel the same anymore. Something about that night made it feel less empty out there." (Christopher, [24:10])

Host Reactions

• Brian: “Zoinks is apt for this. Goodness gracious. Well, I’m glad Tiberius was okay.” ([24:30])
• McLeod: “It’s not like anything I’ve heard before… The voice thing is just like oof.” ([24:36])
• Speculate about cryptid identity—Bigfoot? Skinwalker? But the mimicry throws them off.
• Both praise Christopher’s continued service despite his chilling experience.

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Story 3: "Who’s That on the Stairs?" — David, Massachusetts

[27:30 – 32:51]

Summary

David moves into a historical 1750s farmhouse and, forewarned of its “energy,” respectfully lays out ground rules for any resident entities. Subtle disturbances arise: a photo frame flies off a shelf, a toy spaceship malfunctions, footsteps on stairs with no visible cause, children and guests seeing shadowy figures. The most haunting occurrence: on their final night, a surge of inexplicable noise and, later, a photo showing a shadowy human shape in an upstairs window as the family poses goodbye.

Highlights & Quotes

• David: “As long as you don’t scare my wife or my daughter, you can stay. If you do, I’ll get a young priest and an old priest…” ([28:20])
• Daughter: “Tell them to go again.”
• Friend’s experience: “She heard someone walk up behind her, footsteps on the hardwood. Except I hadn’t ripped up the carpet yet to reveal the beautiful oak floors.” ([31:05])
• Final act: “Before leaving and locking the door one last time, I turned and spoke to the house. Thank you for the memories, but you cannot come with us." ([32:34])

Host Reactions

• McLeod: “He’s our priest or our paladin…We’re putting together a really strong Dungeons and Dragons team.” ([28:22])
• Both examine the photo (on Instagram @sightingspod):
  • McLeod: “There’s like, the shadowy outline of a human. A person. Like a head and shoulders at the window.” ([33:02])
• Brian: “Cool story. Cool photo. I think what I loved about this too, was…he’s just gonna talk, right? He’s just gonna tell ‘em, this is how it is, ghosts.” ([33:20])

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Story 4: "Creature at the Tree Line" — Mikayla, Kentucky

[37:05 – 40:48]

Summary

Mikayla, staying in a century-old house bordering vast woods, is smoking on the porch late one night when primal fear grips her—something is stalking them beyond the tree line. Her husband, Igor, initially dismissive, suddenly spots a seven-foot-tall, eye-shining being peeking from behind a tree. He shouts and attempts to scare it off, but the creature remains unfazed. For weeks, they’re plagued by unsettling noises and feelings of being watched, leading Mikayla to suspect a wendigo or skinwalker.

Highlights & Quotes

• Mikayla: “The feeling was primal, like I felt like I was going to die if I didn’t get out of there. Intense.” ([37:38])
• “He just started stomping on the porch and screaming, ‘I can see you. I see you looking at me.’” ([39:03])
• “We even checked the next morning and there were no tracks of any kind near the tree. I believe it was a windigo or maybe a skinwalker, but either way I pray it doesn’t show up again.” ([40:37])
• Final reflection: “After that experience, ghosts are the least of my worries.”

Host Reactions

• Brian: “If this one had started talking though, like the first one, I would have never gone back to Kentucky. And I like Kentucky.” ([41:32])
• McLeod: “It reminds me of, like, a found footage time type horror film…” ([41:00])

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Conclusion & Community Engagement

[41:36 – 42:18]

• McLeod: “I did survive these four stories, and I’m a better man for it.”
• Listeners are reminded of the new publishing schedule; all previous episodes are available to binge.
• Continued invitation to submit stories: storiesightingspodcast.com or Instagram @sightingspod.
• Both hosts sign off with warm wishes for a spooky and thrilling 2026.

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Notable Quotes

• Gretchen’s Mother ([12:07]):
  “We don’t know how time works… Who knows whether we are even the real one? Maybe, she said, it was us who haunted them.”

• Christopher ([22:13]):
  "From above me, my own voice answered, ‘what the hell?’ Perfectly. Same tone, same inflection...There was no echo, no Distortion. Just my voice coming from the trees."

• David ([28:20]):
  “As long as you don’t scare my wife or my daughter, you can stay. If you do, I’ll get a young priest and an old priest, and I will cleanse this house from top to bottom.”

• Mikayla ([37:38]):
  “The feeling was primal, like I felt like I was going to die if I didn’t get out of there.”

• Brian ([33:20]):
  “Cool story. Cool photo. I think what I loved about this too, was…he’s just gonna tell ‘em, this is how it is, ghosts.”

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Timestamps for Key Moments

• [02:52] — Stories segment begins
• [05:02] — Gretchen’s haunted house, Australia
• [13:06] — Host discussion (Gretchen’s story)
• [17:49] — Christopher’s mimic cryptid, Pacific Northwest
• [24:30] — Host discussion (Christopher’s story)
• [27:30] — David’s haunted farmhouse, Massachusetts
• [32:51] — Host discussion (David’s story, photo reaction)
• [37:05] — Mikayla’s creature sighting, Kentucky
• [41:36] — Hosts wrap up, invite stories, announce next episode

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Tone & Style

The hosts maintain a balance of earnest curiosity, empathy, and humor, always respecting the storytellers’ experiences while grounding their own reactions in wit and camaraderie. The stories themselves range from subtly unnerving to outright terrifying, each with its own unique take on what constitutes a “sign” from the other side.

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Sightings continues to capture the allure of supernatural mysteries, blurring the boundaries between skeptic and believer, and reminding everyone that sometimes, the scariest things are not the outright hauntings—but the signs we almost don’t notice.

Transcript

[Brian Sigley]

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[McLeod Andrews]

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[Brian Sigley]

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[McLeod Andrews]

Experian. Most supernatural encounters don't begin with screams or apparitions. They begin with signs. A sound that doesn't belong, a shadow where there shouldn't be one, whispers drifting through the woods, or footsteps echoing in the dark. At first, these moments are easy to ignore, easy to explain away. But once you notice them, it's already too late. Because when something from the other side wants to be seen, it rarely arrives without warning. Welcome to Sightings and welcome to a brand new year of creepy encounters. I'm McLean.

[Brian Sigley]

I'm Cloud. And I'm Brian. And thank you all for your patience as we took a holiday break to reset. Because we have a lot going on, don't we McLeod?

[McLeod Andrews]

We do.

[Brian Sigley]

I'm writing a movie. McLeod is an audiobook machine, and even though we want to bring you an amazing, fully produced story every single week, we simply don't have the time.

[McLeod Andrews]

So this year, Sightings is going to look a little bit different. We still plan to bring you fully produced Monster, Alien and ghost stories, but this year that will happen during Spooky Season this fall.

[Brian Sigley]

So for the rest of the year, we're going to bring you more of what you've been saying you like the most. The creepy listener stories we bring to life each month. So every month until Spooky Season starts, we are going to bring you a brand new episode stuffed with even more listener stories that left us chilled.

[McLeod Andrews]

Speaking of which, since we're going to be focusing on listener stories until the fall, we'd love to hear yours. You can email [e-mail] or message us on Instagram at sightingspod or we cannot

[Brian Sigley]

wait to hear your stories. And we cannot wait to get together with you every single month to bring you a brand new episode of our very favorites.

[McLeod Andrews]

That's right. Send us your spooky fuel.

[Brian Sigley]

That's a good way of saying it. I like that. Feed us.

[McLeod Andrews]

So join us now as we explore four listener stories that will have you looking over your shoulder in the night. Will you see the signs of something eerie before it's too late? Find out on this episode of Sightings.

[Brian Sigley]

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[McLeod Andrews]

I love Quint's. I just took a look at their website again because I love their stuff so much. I mean there's this hoodie like waffle print hoodie that I'm like, I've got my eyes on.

[Brian Sigley]

I think I need to look at that McLEOD Because I love my quints too. My quint shirts are holding up so much better. The other brands I've used and you'd never know that they cost less than all the other brands out there. That's because Quint cuts out all the middlemen to deliver the same quality as luxury brands at a fraction of the price.

[McLeod Andrews]

So this new year, refresh your winter wardrobe with quint. Go to quint.com sightings for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns now available in Canada too.

[Brian Sigley]

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[McLeod Andrews]

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[Brian Sigley]

Welcome back everyone. We are so excited to bring you some of our favorite listener stories that you have been sending in. McLeod. I know it's your favorite thing to do.

[McLeod Andrews]

Now I only get freak out McLeod, which is great.

[Brian Sigley]

Yes indeed. We're actually, since we're only doing an episode a month right now, we are actually going to bring you more listener stories than usual. So we've got four today. McLeod.

[McLeod Andrews]

Woo hoo.

[Brian Sigley]

Our first one actually comes all the way from Australia. All right, so this comes from Gretchen and I'm not gonna say anything other than it's a spooky house story.

[McLeod Andrews]

I'm not a fan of this change where you don't give me any clues or tell me anything or any warning about what I'M walking into.

[Brian Sigley]

Oh, you gotta keep you on your toes, just like the audience.

[McLeod Andrews]

And again, just to be clear, I should leave the Australian accent alone, right?

[Brian Sigley]

I think you probably should.

[McLeod Andrews]

Yeah, I probably should.

[Brian Sigley]

Well, I'm excited to hear your normal McLeod accent. Let's get some music going.

[McLeod Andrews]

Okay. I live in Brisbane, Australia, but when I was a child, we lived in a town a couple of hours away. When I was 7, my sister was 11, my brother 15, we lived in a rental house that was built on a block of rural acreage that used to be a cattle slaughterhouse. Oh, boy. It was a beef farming and gold mining town. The house was nondescript. Just a two story brick house with three bedrooms and bright orange shag carpet everywhere. Oh, it was haunted by fashion disasters. I shared a room with my sister. It would have been around 1993. We lived there for a few years. We went to the school next door. Our dad was a fitter and turner, and our mother worked at the local paper. We had a quiet life. Nothing very exciting happened generally, which is how I like it. But a couple of years into living in the house, our mother started kind of consistently losing her patience with my brother. He's eight years older than me and we may as well have lived in different worlds. He was a bit of a troublemaker. Not just then, but on into his entire adult life, too. It wasn't like our mother to be impatient or to take things that kids did particularly personally. But she had got it in her head that my brother was deliberately disturbing her sleep. Every morning she would tell him to knock it off. And every day she was a bit more tense about it. He didn't deny it. He would just say, okay, Mum. And the next day, Mum would tell him off again. Finally, my older sister asked him when our parents weren't home, what on earth he was doing at night and why he didn't just stop. All he would say was that he wasn't doing anything, but it was better if Mum thought it was him. I didn't really ask any questions beyond that. I wasn't especially interested. But I shared a room with my sister and she started waking me up at night. It turned out she had been staying up at night as long as she could possibly stay awake to try and hear whatever it was that Mum was blaming our brother for. When she heard it, she would wake me to make me listen too. At first it was just footsteps, long and slow on the concrete footpath beneath our second story bedroom window. The first time I told her it was dad leaving for work because I thought it was early morning rather than late night. And our dad left at 5am to go to the MDF factory he worked at. So my sister dragged me out of bed to go into the hallway so I could see our parents asleep in their bed. So I said it was our brother and she creaked his bedroom door open so I could see him asleep too. I still wasn't afraid. I didn't really care if someone was walking on the footpath that went from our door to our washing line. I was a child that didn't find things to be sinister. Things just either were or were not. I poked my head out the window. I couldn't see anyone, and I went back to sleep. My sister didn't really sleep after that. She woke up at every little sound. She lived in a state of hypervigilance. I slept like a log. But she started waking me up again when the footsteps started moving. They went from the footpath outside to the steps outside the front door and then moved to our hallway inside the house. I would get up when she woke me and I would listen. And I absolutely did hear them too. They just didn't frighten me or stop me from sleeping. Then one night my sister woke me up again. She had the blanket wrapped around her whole body and head so she looked like a caterpillar with just her face showing. I could hear the footsteps, heavy and slow, like someone who was very tired was walking the hallway outside our bedroom door. Because I wasn't afraid. She whisper screamed at me to open the door and go into the hallway. So I did. I stood in silence. I listened to the clock tick. I could hear the refrigerator humming. It was dark and otherwise silent. I waited. Then I heard the click of a light switch and the living room light turned on. I felt uneasy. I stared down the hallway to the living room. Waited until the click sounded again and the light turned off. Then I went back into our bedroom, closed the door, told my sister everything was fine, and went back to bed. My poor sister. She was a nervous mess all the time. I was okay. I still slept fine. I understood that something was happening that was upsetting and strange. But I didn't really think it was something to be afraid of. Because as far as I could tell, whatever it was seemed completely uninterested in us. Until the night before we left that house. My sister and I were asleep. I remember our dunas didn't have any covers on them because the linen had all been packed up. So we were just on mattresses with our dunas. No pillowcases, etc. My sister whisper screamed at me, doing her blanket chrysalis again, but this time when I looked at her wide eyed face there were shadows moving across it. The shadows were long, thin and slanted and they were being caused by the venetian blinds being rapidly opened and closed. On our desk there was an open packet of uninflated balloons. As I sat up I heard a strange snapping sound and I turned to look at the desk. I could see a balloon being stretched out, pulled tight as far as it could go and then being released. The snapping sound was the result of it being released. I remember not thinking or feeling anything. I just watched the balloon stretching and releasing until it dropped onto the desk and stayed there. I was still staring at the balloon, now inert, when I realized there was a slow scraping sound coming from within the wardrobe. I realized it was the metal coat hangers now with no clothes on them, being pulled from one side of the metal rod to the other. The wardrobe door remained closed. By this time my sister was in tears, urgently demanding that I go get our mother. So I did. I ran across the carpet, woke up mum, dragged her into our room and everything stopped. I hadn't understood how loud the sounds were until they were gone and it was just my sister crying under her doona. Mom didn't believe us, but I think she also knew we were leaving in the morning and there was no use in dwelling on any of it. She told us she thought the house didn't want us to go and whatever was there was trying to communicate and just didn't realize how frightening that would be to us. The next day we left. We went to our new house where the weirdest thing that ever happened was a brown snake in my bedroom. No ghosts at that house, if that's even what was at the rental house. My sister is in her early 40s now. She has five children. She believes that our dead uncle made contact years ago and told her to break up with her boyfriend. Though weirdly, for someone who believes in such things, she did not listen and she married him instead. I was much more observer than believer and I still don't know what was happening in that house. I still believe it was nothing to be afraid of. Our mother does believe in ghosts, but she's always maintained she doesn't think that house was haunted. It's more like a memory, she told me once. A memory of a life lived there, playing again and again. We don't know how time works, she told me. We don't even know if it's real or if it's just a thing we tell ourselves to make sense of the world. Who knows how many layers of reality are at play in one place at one time? How many people are in one place at one time, separated by whatever the thin veneer between worlds or dimensions is? Who knows whether we are even the real one? Maybe she said it was us who haunted them.

[Brian Sigley]

There's a lot of things I really liked about this one that I thought were pretty unique. First, that the writer is one of the biggest skeptical geckos I think we've ever heard.

[McLeod Andrews]

I know. Like, nerves of steel.

[Brian Sigley]

It's awesome for a little girl. I loved it. She's like, nobody. Just gonna walk outside and look and just stand there and, you know, doesn't bother me. I'm not interested.

[McLeod Andrews]

Yeah. This woman goes on my, like, who do you want to be in your, like, crew in the zombie apocalypse?

[Brian Sigley]

Absolutely. I think she would be the one wielding a shotgun, kicking down doors. Yeah.

[McLeod Andrews]

Just like, I don't believe in zombies, but I'll kill this one.

[Brian Sigley]

Other than that, this story kind of reminded me of the movie the Others with Nicole Kidman, where Nicole Kidman thinks that her house is haunted. I'm spoiling this for everyone.

[McLeod Andrews]

I think the spoiler alert window has passed.

[Brian Sigley]

Yeah, I think so. Yeah. But she realizes that she's haunting the house. And the way that this haunting felt kind of felt like that, like, these people were almost intruding on this other party of people who were occupying the same space, but in another liminal space or something like that. But then that balloon moment.

[McLeod Andrews]

Yeah, that's very, like, literal and tangible.

[Brian Sigley]

Yeah.

[McLeod Andrews]

And, like, I just sat there and watched a balloon being stretched.

[Brian Sigley]

And, like, it is interesting to me that that happened on the very last night. It's almost. Is that just coincidence, or do you think that.

[McLeod Andrews]

I don't.

[Brian Sigley]

There was some kind of piercing of the veil in some kind of way. You know, like they knew that they were leaving and wanted to make their presence more known or something.

[McLeod Andrews]

Oh, I don't know. But, I mean, like, they moved the balloons. Maybe the balloons were some sort of. Like, the balloons got moved into her room from the kitchen drawer or something.

[Brian Sigley]

But it was not just the balloons. It was those hangers in the closet and then the venetian blinds. Like, the venetian blinds alone. If I had blinds like that on my windows before.

[McLeod Andrews]

Oh, yeah.

[Brian Sigley]

If those started moving on their own.

[McLeod Andrews]

Yeah.

[Brian Sigley]

Never would I have sat back in that room.

[McLeod Andrews]

Flip flap.

[Brian Sigley]

But, yeah, that alone is terrifying, Let alone seeing the balloon rise up off the table and start snapping back and forth. I don't even know how I would have handled that. And this woman or this girl, I guess at the time sounds like she was a champion. Yeah.

[McLeod Andrews]

Yeah.

[Brian Sigley]

One question I do have though, for Gretchen. You mentioned at the beginning that your brother was just kind of taking the, you know, just kind of like not fighting back when his mom was like, why are you keeping me awake at night? He's like, he just kind of rolled with the punches, I guess. Clearly he knew something was going on in the house, but the story never mentioned what he experienced. I would love to know.

[McLeod Andrews]

Oh yeah, that would be interesting to know. Follow up sequel.

[Brian Sigley]

Yep. So, Gretchen, if you hear this, let us know if your brother had any experience of his own. But thank you for sharing that. We've got three more stories coming your way right after this ad break. I'm a cloud. What's our ad gonna be for?

[McLeod Andrews]

Enjoy this advertisement for Wood, Wood, Wood. It's everywhere.

[Brian Sigley]

This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. The new year is a new opportunity. And for me, that means letting go of what's been weighing me down and striving to feel lighter. But in your new year, feeling lighter doesn't need to mean doing more and being a whole new you. Sometimes it just means carrying less. And if you could use some clarity on what that means for you, you should think about talking to someone with better help. BetterHelp matches you with a therapist who can help shine a light on what's been heavy in your life and illuminate all the possibilities for the year ahead. If you aren't happy with your match, switch to a different therapist at any time from their tailored recommendations. So check out BetterHelp today. You can't step into a lighter version of yourself without leaving behind what's been weighing you down. Therapy can help you clear space. Sign up and get 10% [e-mail] sightings. That's betterhelp.com sightings. Thanks BetterHelp for sponsoring this episode.

[McLeod Andrews]

On December 12th, Disney invites you to go behind the scenes with Taylor Swift in an exclusive six episode docuseries.

[Brian Sigley]

I wanted to give something to the

[McLeod Andrews]

fans that they didn't expect.

[Brian Sigley]

The only thing left is to close the book.

[McLeod Andrews]

The end of an era. And don't worry, Ms. Taylor Swift, the eras tour, the final show featuring for the first time the Tortured poets department. Streaming December 12th, only on Disney.

[Brian Sigley]

All right, everyone. Welcome back from that fascinating ad break. Some from our actual sponsors and also apparently from Wood, wood, wood. So McCloud story number two. This one. This one has a dog. I'll say. The dog doesn't die, though, so that's good. And this one is pretty creepy. It's from Christopher from the Pacific Northwest.

[McLeod Andrews]

All right. I should start by saying I'm a pretty average guy. I'm married, have three kids. Hey, you don't say. Me too. And live in the Pacific Northwest. We live in a rural unincorporated area. Most properties sit on several acres, some on much more. Livestock is common. Horses, sheep, goats and cattle. We keep about 15 chickens, a few ducks that appeared and never left, a goat named Beta Ray and a black lab named Tiberius. Nice. Tiberius matters here, okay? Because he was with me when the incident took place. And again, you. You confirmed that Tiberius is not going to get hurt.

[Brian Sigley]

Tiberius is safe, okay?

[McLeod Andrews]

At the time, he weighed about 85 pounds. He was well trained, steady, and intelligent. He. He worked search and rescue with me. I'd been a volunteer firefighter for nearly 20 years at that point, and a search and rescue specialist for over a decade. We operate out of a single fire hall. We have one primary engine, a backup engine, a tender, a highway rescue unit, two rapid attack vehicles for wildland firefighting and Rescue 4. Rescue 4 is a military Humvee converted for forest search and rescue. Its job is to get into the woods, find someone and bring them out to a waiting ambulance. This incident took place in the winter of 2020, a couple of weeks before Christmas. It was raining. Steady, heavy rain. The kind that never really stops in winter. Here. It was a Friday night, just after 9pm My wife and kids were on the couch watching a holiday movie, Christmas Vacation, if memory serves. I let Tiberius outside, grabbed a beer from the fridge and had just opened it when my phone went off. The dispatch app uses a siren sound that's quite literally impossible to ignore. I remember feeling irritated and had a long week and wanted to sit down and be done for the night. I set the beer down and opened the app. Two women hikers, or mushroom pickers had been reported missing. They were supposed to rejoin their group hours earlier and never did. The group called 911 and our department was dispatched. I changed clothes, said goodbye, loaded Tiberius into my truck and drove to the fire hall, which is only five minutes from our house. That night. No one else came. That's the reality of a volunteer department. No one is truly on call. You show up when you can. I grabbed the keys to Rescue 4, threw my SAR gear inside, loaded Tiberius into the passenger seat and rolled out with lights on, but no siren. This wasn't the first time I'd responded alone. Having another person is always preferable. But I had Tiberius, and Dispatch was diligent about check ins. I wasn't worried. I reached the area where the women were last seen and found a logging road leading into the forest. Rain hammered the canopy, but there was no fog. I ran high beams and full emergency lighting so I'd be visible if they were nearby. About 40 minutes in, I reached a locked gate. I left Rescue 4 running in case the hikers found it and needed warmth, then headed uphill on foot with Tiberius. The Humvee disappeared behind us, though the emergency lights still pulsed faintly through the trees. We'd been walking about 15 minutes when Tiberius stopped. Not slowed, not hesitated. Stopped. He lowered his head. The hair along his back rose and a low growl came from him. Controlled, deliberate. Tiberius had never reacted like this before. I stopped beside him and listened. Rain filled the forest. Nothing else stood out. His agitation increased, subtle at first, then unmistakable. I felt a chill move through me that had nothing to do with the weather. It wasn't the sense of being watched. It was something worse. An instinctive certainty that we were not alone and that whatever was nearby knew exactly where we were. His growl faded into a whimper and his tail tucked tight beneath him. That's when I decided we needed to turn around and calmly head back to Rescue 4. That's when I saw the eyes. They were high up in a tree, reflecting the emergency lights below. Pale blue. Not amber, not green. Not animal in the way I understood animals. For a moment I assumed Cougar. But the color was wrong. The shape was wrong. It was larger. Bigger than Tiberius. Bigger than anything I expected to see off the ground like that. It moved slowly at first, descending the trunk. Its body was lean and wiry, with defined muscle. It didn't move like a cat. It didn't move like a bear. I couldn't see a tail at all. I raised my flashlight. The instant the beam touched it. The thing moved. Not down. Sideways. It leapt from one tree to another with a speed that made my stomach drop. I caught just enough detail to register something deeply wrong. It looked almost human. Patches of dark gray fur clung to its body. The hands. Those stayed with me too large fingers too long. Nails that caught the light as it moved. I tried to follow it with the beam. It jumped again, never touching the ground. Tiberius began to whine loudly. I said without thinking, what the hell? From above me, my own voice answered, what the hell? Perfectly. Same tone, same inflection. Then it repeated it twice. There was no echo, no Distortion. Just my voice coming from the trees. I didn't try to understand. After that I turned and ran. Panic stripped everything else away. Tiberius stayed with me and we reached Rescue 4 faster than I thought possible. I drove out immediately. As I was leaving, dispatch informed me the missing hikers had been located and were safe. I think about that night often. Especially when I'm called into the woods alone. I've never seen that thing again and I'm grateful for that. I've tried to explain it away. A sick bear, a diseased cougar. But I can't explain. The voice, the perfect mimic of my own words was nerve shattering. I still like the woods. I still work search and rescue. But the forest doesn't feel the same anymore. Something about that night made it feel less empty out there. And sometimes when it's quiet enough, I still think about how easily my voice came back to me from the dark. Um.

[Brian Sigley]

Zoinks. Zoinks is apt for this. Goodness gracious. Well, I'm glad Tiberius was okay.

[McLeod Andrews]

Yeah, I'm glad Chris is okay. I know it's like not like anything I've heard of before. I'm like Bigfoot. I'm like no skinwalker.

[Brian Sigley]

Yeah. This could be anything. At first when he was describing I'm like okay, it could be some animal that is just like a manged.

[McLeod Andrews]

But the voice thing is then just like oof. Gray furred parrot. A large clawed.

[Brian Sigley]

Let's go with that.

[McLeod Andrews]

Well I'm also Chris, I'm glad that you're still doing your thing and out there searching and rescuing.

[Brian Sigley]

Absolutely.

[McLeod Andrews]

Because we need you especially with wildland firefighting right now. Oh boy.

[Brian Sigley]

Definitely.

[McLeod Andrews]

So good on you man.

[Brian Sigley]

Good on you. And thank you for sharing this story.

[McLeod Andrews]

I'm glad it's not dark right now.

[Brian Sigley]

Yeah. But we do have to to a quick ad break. McLeod, I think this time we are going to be shilling some bird food.

[McLeod Andrews]

Right. For our giant parrots. That's right.

[Brian Sigley]

They eat entire goats.

[McLeod Andrews]

Bird food aka entire goats.

[Brian Sigley]

McLeod, you know me, you know I'm not a weightlifter. Surprise, surprise everyone. So when I hear about creatine I think oh that is just for bodybuilders. Right.

[McLeod Andrews]

Same, same. I lift my coffee mug.

[Brian Sigley]

There you go. We are hardcore worker outers.

[McLeod Andrews]

Hardcore worker outers.

[Brian Sigley]

But you know what McLeod? Creatine is not just for building muscle. It's become a daily essential. Focus, recovery, aging and cognitive performance.

[McLeod Andrews]

I actually did know that because I've been using the new creatine chews from Momentous. I gotta say like, it's been positive. I've been having a positive experience with it.

[Brian Sigley]

Nice.

[McLeod Andrews]

Yeah.

[Brian Sigley]

That's awesome. What I love about the creatine shoes from Momentous is how easy they are, you know?

[McLeod Andrews]

Oh, yeah. And they're pretty tasty, too.

[Brian Sigley]

Yeah. When I was in college, you just had to mix this gritty powder. You don't do that here. You just pop it and you're done. Because Momentous doesn't just follow trends, they perfect the fundamentals. And with these creatine shoes, they've got to say they've done creatine, Right?

[McLeod Andrews]

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[Brian Sigley]

All right, everyone, welcome back. Hope you enjoyed the spot from our legitimate sponsors and then also the spot for bird goat food. Yep. So let's hop to a story from David from Massachusetts. McLeod. He wrote a preface here.

[McLeod Andrews]

Okay. All right.

[Brian Sigley]

I'm a born and raised Massachusetts boy, but I don't have an accent. My parents are from Philadelphia, and I've been spared both accents, thank God. So.

[McLeod Andrews]

Oh, man, I don't know how to take that. A listener just being like, don't, don't.

[Brian Sigley]

Just don't, don't, don't do it.

[McLeod Andrews]

The list is said, 1750 farmhouse in Chelmsford, Mass.

[Brian Sigley]

There you go.

[McLeod Andrews]

Sorry, David.

[Brian Sigley]

Let's get some music going. And here we go.

[McLeod Andrews]

The listing said 1750 farmhouse in Chelmsford, Mass. And my wife knew I'd want to check it out. It was a large three story white clapboard colonial with an attached barn. She went to the open house without me as I was working later that night. When I arrived home, she told me, you're gonna love it. It needs some work, but you'll love it. I did, and we bought it. I have a pretty strong sense of empathy, and I could feel the energy of the house immediately. On the morning of our closing, after we did the walkthrough and once my wife was outside, I said aloud, okay, everyone, listen up. We are buying this house. We will be paying the mortgage. As long as you don't scare my wife or my daughter, you can stay. If you do, I'll get a young priest and an old priest, and I will cleanse this house from top to bottom.

[Brian Sigley]

Oh, wow, he's smart.

[McLeod Andrews]

Right off the bat, he was like, I feel the ghosts bold. Such brave individuals in this episode, I feel like we're putting together a really strong Dungeons and Dragons team. He's our priest or our paladin or whatever. We've got our medic and firefighter and then we've got our, I don't know, fearless scratching with the knight. Like our fearless knight.

[Brian Sigley]

I love it.

[McLeod Andrews]

For the most part, our time in the house was quiet until one warm early spring day while I was out grabbing takeout, a framed photo of one of our cats blew off a shelf in our pantry, shattering the glass. When I arrived home, my wife had a look on her face. She told me about the mess she had to clean up when she should have been feeding our soon to be one year old. I told her it was strange, but that it could have been a burst of wind. Now, we did have the windows open, but we placed the photo back on the shelf and it never blew off again. Late one night soon thereafter, I awoke to my wife whisper yelling for me from our daughter's room, which adjoined ours. I hurried in and she whispered to me, get that thing out of here. Pointing at a plushie of the original Starship Enterprise. It had lit up red and was slowly making photon torpedo sounds, something that we could never get it to do in over the year we had it. At night, there were constant bangs and bumps. We always chalked them up to the cats or the dog, even when they were all with us on our bed or in our room. When doing laundry in the cool, damp, unfinished basement, I would often see a black shadow on the stairs. Every time, I'd turn and expect to see our black cat, but nothing was ever there. Once during the day, when my daughter was a bit older, I was carrying her from the kitchen into the living room. She pointed up the stairs and said, who's that? Taking a moment, I looked and saw nothing. And I replied, I don't know. What do they look like? Being young, she couldn't tell me and she kind of shrugged it off. Later, after we moved out, my sister would tell us that she never felt comfortable on those stairs, and our babysitter said she always felt like someone was about to push her down them. A friend took a job nearby and lived with us for a short while in the guest room. She told us how one day while everyone was out and she was on the couch, she heard someone walk up behind her, footsteps on the hardwood. Except I hadn't ripped up the carpet yet to reveal the beautiful oak floors beneath. Without turning, she said, nope, no I'm not in the mood for this today. And the footsteps slowly retreated from the room. But really, the creepiest thing was one night as we were putting our daughter to bed, before she would lay down, she pointed over my shoulder and said, tell them to go again. Not saying what I wanted, I turned and said, okay, everyone, it's time for Morgan to go to bed. You can play again tomorrow. Everyone out. Finally, after about three and a half years, we decided it was time to move, more because of the mice than the other people staying with us. We found a split level house from the 1980s on a quiet street in the next town over. On our last night, in what we affectionately call the farmhouse, our daughter was with my wife's parents. The dog was at the kennel, and the cats were at a friend's house. We now had a son who was six months old, sleeping in a pack and play beside the air mattress we were on. And there was only one box left in the house. It was on the kitchen floor downstairs. When I tell you there was activity. Good God. We didn't get much sleep. I constantly had to get out of bed to investigate. Even knowing there was nothing left in the house. The banging and smashing was unlike anything we had experienced. It sounded like piles of boxes or bookshelves falling over. Finally, I yelled, you don't know. You'll like the new people better. Just let us get one night's sleep, please. That seemed to appease them. And the rest of the night was quiet it. Before leaving and locking the door one last time, I turned and spoke to the house. Thank you for the memories, but you cannot come with us. You have to stay here. We paused once more in the horseshoe driveway to take one last selfie with the house. I'll include it with this email. Sometimes when you say goodbye to a house, the house says goodbye back.

[Brian Sigley]

All right, McLeod, scroll down a little bit, and you're gonna see a photo that I'm gonna put on Instagram. But above the couple who's doing a goodbye kiss in front of the house, there's a window. Look in the window, McCloud.

[McLeod Andrews]

Oh, no. What? What? There's like. Okay, so for listeners who aren't looking at the Instagram page, there's like, the shadowy outline of a human. A person. Like a head and shoulders at the window.

[Brian Sigley]

Yeah. Watching this couple as they're standing in front of the house.

[McLeod Andrews]

What?

[Brian Sigley]

Y. Yeah, cool story. Cool photo. I think what I loved about this too, was, I think, as you mentioned, you know, like, this guy would be a great D and D team addition. But like he's just gonna talk, right? He's just gonna tell him this is how it is. Ghosts. Yeah, I like it.

[McLeod Andrews]

Just the confrontation, it just makes me wonder what are the entities in here? I will say with the stairs, I feel like when you have dangerous looking stairs, like you can kind of manifest the scary feeling because you're like, oh, wouldn't want to be pushed down. These kind of manifest the feeling that someone might be trying to push you down them. So that I can explain away. But like all of the, a lot of the other things, the sounds, stuff

[Brian Sigley]

falling off of mantles and then the daughter sensing like, who's that in the room or go away or you know. Oh my goodness.

[McLeod Andrews]

Yeah. And then of course, this picture.

[Brian Sigley]

Yeah. So thank you, David, for sharing that picture. And again, listeners, go check out David's picture picture on Instagram itingspod. But McLeod, we got one more story coming our way, but we gotta jump to an ad break. What's your ad break for this time?

[McLeod Andrews]

This one is for flyswatters.

[Brian Sigley]

Flyswatters?

[McLeod Andrews]

Fly swatters. All right, sounds good, Brian. I have just learned that 2026 has an official uniform and it's the perfect gene.

[Brian Sigley]

Oh, man, you know I love my perfect gene just like I love their ad copy.

[McLeod Andrews]

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[Brian Sigley]

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[McLeod Andrews]

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[Brian Sigley]

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[McLeod Andrews]

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[Brian Sigley]

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[Brian Sigley]

Payment processing fees and boosting fees still apply. See website for details. All right, welcome back, everyone. We've got one last short story for you guys.

[McLeod Andrews]

Oh, man.

[Brian Sigley]

From your neck of the woods, McLeod. This is Mikayla from Kentucky. So I think we can do a little bit of Kentucky accent because we haven't really gotten to do accents on this episode. So give me a little bit of Kentucky on this.

[McLeod Andrews]

Just so you know, at least. Like, my Kentucky accent. Like. Cause I guess I'm from Louisville, but even my brother went to school in central Kentucky. Like, it's not like a super heavy southern accent. Like, it's a good storytelling accent. Maybe that's why I ended up doing what I do. But, like, it has this kind of pop and bubble to it that I. But it's not, like, super intense. So anyway, so if anyone out there, like, he didn't do an accent, it's like. Well, it's. Cause it's just kind of how I talk, but just, like, with a little bit. Anyway, so here we go.

[Brian Sigley]

Let's get some music going.

[McLeod Andrews]

I'm from Kentucky, and I currently live with my grandparents in a really old house that was built in 1901. And our yard backs up to several hundred acres of woods and a state park. Whoa. That's awesome. It's a big house. So we have a back entrance that faces the tree line and leads into our living room that my husband, our friends, and I use instead of the front entrance at night so we don't wake the dogs up. And in turn, my grandparents and our two kids. I've always believed in ghosts, and everyone that's been to this house has had some experiences here. But this isn't a ghost story. Honestly, I don't even know what it was. But it. If it's what I think it is, then ghosts are just the tip of the iceberg. Anyway, here's what happened. My friend Devin and my husband Igor were getting hungry, and since the kids were already asleep, Devin and I figured we would just pick us up some food. Denny's was the only thing open since it was late, so we gathered our stuff and got ready to leave. Devin's car was parked at our second gate, halfway down the driveway, so we had a good little way to walk in the dark. We walked out of the house and got to the front and immediately to our right we heard something running along the fence in the field. Several of our friends have said they've heard voices or something following them to their car at night, but this was the first time I've ever experienced it. We were pretty freaked out, but we walked calmly to his car in case it was an animal. Things went smoothly and we got our food and headed home. When we got back to the house, I started smoking a cigarette and stayed out on our back porch to finish it while Devin went inside. It was wintertime and there was no snow on the ground. And while I was standing there, I started to hear sticks breaking and felt like something was watching me. And the feeling was primal, like I felt like I was going to die if I didn't get out of there. Intense. I started waving at Igor through the glass door for him to come outside and I told him I heard something and he jokingly asked me if I was scared and I said yes. I was starting to get frantic because I had never felt that deeply petrified in my life. He finally took me seriously and grabbed my phone and started shining my flashlight around us and at the trees, and suddenly he froze. Now, my husband is 65 and 245 pounds, so he's not a small guy, but I could hear the fear in his voice when he asked me, do you see that? I asked him what he was talking about and he just started stomping on the porch and screaming, I can see you. I see you looking at me. And he grabbed me and pointed, saying, do you see that? Looking at us from behind the tree. Sure enough, about 50ft from us was a bare tree with something tall peeking out from behind it. And as soon as I saw it, it hid again. We ran inside and locked up and Igor told me that he was trying to scare it off, thinking it was an animal, but it didn't flinch. For a couple of weeks after that, we would hear stuff hitting the house, walking around on our back porch, following us to the car at night, and I was terrified to go outside. Thankfully, it stopped about two months later and so far I haven't seen or heard anything since. We tried to reason what it was, but the way its eyes shone looked like a deer. But no. White tailed deer is seven feet tall and there were no branches where its head was, so I know it wasn't an owl. We even checked the next morning and there were no tracks of any kind near the tree. I believe it was a windigo or maybe a skinwalker, but either way I pray it doesn't show up again. And after that experience, ghosts are the least of my worries. Another creature in the woods.

[Brian Sigley]

Yeah. I love the moment, though, when I'm trying to. I can see this in a movie where they're out on the front porch shining a flashlight around. The flashlight suddenly stops, and the guy is just screaming, I can see you. I can see you looking at me.

[McLeod Andrews]

It reminds me of, like, a found footage time type type horror film, like, where you just, like, see the blackness and the camera is like someone's on their phone and they're shooting, like, back and forth, like, what. What are you looking at? And you, like, come back and he's just like, the top.

[Brian Sigley]

And clearly he. He sees it and is absolutely terrified. And you're trying to play catch up. And then you do see it, and it's seven feet tall and, you know, has eyes that are shining. So if this one had started talking, though, like. Like the. Like the first one, I would have never gone back to Kentucky. And I like a ducky.

[McLeod Andrews]

Right?

[Brian Sigley]

So, McLeod, did you survive these four stories?

[McLeod Andrews]

I did, and I'm a better man for it.

[Brian Sigley]

There you go. Well, listeners, as a reminder, we are going to be back every month with a new episode. So I think we're doing the third Monday of every month.

[McLeod Andrews]

Third Monday.

[Brian Sigley]

Third Monday. So if you need your sightings fixed, we got 57 other episodes for you to go back and listen to.

[McLeod Andrews]

That's right. We got a deep catalog.

[Brian Sigley]

We do. But we look forward to seeing you all on February 16th. Thanks for listening. And again, please send us your [e-mail] or shoot us a message on Instagram itingspod.

[McLeod Andrews]

Happy 2026.

[Brian Sigley]

Sightings is hosted by McLeod Andrews and Brian Sigley. Produced by Brian Sigley, chase Kinzer and McLeod Andrews. Series music by Mitch Bain. Mixing and mastering by Pat Kicklater of Sundial Media. Artwork by Nuno Sarnatos. For lists of this episode's sources, check out our [e-mail] Sightings is presented by reverb and Q Code. If you like the show, be sure to subscribe on your favorite podcast platform so you're first to hear new episodes. And if you know other Supernatural fans, tell them about us. We'd really appreciate it.