Transcript
Danielle Addison (0:05)
Little Jack Horner sat in the corner and Jack began to cry. When asked what's wrong, he said, forlorn, I know who's next to die. You're listening to Spooked. Stay tuned. I have a little nephew, seven months old. He's beautiful, grinning, chubby, chuckling little guy you can't help but wanna squeeze on him. I get all up in his face and he looks straight at me, his full attention. And he's smiling, laughing, reaching, grasping. Like he's never seen anything more delightful in all his short life. With my roundy head, lips, my ears. He's got plenty to say, too, to say to me that he wants me to know. I want to know. But then somebody always has to come talking about, it's time for the babies now. Okay, fine. They lay him down in the other room. Turn the lights back. Be quiet for the baby. All right, all right. I'm quiet for the baby. But I sneak into that other room. I see him in his crib. There he is, and he's still talking to someone. Smiling, laughing, reaching, grasping, focusing. Like whoever he's looking at, whoever he's babbling to is looking right back at him. And I can't help but wonder what he sees, who he sees. My mother says that I used to do the exact same thing. She wondered who it was I was talking to, who was I looking at? The same way, I wonder, who is it he's looking at? Who is it he's talking to? And if maybe a long time ago, perhaps I spoke to them as well. Spook starts now. Now, I never played any of those games that you learn from other kids in school. I didn't play Candyman. I didn't step on any cracks. I wasn't gonna break my mama's back, no way, no way. No matter how much my friends dared me to do what I knew better. But some people, some folk, they need to see it to believe it spooked.
Maggie (3:39)
Growing up, I was never afraid of anything. I remember when Thriller came out. I was little, and all the little kids were terrified of it. I would just be like, what are you scared of? That's crazy. This is make believe. It's no different than anything else we watch. I was very logical. I always looked for an explanation. It's the beginning of the year. I'm in the fifth grade and I start to hear about this game. Everyone is talking about Bloody Mary. They're talking about it on the playground. They're talking about it at the bus stop. They're talking about it in Our class, when our teacher turns her head. My friends tell me that to play this game, you have to go into the bathroom and you have to say her name, Bloody Mary, multiple times in the mirror. And she would appear. And if you were too afraid, you shouldn't say her name because she'll show herself and then she'll kill you. We're waiting at the bus stop and these boys won't stop talking about how Bloody Mary said she was going to come after them after they played the game at their house. We played Bloody Mary yesterday and she appeared. We saw her. She said that she was going to come after us and she wanted payback. They're scaring my friends. Behind me. My friends are sitting here terrified. I'm so annoyed with this whole thing. My friends are all scared. These boys are tormenting us. And I just feel like everyone is lying. I feel like no one's seeing anything. And they just keep talking about Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary. And meanwhile, I just really want to talk about something else. I want to talk about Janet Jackson, because I'm obsessed with her. And I just want to talk about dancing and singing and playing and just anything else besides Bloody Mary. My friend starts crying at the bus stop because these boys won't stop, and they threaten to say it again. I tell them that Bloody Mary's not real and I'm gonna prove. Later in class, I'm doing my schoolwork and chatting with my friends, who I sit besides. Our desks are all lined up in this U shape, and our teacher stands in the middle. Our teacher turns her back and the boys whisper to me, you're scared. You're not going to do anything. And I want this over with and I want this over with now. I say to them, watch this. I raise my hand to go to the bathroom. I get a pass from the teacher. I march my way down the hall. I walk into the bathroom and I can see the cement brick walls and the dirty, dingy, dirty white paint. And then I turn to the right where there's three stairs, stationary porcelain sinks and three mirrors. And at that point, I gather up any kind of determination in me and I decide that I'm gonna go ahead and play this game. I hope nobody comes in here and sees me doing this. This is so embarrassing. This is such a stupid game. I just want to see something or have this be over with and prove to them that this isn't real. So if there something that's going to come out of this game, it better happen now. So I put my Bathroom pass on the side of the sink. I stand in the mirror. I go ahead and run the water a little bit, and I take my hand under the water and I sprinkle it on the mirror. And then I proceed to look into the mirror, and I start chanting, bloody Mary, Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary. And then the lights go out in the bathroom. It's pitch black in the room, and the only thing you could see is the reflection of the mirror. That's really all you can see. The room starts shaking as if it's an earthquake. Everything starts shaking. The sink, the mirrors, everything. I felt like the walls were shaking. It's not a normal shaking. It's literally hearing the rattling against the cement and seeing the sink shake that's firmly inside of the ground. I'm terrified and hysterical all at the same time. And what's going on? I look up in the mirror, and behind me, I see a white figure start to appear. It doesn't come all at once. It's about 6 inches, 7 inches above the floor. And it starts appearing at the toes. The feet are like, kind of dangling, as if they're just hanging there. They're not standing. They're just hanging and drifting there. I try to shut my eyes and tune it out, and I'm like, this isn't happening. This isn't real. Open your eyes. Get a hold of yourself. And I open my eyes again. Then it more starts to reveal itself. It's a white dress, a long white dress. But it wasn't. It wasn't like a wedding dress. It was just a gown. Almost clear. I see her black hair draped on her dress. Her hands are dangling, her feet are dangling, but there's no face. Like, I don't see a face. And I see some blood on her dress as if she was hurt. So I'm like, I don't want to see it. I don't want to see it. I run into the bathroom stall. Everything's still shaking. I tried to keep the door shut, but it's shaking and everything's moving. I still see the white light in her nightgown. I'm terrified and I'm crying, and I just don't want to see this anymore. I don't want to see. I don't want to see. I don't want to see. I don't want to see. I don't want to see. Make it stop. Make it stop. Please stop. Make it stop. Up. And then all of a sudden, everything stops. As I'm running out, even though the lights come on, I feel like, out of the corner of my eye, the figure is still there, not saying anything, not doing anything, just dangling the feeling I got. And it just. It just comes over me, and it's almost like a he. Energy just flows from the top of my head, and it's just like. It's like a wind burst down to my toes. She just wants to be seen. I run out of the bathroom, and I see the janitor in the hallway. I run to the janitor, and I'm like, why did the lights cut out? Is there an earthquake? Why did the power go out? The janitor says to me, what's going on, honey? What's going on? What is. What's wrong? And I keep pleading with this janitor to tell me anything, anything that makes sense of what just happened in the bathroom, because nothing makes sense at this point. And he says to me, everything's on. Look around you. The lights are on. They never went off. Nothing was ever shaking. So he takes me, and I go into the classroom. I can't stop crying. And the janitor says to my teacher. She's so upset. I'm gonna go check out the bathroom. And so he runs. I can hear his keys slamming against his leg, back and forth. I'm in front of my teacher, and she's consoling me, and she's hugging me, and she's like, what's going on? Are you okay? What's the matter? The janitor comes back and he says, everything is fine in there. I didn't answer the boys when they asked, what's going on? I didn't try to tell them what I saw. I didn't want to brag about it. I didn't want to talk about it. I didn't want to. I just. I want to forget. I was always a need to see it, to believe it type of person. So that was my. For sure. Okay? You need to see it to believe it. Well, here's your proof. Something I said, something I did in my actions. Maybe it was asking to see it, I don't know, but it opened up some kind of. It opened up something bigger than myself. I asked to see. I got what I asked for. Years later, my daughter comes home, and she said some kid was at school talking about it. And the only thing I said to her is, do not play that game. Do not try it. Don't do it. Never ask to see a spirit. Never ask. She looks at me, and she just kind of pulls back, like, whoa, Mom. Like, why? I just said, it's like, you don't mess with things you don't understand.