Caroline Misses You Too

[00:00:00] [SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to Scary Story Podcast.

[00:00:03] [SPEAKER_00]: In this episode, we have a story about a beloved ragdoll, along with one about a peculiar case

[00:00:09] [SPEAKER_00]: of a joke gone wrong.

[00:00:14] [SPEAKER_00]: My name is Edwin, and here is a scary story.

[00:00:25] [SPEAKER_00]: Caroline Misses You Too.

[00:00:32] [SPEAKER_00]: It was nine in the morning and bright outside.

[00:00:35] [SPEAKER_00]: The light bothered me, especially after tossing and turning the whole night.

[00:00:40] [SPEAKER_00]: I'm still the same way like when my sister and I were kids.

[00:00:43] [SPEAKER_00]: You know, too excited the night before going to a theme park.

[00:00:47] [SPEAKER_00]: But this was going to take a toll on me.

[00:00:50] [SPEAKER_00]: I couldn't sleep and I had a long day of orientation at my new college.

[00:00:54] [SPEAKER_00]: Plus, I would have to drag my luggage up a few floors of my dorm building.

[00:00:59] [SPEAKER_00]: There's something about being excited over an event that gets rid of your tiredness,

[00:01:03] [SPEAKER_00]: doesn't it?

[00:01:04] [SPEAKER_00]: But that light from my window, my god, the thing was so bright that I had forgotten

[00:01:08] [SPEAKER_00]: completely what a true morning light was like.

[00:01:12] [SPEAKER_00]: Mom had convinced me to pack the dark curtains from my room.

[00:01:15] [SPEAKER_00]: You know, the ones that block out the light.

[00:01:17] [SPEAKER_00]: I'm glad I did.

[00:01:20] [SPEAKER_00]: It would make my room feel like nighttime all the time, and mom was always right.

[00:01:25] [SPEAKER_00]: I started looking at the things and random collections I supposedly started when I

[00:01:29] [SPEAKER_00]: was a kid.

[00:01:30] [SPEAKER_00]: And then I looked at everything that was on my desk and on the shelves.

[00:01:34] [SPEAKER_00]: I tried starting a playing card collection, a rock collection, a coin collection with

[00:01:39] [SPEAKER_00]: that map with the corridors from every state in the United States.

[00:01:42] [SPEAKER_00]: But I gave up pretty easily on those.

[00:01:45] [SPEAKER_00]: Still, I had a tough time getting rid of things.

[00:01:48] [SPEAKER_00]: So I stood there like they do in the movies, reminiscing I guess you could say,

[00:01:52] [SPEAKER_00]: about my life up through high school.

[00:01:55] [SPEAKER_00]: I smiled to myself.

[00:01:56] [SPEAKER_00]: I was being dramatic.

[00:01:58] [SPEAKER_00]: I looked at my mirror with a couple of pictures mom printed out for me

[00:02:02] [SPEAKER_00]: when something caught my eye from the reflection behind me.

[00:02:05] [SPEAKER_00]: I turned around.

[00:02:08] [SPEAKER_00]: Next to the wooden blocks and the old paper airplane that I had ever since I

[00:02:12] [SPEAKER_00]: was a little kid, was an empty space.

[00:02:15] [SPEAKER_00]: Caroline was gone.

[00:02:18] [SPEAKER_00]: I looked behind the bed, the space between the frame and the wall.

[00:02:22] [SPEAKER_00]: Had I covered it with blankets without noticing when I quickly made the bed?

[00:02:27] [SPEAKER_00]: I know it wasn't important, I know that.

[00:02:30] [SPEAKER_00]: But there's an odd sense of guilt and irrational fear of losing something

[00:02:33] [SPEAKER_00]: that important.

[00:02:34] [SPEAKER_00]: She was given to me for my fourth birthday.

[00:02:37] [SPEAKER_00]: Dad used to joke that she was bigger than me when I got her,

[00:02:40] [SPEAKER_00]: and she easily could have been.

[00:02:43] [SPEAKER_00]: Made out of cloth and wearing a red dress with the dark hair made of yarn.

[00:02:47] [SPEAKER_00]: I used to stretch that doll as I carried it everywhere by the hand.

[00:02:51] [SPEAKER_00]: I cried when they washed her for the first time.

[00:02:55] [SPEAKER_00]: I also cried at night because of it.

[00:02:58] [SPEAKER_00]: It's a long story, but my grandma took the doll away from me after speaking

[00:03:02] [SPEAKER_00]: with my mom about suspecting that the doll had a dark heart.

[00:03:06] [SPEAKER_00]: Mom sort of took it seriously and tried to hide Caroline from me,

[00:03:10] [SPEAKER_00]: hoping that I would eventually forget about her.

[00:03:12] [SPEAKER_00]: But that took care of that pretty quickly.

[00:03:16] [SPEAKER_00]: One of the only arguments I remember as a kid for my parents was when I cried over Caroline.

[00:03:21] [SPEAKER_00]: Dad argued that it was nonsense, the thing about the dark heart.

[00:03:25] [SPEAKER_00]: Nobody, he bet, not even his own mother-in-law even knew what that meant.

[00:03:30] [SPEAKER_00]: What I know about the dark heart theory is that inanimate objects,

[00:03:34] [SPEAKER_00]: things like furniture or toys, even cars,

[00:03:37] [SPEAKER_00]: can have a dark core of energy,

[00:03:40] [SPEAKER_00]: lurking either from a sinister past or tragedy,

[00:03:44] [SPEAKER_00]: or it can be that way due to a curse.

[00:03:47] [SPEAKER_00]: Granted, I had to figure this out much later as every once in a while

[00:03:51] [SPEAKER_00]: grandma would ask me about the doll and demand that we get rid of it.

[00:03:54] [SPEAKER_00]: That's when I got curious about it.

[00:03:57] [SPEAKER_00]: But to grandma I'd normally just chuckle and tell her that the doll was gone

[00:04:00] [SPEAKER_00]: and to stop worrying about it.

[00:04:03] [SPEAKER_00]: She would give me that look that I remember very well from her,

[00:04:06] [SPEAKER_00]: and when she died I strongly considered granting her the wish.

[00:04:11] [SPEAKER_00]: When it came down to picking what was going to the trash

[00:04:13] [SPEAKER_00]: and what was going to the thrift store,

[00:04:16] [SPEAKER_00]: I just couldn't do it.

[00:04:20] [SPEAKER_00]: It was almost 10 in the morning and Dad was at the door of my room

[00:04:23] [SPEAKER_00]: asking for my suitcase.

[00:04:25] [SPEAKER_00]: He carried it downstairs and walked through the house.

[00:04:28] [SPEAKER_00]: I heard the trunk of the car shut as I worked my way downstairs

[00:04:31] [SPEAKER_00]: with a bag of things that Mom had packed for me

[00:04:33] [SPEAKER_00]: that I would be taking along with my carry on for my flight.

[00:04:37] [SPEAKER_00]: I wasn't aware of it, but Caroline flew with me

[00:04:39] [SPEAKER_00]: along with my other stuff across the state.

[00:04:43] [SPEAKER_00]: Nobody to this day

[00:04:45] [SPEAKER_00]: will admit to having placed her there.

[00:04:48] [SPEAKER_00]: It was until I met my roommate who also appreciated the dark curtains by the way,

[00:04:52] [SPEAKER_00]: who started telling me about the strange things that were happening in the middle of the night.

[00:04:57] [SPEAKER_00]: Her bed across her mind was separated by a wooden closet

[00:05:01] [SPEAKER_00]: where we each kept our things.

[00:05:03] [SPEAKER_00]: She described sounds coming from the closet,

[00:05:07] [SPEAKER_00]: things that would tap and rattle around.

[00:05:10] [SPEAKER_00]: She thought it was rats,

[00:05:12] [SPEAKER_00]: but the space was so small that you could see the floor of it

[00:05:15] [SPEAKER_00]: and there was no way an animal could be living there.

[00:05:19] [SPEAKER_00]: A part of me told me that Caroline had something to do with it.

[00:05:23] [SPEAKER_00]: I was too embarrassed to even bring it up.

[00:05:26] [SPEAKER_00]: And it wasn't until she started describing soft cries,

[00:05:30] [SPEAKER_00]: like those of a young girl that I started doubting that it was her imagination.

[00:05:35] [SPEAKER_00]: Those memories of taking the doll outside with me to play in the backyard,

[00:05:40] [SPEAKER_00]: the way I would speak to her and ask her to say something to me,

[00:05:43] [SPEAKER_00]: I remember wishing so badly that she was alive.

[00:05:47] [SPEAKER_00]: I remember the way Mom made me take off my shoes

[00:05:49] [SPEAKER_00]: with that stern voice because I had muddied them.

[00:05:53] [SPEAKER_00]: And then she tore Caroline away from my hand to wash her.

[00:05:57] [SPEAKER_00]: I remember the way Caroline cried.

[00:06:00] [SPEAKER_00]: I remember those cries too, back when my mom hid the doll from me.

[00:06:05] [SPEAKER_00]: Dad thought it was only me, but I believed back then that Caroline was missing me too.

[00:06:11] [SPEAKER_00]: But the taps were something new, see?

[00:06:14] [SPEAKER_00]: The only time I heard them was when my cousins came over

[00:06:16] [SPEAKER_00]: and when my aunt made them, cleaned up the mess they made in my room.

[00:06:20] [SPEAKER_00]: They simply stuffed Caroline into one of the plastic toy chests that I had and forgot about her.

[00:06:25] [SPEAKER_00]: I must have been like what, eight or nine years old?

[00:06:29] [SPEAKER_00]: That's when I heard the taps coming from inside the toy chest.

[00:06:33] [SPEAKER_00]: Scared one night I covered myself up with a blanket

[00:06:36] [SPEAKER_00]: and cried myself to sleep in silence.

[00:06:39] [SPEAKER_00]: Yet you could still hear the soft squeals coming from the chest.

[00:06:44] [SPEAKER_00]: Caroline had always been used to being on display.

[00:06:49] [SPEAKER_00]: So that's what I did after I took Caroline back home and put her in her own spot.

[00:06:54] [SPEAKER_00]: Mom grew tired of the cries and the taps soon after.

[00:06:58] [SPEAKER_00]: She got rid of the doll and never told me about it.

[00:07:01] [SPEAKER_00]: Dad tells me that she sent it to a thrift store, but mom says that she threw it in the trash.

[00:07:07] [SPEAKER_00]: Still dad did his best to get it back, but couldn't find it.

[00:07:11] [SPEAKER_00]: Even though I understand mom, I know that she knew how I felt about it

[00:07:15] [SPEAKER_00]: and she did her best to tell me that it was the right thing to do.

[00:07:18] [SPEAKER_00]: I remember that it wasn't worth all of the trouble the doll was causing around the house.

[00:07:23] [SPEAKER_00]: I never asked about the trouble.

[00:07:25] [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't want to know back then.

[00:07:28] [SPEAKER_00]: I was angry.

[00:07:31] [SPEAKER_00]: But now I simply remember the nice things about my childhood with that doll

[00:07:34] [SPEAKER_00]: and the things we used to do.

[00:07:38] [SPEAKER_00]: I miss Caroline. It helps to think that someone out there has her.

[00:07:44] [SPEAKER_00]: I even dream about her sometimes.

[00:07:47] [SPEAKER_00]: She speaks to me there.

[00:07:51] [SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes I hear her cries.

[00:07:54] [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not sure whoever has her.

[00:07:56] [SPEAKER_00]: Probably hears her too.

[00:08:11] [SPEAKER_00]: The following story is called Meet for Sale.

[00:08:15] [SPEAKER_00]: It will continue right after this.

[00:08:18] [SPEAKER_00]: The story is about a simple joke that people took too seriously.

[00:08:26] [SPEAKER_00]: Meet for Sale.

[00:08:31] [SPEAKER_00]: Kids were out in the front yard again, treating it as their own little park or something.

[00:08:36] [SPEAKER_00]: It really made me angry.

[00:08:37] [SPEAKER_00]: It would be years until those little brats would begin to get a glimpse

[00:08:41] [SPEAKER_00]: of what taking care of the most beautiful lawn on my street was like.

[00:08:46] [SPEAKER_00]: I tried to scare them off with the water hose one time.

[00:08:49] [SPEAKER_00]: But one of those parents, you know the kind,

[00:08:52] [SPEAKER_00]: had the audacity to come to my front door and complain about it.

[00:08:56] [SPEAKER_00]: What? The water hurt the kid?

[00:08:58] [SPEAKER_00]: It was water.

[00:09:00] [SPEAKER_00]: But what else can we expect from a child with a parent like that woman?

[00:09:04] [SPEAKER_00]: I told her to go away and close the door before she took out the door.

[00:09:07] [SPEAKER_00]: I tried to scare her herself and to record me.

[00:09:10] [SPEAKER_00]: My grandchildren always told me to watch out for people like that,

[00:09:12] [SPEAKER_00]: people that record you because it will go viral or something like that.

[00:09:17] [SPEAKER_00]: But it's when people get angry at you for offending them.

[00:09:20] [SPEAKER_00]: At least that's what I understood.

[00:09:23] [SPEAKER_00]: They also warned me about the phone calls from people pretending to be someone I know.

[00:09:27] [SPEAKER_00]: Or those that asked for credit card numbers to verify a purchase.

[00:09:31] [SPEAKER_00]: But I catch on right away.

[00:09:33] [SPEAKER_00]: I don't trust credit cards.

[00:09:35] [SPEAKER_00]: I tried everything to get rid of those kids

[00:09:38] [SPEAKER_00]: from simple keep out signs to signs with a beware of dog wording.

[00:09:43] [SPEAKER_00]: Yet those little humans kept rolling down the tiny hill of my front yard

[00:09:46] [SPEAKER_00]: and onto the garden area.

[00:09:49] [SPEAKER_00]: I got a good look at one of them once

[00:09:51] [SPEAKER_00]: and I stretched out my hand and pointed my finger

[00:09:53] [SPEAKER_00]: and lifted my thumb in the shape of a gun.

[00:09:57] [SPEAKER_00]: There were four that kept returning.

[00:10:00] [SPEAKER_00]: Water kid, ponytail, belly

[00:10:03] [SPEAKER_00]: and his younger sister, Booger girl.

[00:10:05] [SPEAKER_00]: Booger girl and belly both knew ponytail

[00:10:08] [SPEAKER_00]: and I think they met Water kid there.

[00:10:11] [SPEAKER_00]: When I sprayed Water kid, all four of them stopped showing up for a few days

[00:10:15] [SPEAKER_00]: but later came back.

[00:10:18] [SPEAKER_00]: The woman who came to complain turned that little kid into a monster.

[00:10:22] [SPEAKER_00]: I swear he would come by and beg to be seen

[00:10:25] [SPEAKER_00]: as he stood in the middle of the yard.

[00:10:28] [SPEAKER_00]: Him and his friends went through the yard after school.

[00:10:30] [SPEAKER_00]: Their shoes bending and twisting every blade of grass

[00:10:34] [SPEAKER_00]: as they ran through it.

[00:10:36] [SPEAKER_00]: I just stared at them from the safe dark living room.

[00:10:40] [SPEAKER_00]: But I had a plan.

[00:10:44] [SPEAKER_00]: It was supposed to be a joke that would only scare a child

[00:10:47] [SPEAKER_00]: and I saw it in a movie.

[00:10:50] [SPEAKER_00]: So I went to the hardware store and picked up a piece of wood

[00:10:53] [SPEAKER_00]: and red spray paint.

[00:10:54] [SPEAKER_00]: Let's not get into the details, you know, paint was never supposed to cost this much

[00:10:58] [SPEAKER_00]: but that's something else.

[00:11:03] [SPEAKER_00]: I went to a neat square and they offered to do it there.

[00:11:06] [SPEAKER_00]: But this is stuff I could do on my own.

[00:11:09] [SPEAKER_00]: Once it was perfect,

[00:11:11] [SPEAKER_00]: I saw it through one of the sides again.

[00:11:14] [SPEAKER_00]: A sign like this would be better if it looked a little crooked.

[00:11:19] [SPEAKER_00]: Then I picked up my stencils,

[00:11:21] [SPEAKER_00]: the same ones that I marked the house numbers with.

[00:11:24] [SPEAKER_00]: I couldn't help but smile to myself and imagine those kids

[00:11:27] [SPEAKER_00]: their eyes as a mouth at out the words

[00:11:32] [SPEAKER_00]: children meet for sale.

[00:11:38] [SPEAKER_00]: And it worked.

[00:11:40] [SPEAKER_00]: Water kids saw it first, can you believe that?

[00:11:44] [SPEAKER_00]: He walked up to it and read it out loud and then took off running right across the street.

[00:11:48] [SPEAKER_00]: Probably to go tell his mother.

[00:11:51] [SPEAKER_00]: Then Ponytail and the other two came by with their backpacks on

[00:11:54] [SPEAKER_00]: when Belly pointed at the sign.

[00:11:56] [SPEAKER_00]: Booger girl didn't know what the sign said and walked up to it.

[00:12:00] [SPEAKER_00]: But the other two came back and pulled her away.

[00:12:03] [SPEAKER_00]: I laughed so hard that the tear started rolling down my left eye

[00:12:07] [SPEAKER_00]: as I went to the porch and pulled the sign down

[00:12:09] [SPEAKER_00]: and placed it inside by the front door.

[00:12:12] [SPEAKER_00]: The news had just started,

[00:12:13] [SPEAKER_00]: so it was around 6pm when I heard a light knock on the door

[00:12:16] [SPEAKER_00]: and then chatter from the outside.

[00:12:19] [SPEAKER_00]: It was Water Kids mom.

[00:12:22] [SPEAKER_00]: I cracked it open and asked how I could help her.

[00:12:25] [SPEAKER_00]: She said that she wanted to talk to me.

[00:12:28] [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't want to talk.

[00:12:30] [SPEAKER_00]: Especially with her cell phone right in my phone.

[00:12:32] [SPEAKER_00]: I was so angry that I couldn't even look at her face.

[00:12:34] [SPEAKER_00]: Her voice got angrier as she spoke even more

[00:12:36] [SPEAKER_00]: and I tried to shut the door.

[00:12:38] [SPEAKER_00]: She yelled calling me God knows what

[00:12:41] [SPEAKER_00]: and then said that I was kidnapping children

[00:12:43] [SPEAKER_00]: and turning them into meat.

[00:12:45] [SPEAKER_00]: She walked along the front porch into the other front window

[00:12:48] [SPEAKER_00]: and then tried recording inside my house.

[00:12:51] [SPEAKER_00]: All while speaking to somebody while recording,

[00:12:53] [SPEAKER_00]: announcing to them that she was going to file a complaint

[00:12:56] [SPEAKER_00]: and everything.

[00:12:58] [SPEAKER_00]: Woman went all out.

[00:13:01] [SPEAKER_00]: Water Kid was going to have some trouble

[00:13:02] [SPEAKER_00]: once he grew up if he always depended on his mom

[00:13:05] [SPEAKER_00]: to fix things for him.

[00:13:08] [SPEAKER_00]: Then it happened.

[00:13:11] [SPEAKER_00]: I started getting people knocking on my door.

[00:13:14] [SPEAKER_00]: Reporters, they said.

[00:13:16] [SPEAKER_00]: They wanted to talk about the incident with the kids

[00:13:18] [SPEAKER_00]: and what I was doing.

[00:13:20] [SPEAKER_00]: What I did for a living.

[00:13:21] [SPEAKER_00]: And how I explained myself.

[00:13:24] [SPEAKER_00]: These guys are intense with their questioning

[00:13:26] [SPEAKER_00]: and they don't take answers very well.

[00:13:29] [SPEAKER_00]: They simply fire question after question

[00:13:31] [SPEAKER_00]: and I refuse to answer anything.

[00:13:34] [SPEAKER_00]: I know my rights.

[00:13:36] [SPEAKER_00]: Then I got a phone call from one of my daughters,

[00:13:39] [SPEAKER_00]: Amy,

[00:13:40] [SPEAKER_00]: who lived a couple of states over now.

[00:13:43] [SPEAKER_00]: She told me she had heard about me

[00:13:44] [SPEAKER_00]: on the news and if everything was all right.

[00:13:48] [SPEAKER_00]: I explained to her the thing about the sign,

[00:13:50] [SPEAKER_00]: the joke I made.

[00:13:51] [SPEAKER_00]: She laughed but she said to simply keep

[00:13:54] [SPEAKER_00]: to myself for a little while

[00:13:55] [SPEAKER_00]: and that people would forget.

[00:13:57] [SPEAKER_00]: She was right. People did.

[00:14:00] [SPEAKER_00]: The phone calls from reporters stopped.

[00:14:04] [SPEAKER_00]: The neighbors stopped lurking around the front yard

[00:14:06] [SPEAKER_00]: and taking photos.

[00:14:07] [SPEAKER_00]: I could finally take out the trash

[00:14:09] [SPEAKER_00]: without feeling those eyes from the houses

[00:14:11] [SPEAKER_00]: across the street staring at me through the windows.

[00:14:15] [SPEAKER_00]: The sign was funny.

[00:14:16] [SPEAKER_00]: Well, to me.

[00:14:18] [SPEAKER_00]: And I still kept it in my garage.

[00:14:21] [SPEAKER_00]: The kids stopped showing up in the front yard

[00:14:23] [SPEAKER_00]: so my mission was complete.

[00:14:26] [SPEAKER_00]: But then one day

[00:14:28] [SPEAKER_00]: when I was sitting on the floor

[00:14:29] [SPEAKER_00]: flicking through the channels on the television

[00:14:31] [SPEAKER_00]: my phone rang.

[00:14:35] [SPEAKER_00]: I walked through the kitchen and picked it up.

[00:14:38] [SPEAKER_00]: Before I could say hello

[00:14:39] [SPEAKER_00]: I heard a voice on the other end say

[00:14:42] [SPEAKER_00]: I'm calling about the sign.

[00:14:45] [SPEAKER_00]: Not this again, I remember thinking to myself.

[00:14:48] [SPEAKER_00]: Another reporter.

[00:14:51] [SPEAKER_00]: This guy had a strange tone to his voice.

[00:14:55] [SPEAKER_00]: Almost nervous.

[00:14:58] [SPEAKER_00]: Wrong number I started saying.

[00:14:59] [SPEAKER_00]: About to put the phone back on the hook.

[00:15:02] I thought I was going to be able to

[00:15:03] [SPEAKER_00]: Wait, I heard the man say.

[00:15:05] [SPEAKER_00]: Sounding desperate.

[00:15:07] [SPEAKER_00]: I put the phone closer to my ear.

[00:15:12] [SPEAKER_00]: How much is it?

[00:15:22] [SPEAKER_00]: To get a notification when new episodes come out

[00:15:25] [SPEAKER_00]: enter your email over on scarystorypodcast.com.

[00:15:29] [SPEAKER_00]: You can also click follow right now

[00:15:30] [SPEAKER_00]: on your podcast player.

[00:15:32] [SPEAKER_00]: Scary Story Podcast is written and produced by me

[00:15:35] [SPEAKER_00]: Edwin Covarrubias.

[00:15:37] [SPEAKER_00]: Until next time.

[00:15:39] [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you very much for listening.