[Music] It was April of 2015. Me, my girlfriends, and my little brother, who was 9 years old, had gone to a small nearby movie theater on a Wednesday night to see the horror movie It Follows. We usually went late on weekends to get the whole theater to ourselves.
Plus, I had off on Thursdays that semester. When we entered the theater, at first it seemed like we were the only ones inside, but then my little brother pointed somebody out. It was a man in a dark gray hoodie sitting in the top left corner seat in the theater.
It was a little sketchy, but nobody would really give it a second thought. We picked upper middle row seats with a railing in front so we could put our feet up and we each sat with an empty seat between us for more room. I know that sounds weird to do with my girlfriend with me, but having my brother there made it a different story.
I was sitting the closest to the edge and therefore the closest to the one other guy in the room besides us. Within 5 minutes, the previews were over and the movie was starting. The lights in the theater dimmed to darkness, and the only light now was the light projecting from the screen.
My little brother took out his bag of candies he snuck in and started to eat them obnoxiously loud. About 5 minutes into the movie, over my brother's loud candy wrapper noises, which we told him to stop, for the record, I thought I heard a pretty loud sound come from above and behind us. I waited a few seconds to sneak a glance behind us and saw that the guy that was sitting in the top corner had moved down a row, which was odd, but again, I didn't give it more than a second thought.
Another 5 minutes later, when the movie was already starting to get interesting, I heard something from behind us again. I turned when I thought it wouldn't be too obvious, and again, the guy was a whole row closer to us. I leaned to my girlfriend and said while chuckling, "Don't look, but that guy keeps moving closer to the screen.
" She shrugged her shoulders and didn't even show interest in checking. I told myself if he did it again, then I would have a problem and managed to get back into the movie. I'd say another 5 minutes later, without even hearing anything this time, I just turned around out of curiosity and saw the man a whole roll closer, but this time he wasn't at the last seat of the row anymore.
He was moved further down the row, closer to us. Now he was only three rows behind us. I nudged my girlfriend and she turned around.
Then she looked at me and gave me a confused, concerned kind of look. She asked me if we should move and I said definitely not. At this point, I wasn't able to pay attention to the movie anymore.
Even though I was facing the screen, I felt like the man's gaze was hitting me in the back of the head. I told myself, if he moves closer, I would turn around and firmly ask him what he was doing. But then I also thought, what if I'm looking too much into this?
What if he's just a normal guy who happens to keep switching seats for a better view? Once more, I turned around and the man was only two rows away from us now, closer to the center of the row, or rather directly behind us, and his head was just completely down looking at his lap. I didn't even bother to check what he was looking at.
He could have been looking at nothing. I literally opened my mouth ready to say something, but I was just too much of a coward. I was only 16 last year and pretty skinny.
My little brother got up during a slow part of the movie to go to the bathroom. About a minute later, I turned to see if the man had gotten closer again. This time actually ready to say something, but I was shocked to see nobody behind us.
It was completely empty. I told my girlfriend and she said, "Good. " But then I stood up in pure fear, thinking of my little brother.
Telling my girlfriend to wait there and running out of the room and into the empty theater halls, I saw the man in the gray hoodie entering the men's bathroom down the hall. Fearing for my little brother's safety, I ran down the hall toward the bathroom, opened the door, and saw the man literally on his knees peeking under the two stall doors. Then he looked at me and at the same time I heard my little brother call me from down the hall.
I saw him waving me over in confusion. I ran to him, got my girlfriend out of the movie room and we went to the front desk. The teen work in the front ticket stand called the police, showed us and the cops the video footage of the man walking down the hall and then we filed a police report.
I'm just so grateful that my brother went to a different bathroom down the opposite direction of the hall because if he had been in there, even with my showing up to save him, I have no idea what would have happened. It's been over a year now and the man was never identified. Back in 2008, Cloverfield was one of the biggest movies of the year, and I desperately wanted to see it.
Most of my friends had already gone to see it, which upset me given that I didn't want to be seen going to the movie theater alone. However, I didn't have work or school on Thursdays. So, on Wednesday night, I figured I could get away with going alone to one of the small theaters nearby with a screening of the film at 9:30 since I knew it would be quiet.
Well, I showed up, bought a ticket, and immediately realized the entire building was dead. I entered the theater and much to my surprise there was not a single person in there. There were two large sections of seats in the theater.
I sat in the bottom row of the upper section which was seated just behind a tiny wall. During the quiet parts of the movie which were very few. I kept thinking that I was hearing something coming from behind me.
It was almost like I was hearing a voice. Is someone there? Nothing.
I felt like the sounds were just getting louder and closer, but I kept turning around and didn't see anyone. I felt like I was losing my mind. Eventually, the sound became so loud that it was evident it was a crazed whispering.
I was about to nope the [ __ ] out of there. But when I got up and took one last look behind me, a figure popped up quickly from behind the seats, just two rows up from me, arms flat to their sides and just facing me like a stiff statue. I ran like there was no tomorrow back to the lobby where I saw nobody, not a single employee.
I kept running to the car, took a few seconds to catch my breath once inside, and drove back home. I tried calling the theater that same night. I never got anyone to answer.
I didn't bother the next day, and I just tried to let it go. It still freaks me out beyond imagination to this day. One of my first jobs was working at a movie theater in Huntington on Long Island.
It was an okay gig for a 16-year-old. Dealing with the general public in Mass, you'll always run into creeps. However, there was one creep and one really weird situation that I still have nightmares about.
It was a Monday, like 11:00 at night, and the last two playing movies were finishing up, which was earlier than usual. On week nights, I would usually be out of there by midnight during the summer. Anyway, I was the only one working besides Kathy, the lady behind the popcorn counter who was closing up.
I was sitting on the carpeted steps next to my ticket podium on my phone when Kathy yelled over to me to sweep the floors. She told me she was heading out and would be back within the hour to close up. I hurried up with the sweeping and sat back down to get back to playing a Tetris-like game on my flip phone.
I was left alone a lot like this, and this was the one time during my shifts that I feared something such as a late night robbery might easily take place. Suddenly, I heard the front door to the theater pull open with force. I stared down at the doorway to the lobby, which blocked the actual entrance section, waiting for someone to walk through and hoping it would be Kathy.
After all, she would have locked the doors anyway at this hour. I called out Cathy's name, and suddenly an upper middle-aged man with a big brown faded jacket came wandering in, immediately locking his eyes onto mine. I told him we were closing up, and he had to leave.
He looked at me with a sort of intimidating Vincent Pastor kind of look on his face. He mumbled his words in his response, but I could make out his phrase to be, "Is Kathy here? " I shook my head no and he mumbled, "I'm just going to go sit down over there for a while.
" I was very against confrontations with other people, so my heart was racing, and I lacked the confidence to order him to leave. I sat back down on the step and pretended to be absorbed in my phone, when really I was texting Kathy, telling her there was someone weird here for her. But with the old flipones, texts took forever to send, and even longer for people to check.
By the time the text was sent, I noticed the man, now across the room sitting on a bench, was literally watching me. I wanted to show him that I was annoyed by this. So, I simply got up, walked up the three carpeted stairs, and sat down on the bench in front of a wall that would block my view from him.
Stupid old me didn't figure this would allow him to do whatever he wanted, not being within my vision. Within minutes, I realized this was dumb and went back to sitting on the step. only now the man was gone.
Kathy returned around the same time that the last of the movie goers were leaving. I told her about the guy and she said she left the door unlocked by mistake. I spent about 10 minutes sweeping up in some of the auditorium rooms before my shift was officially over.
Kathy wanted me to do one more favor before leaving. Bring the mop, bucket, and broom down into the storage den. I did as she asked.
opened the door in the lobby which leads to the storage area, walked down the halflight of concrete stairs with a mop broom and bucket and stopped. Behind one of the boilers, I could see as clear as day an arm tucked away in the corner. It was the man, and he was very clearly trying to hide.
I pretended like I didn't notice and walked back up the stairs. I locked the door behind me and ran to Cathy. She checked the camera footage first, and this is where things got disturbing.
Within the period of time that I was hiding from the man, the surveillance cameras caught him getting up and leaving the theater. Kathy seemed surprised and declared, "That's my ex-husband. " I felt like my heart was starting to drop as she said this, and I was starting to put things together.
I assured her there was in fact somebody down there. She took out her cell phone and dialed not for 911, but rather for her ex-husband. As she left the building, I followed her, afraid to stay in the theater alone.
Kathy suddenly started to panic as it seemed her ex-husband hung up the phone on her. She then called the cops and what she explained to them shocked and disturbed me. When she hung up the phone, she was in a panic and she tugged me away from the building.
It turned out her ex-husband arrived to the theater to get her out of there because he had apparently run into some trouble with a guy he knew who threatened to kill Cathy for whatever messed up reason. The cop cars pulled up into the parking lot with their sirens blaring. Minutes later, they came out with some old Italian mobster looking guy in cuffs.
Kathy never showed up for work after that and I was never able to get the full backstory out from anyone. I was the coolest guy at the theater for a while since I witnessed all of this. I just really wish I got the full story though because it really interested me.
I never saw Kathy, her ex-husband, or that random guy who potentially almost killed me had I approached him ever again.
