Dead Pan

A creepy walk in the woods

September 20, 2014

Dead Pan

Richard R. De Blasio

Last night, around 930 at night, I took Gracie to the woods behind my house. I noticed that it was unusually dark, even for the woods, no moon and it was cloudy.

I live in a condo complex that backs up to the forest side of Warren Park. It’s hundred acres of wild land with terrain from marshy field to rocky hill and dense woods.

I have to walk through a narrow deer trail about 200 feet long, through thick bushes and short trees, to get to the clearing in the middle.

I don't leash Gracie once I enter the woods because it's too narrow, so I let her go and she stays close, on the way to the clearing. I walked her in the field for a while, letting her run loose. Then I started walking back up the path that leads home. My eyes had adjusted to the dark but, The path winds around so there are a few turns you can't see around, until you get there.

Gracie was a few paces behind me, as I rounded 1 turn, about 100 feet from the clearing. There is a man standing there. He is dressed in black, black like ink. From the top of his head to his feet, uniformly black. Everything was so black you couldn't tell where the shirt ended and the pants began or boots to feet. It must have been a hoodie and a mask. There was no face. He was just pure black with no features. So much so that I couldn't tell if he was facing me or facing away.

He wasn't moving. He was standing dead still at the end of the leg of the walk I was on.Not like he was walking toward me not walking away, just standing there.

He startled me, and I called out for Gracie who was off the leash. And she trotted up and stopped. I clipped on her leash.

I didn't know if he saw me or not. So I called out "Hello?"

Really slow, Southern Drawl, maybe Mississippi accent "Diiiiiid Ahhhh scaaaayre yooo?"

I said "No, I don't scare that easy. But I did want to make sure you know I'm here. I have a big, aggressive dog I'll have trouble controlling her, when I walk past you."

No response. I started walking.

And now a hundred and thirty pounds of Gracie is lunging and dragging me. This guy still hasn't moved. Not shifted his stance, not moved his hands, nothing, statue still, not even the head is moving. I'm walking past him on the bend with Gracie on 10 inches of leash and she is loosing her mind, going after this guy.

He says "She shoore does look like uh beast." with no fear, no waiver, nothing in his voice. Dead pan. That dude didn't scare or intimidate me but that was one of the creepiest things I ever encountered as an adult.

Author's Note

This story is not fiction, it is a real account of the creepiest event of my adult life. It was not originally written as an essay or story, it was a chain of text messages I sent to a friend, a few minutes after I got home, from that walk.

I walk that stretch of woods twice a day, seven days a week and occasionally encounter other people walking with and with out their dogs, smoking or talking on the phone. I know the people who pass that way and i never saw or heard of this dead pan man again.

Reviews

[Saichiro Wolftotem]

Don't hate me. I rewrote it. I hope you don't mind. I know you cobbled it back together from texts and whatnot, but I felt it could use some zazz. Um...as far as the writing itself goes, I would recommend reordering your words to make timeframes more relevant and easier to read. There were also a couple of instances of repeated descriptions. Fix that and you have yourself 75% of a creepypasta! Very unsettling.


It was moonless and cloudy last night as I took my dog, Gracie, through the woods behind my house. We did this often, but I noticed that this night it was unusually dark, even for 9:30 at night. Warren Park must have been a hundred acres of wild land with even wilder terrain varying from marshy field to rocky hill to dense woods and it sidled right up to the edge of my condo complex. I found it rather convenient to walk Gracie there on a regular basis. You hardly ever met anyone out there and because of the narrow trail, it was easy to let her off the leash.
There was a narrow deer trail, about 200 feet long and surrounded by thick bushes and short trees, that led to a nice clearing we liked to visit. After so many walks, I imagined to myself that she probably owned that clearing in the dog world. It was an amusing thought.
Gripping the unattached leash in my hand I smiled as she ran loose around the sparse area, happy that we had this place to go to after a long day. Once Gracie had lost interest in sniffing each individual tuft of grass, I doubled back toward the winding path home. It was late after all.
As I walked I had started to think about what I needed to do when I got back home when a bend in the trail revealed a figure standing startlingly close to where we were. I took a couple more uneasy steps forward, but the figure remained stationary. Everything about him was a uniformly inky black, obvious even against the very little light outside, but with no definition. You couldn’t tell where hoodie began or boots ended. Even his face was obscured and a chill crept up my spine. It was like someone had forgotten to take their shadow with them.
Gracie was behind me, still off the leash, and she trotted up and stopped hackles arise. I didn’t know if he saw me or not so I called out a nervous greeting.
A slow grinding southern drawl responded: “Deed Ah scaaayre yoooo?” It was too slow and deliberate with a sort of Mississippi accent attached.
“No, I don’t scare that easy. But I did want to make sure you know I’m here. I have a big, aggressive dog. I’ll have trouble controlling her when I walk past, so…”
My response sounded confident in my head, but I’m afraid my delivery probably gave me away. It was at this point that Gracie decided to lunge forward, dragging me with her. The man didn’t even flinch, remaining more than glued to the spot. His stance didn’t shift, his hands didn’t move. I can’t even say I’m sure his mouth moved when he spoke next: “Shee shoor does look like uh beeest…,” no fear, no waiver. Nothing in his voice said that there was ten inches of leach and one frightened handler between him and the 130 pound snarling dog. He was dead pan, and as soon as I was out of sight I hurried back to my condo without so much as a glance backward. It was one of the creepiest encounters of my life.