[u]TL;DR and explanation[/u]:
I found this story online a few weeks ago, but only got around to reading part one this morning. When I finished part 1, I bought the full (more detailed) kindle edition and it's pretty cool so far.
If you aren't interested in reading it, the short version is that a creepy stalker lady stalks this guy and keeps offering him Oranges. Sounds silly, but it's pulled off pretty well. You can find the full version of part 1 online, along with part 2.
For discussion value, what are your favourite creepy pastas?
[i]The Story of Her Holding an Orange[/i]:
[quote]Okay guys, before I begin, I gotta give you a fair warning. This story is absolutely true unfortunately. It is also very long. It goes back to my childhood, but it wasn’t as terrifying until very recently. Now I am completely lost in fear. I am an adult man, logical and intelligent (or I’d like to believe so) sitting in my bed, scared shitless right now, goosebumps all over my body and tears of horror in my eyes. I ask for your help in explaining this -blam!-ing horrifying thing. Caution: you’ll notice that I curse quite a bit.
I want you to know that what you read from now on is the situation perceived by my mind. I like to think that I am a very rational person and I haven’t been able to explain these occurrences in any natural way.
Since my mom got a new job, she started making new friends. It is common in our country that friends come to each other’s houses for a cup of coffee, cake, gossip and whatnot. Few weeks into her new job, my mom made friends with this woman, Rose. She would come maybe twice a week and they’d sit around the coffee table on our balcony and just talk. One day, when I was 17, I was at the balcony with them. I’m not sure why I was there, but knowing me, I probably ran out of internet hours (back in a day we bought internet monthly per hour in my country) and was bored as -blam!-. So we’re sitting there, they’re gossiping about who knows what, and mom gets up to go get some cake she had baked recently. I remained sitting at the table with Rose and that’s when my life changed forever. Rose was a good looking woman. She was about 5’6”, skinny, long black hair, pearly white teeth. Attractive woman overall. So anyways, I am sitting there with her, and she turns to me. She has this creepy grin on her face; bright red lipstick with bright white teeth underneath are just making it look more scary. Her head is moving slowly, almost as if she became a puppet. She says something in the lowest tone possible, certainly not loud enough for me to understand. “Excuse me?” I say, still not being scared, just a bit weirded out.
“You ready to go now?” She said this in a voice of a child, I kid you not. Like maybe an 8 year old girl.
Grin is still there. She mustered those words through her teeth, never opening the jaw.
“What?” I ask, starting to get scared.
“You ready?” The same thing again. Only this time, she pulls out an orange out of her purse. That’s it, she just took the orange out, and held it there. Didn’t offer it, didn’t eat it herself, just held the -blam!-ing thing.
At that point, I was getting scared as -blam!-. Thankfully, my mom came with the cake. Rose, almost as if someone pushed a button on a remote control, switched back to her normal self, putting the orange back into her purse without my mom noticing. I left the balcony creeped out, but I was 17 so I brushed it off quickly.
That night, I had trouble sleeping. My room is on the first floor and my window is at a maybe 5’ height, so I kept looking at it praying not to see some scary monster. I would turn in my bed constantly and look at the window maybe every 5 minutes. It was getting late and I started to doze off, but decided to look into the window one last time. And there she -blam!-ing was. Standing in the -blam!-ing window. Rose. Just standing, looking directly at me (moonlight was bright enough for me to see), with the same grin on her face. Lipstick was red as ever, and teeth were whither than ever. I was paralyzed with fear. I often imagined what I’d do in situations like these, and I always had an escape plan for any hypothetical I threw at myself. But now, when this friend of my mother’s was staring at me through my window at 4am, just smiling, I was motionless. My mouth got dry, I got goosebumps (have them now as I type this), and I swear it became freezing in my room, probably just the way the body reacts to shock. I finally gathered the courage to get up. I started walking towards the door. Hear head was turning with me. Slowly. With the grin still there. Again, it was as if she were a puppet. I wanted to scream for my parents, but knowing how tense they are, I decided not to cause panic just yet. There had to be some rational explanation, right? For -blam!- knows what reason, I decided to walk to the window and ask her what the -blam!- her problem was. I made two slow steps towards it and froze. I froze because she moved. You know what her movement was? Taking the orange out of her purse. Does anyone know what the record time is for having goosebumps? Because they sure as shit aren’t going away. Anyways, after being terrified for a minute, I decide to go on. I am a big guy and figured I’d be able to fight her off if push comes to shove. My windows pull up in order to open. I pull it open maybe some 10 inches and stop. She’s not moving, just holding the -blam!-ing orange and looking at me with the scariest grin you’ll ever see. I stand there. She stands there. Then, she starts bending. But every move she makes is so slow, so mechanical. She’s bending so she can reach the open part of the window. I’m horrified. She pushes her head through it (just enough space for her head to go through).
“You go with me now?” As she’s saying that, in her 8 year old voice, her hand is making its way through the crack, holding an orange. What do I to? What you’d do. -blam!-ing run. I run out of my room, screaming for my dad. My dad being a light sleeper, he jumps out of his bed and screams back at me asking what the hell is going on. All I can muster to say is “Rose…window.” While dad is putting his pants on, I run back to my room, wanting Rose to be there so he can see that I am not crazy. You know how in horror movies the person you saw is gone by the time witnesses come? Yea well similar thing happened, except I caught Rose leaving. There is a house some 100 yards away from mine, and it had one of those motion activated lights (lots of crime back home). I saw the light turn on, and a glimpse of Rose disappearing behind that house. By the time dad ran into my room, she was gone. After much talking, he decided that it was just a nightmare and told me to call him only if someone physically comes into my room. “You and your -blam!-ing imagination” he said walking away. Needless to say, I got exactly zero hours of sleep that night.
Nothing happened in the next few months. Rose would still come to visit my mom, but I’d make sure I wasn’t there. -blam!- that. As in every teenager’s life, so many things were happening around me and I forgot about the Rose incident. Then one day, I was spending my afternoon browsing internet (years before Reddit unfortunately). I got pretty hungry so as any spoiled child, I yelled from my room to see if my mom would come. She didn’t. Oh well tough luck, I have to go to the kitchen and make myself a sandwich. Kitchen in our house is connected to the living room, but you can’t see the living room until you’re at least in the middle of the kitchen. So I open the kitchen and walk in. I freeze. There it is, right there on the kitchen table. An orange. Immediate thought of that creepy night. Rose is here. I am still motionless in my spot. Few seconds later, I realize how stupid I am for relating a common piece of fruit to a crazy window stalker. So I walk towards the table, wanting to put the orange back in the fruit cabinet. I grab the thing and hear the voice behind me: “You will have to come with me soon, you know.” Child’s voice. It’s Rose. I produce some kind of noise resembling scared pig about to get slaughtered. Lightning fast, I turn around and there she is, standing in the middle of the living room. Just standing there, same grin on her face, same lipstick on her lips, teeth white as ever. Only she started tilting her head to the left a bit, in slow motion. I remember it as if it happened yesterday: her long black hair falling down her shoulders, white summer dress, bright red shoes to match her lipstick. I forgot to mention that she was very pale. Even in the summer, she seemed to not be friends with the sun. This added to creepiness. There’s this woman who already scared the shit out of me once, standing alone in the middle of my living room, pale as a ghost, bright red lipstick and shoes, tilting her head to the side, speaking in child’s voice. And then, and -blam!-ing then, she takes an orange out of her purse. Takes it out slowly, and looks at me, as if she wants me to have it. Just as my self-defense mode is about to take over and I either run away or tackle the crazy bitch, my mom walks in. I know it didn’t happen, but it seemed like my mom brought the light into the room. I released a breath of relief. Rose, of course, went back to her “normal” self. They were about to go for a walk and my mom was getting ready in her room while she was pulling her grudge shit on me.
Since my parents wouldn’t believe anything I was saying about her, I wasn’t sure what to do. Only thing I could do at that age is nothing, I suppose. But I swore I’d punch that woman should she ever come close to me again.[/quote]
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Should have banged rose...that will teach her.