This past year we made the rounds of our local neighborhood. We made sure to only approach homes that had their porch light on, which was the unspoken rule. Our night had almost come to an end when we reached a home that had been vacant for the last two seasons. It was the largest within our neighborhood, towering at two stories when all others only had one level. It was a large, brick Victorian monstrosity that may have once been beautiful but the landscape had long needed work. It was the house most kids made stories about and when we saw the dim glow of that yellow bulb I was unsure of letting my children approach.

My oldest begged to ring the doorbell and my youngest simply wanted more candy. I was outnumbered and relented at their pleas. My wife sat within the idling vehicle while I followed close behind. The two made their way up the steps and I waited at the bottom. Like always, I reminded them of what to say. My oldest son held his brother's hand and pressed the lighted button. Ringing, much like church bells, echoed from within the house for a moment, before returning to silence. After a few seconds, they turned to me with questioning looks.

I first heard about the Bogeyman when I was five. My parents used to treat him like a ghost story.

“If you don’t be good and finish all your supper, the Bogeyman is going to come and take you away from us.”

In retrospect, that was probably one of the most frightening things you could’ve ever told a five-year-old. That a strange man will kidnap you away from your friends and family and everyone you love just because you weren’t behaving. Parents can be cruel, but now that I think about it, it worked. So, what can I say? They must’ve known what they were doing.

This is a true story about when I was 12 and my family and I moved into our new house. We all loved it, except it had a room we liked to call the "Dungeon" (An extremely tiny room in the basement, that could be padlocked from the outside with no light inside). I even recall finding an old little toy car in the corner of the room. The house didn't feel right.

The property had a chained link fence all along the side, with barbed wire on top. I later found out this was an old foster home, but even now I never have really looked into the history of the house. I'm still afraid of what I could find.

It is said that 3:00 AM is the most wicked time of all. The time when the night is the darkest, and fear and hysteria sinks in the fastest. When the clock struck 3 AM, my life took a turn for the worse.

I had just arrived home from work, my throat was strained from yelling my lectures. I tell you, I never really realized how much I have to use my lungs when teaching in a large auditorium, but I digress. I removed my outdoor wear, and walked towards the stairs when I heard a knock from the upstairs.

Vince sat, blood trickling down towards his elbow, with his recently deceased wife lying in his arms; her face pale and soulless. As tears cascaded down his cheeks, he turned to see his two young children who were bound in ropes beside him. Vince’s young daughter, her blonde hair tangled and knotted with congealed blood, was contorted with a gash across her neck; her eyes glassy and motionless. His son was lying on his front, a pool of blood forming around his head and deep rope abrasions looking sore around his neck and wrists; his eyes empty and lifeless.

"Who did this to you?" Vince whimpered, "No!

There has been a lot of discussion surrounding the mysterious footage of the so called Nightcrawler.

I grew up in the Fresno area of California and for many years had no handle on a terrifying teenage experience that haunts me to this day.

It began in 1993 when three friends and I decided to spend an autumn night in the woods near Millerton Lake. It was the perfect conclusion to an amazing summer and something we had planned for so long but always found a way to put off.

We walked aimlessly by the lake for hours, skipping stones, fishing and enjoying the warmth of the quickly fading sunlight. The warmth soon disappeared behind the treetops and we decided to walk a little further into the undergrowth to find a good spot to set up camp for the night.

As a child, I grew up in a small Southern Missouri town just north of the Ozark Mountain Range. There were about ten thousand people living there and, for the most part, they preferred to keep to themselves.

It was a weird mentality you never ran into often in the south. During the summer following my second year of elementary school, all of that would change.

In this town, there was only one provider for television. It was an old cable provider known as “Ozark Cable,” which served southern Missouri and northern Arkansas.

I love Daniel.

We are but work partners, but nonetheless, my mind is similar to a movie, where he is the main character. Ever since we started working together, I cannot stop thinking about him, his face, his name, his everything.

I have a desire, no, a need to be around him. Sometimes I think about how everything I care resumes to him. Since the beginning of this year, I have forgotten friends, family, everything. Even my work is shit. The reason I do it, as every other thing, is to spend time with Daniel.

It was a bleak Sunday, while I watched a film, thinking about him, that someone called. Thank God it was him, and the moment he said we were arranging a work-meeting on February 14th, to discuss something I didn't care about, I cannot describe the sensation.

People always tell you not to play with Ouija Boards. Personally, I’ve never bought into any of that nonsense. I’m not afraid of something invented by a toy company. Every account you hear of weird stuff happening after someone used a Ouija Board at a slumber party or whatever are just due to the power of suggestion. If you tell someone that something creepy is going to happen, they’ll see something creepy in everything.

The American dream: it's different for everyone. For some, it's to be successful and live in a big house on some hill in California. Mine is simple albeit a bit stereotypical. My dream is to live in the suburbs and live a quiet life with my family in a small neighborhood. Our house lies just on the outskirts of a town and our street is full of pleasant people. My family and I easily became friends with everyone on our street once we moved. Our house was in front of a dense forest full of green trees. It was a beautiful scene that fit my dream perfectly.