Is it true that ghosts or spirits exist, or is it all a conspiracy theory? Here are some scary stories Reddit users have shared that will send chills down your spine.
As children, we were most fascinated by true real life scary stories and movies that our grandparents used to tell us or something that we watched on the television. And no matter how scary they might have been, it never stopped us from watching them.
But, more than stories do you know what is more terrifying? These stories inspired by real-life incidents, that are perfect for Halloween Horror nights.
Horrific things occur around us every day like murders, possession, and disappearances and you’d be surprised that these stories aren’t just fiction but some of them are real-life scary stories too.
We’ve compiled a list of some of the most terrifying, fictional, and real-life unexplained short scary stories Reddit users have submitted below.
Knock yourself out, but make sure you keep the lights on after you read these true scary stories Reddit users have shared!
13 Real Life Scary Stories Reddit For Halloween Horror Nights
1. The key to the door…
I found the key to the door my mom had been hiding from me for the past week.
About a week ago, I found a small trap door in my mom’s closet. She told me not to go in, ever since then she has been acting strange.
The key was behind the washing machine, I thought about it at first, what if she found out and got mad at me? But I did it anyway, the door clicked open, and there, I saw a body.
My Mothers Body…
Posted by u/Liam4Fingarz
2. Hello…
When I was young, telephones didn’t have keys to press or even a dial to rotate. You’d pick up the phone, and the operator would say, “Number please.” Then you’d give her the number and she’d connect you.
When I was very young, I didn’t really know the purpose of a telephone. I just knew that you could pick it up and talk to someone. I’d pick up the phone and when I heard “Number please,” I’d just start chatting with the operator. Some didn’t want to talk to a little kid, but one, in particular, seemed to enjoy it. I’d call her and we’d talk about what was going on in my life and then we’d hang up.
When I started grade school, my favorite operator would help me with my homework. I’d ask her questions, and she’d help me figure out the answers, she’d never just tell me directly, but with her help, I could always find the answer.
As I got older, I realized that this was not what the operator was for, but it was such a habit I kept it up. When I started dating, I’d tell her all about the boys and what we’d done the night before.
One day, I called my operator up crying. My date the night before hadn’t gone too well. The boy had been pushing, demanding things I didn’t want to do. When I refused, he hit me and left me to walk home alone.
My operator listened while comforting me, and told me not to worry, things had a way of working out. The next day, the boy was found dead outside his house. No one knew exactly what happened to him, myself included.
Later I met your grandfather. He was sweet at first, but as time went on things got unpleasant. He’d go out drinking, and when he’d come home he’d beat me.
I hadn’t spoken to my operator in years, but one day I remembered her and picked up the phone. By this point phones had dials, so I dialed 0 and got the operator. I told her what was going on in my life, and she said not to worry, things had a way of working out.
The next morning your grandfather wasn’t in bed with me. When I went outside, I found him on the porch, dead. He’d been dead for hours. I have no idea how she did it, but anyway, that’s what happened to your grandfather.
Posted by u/jbuchana
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3. My neighbor, the murderer
“I lived next to a murderer. Faye Swetlik was 6 years old when she was kidnapped out of her front yard. It was all over the news. I had news crews, cops, even the FBI all over my townhouse complex. My fiancée and I met with the FBI 3 times. They searched our home and everything. I remember clear as day, my fiancée FaceTimed me as the cops were digging through the trash cans directly in front of my townhouse.
They pulled out her boot and a bloody knife. Then they found her body, dumped maybe 300 feet from my house. He had watched them find the murder weapon. Dumbass put it in a trash bag along with his other mail.
He went to his back porch and opened his own throat. It’s crazy. I had conversations with the guy. I never knew he was a psycho. This all happened a year ago.”
Posted by SCRhyperior
4. Shrieking Susan
I turned to Dan and nudged him in the ribs. “Hey, did I ever tell you about shrieking Susan?”
He groaned. “Is this another one of your dumb ghost stories?” “No. Well, yeah. But this one’s actually true.” Dan laughed as we followed an S-shaped path through the forest, ascending a steep hill.
“Well? You wanna hear about her or not?” “No. But you’re gonna tell me anyway.”
“OK. So the story goes that she was a beautiful young woman who lived just outside this forest.”
Several hikers passed us by as they made their way down, rushing to get home before dark.
“One night she was walking home, alone, when—” A lady holding two hiking poles interrupted me. “It’s getting dark, fellas. And the paths are a bit tricky up ahead. You should probably—say, are you guys twins?”
Dan and I gave each other a look that said, ‘not again’. He turned to the lady. “No. We both just so happen to be in this exact same spot at the exact same time and look exactly alike. Crazy, huh?” She shook her head and walked off, muttering under her breath.
I picked up a rock and threw it at a hedge. Several birds took off. “Anyway, Susan was walking home when she realized somebody was following her, and she started running along this exact trail. She made it all the way to the top of the hill where—”
“Let me guess,” Dan interjected, “she made it all the way to the top, where the man bashed her skull in or strangled her, and now her tortured spirit wanders the forest every night searching for the man who killed her. Am I close?”
“Well, yeah. But you took all the suspense out of it…”
We reached the top of the hill where I threw down my pack, took out a Halloween mask, and slipped it on.
Dan rolled his eyes. “That would scare me more if I hadn’t just watched you put it on.”
“Oh, I’m not wearing this to scare you. I’m wearing it so Susan won’t recognize me.”
Now it was completely dark. Somewhere behind us, a twig snapped. Dan spun around.
“There’s something there,” he stammered. “Of course there is. It’s Susan. And she’s about to exact her revenge. See Dan, there’s a reason I know about her.”
A shadowy figure crept between the trees. “It’s because I was her attacker.” From beyond the trees there came a piercing shriek.
“And rather than risk bumping into her somewhere down the line, I thought it would be safer to help her spirit find peace.”
Dan’s jaw dropped as a ghastly figure with bone-white skin and dark sunken eyes stepped onto the path. He traveled backwards until he tripped over an exposed tree root and fell. Then shrieking Susan charged towards him, arms outstretched.
“Wait,” Dan screamed, pointing at me. “It’s him, he’s the one who—”
Before he could finish, Susan’s long fingers closed around his throat.
Posted by u/jtb685
5. The corpse sat up – Real Life Scary Stories Reddit
“My dad worked in a morgue during college in the ’60s. One time on the night shift he was training a recent hire who was wheeling a body down the hallway. The body was under a sheet but all of a sudden started to sit up. The guy immediately freaked out, ran out the doors and quit. Apparently, a dead body can have muscle contractions in the abs causing it to start sitting up”
Posted by PJammas41
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6. The Message on the Tape Recorder
My wife and I had just moved into our new house when I found the tape recorder. It was on the desk in the office. The house came completely furnished. At that time it wasn’t unusual. In fact, all of the houses in the neighborhood came furnished. Not with new furnishings either, more like they were sold “as is”. It was as if everyone just up and vanished. My wife was hesitant to move here because of that, but the house was a great deal, and I reassured her that it was simply just a ghost story. She was reluctant, but still, we made the move.
I sat in the chair at the desk with the noontime sun shining behind me through the window, and hit play on the tape recorder. A man’s voice played back with this message:
“It all started with the owls. I had only ever heard them at night, so you can imagine my surprise when I saw one in broad daylight. It was sitting on the roof of my neighbor’s porch at 8 am, right before I left for work. Pretty soon daylight owl sightings were happening all over. It became the norm. Scientists attributed it to a change in diet, and that simply the prey that they hunted was more active during the daylight hours.
That didn’t explain the raccoons though. I saw one rummaging through my garbage one morning a few weeks after the owl sighting. They had always gotten into my trash, but I always discovered the mess the morning after, with no raccoon insight. Now my garbage went untouched through the overnight hours.
Shortly after the raccoons, I stopped hearing the coyotes at night.
The news was plastered with speculation about these strange changes in behavior of the creatures of the night. It was almost as though they were becoming afraid of the darkness. Was there an even scarier creature of the night?
Soon the news broadcasts stopped, and the TV read a single message on every channel:
IT IS IMPERATIVE THAT YOU STAY INDOORS FROM THE MOMENT THE SUN GOES DOWN, TILL THE MOMENT THE SUN RISES. DO NOT GO OUTSIDE DURING THIS TIME, NO MATTER WHAT YOU HEAR.
It’s currently night-time as I sit here now telling you this. I’m not sure how much time I have left. They’re out there right now. I heard the screams of my neighbors, and now I can hear the scratching at my own door. I have no idea what they are, and I don’t think I will be able to…”
The recording stopped. The message chilled me to the bone. I could not tell my wife about this. I hid the tape underneath a stack of paperwork in the bottom drawer.
Moments later I heard my wife call me to check something out. I found her in the kitchen looking out at the back deck, staring at an owl on the railing.
Posted by u/TheWhitePeanut
7. The Devil
I always had a problem with sleeping growing up. Many times I’d get sleep paralysis but after I blessed my room.. it hasn’t happened in months.
This happened to me about a year ago. I woke up in the middle of the night freezing. If I tried to move I’d get a really loud ringing noise in both my ears. It would get louder each time I moved. I was terrified. I was too scared to open my eyes but I felt the presence of someone in the room with me.
(Now my room isn’t completely dark because I have a small blue night light) I open my eyes and see a very tall and dark figure with two horns on each side of his head just standing there in the corner of my room facing me… I panic and try to move my body. The ringing gets louder and louder and louder and I can feel myself crying. I close my eyes and in my head start saying “ God will protect me, God will protect me..” then… I hear a low evil voice say “ God can’t help you anymore..”
Posted by u/Alyshia091
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8. Eleanor Sinclair
I grew up in a small town. One of those quiet country places where the tallest building is four stories high, and the grand opening of a Starbucks makes the front page of the local paper. It’s right next to a reservoir and dam that’s faithfully supplied the town for a little over a century now, with both water and myth.
Construction started on the lake in 1904, overseen by Thomas Sinclair. He brought his family on site one day. It was meant to be a short visit, but as they stood on the partially finished dam, the brick gave way. The youngest of Sinclair’s children, Eleanor, fell in. Construction was halted, and they searched the lake for weeks for any sign- clothes, remains, but nothing showed up.
Sinclair and his family left after years of searching and mourning, and the dam would wait nearly a decade before it was finished.
The real drama isn’t a thing we have to worry about here. Other than David Myers getting addicted to narcotics a few years back, our lives are fairly quaint. So the urban legends that grow from our humble pasts become the lifeblood for us.
We occasionally get ghost hunters that bring their hodgepodge equipment, trying to contact poor Eleanor. Her ghost has been said to be seen on dozens of occasions, even my grandpa told me and my brothers’ stories about her. Stuff like if you stand on the dam and scream “Eleanor Sinclair, I release you from your torment!” and jump into the reservoir, she’s said to appear, bloody and mangled beneath the murky waters. Sometimes, you wait until Halloween. Sometimes, the magic hour is 11:34 pm, and in others, it’s 3 am on Sunday mornings.
Everyone’s tried one method at least once, myself included. “Just scream it. Like your pa said.” Wilson nudged me as we stood on the dam for what was probably the hundredth time in our lives.
“That ain’t gonna work, I tried before.” I nudged back. “It’s all bullshit.” Michael scoffed and walked away.
We nodded and followed, but the brick under my foot crumbled and I plummeted into the lake…
The drop was maybe ten feet, so other than the initial shock, I was fine. But as I was submerged underwater, I felt a level of unease I never felt before. I didn’t want to make sense of it so I swam for the edge, my friends already waiting for me with giant grins on their stupid faces. They pulled me out, telling me how dumb I looked. I let them have it, even indulging them with the unease I felt underwater.
What I didn’t tell them was the flash of golden blonde hair I saw as it flowed in the waves. Nor did I tell them I felt a tug on my shoe as I swam for them. And I definitely didn’t tell them the faint whisper of “please don’t leave me here” as they pulled me from the water.
Posted by u/johnnyohdear
9. This new house
We bought an old house, my boyfriend and I. He’s in charge of the “new” construction – converting the kitchen into the master bedroom for instance, while I’m on wallpaper removal duty. The previous owner papered EVERY wall and CEILING! Removing it is brutal but oddly satisfying. The best feeling is getting a long peel, similar to your skin when you’re peeling from a sunburn. I don’t know about you but I kinda make a game of peeling, on the hunt for the longest piece before it rips.
Under a corner section of paper in every room are a person’s name and a date. Curiosity got the best of me one night when I Googled one of the names and discovered the person was actually a missing person, the missing date matching the date under the wallpaper!
The next day, I made a list of all the names and dates. Sure enough, each name was for a missing person with dates to match. We notified the police who naturally sent out the crime scene team.
I overheard one tech say “yup, it’s human.” Human? What’s human? “Ma’am, where is the material you removed from the walls already? This isn’t wallpaper you were removing.”
Posted by BatoutofHell821
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10. “Did you sell me a haunted house?”
I moved in with dad who lived in White Center, Washington when I was fifteen. The house technically had six floors. Although the staircases leading to each floor were only about nine or ten steps. The house’s layout was a maze of staircases leading in and out of each floor with large windows in almost every room including the basement.
My brothers and I have had numerous paranormal experiences in this house and they even told me about some before I even moved in which sent shivers down my spine. My dad never believed in ghosts and whenever my brothers and I would explain what happened while he was at work he would say, “It’s all in your heads, this house is not haunted.” Even after my stepmom went to a psychic who knew nothing of the house and stopped her session short to tell her, “Get out of your house, there is bad energy there.” He still denies everything.
It wasn’t until we finally moved out of that house that he finally had to face the facts. He sold the house to an employee of his named Cathryn, who just married and was looking for a house for her, her husband and daughter that was closer to work.
A few weeks later Cathryn rushes into my dad’s office and closes the door. “Excuse me, John, did you sell me a haunted house,” she asks. “Don’t be ridiculous Cathryn, there are no such things as ghosts” he replied. “My daughter told me there have been people who come to visit here every night since we moved in. They told her, “They don’t like us and want us out of the house.” She explains while half crying.
Cathryn and her family moved out of the house soon after. My dad still says he doesn’t believe in ghosts but when my brothers and I tell him about stories and experiences we have had there. He quickly changes the subject.
Posted by u/TheWhitePeanut
11. “Party time”
“My great aunt woke up in the middle of the night, she heard her dog making these low growls. She was single at the time and living alone in her ranch-style home. She walked out to her living room to check things out. She didn’t see or hear anything out of the ordinary, so she decided to make sure her door and front windows were locked.
The door was locked, the first window she checked was locked. When she lifted the mini blind on the second window, it was wide open and a guy in a ski mask was standing there. She said he laughed this evil laugh and said “party time” then he started to climb in. She screamed that she had a gun, and her dog started barking his head off. The would-be rapist decided to bolt. My aunt did get a gun after that and learned how to use it.”
Posted by belai437
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12. Wedding Day
I first met my wife in high school. Her beautiful, sparkling eyes drew me in; they were a reflection of heaven, and her voice, a chorus of angels.
I proposed after we graduated from college and we planned our future together.
But things have changed since then; she’s been acting strange lately. In bed she’d toss and turn all night, muttering under her breath.
Some nights I’d hear other strange noises, like faint screams.
I still loved her, though.
We decided to get married at our local church. Before I knew it, I was waiting at the altar for her to walk down the aisle. I nodded to the priest and signaled to the men sitting in the front row.
We pinned her on top of the altar as the priest wrapped her arms and legs in chains. She hissed and howled, her body writhing in agony.
The priest grasped the crucifix in front of her face and began the recitation.
I wasn’t going to let her go. I wanted my wife back…
Posted by Twisting_Straw
13. Stone cold
“I grew up in a funeral home. I helped out in the office. When I was about 15, we got a call from a man whose wife and infant baby had been murdered in cold blood.
There were very few clues. It made headlines. Cops set up surveillance at the viewing. It was heartbreaking, as the mother was holding the baby in her arms.
I was asked to take the flower cards and periodically get the husband and ask if he recognized the names. I then photocopied them and put them back. I did it because I was a “kid,” people knew me, and I was unobtrusive. I talked to the husband quite a bit. He seemed devastated and shaken.
The cops told me they had an eyewitness to someone leaving the house the day of the murder.
The witness was a three-year-old girl. She recognized the man leaving. It was the husband’s best friend. Turns out that the friend and the husband had made a pact to kill each other’s families and run off with their secretaries. The little girl identified the friend, and I guess one of them cracked.
They both went to jail on multiple counts, all on the testimony of a three-year-old.
I still cannot believe to this day that that man stood right beside me, multiple times, and I had NO CLUE.
I don’t think I ever looked at life the same way after that.”
Posted by RareBeautyEtsy
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So, did you find these short real life scary stories Reddit to be interesting? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
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