So, this is going to sound totally crazy, but this still haunts me to this day, and I just had to share. Because of the events that I'm about to share, my parents sold our house and moved us into the city, and we were never allowed outside after dark.
I was about 6 when my family moved into this old farmhouse in the middle of nowhere in Indiana. For context, there was an old barn that was falling apart, several cornfields, some crab apple trees, mulberry trees, blackberry and raspberry bushes, and there was a gun club just across the street that only ever had people around on Sundays. There was a bit of woods beyond the blackberry bushes, and the nearest neighbors was a classmate of mine about a mile down the road. We also had a pretty big yard that was in full view of almost every window in the house, and, as long as we never went past the dirt patch between the yard and the barn or past the trees or bushes, we were able to play wherever we wanted in the yard.
It was early summer, and I was outside playing by myself. At some point in time, I got hungry and decided to snack on some blackberries (this was permitted by my parents as long as we made sure the berries were ripe). I was in the middle of collecting a handful of berries when I noticed I wasn't alone. There was what looked like a man with a wide brimmed hat and a trench coat standing towards the back of the blackberry bushes. He was smiling at me and kept waving for me to come to him, and I grew very confused. Like I said, the nearest neighbors outside the gun club were about a mile down the road, so lost visitors wasn't exactly something that happened regularly. I tried asking him different questions about who he was and what he was doing there, but I only got the wave indicating he wanted me to approach, and I kept hearing this strange wheezing noise.
From what I understand, my mom happened to look out the kitchen window and saw me standing by the blackberry bushes, talking to someone. Now, I was a very active kid with an even more active imagination at the time, so I was always playing by myself and talking to "imaginary" people, so it wouldn't have struck her as strange behavior at first. However, when she noticed that I was standing there longer than I would if I was playing a game, she came out to investigate and asked me what I was doing. I immediately pointed to the man in the bushes, and I watched the color drain from my mom's face.
She immediately ordered me to go inside and get my dad. After hearing the fear in her voice, I sensed something was wrong, and I ran to the house as I was afraid she was hurt (she was pregnant at the time with one of my little sisters). As I ran, I heard my mom scream, and something massive burst through the bushes. I don't know why or how, but something told me not to look up or back, so I lowered my gaze towards the ground. That's when I saw it... The shadow of what looked like a man with bat shaped wings.
From here, everything gets fuzzy, but I remember people coming over to the house to ask me questions about the man and what had happened, and my sisters and I were forced to sleep in the living room until my parents finally sold the house later that winter.
I had almost forgotten everything until I was 18 and discovered the movie Jeepers Creepers. Watching both movies, I was reminded of the man I had seen at the back of the bushes and was about to write it off as my imagination when my mom came up and asked me what I thought about the movies. I told her they were scary and reminded me of the man back at the farmhouse, and I could see the color drain from her face. She immediately told me that I was to never bring it up again, but now really curious.
Is there really a creature like the Creeper? What kept it from scooping me up as a kid? Why was my mom so afraid if it was nothing but my imagination? Maybe someone here has answers or some kind of explanation...
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