scary stories and true crime

The Lost Keys (true?)

I live in England, in a small town with about 1,000 people there. We are located in the deep countryside and crime just doesn't happen often apart from the odd stolen bike etc. I suppose we are quite relaxed about home security and will often leave the door open all day in summer for the dog to walk in and out as he pleases, leaving the cars unlocked and even the house sometimes never with any problems. Maybe our naiveness played a part in this story.

It is important to explain that my kitchen backs onto a public footpath, which in summer is extremely busy with people walking their dogs. They can look straight in the many windows from the footpaths into our kitchen. Now with the setting explained I'll get on with the story.

I was out 16 at the time, this story was a couple of years ago. I had taken my dog out for a walk mid afternoon like I did every day, I grabbed his lead and locked the door and took him out for a hour walk, though the fields that surrounded my house and then came back. When I came back I opened the door and placed the keys on the kitchen table and went on with my day.

Later on my Mother asked me if I had seen the kitchen door key and I explained that I had left it on the table, she went and looked and it wasn't there. I then doubted myself thinking maybe I didn't lock the door when I left and I dropped it on a walk although I was certain I could remember leaving it on the table. I didn't think much about it, thinking that it would appear in the house and if it didn't I would find it on a walk the next day as I always walk the same route.

A couple days went by and the key still wasn't found, I searched the house and my walk route but it couldn't be found. I found it rather strange as I could recall putting it on the table but assumed I had imagined it and I must of dropped it. Luckily we had another key and went on using that key for the door instead.

About 4 days after loosing my keys(which didn't just have the kitchen door key but also had the front door key on) myself and my mum was disrupted from watching the tv by our dog barking like crazy in the kitchen, this was very out of character for him as he only normally barks in the day when people walk past the kitchen. Me and my mum went in to find out what had upset him, to find the new key had fallen out the door and was on the floor.

This was extremely strange because we have extremely old doors since my house is about 200 years old, the keys are very thick old fashioned keys and the only way they can fall out of the door is if you push a key in from the other side or that you pull it out. Me and my mum was a little concerned at this point but decided we was being silly so we locked and bolted the door and went to bed. When I got to my room I locked my bedroom door as i quite open do to stop my parents disrupting me in the morning. Thank god I did this night.

The next morning I was woken up by my dad shouting he was leaving for work and he would lock the door, my mum had already left so it was just me in. I heard him lock the door and I tried to go back to sleep. Roughly 10 minutes later I heard the door being unlocked and opened again and someone come straight up stairs, I thought nothing of this and assumed my dad had forgotten something. That was till the person walked straight up stairs to my bedroom door and started to rattle it forcefully, trying to get it open. I was confused and shouted 'Hello'. At this moment I heard someone sprint from my room and down the stairs nearly shaking the house he ran that fast .

I knew it wasn't my dad now. I jumped out of bed and unlocked my door and ran down stairs to make sure my dog was ok. When I got to the stairs I could see that the front door was wide open. I panicked and ran outside to see if I could see anyone, but I couldn't. At this point I started to cry when it finally occurred to me that someone must have seen my keys on the kitchen table, taken them and tried to get into my house the night before but was disturbed by my dog.

It didn't make sense to me though because right next to our front door was my mac book, 50 inch TV, a mobile phone all in arms reach but the person didn't stop at all, they just walked straight up to my room with purpose.

I phoned my brother who came storming round trying to condole me. He decided he would take me out to get some food after calming me down as much as he could. When we was about to leave we made sure all doors downstairs were locked and bolted expect the front door which cannot be bolted, my brother also went up stairs and shut every single door of the rooms upstairs.

We went out and came back to the front door again unlocked. At this point I was so scared, if once hadn't of been enough. We went inside to see again that nothing was stolen, everything was in its same place apart from the laptop and mobile which we had moved before hand. We went upstairs to check if anything was gone upstairs to find when we went upstairs, only one door was open. Which was, you guessed it, my bedroom. Nothing I could notice was stolen, you could tell someone had looked around but I couldn't see anything missing.

My parents assumed that I must had a stalker, which I couldn't pin point anyone who it could likely be. Being a teenager with red hair, my hair and looks has always given me and still till this day gets me unwanted attention of many creepy men. Which I will put this encounter down to.

We changed the locks on all doors and added extra bolts, we have never had any issue since but I am still terrified to be home alone. It terrifies me to think what the persons intentions were and how persistent he was at breaking in. I'm so glad I had locked my bedroom door that day, and the intruder hadn't barged in to myself.

Mr.stalker, let's not meet again.