Vol. 241: Disturbing True Stories From Reddit
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That's N-O-O-M dot com. This may be a short story, but it's still the scariest thing that has ever happened to me. I guess what's most chilling is I didn't realize how big of a threat it was until I was much older. This happened to me when I was about four years old, living in Memphis, Tennessee. It had to be around 1990, and my mom had gotten me one of those kid-size electric cars that children can ride in, one that runs on batteries.

At the time, this toy was top of the line, rare, and I was ecstatic to have one. Because I was only four, I don't really remember the specifics, or how I was allowed to ride the toy car on the streets, but I'm assuming there was an adult supervising me until maybe they were distracted or had to leave me for a moment. From what I can remember, we lived in a suburban area with small streets and very light traffic. I can't remember if I was on the road or the sidewalk.

But I ended up on a street a couple blocks away from my house. I didn't have a care in the world. I was just having a blast riding my new toy up and down the street. And then I remember a white van that came to a stop right next to me. That's when a man leaned out the window and smiled this big, toothy grin at me. He then proceeded to speak to me, although I don't recall what we talked about. I also remember not being frightened because he was being so nice to me. I do recall feeling just a touch wary because an adult was speaking to me.

but I was fully unaware that this man was a danger and that I shouldn't be speaking to strangers. That's when he got out of the car and he motioned me to come closer to him. I hesitated, not because I was afraid, but more because I didn't know what to do. I was taught to listen to adults, so I slowly started to move closer to him. He again motioned me to come closer, and then he started to head towards the back of the van. When I didn't move from my spot, that's when he came closer to me and held out his hand.

As I was about to reach out my hand to this man I'd never met, a woman opened her front door and walked out. She happened to be leaving the house right in front of where I was standing. I don't think the woman's intention was to save me from the stranger. I think she just happened to leave the house right there and then. In the instant that I turned my head to look at this woman and look back at the man, I noticed the stranger head right back to his driver's side door, close it, and speed off. Honestly, I didn't think much of it because at that age,

I never even registered it as a threat, so I just got back in my toy car and drove my way back to my house. I never even told anyone in my family about it, but now as an adult, whenever my mind wanders back to that day, I get a case of the shivers. I think about the random woman who might have saved my life just by walking out her front door, and how different my life would be, or if I'd even still be alive if she had come out even a minute later. I can't imagine what that man would have done to me if he was able to kidnap me.

but I have no doubt that that was his intention. As a child, you're not afraid because you don't know the horrors that await you. As an adult, you're terrified because you do. I never saw that van or that man again, but almost 35 years later, the images of both still live rent-free inside my head. Alright, let's talk about something that's been keeping me motivated and actually fitting into my crazy schedule. Peloton.

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Casino credits are non-withdrawable and expire in 168 hours. Terms at casino.draftkings.com/promos. I met an Australian Tinder swindler, and he deserves his own Netflix documentary. I'm sharing this so hopefully no one else has to deal with this flea of a human. It's going to be a wild ride, so grab your popcorn and get comfy. Back in June of 2022, I met Wilton Wallace on Hinge. I'm from Victoria, Australia,

He was from Queensland, but was working in Victoria and was 28 at the time. I was 24. We hit it off and within a day of chatting he asked to meet me in the city for drinks. He seemed friendly and cute, so why not get dressed up and give him a chance? Funnily enough, my spidey senses were tingling already, but I just thought it was usual nerves for a first date. I should have trusted my gut, but he hadn't given me any red flags yet. He met me at Flinders Street Station.

First impression was he was dressed really nicely, suit, long coat, clearly took pride in his looks. Instantly, he was super affectionate, way more than I'm used to. He kissed my cheek, picked me up, squeezed the crap out of me, and we were hand in hand from the get-go. Although I was taken aback, he was of Brazilian descent, and I know their culture can be quite forward. I wasn't overly alarmed, but this was within 10 seconds of meetings.

So we decide to go for drinks, and he recommends a very well-known fancy bar. I have a low-level job in the medical field, so this was way above my pay grade, but he said he'd like to cover the whole night. It became apparent very quickly that he was super chivalrous, charming, and a sweet-talker. It felt like some soppy 2000s rom-com. I can't even lie. He was super open about his life, and because he was, so was I. We had so much in common, and everything just felt right.

It all makes me want to gag, now that I know the real him. If it feels too good to be true, it likely is. Basically, the life story he threw up all over me was that he was born in Brazil, his parents had a family business and were well off, but lost it all somehow. I think he said his dad died, RIP dad. His mom couldn't afford to care for him and his four sisters alone, so she gave him up for adoption and he moved to Portugal. I guess he was the runt of the litter,

because she kept the four girls. So he grew up in Portugal from about five until he was seventeen, when he decided to finally move back to his biological mother. He said his Portuguese family were lovely but incredibly religious, and he didn't like the constraints that came with that. So at seventeen, he moves back to Brazil and builds his relationship with his biological mother, and eventually he decides to move to Australia. He moved over to study some aerodynamic bullshit degree for some career that I don't give a fuck about.

Fast forward 11 years to 2022, and now he works in Queensland as some manager for shipping companies, and flies to and from Melbourne for work every few weeks. Now that you're up to speed with that crock of shi- Let's get back to the date. I had a traumatic upbringing, so hearing all that he shared really touched me. The man had me in the palm of his hand. I felt at times he was cocky, and had an ego on him, but he even mentioned that he could come across as cocky.

and reassured me that's how some people perceive him, but he's not at all that way. Well, very clearly, someone's pulled him up for being an arrogant twat before. The date is progressing, and we obviously have chemistry. He was ticking so many boxes. We spoke about how I loved to dance, and always wanted to learn salsa, so he suggested a studio that does weekend night classes, but it had sold out, so he asked if I'd like to go back to his place, just to hang out,

I don't know what this man put in my drink, not literally, just FYI, but my common sense was out the window. I told him I needed to go home before midnight and was only coming over to talk. Anyway, we get to his apartment, and like the scene from Crazy Stupid Love, he lights candles, puts on salsa music, pours a heavy glass of red for us, and asks if he can teach me how to salsa in his tiny living room. Like, was I Kate Hudson in How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days?

I oblige, because my fanny flutters are in full control of my functioning at this point. We end up making out and things get hot and heavy, but I stuck to my guns and didn't let him pass my chastity belt. Long story short, but not short at all, we ended up falling asleep together and I was fully clothed. How about that? We woke up the next morning and he took me out for breakfast before ordering me an Uber home. Keep in mind, that was the one and only time I physically met him and it was all PG rated.

More or less. A few days later, things started getting weird. He started making these grandiose gestures and love bombing. Without asking me, he bought me lingerie. He bought me jewelry for my birthday just one week after we met. And then the grand prize. An all-inclusive holiday to Queensland. I said yes because YOLO, right? Like literally, I might die, but at least my tombstone would say I was living my best life.

He told me that on this trip, we'd go to a private restaurant that his friend owns, a helicopter ride, and a cruise on a yacht, amongst a bunch of other completely insane things. He paid for the flights and told me not to bring lingerie because he had that covered. My red flag alarms were now going off. Like, is he a sugar daddy? Or am I about to be trafficked in the lingerie and jewelry he just bought me? Think about it. Dude works for a shipping company. Perfect way to ship me off to the market.

So at this point, my stomach is turning, and I'm getting rather sus. I realized I hadn't done much digging on him, and if I was going interstate with this schmoozy wet sock, I needed to know everything. I spent hours with my housemate investigating, his Facebook was on total lockdown, and his Insta had no signs of family. He barely had any tagged photos with people, and the photos he did have were from years ago in Brazil. All the photos he had were just him solo and traveling.

So I started to question everything. Was his name even Wilton Wallace? Doesn't sound Brazilian or Portuguese to me. Sounds more like Donald Duck or Chuck E Cheese. So we search for his phone number on my bank app using PayID. Lo and behold, W Vega dos Santos comes up. I'm shitting bricks now. Like, who the fuck is this toenail I've been wasting my time with? So I go deeper. I'm going through all of his insta followers looking for any remnants of him.

I find a mutual in the deep dark cave I've gotten myself into, and there it is. A group photo of him from around 2016, holding a Brazilian woman that looks to be about 35. And in the comment section, "Love you both. Can't wait to see you two again. Couldn't confirm if they were married, but that's where my money was." I dig more and more to find out who this woman is. I can't find anything, but I had a lead on what her name might be.

So I head to Google and search both her name and Vega dos I'm a fucking liar name. After sifting through countless pages that I can't read because they're in Portuguese, I find a settlement document. It was a civil dispute about a debt, but both their full names were there. To my delight, his full name in the case was Wilton Wallace Vega dos Santos. I don't blame him for going by the easiest of the five names, but one truth doesn't fix a truck of lies.

So now I'm thinking I've gone mad and overthinking. Maybe he's just divorced and doesn't post a lot. Nope. While doing our investigation, I asked him to send his passport so my friends had his details for when I went to Queensland, just to be safe. He sent me his passport after hours of waiting, and he had blacked out info and covered his face. But the guy didn't cover his date of birth well enough, because would you look at that? He was born in 1986.

making him 36. Now that I saw through the bullsh- I wanted to flip the game for a little while. I had to do it for the plot. I confronted him about it. He made up some sh- about when he was registered in Portugal. They messed up the date. Didn't know a five-year-old could look 13, but there you have it. Over the next few weeks, he kept canceling and changing Queensland plans. Days before each rescheduled flight, there was always another issue.

I went along with it. I had no intention of going, but wanted to see his cunning plot come to fruition. Maybe it wasn't trafficking. Maybe he was going to magically lose all of his money and get cancer and need my help to survive. And then I get the message that broke the camel's back. His grandmother in Portugal was sick, so he had to fly there ASAP. I literally laughed when I read it. I was super short and apathetic with him. Next day, grandma died of a stroke. Boo hoo.

Some may think my digging went a bit too far at this point, but I ended up messaging the woman from the insta photo and the legal document because I just had a horrible gut feeling that there was more to all of this, and I was sick of all the games. It definitely felt like I was crossing a line, but I just had to know. She ended up messaging me back that she unfortunately did know him and wanted to tell me everything over the phone, which she told me blew my fucking mind. Excuse my language, but this cunt.

was the biggest narcissist, pathological lying, cheating scumbag I had ever had the displeasure of knowing. He had lied about it all. He was 36, born and raised by his mom and dad in Brazil his entire life. He had brothers, not four sisters. Never lived in Portugal. Grandma was still alive and kicking. He studied social work and was now studying to become a physiotherapist. Nothing to do with Aero-whatever-the-fuck. I don't even know what the shipping container place has to do with any of it.

But he'd sent me insta stories of him working there, so that's a bit scary. He was the same charming suave man to his ex-wife, who he had married in Brazil, and they moved to Queensland shortly after. As soon as they arrived, he became financially and emotionally abusive to her and refused to get a job. She worked and paid for the bills, his social work degree, random business trips, and whatever else this scumbag pretended he did. Side note, please don't try to find this woman.

She'd like to remain anonymous, and is truly scared of her ex-husband and what he might be capable of. After being in Queensland for 5 years, she got a message from a 24 year old Australian girl, same age as I was at the time. And it turned out that she and her husband had been dating for 3 years. They'd met at university, and he'd been using her to do all of his schoolwork. She was told the same life story as me, but the poor thing never questioned it. She believed all the crap about his age too.

A friend of this girl at her university saw a photo of him and said that she thought he was married. Thank f*ck for that friend. So Wilton and his wife get divorced, and the 24-year-old kicks him to the curb. But just a year later, another girl reaches out to his now ex-wife. Same story. 24-year-old Australian girl told the same bullsh*t life story and believed it. They'd been together for four years, and he was using her to pay for his lifestyle and clothes.

Another two years go by. His ex-wife just hoped that he had finally come to his senses, but that wasn't the case. I was the third girl to reach out to her. My guess is he still got a few girls on the go at a time. His plans probably kept changing because of them, and one of them probably pays for his trips every few weeks. Jesus, the holiday, jewelry, and lingerie, all paid for by some other woman's hard-earned money. Needless to say, I was furious.

I ended up ghosting him because that's the best way to piss off a narcissist. He messaged me for weeks, through text, insta, whatsapp, and facebook. Eventually, I decided to give him a taste of his own medicine. I told him I knew some things, and he needed to come clean. I never mentioned what or how I knew, but he said he'd be fully transparent and fly down to Melbourne to see me. He probably thought I knew 1% of the truth, I thought about actually seeing him.

and seeing what lies he'd come up with next, but I was done. I told him I was about five hours from the city, in a town that's so small there's only one train to get there a day. I said I couldn't pick him up from the airport, but he could stay a few days. I'd show him the real Australian country, and I'd drive him back to the airport at the end of his visit. So after catching a two and a half hour flight, and sitting on a train for another five hours to go out to the middle of nowhere,

I asked him to send a photo of where he was so I could find him. He'd actually done it. I was at home in my pajamas, watching a movie, and he was at a train station in the rain, five hours away from the airport, and stuck until the next day. Pure gold. I can only imagine how pissed he would have been. I sent him a message I had ready and waiting for that exact moment. I waited for a reply so I knew he got it, then blocked the piece of shit on everything, never looking back.

So there you go, stay safe out there, and always trust your instincts. Years ago, I posted this on a Melbourne forum, and unfortunately, there were a lot of girls that had met him online or for a date, but thankfully, they all got the same vibes as me before it went too far. Although, I was the only one crazy enough to find out who this scumbag really was. I just hope he hasn't been able to trick any more since my run-in with him, and if any other young women have been swept up in his lies.

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This all happened quite a few years back. At this time, I had a particular affinity for a certain white substance in the form of lines. On one very cold, snowy night, around 11pm, I went for a walk to meet my dealer. I had never been to his place before, so he gave me the address to a small, two-story apartment building with maybe six units in it. Upon arrival, I noticed several strangers inside after they had all hit their pipes of their preferred substance.

Two clearly unwashed guys came over to sit at the dining table while I waited for my G. I've never smoked anything besides weed and cigarettes, and their presence made me instantly uncomfortable. They tried their best to make small talk, but I only grew increasingly uneasy, giving short, vague answers to everything they asked. Once my dealer popped up, I quickly paid for my stuff, grabbed the baggie, and got up from the table. That's when one of the guys offered to walk me home.

My heart started to sink. I politely declined. "That's okay. I don't live far." The other guy stood up. "No, really. We can walk you. We don't mind. We have to get going anyway." That's when my instincts finally kicked in. I became very aware and very scared. I immediately thought, "I'm fully dressed and ready to go, but they still have to put on their coats and shoes. If I leave now, I'll get a head start and quickly disappear into the night."

They said something else as I headed for the door, but I pretended to take a phone call, waved goodbye to my dealer, and quickly closed the door behind me. I jogged down the hallway to the outside door, and once I got outside, I made a run for the street. I decided not to take the fast route home, because from the building, they'd be able to see me. I didn't want them knowing even the slightest direction that I lived in, if they were really following me.

The building was at the end of a street, so instead of going straight up the hill, the way that I initially came from, I turned right and started jogging. I kept glancing back over my shoulder, and finally I saw them, about a block behind me, but certainly following me. The street I needed, Stanley Street, was across the intersection on my left, about another block ahead at a four-way light. As I approached the intersection, I noticed the corner house on my right.

There was an older gentleman sitting on the porch, smoking. I recognized him. He was another dealer I had met only once a few weeks before, when my usual guy was dry. I nearly choked up as I got to his porch, and I asked if he remembered me. He did, and asked, "What's wrong?" I quietly told him, "I think these two guys are following me," and asked if I could go inside for a minute until they passed. He didn't hesitate. We went inside.

past his front living room and into the kitchen, where I began to explain all that had happened. He told me not to worry, that I was safe there, and I could stay as long as I needed to. That's when he heard a knock at the door, and my panic set into overdrive. He went to the door, looked through the peephole, and yelled, "Just a minute!" He came back quickly and whispered that he knew the guys and was going to invite them in to have a hit. He told me to sneak out through his back door, which was beyond the kitchen,

and go to the right of the yard and find the gate. This would lead to a side street. He instructed me to creep up along the side of his house, close to the shrubs, and check the porch to make sure that they had all gone inside. I followed his plan to a T, and when the coast was clear, I didn't jog. I sprinted all the way up Stanley Street and zigzagged my way back home from there. When I think back now, I'm in utter disbelief at my actions and just how foolish I was.

I thought I was invincible, I was far too trusting, but I thanked God for the man who helped me that night. I don't know what those two guys wanted from me, but I'm forever grateful that I never had to find out.

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