It All Happened in the Parking Lot

I'm not going to try and create some distinctive attention grabber. I don't want your attention. Although, I do want you to know what happened to me. Nothing bad, really. Just a very unnerving tale of a man that liked to fuck with my head. A man that invaded my privacy from January 1st, 2006 - April 3rd, 2008. I called him the Annelid Man. You will know why if you read on. The Annelid Man had a talent for making me feel watched, because I know he was watching me every day. I just fucking know it.

The ball dropped. The New Year started. And of course, the first thing said to me on the New Year was to take out the damn trash. I remember walking outside, and the first thing I saw was the Annelid Man. I live in an apartment complex. I would walk outside, and to my right would be the parking lot. On the far left side of the parking lot, there are two evergreen trees. I remember seeing him standing there underneath the trees. He had his back turned. I remember walking out and seeing him, nothing else. It was almost as if I was standing in a white room, and the only form of color that stuck out was his black peacoat. His black dress pants. His black shoes. His black hair which was greased back.

I walked to the dumpster, eyes fixated on him. A sort of disturbing vibe radiated from him, I swear it spread throughout the entire neighborhood.

He would only appear in the parking lot at 12:02 AM exactly. No other time. He would appear at 12:02 AM, and leave at 2:02 AM. I would never stay to see him arrive, or to see him leave. I feel as if he lived here. Either that or he just slowly faded in from thin air, like a ghost. But the Annelid Man wasn't a ghost. He was an existent being. An evident enigma. An oddity that chose me due to weird circumstances.

I remember the first time he looked at me. Now that I think about it, I don't even know if he was looking at me. It was sometime in mid January, and it was the first time he didn't have his back turned. But he was facing me. I couldn't see his face. I could see black. Everything about him was black. His presence sent chills up my spine. He didn't fucking move. He just stood there- frozen.

I tried to get my parents attention on this topic. They would just reply with, "I'm sure it's nothing, Logan. Worry about yourself, and the man will mind himself as well."

That was a bunch of bullshit. He haunted me for two years. No one knew about it. It was all between the Annelid Man and myself. No one else was involved. No one saw what I saw. No one heard what he said to me. No one knew. Not a single goddamn person.

I've tried to tell people about him. I was beginning to create theories as to who or what the Annelid Man was. I resorted to internet forums, asking people if they've seen this type of man, attempting to debunk the possibility that I was dealing with a paranormal entity. I wasn't. They all said it was just some fucking whacko staring at the stars. I've tried to tell my friends, I've tried to invite them over to see the Annelid Man, to try and crack the case with me. They all refused. Every single one of them.

I believe it's time to explain the climactic events between me and the Annelid Man. I'm sure by now, you, the reader, have many questions. Why do I call him the Annelid Man? Did he hurt me? Did he hurt my family? Did he kill anyone?

For a year and a half, the Annelid Man would stand outside. Back turned, except for that one time. I remember the exact day when shit started to get weird. November 27th, 2007. When I walk outside, there's a parking lot on my right, and to my left there is a cement bench underneath another evergreen. He was sitting there. I creeped my head out of the doorway slightly to see if he was where he had always been, not seeing him in the parking lot was different. My stomach dropped. I dashed outside, wiped my eyes, and stared at the parking lot in disbelief.

It didn't take long for something inside me to tell me to look to the left. He was sitting on the stone bench. He rested his arm on the back rest, and was staring right at me. I'm sure almost everyone was in bed by now. It was just me and him. Alone. Several feet from each other.

"You better run back inside. You'll catch cold."

I looked through my peephole throughout the entire night.

He never walked up to my front door.

I would search for hours on the internet. Trying my hardest to figure out who the fuck this man was. I tried my best to find posts about people having the same occurrences. No one ever did. It was just me. It was frustrating. There were no resources that could have possibly helped me. Maybe it was because some people that experienced this never lived to tell the tale. That has to be it. I couldn't have been the only one going through this shit.

I would have nightmares about the Annelid Man, I knew that something bad was going to happen. Every time I would look outside, and he would be standing there, I was just inching closer and closer to some sort of demise. Some sort of inescapable point, almost like an event horizon in a black hole. And I was right.

The night the Annelid Man bid his farewell, is the night that still prevents my psychological recovery. The night that left me confused and terrified. The night that left me answering my own questions. The night that proved half of my theories wrong, and half of them right. The night that no one else knows about. The night the Annelid Man left, is the night that will haunt me for as long as I live.

It was April 3rd, 2008. I checked to see if he was outside at the given point in time. He wasn't under the evergreens, or sitting on the cement bench, but he was lying in the middle of the parking lot. Sprawled out. It looked like he had been assaulted.

I knew that I didn't want to approach him. But something told me to go help him, those words were just blaring in my fucking head, for me to go help him. It had to have been him. I knew better than to not go after him. There's just no way in hell I would have made the decision to try and help him on my own. He did something to me. I know he did.

I walked slowly. Everything in me was trembling. He was already staring at me. Even when I was indoors, he was staring at my building. Waiting. He knew I was going to fucking walk out. The closer I was, the more clearly I could see that expression on his face. Those blank eyes. The flaring nostrils. The shit eating grin he had on his face. He had terrible intentions, and he was excited to unleash them on me.

Why do I call him the Annelid Man? Well, the scientific name for a worm is of course and Annelid. And at that moment, he was indeed an Annelid. You how a worm will slide, and even when they're still, there's that wave-like movement inside of them? That was the Annelid Man. He was slowly grooving side to side in a wave like motion. Almost as if his body was breathing in a chronological order starting from the top of his to the bottom of his feet, and then all the way back up, and the all way back down.

He began to roll over, and slide slowly across the parking lot. Giggling. I knew what I was seeing was real, and I knew that I just had to get out of the fucking parking lot. Everytime I would attempt to escape, he would whisper, "Please don't leave me." in a garbled voice that changed every time he said it.

He had this spell over me, I felt sympathy for him whenever he begged me to not leave him. And I didn't. I just stood there. Terrified. He rolled back over on his back, and he looked right into my eyes. His face began to change, but it didn't. I can't describe what I saw, but there was his face, and then another face. A face of someone I knew. His limbs would change too, I can't really explain what I was looking at. I wish I could. I wish other people could have seen what I saw. I know what I saw was real.

This altercation between the Annelid Man and myself was coming to an end. It started at 12:02, and it just struck 1:57. I didn't want to stay goodbye to the Annelid Man. He was a huge part of two years of my teenage life. I wasn't ready to let go of the man that stimulated almost every emotion in me.

I didn't want him to go. And when he did, it was the hardest goodbye I've ever had to deal with.

Hopefully one day he'll stand outside of your residence. Perhaps he is right now.

I've told you everything. Thank you.

--NevetS lletxA (talk) 16:52, April 3, 2014 (UTC) NevetS lletxA