Boys' Night Out (PODCAST EXCLUSIVE EPISODE)

at some point during their fun night out, things take a disastrous turn for the worse.

“But before we get into today's stories, if you're a fan of the strange dark and mysterious”

delivered in story format, then you've come to the right place because that's all we do, and we upload two, three, even four times every week. So if that's of interest to you, please invite the follow button to come swimming with you at your favorite lake. But wait until they've jumped in before you tell them the lake is actually full of alligators.

Okay, let's get into our first story called The Traffic Lane.

Around 7 p.m. on Saturday, August 13, 2011, 19-year-old Wong Wijie was with his friends, Ma Jun, and Joe Guo at an internet cafe in the city of typing, China, watching June play a computer game. Now, Wijie and his friends went to this cafe a lot, and today they had literally been there for hours by this point.

“But now, as June finished up the game, he was playing Guo announced that he was actually ready to”

go do something else now. So the three of these guys spent a lot of time together, whether it was at an internet cafe or elsewhere, they were like really close friends. And generally speaking, Wijie usually just did whatever June and Guo wanted to do, since they both had strong opinions, and Wijie was more of a go with the flow type of guy. And so now, as Guo decided, they were done with games. Wijie was just like, "All right, cool. Well, why don't we just head back to one of our

places just to hang out?" But Guo, he shook his head and said, "No way. Like, it's Saturday." They didn't have to be up for school the next day, and so they could stay out all night if they wanted to. And so we said, like, we got to find something really exciting to do. Like, we got to make the most of this night. Now, nobody had like a great idea of what was going to be super exciting.

And so Guo was like, "All right, well, for now, like, let's just go outside and we can smoke first,

“and then we can go from there." And at this, both June and Wijie just nodded in agreement,”

like, "Okay, that's the plan." But in reality, Wijie wasn't really sure if he felt comfortable staying out all night tonight, because tonight was not just a normal night. Like, this was an ifie night to stay out all night. So this particular weekend was not just an ordinary weekend. It was actually the area's annual ghost festival, a time on the lunar calendar when ghosts, apparently, would wander the streets after dark. And Wijie's family, along with his friends,

families, and frankly, a lot of other people in this area, they took this festival really seriously. They believed the ghosts really were out wandering the streets after dark, because they were just very superstitious. In fact, in this area, this festival was taken so seriously that businesses would often close early, so people could safely make their way home before nightfall. Now, Wijie himself didn't really necessarily believe in ghosts, despite his family appearing

to very much believe in them. But the reality was, his Wijie was just not a guy who ruffled feathers. He went with the flow. He was a, he was a rule follower. So in his mind, he was thinking, "That's the ghost festival." Kind of don't want to stay out late tonight. But now, Guo was already making his way towards the exit with June, and so Wijie didn't bother to argue. Instead, he just followed right along, and they went outside to smoke.

About an hour later, Wijie was sitting in the passenger seat of his own car, with June behind the wheel and glow in the back, and they were driving down a road in the outskirts of town. And by this point, the sun had set, and so now they were officially in ghost festival territory, like presumably there are ghosts out now out on the roads. So after leaving the internet cafe, the three of them, they had a smoke, but then as they're out there, they couldn't come up with

a compelling idea for how to spend the rest of their big night out. All they came up with is, "Oh, let's just like get in the car and drive around, and maybe we'll figure out something to do." Now, initially, when they hopped in the car, they were thinking, "Okay, like it's getting dark out, like we're going to be driving around during the ghost festival. We're bound to find something exciting to do, and so all of them are like, they're amped up. They're in the car. They're pumped.

We're going to find something fun." But after a while, they were just randomly driving around, no one's really out, because again, it's this ghost festival. Everybody's, you know, in their homes, there's nothing going on, and it just became really, really boring. They're just like driving around and nothing's going on. And so at a certain point, Wajah is just feeling so frustrated,

because it's like he didn't want to be out here in the first place. He didn't voice that to his friends,

but like he didn't want to be out here. He just wanted to be home. And so he just was like, "Man, this is so boring, and he just leaned his head up against the window and just decided to drift off to sleep." And so he's like, "Closing his eyes, he's just laying there and June,

as he's laying there, he suddenly feels the car come to a screeching stop. And grow in the back seat

“immediately, reflexively screams at June, and the driver, like, "Hey, what are you doing?”

Drive more carefully!" And Wajah, he's like, "Look at around, what just happened?" And he looks over at June, who's driving, and June is not paying any attention to grow, or to Wajah. He's just pointing out the windshield at something on the road, and he's like, "Look!" And so Wajah, who's just sort of confused because a moment ago, he was half asleep. He he looks from June out the front windshield to see what he's pointing at. And there's this woman,

who's just sitting in the middle of the road, they're out on the outskirts of town, like there's no really any buildings around or anything, like they're out in the sticks. And it's dark out, and everyone's home for the ghost festival, and there's just this woman sitting on the ground, she's wearing this floral dress, and there's a bike that she has that's next to her, just propped up. And she's almost been hit by a car, like they stopped very close to her.

“She's almost been hit by a car, and she's just sitting there staring blankly at the car.”

And so, June, he's pointing at her, like, "You can't believe it, he almost hit her, and we just, like, what's going on?" And, "Whoa, like, he doesn't even know what to make of it." And at some point, June sort of snaps out of it, and he leans out the window, and he yells at the woman to, like, get out of the way, like, "What are you doing, like, get out of the road?" But the woman didn't budge, she just sat there staring at them, just on the ground, not a

care on the world, just looking right at all three of them. And so, eventually, after sort of the tension in the car went down a little bit, June just pulled his head back in the window, and he looked at his friends, and he's like, "I don't know," and he just drove around to this woman, you know, just avoided her, and they continued driving along. For the next few hours, the three boys just continued driving around town, looking for something to do, but there still was nothing to do,

“you know, everything's basically abandoned, because it's this ghost festival night. Nobody's”

out, no businesses are open. There's nothing to do. And what really had not left any of their minds, even though they really didn't talk about it, was that woman? Like, that was so unusual to just see her sitting there, not reacting to nearly being hit. Like, the whole thing was just so creepy, made more so, because it's the night of this ghost festival, like, talk about the creepiest night to see something like that. And so, eventually, around like one AM, when the boys are still

just driving around, someone in the car suggests, like, "Hey, let's go back to that intersection and see if she's still there." Like, let's just see what she's doing. Now, keep in mind, it's been hours, since they've seen this woman, like, hours. And so, they drive back around, not really expecting to see her there. They think that, like, no matter how weird that was, she has to have gotten up and left by now. But no, they turn on to that road, but again,

as outside of the town, there's no buildings around, it's dark, minus their headlights, when they drive down this road and shurn off off in the distance, still sitting in this intersection, is this woman? She's unmoved. She's just sitting there in her dress, with a bike next to her, just hours later, no change. And so now, it's like the boys can't help but feel really uneasy here. Like, this isn't right. Something's wrong with this woman. I mean, also, they can't help but think,

like, it's the night of the ghost festival. Are we seeing a ghost? Like, they're terrified. I mean,

that's the reality is they were scared, but really more than anything, what all three of them are

thinking and discussing in the car is we got to tell someone about her. Like, there's something wrong with this woman. What is she doing? Is she mentally unwell? Is she on drugs? We don't know, but like, this isn't okay. We got to tell someone. But for now, the three boys decided that they had had enough fun for one night and they drove to June's house and they just all crash there or determined to figure out what to do with this woman and what they saw the next day.

And so several hours later, the boys wake up, they make their way into the kitchen because they can hear June's mom is in there making breakfast and right away, June tells his mom what happened the night before. And as he's regaling her in the details of the story, June and Gwow also chimed in with their perspective. And then after they were done telling June's mom, they all sort of expected her, you know, being an authority figure to know what to do, that she would very likely

say, okay, we need to call the police or we need to call a hospital or we need to call some other authority figure and handle this professionally. But she didn't do any of that. Instead, she just kind of looked at the boys and she said, you saw a ghost.

Now, at first, all three boys were just shocked at how confidently and calmly she said this.

I mean, of course, they knew about the annual ghost festival. And of course, people in this town were very superstitious, including their own families. They knew this meant a lot, this festival.

ground last night was a literal ghost that seemed crazy. And the boys began saying as much to June's

mom. But June's mom was just really annoyed with them and just basically shot them down and said,

look, you saw a ghost. But like, that's the reason you're not supposed to be out on the night of the annual ghost festival. It's why the business is shut down. It's why we all go home before

“nightfall. You knew you weren't supposed to be out at night. You were. That's why this happened.”

Not to mention, these ghosts, they don't just wander around. They target people. You were targeted. Now, June's mother was not just throwing that out there. She was referencing one other aspect of this annual ghost festival that lots of people in this area believed. Which was, these ghosts that wandered around after dark on this one night of the year, they weren't just wandering around. They were looking for people to effectively latch onto. And so part of the reason

people believed you need to stay in at night and avoid being out after dark is because if you basically interact with one of these ghosts, they could latch onto you and then you become its target. In some cases, people believe it just produces really bad luck for you for potentially months at a stretch. Some other people say that once you've been targeted by one of these ghosts, they may try to kill you, specifically they may try to drown you. And so no one really knew,

but it was like this belief that you just never want to interact with a ghost because it could

be very bad for you. And so June and Guo, they still tried to argue a little with June's mother trying to tell her that no, this could not possibly be a ghost. But their voice has seemed less forceful now, and wait ya, like he was sitting there thinking like, actually, if that was a ghost, this kind of makes sense. It explains why she didn't react at all to nearly being hit by a car. She just sat there. Also, why is she just sitting there? Strange activity for anybody to be doing.

Maybe a ghost would do that. It also kind of explains why she was still there. How are as an hours later, just sitting in the middle of the road? Like, other cars must have gone by, like, this is not normal behavior. And so wait, just thinking, wait a minute. Maybe this was a ghost. However, just as wage a really started to feel almost sick with worry about, you know, the seriousness of what had happened. He heard June's mom tell them, "Don't be afraid." She said,

“"Look, I know exactly what you need to do to stay safe." Later that same day,”

wage a parked as car at a cemetery that was near June's house. And after he parked, he and June got out while Guo stayed behind in the car. All three of them were very tense, they were very anxious. And as wage a scan, the headstones and looked over at a corn field that was next to the cemetery, all he was thinking is this ghost, this ghost woman, is going to appear at any moment. And she's going to do something to us. But she didn't. And so eventually,

wage a and June began walking down the path that would lead them through all the gravestones,

basically deeper into the cemetery. So the reason these two were here and now walking into the

cemetery is because they were following June's mother's advice for how to stay safe. Now that they had potentially come in contact with this ghost. And so they had gone out and acquired a stack of ghost money. And now they were going to go spend it. So ghost money is a kind of paper sheet in China that typically is burned when a loved one dies. The idea is when you burn this money, it sort of goes to the deceased loved one. And then they have money for the afterlife. You're basically

giving your deceased loved one currency for the afterlife. But it can also be a way to buy protection from angry spirits. So wage a and his friends have been told to burn ghost money over their family grave plots so that their dead ancestors could essentially pay the ghost the evil ghost to leave them alone. Now they've already done this at Guowe's family plot in a separate cemetery.

“So that's why Guowe was staying back in the car. And now they were going to do June's family plot”

in this cemetery. And so wage a and June they continue walking through the cemetery until finally they reach some of June's ancestors graves. There they melt down, they pulled out their ghost money, and they began to burn the vils. And they're both just kneeling there, burning this money. And with each you know, build it crumpled up and smoldered, both of them were feeling like this enormous wave of relief coming over them. And so for a little while they're just burning their

money, and they're both looking down at the money on the ground, they're just kneeling there, but then at some point wage a just looked up. And as soon as he did, he froze, because standing right behind June, June can't see this, right behind June, is that woman in a dress. And she's looking at both of them. And wage a was so scared, he shrieked, he jumped up turned, and started running in the opposite direction. Now June is so startled by wage a screaming

around, because he could tell wage a saw something behind him, but there's nothing behind him.

“And he's thinking he must have seen the ghost, because why else would he react this way?”

But there's nobody here. And so June sort of put together like what's going on here, like wage a clearly spooked himself, or in a cemetery after all, and he sees wage a, and he's running, and he's running, and he disappears into the cornfield that was next to the cemetery. He's just gone, running, he's gone. Now this cornfield was pretty massive, it had not been harvested, the stocks were really tall, and clearly like wage a was on a mission.

And so June was not about to just chase after him. Instead, he ran back to the car and he grabbed

glow first, and the two of them went after wage a. However, when they got to the cornfield,

and actually went inside of it, they quickly realized it was going to be really hard to find anything in this cornfield. I mean, the stocks are so thick and tall, it's so dense. I mean, every step was so slow and difficult, and they're calling out for wage up, but there's no response.

“And so after several minutes of only moving, you know, 10, 15 feet or so into this cornfield,”

making no progress, the two of them are like, what happened to him? Like, either the ghost got him, or like, maybe he's in hiding somewhere. Maybe he's convinced that the ghost is nearby, and he's just being quiet, and he's in hiding, and he's somewhere in this cornfield, but we gotta find him. And so the two friends, they back out of the cornfield, and they end up

calling a bunch of their friends to meet them at this cornfield and help them look for

wage up. So all these friends, they eventually arrived, and all day and into the night, these friends searched this cornfield, they're looking everywhere for wage up. Everyone screaming his name, there's no sign of him. Three days later, and wage up still had not been found. Now, by this point, the parents' wages parents had been told they had told police, police had looked for wage up, but there was no sign of him. I mean, they were still out looking for him,

“but right now, like the talk of the town was where is wage up? Nobody knew. And so on this day,”

three days after the day that wage went missing, June was sitting in his room, just feeling miserable, all he can think about is his friend, and what happened to him? Like, you know, he ran off after presumably seeing this ghost like did the ghost get him, like all these horrible thoughts are going through his head. And June, as he's sitting in his room, he hears his mom call out to him, telling him there's a visitor. And so June, he gets up, he leaves his room,

he goes to the front of the house, and he sees a police officer standing in the doorway. And the officer would tell June and his mother that they had found wage up, and he was dead. His body was found in a lake that was not far from the cemetery, and that he had drowned. June is completely shocked. I mean, on the one hand, he sort of was expecting bad news at this point. I mean,

basically everybody was, but to hear that his friend was dead was just horrific, and he, you know,

really struggled to keep back tears. But, you know, before he could really even react to this, the officer went on to say that, you know, June, we spoke to wages parents, and they told us that, you and grow were with their son last, that you were with him before he vanished. And so we just want you to tell us, you know, now that we know he passed away, that he drowned, we want to know what happened. What did you see? Like what led to him drowning? And June, he just launched into the

most detailed version of the story he could possibly think of. He took the officer all the way back to them at the internet cafe, you know, playing computer games. They decide they're going to stay out all night. They go outside. They're having a smoke. They're talking about what they're going to do. They decide they're going to get in the car and just drive around. They're driving around on the night of this, this goes festival. They see this woman. They think it's a ghost. Like he

went through this whole rendition of of the ghost being really central to the story and how the next day, June's mom had like said, oh, go burn ghost money in the cemetery to to protect yourself from the spirits, they go to the cemetery and they're burning the ghost money, but then wage a he gets so scared. June's convinced it's because he sees the ghost again this woman and he takes off running into the the cornfield. So he tells the officer like every

little detail. And he knew that even in a place like this where people did for the most part believe in ghosts, he knew his story like really hinged on a ghost made way to do this and he knew that it was like totally preposterous in some ways, but he thinks he's telling him the truth. And so he tells the officer that all this stuff. And the officer is just staring at him and he's he's clearly very skeptical. And then at some point after June is done and he's just waiting for

the officer. The officer looks at him and he asks him one question that once June answers, once he answers honestly, it completely explains everything that happened. It would turn out that woman who was

was not a ghost. In fact, she wasn't even real. Because the three friends, June,

“go and wager on the night. They decided to have their big night. They're going to stay out all night.”

When they went out for a smoke, they didn't smoke cigarettes. They smoked methamphetamine, which can cause you to hallucinate. And so they were high on meth driving around and hallucinated that woman. But they all, you know, believed they saw it and it felt so real and it was in the same night as this annual ghost festival that it felt so real that even the next day when they were no longer high, they still believed they'd seen it. And then June's mom confirmed, yep, that was

a ghost because she believes in ghosts. And so they set out to the cemetery and they're going to, you know, burn this ghost money to to to save themselves from these evil spirits. And what do they do before they head out to the cemetery? They smoke more meth. And wager, he has another hallucination, he thinks he sees the ghost ran into the cornfield, not realizing that deep in the cornfield

“was a lake, he fell into it and he was high on meth and didn't know how to swim and so he drowned.”

And now let's get into our second story called a wild night out.

On the night of August 28th, 2004, a 21 year old named John Hutcherson leaned over a bar in Marietta, Georgia and asked the bartender for another beer. John, by this point, had completely lost track of how many drinks he had had in the past few hours, but he was sure it had been a lot because by this point the room was starting to spend. However, he had no plans to stop drinking anytime soon. After all, it was only midnight, which was very early for John and he was having

a great time and the bar was packed and there was loud music playing and John was also on a winning streak playing pool. And so while he waited for his beer, John looked over at the pool table. He had left his best friend Frankie there a few minutes ago, but now as he was looking over there,

“he didn't see Frankie anymore. So John and Frankie had been very close ever since high school,”

and this night out they were having was sort of like a typical Saturday for them. Every week they would meet at this bar, they would get exceptionally drunk,

and they would basically stay out all night. But on this night, they were both a lot

drunker than usual, and now Frankie was gone. And so as John very drunkenly looked around the bar to see if he could find Frankie. He noticed a girl he didn't recognize at the end of the bar, she was very cute, and she appeared to be smiling at him. And so, you know, John sees her and forgets all about his friend Frankie being gone and just smiles back at the squirrel, and then a moment later the bartender hands him his beer, and you know, John's feeling really confident he

takes his beer, and he begins walking towards the squirrel, however before he actually reached her, he felt a hand on his arm, and he turned to see Frankie, who looked just awful. He looked so pale, he smelled like vomit, and Frankie told John, you know, as well as he could, because he's so drunk, he's mumbling everything, he just said he, he felt horrible, and it was time to go. Now, John was really disappointed, because even though he was really, really drunk too, he wasn't as bad as Frankie,

like John had not reached the nauseous and vomiting phase of extreme intoxication, and so he's thinking, man, like, there are a couple more hours to closing, and I really want to talk to this girl, but he was Frankie's ride, and Frankie had to go home, clearly, and so if he was going home, John had to go home too. So, John just chugged his beer, put it back on the bar, and then he turned, and kind of waved at the girl, being like, sorry, I gotta go, and then John pulled his car keys

out of his pocket. And so, John and Frankie, they head outside to the parking lot, and John goes to his truck, and he climbs into the driver's seat, and as he's fumbling with the keys to start the car, Frankie had gone around to the other side, and stumbled his way into the passenger seat, and even though he's like wrecked drunk, he's like totally out of it. Frankie looks over John, and sees him unable to even start the car, and he's like, "Hey, are you sure you're good to drive?"

And John looks over Frankie, and he's like, "Of course, I'm just fine. I do this every single week.

We always get home safe." And so, at this point, Frankie's like, "All right, you know, whatever,

let's just go." And so, John, he eventually manages to turn the car on, he throws it in gear, and he began to pull out of the parking lot onto the road, but as he did, I mean, he really had to squint his eyes just to see the road clearly. I mean, his whole world is totally spinning because of how intoxicated he was. And then as soon as he actually began driving down the main road on the way home, the first thing he did is he's like hitting the curb and swirving

back onto the road, but he was, you know, basically steady, you know, he's totally wasted,

John was white knuckling at the rest of the way, you know, he's driving along, he sees the

“gas station that he always passed on the way home, so that's a familiar landmark, he's going”

the right way, he eventually passes a familiar billboard, but then at some point his eyes, like, snap back into focus because he realizes he's swirving off the road onto the shoulder, but he swirves back just in time to avoid hitting a telephone pole, and he's like, "Oh, man, like, I got this, like, stay focused." And then somehow, some way, eventually, he winds up in front of Frankie's house, and so he drops his friend off, and then back on the road he goes,

you know, navigating now at this point like with one eye shut, and he eventually finds this way to his parents house where he was staying. And from there he climbed out of his car, he walked up the driveway, he unlocked the front door, and then stumbled up to his room where he immediately just fell into his bed and passed out. The next thing John knew, he heard voices, and then he felt somebody grab his arm and shake him, and then when he opened his eyes his vision was very blurry,

but eventually it came into focus and he saw that he was clearly in his bedroom and his bed on top of his blankets, but he had no idea how he got there. He looked down and noticed he was still wearing the same clothes he had worn the night before, but they were sticky and they were dirty. And then there were also these two figures who were standing over him, repeating his name, over and over again, almost angrily. John looked at these two and didn't really know who they

were, but then he noticed they were both wearing matching uniforms. They were police officers.

“And these officers were very angrily asking John, what happened last night? Like what did you do?”

What happened the night before? But John, he still is sort of like trying to figure out what's even going on, he really doesn't have a good memory of anything that happened the night before. I mean all he can just quickly remember is like he was at that bar, he saw that girl, he drove Frankie home, like he knew he was drunk on the right home, but he got home, like he didn't know

what else they were trying to figure out about what happened the night before. And so when he finally

opened his mouth to be like, what is going on? Because he was still basically drunk. It just came out of his mouth like this incoherent babbling. Oh, I was going on here. And the two officers, they were just over it and they just grabbed John and literally pulled him out of the bed. They whipped his hands behind his back, the handcuffed him and John, who's like, what is happening? They lead him out of his bedroom downstairs, passed his mom and dad, or staring at him like,

what is going on? And even though John again is basically like borderline incoherent, you know, in passing by his parents, he's hoping they're going to be like, hey officers, why are you arresting my son, but instead as he's led past them, he looks at his mom and dad, and they're not about to put up some fight. They're crying. They're holding each other and crying. Like they clearly know something bad has happened, and they can't stop what's happening to their son. And so the

officers, they walk John in handcuffs out the front door and they walk him over to his truck in the driveway. And when they got there, the officers just stopped and gestured for John to have a look inside.

“And so John, he sort of looked at the officers like, okay, what's what's going on with my truck?”

And he turned and he just sort of squinted it and looked through the window into the car, and there was this large object in the passenger seat that he didn't remember being there the night before. Then as he as he looked more closely, he realized with horror what it was. So the night before, John did drive when he absolutely should not have. He was clearly way past the legal limit for

driving. He should never have been driving totally unsafe for others for him. Shouldn't happen,

but he did. He drove. And so he and Frank either, they're driving home and John in his limited memory recalled, you know, this sort of like blurry, ride home, you know, where basically as as dangerous as it was, he got them home. But at one point, he remembered almost hitting a telephone pole and he swore off just in time and he narrowly avoided it. And in some ways that was true, he did avoid smashing into the telephone pole. But he didn't avoid an incident. So Franky,

because he was so nauseous from having drank too much, he had his head out the window as they were driving along, trying to get some fresh air. And when John drove too close to that telephone pole and swore up to the last second, Franky's head was still out the window and his head was decapitated by one of the tension wires coming off the pole, the tight wire that holds that pole into the ground, one of them. It's like a guillotine and they're speeding past it and Franky's neck,

hit the wire off when his head. But his body remained in the passenger seat of the car, and John was so brilliantly drunk that he didn't see he had just killed his friend, nor did he see his friend's body or a part of his body still in his car. And so when John

but clearly he didn't. He was just there, dead, in his passenger seat. And then John just drove

“back to his parents' house and just left the car on the driveway with his friend's body inside”

and up to his bedroom he went and passed out having no idea what he had just done. A few months later,

John would plead guilty to vehicular homicide and he was sentenced to five years in prison.

“A quick note about our stories, they are all based on true events. But we sometimes use pseudonyms”

to protect the people involved and some details are fictionalized for dramatic purposes.

The Mr. Ballem Podcast, strange dark and mysterious stories, is hosted and executive produced by me,

“Mr. Ballem. Our head of writing is Evan Allen, produced by Jeremy Bone and Cole Calaccio,”

this episode was written by Kate Murdoch and Kate Gallagher. Story editing by Evan Allen, research and fact-checking by Shelley Shu, Samantha Van Hoos, Evan Beamer, Abigail Schumway, Camille Callahan, Alex Paul, Ben Fassiano. Research and fact-checking supervision by Stevenier, audio editing and post-produced by Whitley Calaccio and Jordan Stitham, production support by Antonio Minata and Delena Corley, artwork by Jessica Klogston-Kiner,

theme song "Something Wicked" by Ross Bugden.