Dear Editors of Monthly Magazine ,
My apologies for writing to you out of the blue.
My name is XXX, and I’m a university student living in Tottori.
I’m writing to ask for your help.
A strange man is following me.
I read your article on the other day, and I thought you might know something.
This letter will be a little long, but please read it all the way through and tell me what to do.
I think it was August of this year.
During summer break, me, my boyfriend, and one of our male friends went out for a drive. We decided to check out a paranormal hot spot, and we headed for . I mean, all the magazines mention it.
We were too scared to go at night, so we went there during the day.
That area has a lot of haunted locations like the apartment complex and that house, but enough people were around in the daytime that we weren’t scared.
We went to Building Five—the one famous for suicides—then walked around outside the haunted house and peeked in through the windows to see if we could spot any talismans. But nothing happened.
, which is on the other side of the mountain, has a dam that’s another hot spot for suicides, so we decided to drive over there, too.
It happened a little after we started down a narrow mountain road. My boyfriend was driving, and I was in the passenger seat.
A car came from the opposite direction. The road had two lanes, but there wasn’t a lot of room, so we both slowed down to pass each other.
I was just staring blankly out the front window when I caught the man driving the other car staring at me, muttering something. I couldn’t hear anything he said, of course, but I didn’t like that he was looking at me and not at my boyfriend, who was driving.
We eventually reached the dam, but it was already dark, and we were too scared to get out and walk around.
So we drove a little farther down the highway to get a better view of the dam, then we went home.
It was already midnight by the time we got back to Tottori.
That was when it all started.
The next day, some other friends and I went out for drinks at a bar near our university.
There are a lot of restaurants and bars on that street, and at night, it gets pretty crowded with students and office workers on their way home from work.
Around nine o’clock, we decided to head to the next place, and we stood in front of the bar discussing where to go.
We were huddled together, talking, when one of my friends asked, “Who’s that?”
She was pointing toward a narrow alley between two restaurants not too far from where we were standing.
Someone had poked their head out of the alley and was looking right at us, muttering something.
It was that man.
It really creeped me out. Some of my friends went over to check the alley, but they didn’t find anyone there.
They told me it was probably just someone who looked similar, and I tried to convince myself they were right.
Then, a month or so later, I saw the man again.
It was evening, and I’d just gotten back to my apartment after finishing my classes for the day.
I was about to head inside, when I heard someone open the door to the next apartment over.
Figuring my neighbor was heading out, I paused to say hi to her. But what I saw instead was a man’s face, staring at me.
It was him.
He seemed to be trying to say something to me, but I was so scared that I ran straight inside my apartment and locked the door.
I asked my friend to come over and spend the night.
My apartment is female-only, so my neighbor is a woman. She’s lived alone ever since I moved in.
Naturally, I called the police, but my neighbor was in her apartment at the time with a friend, so they determined I had made a mistake.
Then, a couple of days later, it happened again.
I went to the bathroom between classes.
The toilets usually get crowded during breaks, but the ones in the research wing are rarely used, so I typically go there. At the time, all three stalls were empty.
I used the one farthest from the entrance.
After I finished, I noticed that the door of the stall next to mine was closed.
I hadn’t heard anyone enter the bathroom, and a bad feeling came over me.
Just as I tried to sneak past it, the door creaked open, and a man’s face peered out. He looked at me with a big grin and spoke.
“Please come again.”
I ran past the stall, but I think that’s what he said.
I’m not really sure, though, since I was screaming at the time.
After that, I didn’t see him again in the real world.
Instead, I saw him in my dreams.
In the dream, I’m climbing a mountain at night.
There are lots of tall trees, and they block almost all the moonlight.
I’m climbing some old stairs carved into a mountain path.
There are stone lanterns to either side, but most of them have fallen over.
The stairs end at a crooked torii gate.
The man is waiting for me under the torii.
He stands there with that same grin, his big mouth opened wide.
The most disturbing thing for me is that, inside the dream, I’m not the slightest bit scared.
When I wake up, I feel calm.
Am I cursed?
Who is this man?
Please help.
*At the end of the letter is a handwritten note, probably made by an editor, that reads:
“Received October 5, 2004. Addressed to the editors, but included no information regarding the sender, so we were unable to reach out for an interview. Publication pending.”