“
When I was 12 (1990) I was at my parent’s condo at the lake of the ozarks. I would often go down to the docks and go fishing late at night after my folks went to bed. There was a rundown old house right next to the complex that had a nasty old dock that was barely floating at this point. If you stepped on it, hell, if you as much as shifter your weight while standing on it, it made all kinds of noise and rocked back and forth. But damn you could catch crappie on it like nowhere else.
So on this night I had gone down to fish and was there for a half hour and it was a dead quiet, beautiful, calm night to be fishing. When suddenly the calm silence is broken with my dad’s voice. He calmly, but chillingly tells me to turn around and come to him right now. He is up on the bank about 30 yards from me and I can tell something is wrong. As I turn around I see him over my left shoulder about 20’ behind me. There was a man, a dirty, massove hillbilly of a man just staring at me. He locked eyes with me and stared at me the whole way as I walked by him to my dad. When I got to my dad, my dad walked backwards while that guy started at me the whole way. My dad called the cops, but when they got there he was gone.
How that guy got on that dock without. me knowing it, I have no clue. That dock was falling apart and you could not move on it without it creaking and rocking. It was very clear he was there to do me harm. The crazy thing is that my old man NEVER came down to check on me when I was fishing before. I asked him what made him come down that night and he said he woke up and just had a terrible feeling that something was wrong. He said he got up in a panic and came down and as he approached he saw that guy behind me and was never so scared as he was in that moment. I still absolutely have nightmares of that guy staring at me as I walked by him. I will never forget how he smelled as I passed him. It was the strongest cigarette smoker smell I’ve ever smelled.”