It happened literally a couple of days ago - around the middle of the night, when our doorbell rang for no apparent reason. I was about to open the door to see what was going on, but my wife, who had just been having a zombie nightmare, stood in my way and simply turned off the doorbell.
I suspect that the doorbell was probably just jammed, but now we will never know the truth. But today's collection of spine-chilling stories about the scariest sounds people have ever heard in the middle of the night will definitely be replenished with another one.
More info: Reddit
#1
My cat screaming.
Turns out she was just doing that thing cats do when they have the whole house to themselves and want to... declare they've claimed it? I have NO idea, but the first time I heard it, I thought she was dying. I jumped out of bed and ran to her, thinking she was in the throes of death. Nope, perfectly happy to see me. Just screaming for no reason.
I learned to tune them out. But when she'd meow when she was going to puke? Oh, I learned that HELLA fast and would jump out of bed and run to her to catch the puke as fast as I could after that.
Then in her last months, she didn't meow at all. I got to sleep in.
And then she died in my arms without a peep two weeks ago.
I miss her morning wails of "DIS MY HAUWSE, HEER ME ROAR".
Image credits: pm_me_x-files_quotes
#2
The “hurk-hurk-hurk” of a dog about to throw up. Nothing gets you out of a dead sleep faster than that.
Image credits: YouArentReallyThere
#3
Foxes, they sometimes sound like a person screaming.
Image credits: Cayde-seven-
A few days ago, netizen u/Stlouizsin asked the question of the AskReddit community: "What is the scariest sound you’ve ever heard in the middle of the night?", and the resulting thread has already collected almost two thousand different stories, scary and not so, as well as a lively discussion about them all. And today we, Bored Panda, are making a selection of the most interesting of them, especially for you.
#4
A lady screaming. I live in a weird little pocket in town. It's strangely isolated and wilded, and the way the streets are set up, there's no through traffic. So one evening around 9ish, 10ish, I was half heartedly watching something on tv and I hear a woman scream bloody m****r. Every hair on my body stood up. I leapt my pudgy a*s from the chair, grabbed my rifle and flew outside, thinking some horrible fate had befallen someone. I stood there looking into the tree line...silence...
Then I heard the scream again, closer this time. It was so loud I d**n near pissed myself too, it startled me so bad. I looked up, and there was a g*****n owl just sitting there on a branch minding its own business, screaming like a woman in a slasher flick. Weirdest combination of terrified and stupid I've ever felt.
Image credits: MidnightBluesAtNoon
#5
A poster falling in your bedroom in the middle of the night.
Bonus if it's on your ceiling above the bed and it's falling on you.
Image credits: blueberry_pancakes14
#6
I was sleeping in the loft of my cabin with the window open it was lightly raining and cool. then20 yards away lightening struck a sycamore tree. It was a blinding through my eye lids flash and the sound was huge not just loud but ground shaking. I went from sound asleep to totally awake in a fraction of a second. then it was completely dark again and I couldn't see a thing till I fumbled for my flashlight. I had so much adrenaline going I couldn't go back to sleep till after dawn.
Image credits: huscarlaxe
Well, of course, we are all adults, and we understand perfectly well that literally behind every strange sound in the night there’s something extremely simple and real (even if very dangerous - like a bear prowling through the night forest). But our subconscious (and at this level many of us still remain little frightened kids) sometimes doesn’t let us believe it.
Once upon a time, many thousands of years ago, our distant ancestors, sitting in cold wet caves and hearing the howling of the wind and other terrible sounds outside, came up with legends for themselves.
This is how spirits and gods appeared, mighty heroes, who split the sky with stone axes in wrath, and terrible half-beasts, half-monsters, thirsting for hot human blood outside the cave. For the night, as you may know, is dark and full of terrors.
#7
The sounds of flames crackling when you don't have a fireplace and are not camping.
Image credits: robitj11
#8
Someone ringing my doorbell at 4 am in the morning over and over at perfect intervals. I did not answer.
Image credits: MSLI1972
#9
Hearing our dog barking incessantly in the middle of the night (something he had never done or since) and my hubby hearing tapping on a window. Never did figure out what that was...not sure I want to know.
Image credits: UniqueOne4Ever
Today, after thousands of years, we are no longer such believers, as our brain has come a long way with evolution - but the body, its physiological reactions in many ways remain the same as they were during the Stone Age. As one writer reasonably noted, "The human psyche is nothing more than a random plaque on the endocrine glands..."
So now, having heard some incomprehensible sound in the middle of the night, instead of calmly getting up, turning on the light and going to figure out what the hell is going on, we sometimes just curl up in horror under the blanket, wanting only one thing - for this horror to end or go away as soon as possible.
And then it turns out, of course, that it was just a showdown between raccoons outside the window...
#10
The click of my wife locking the door AFTER she’s sent me outside to investigate the first scary sound.
Image credits: TradeIcy1669
#11
My dog used to love ripping up stuffed animals. I would get them for her at garage sales for pennies so she could have some fun. One time I got her a Teletubby stuffed toy. For some reason she liked it and decided not to rip it up. About a week later in the middle of the night my wife and I got woken up to this creepy high pitched soft voice saying “Uh Oh” it kept repeating every few minutes. Scared the c**p out of us. Went on for the next couple of nights. We were both thinking that this was an actual haunting. Came to realize that the Teletubby doll had that recording built in and our dog was bringing it into her dog bed at night and was triggering the voice.
Image credits: Imissmysister1961
#12
My mom having nightmares. My father was a*****e to all of us, but she got it so much worse than my brother or me. She's never been diagnosed with PTSD, but I have no doubt she has it.
When she has one of those nightmares, she screams, "No!" and begs for the person in her nightmare to stop. I have woken her up during a nightmare to try to help her, but she becomes very combative, like she's still trying to defend herself. She has injured me on multiple occasions, so I only wake her up now if the nightmare seems to be particularly distressing.
Fortunately, they've gotten less frequent over the years, but I hate that she has ever had to endure this.
Image credits: taniamorse85
Alfred Hitchcock, the great master of horror movies, understood the nature of horror perfectly well, and therefore very rarely did any zombies, ghouls or other undead appear on his screen. Because horror isn't really about some scary creature willing to devour you. Real horror is when your subconscious hears a sound and paints the pictures in your head.
Just take the maestro's most famous film, "The Birds." Why did those seagulls suddenly go crazy and start attacking a simple house en masse? The original story by Daphne du Maurier at least hints at the reasons (even if it's very vague), but in the movie the birds just attack. Silently and for no reason, making everything that happens even more eerie.
The same thing happens in many of the stories in this list. Yes, it could be a dog, a coyote, a fox, a drunken neighbor, or the aforementioned raccoons. But hey, what does that matter when we wake up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night?
#13
Man. When my sick kid with a high fever started laughing manically in the middle of the night, I questioned whether or not possession was real. Just straight sat up and stared at me with a huge smile and laughed like a m****c. Scared the s**t out of me.
Image credits: JWNAMEDME
#14
Woken up in bed by a huge explosion, thought it was a plane crash! Jumped out of bed, heart pounding, ready to grab my dog and run, looked out the window - nothing, neighborhood was all quiet. I had experienced episodic cranial sensory shock - aka [""exploding head syndrome".]
Happened to me a few times now. Scary as hell.
Image credits: psilome
#15
15 years old, backpacking in western Washington in the 70s. No cellphones in those days, and I was the oldest of three of us. We were just going to bed, letting the fire die out when a cougar screamed pretty close to our camp. Our fire did not die down for a few hours after that! I’ve heard cougars screaming since then and it still makes my blood go cold, but nothing like that first time.
Image credits: Whyme1962
Okay, now how about sharing your own scary auditory memories? Because I'll never believe that you haven't had anything like that in your entire life. In the end, we are all human and no matter how fearless we are, we’re still afraid of something and somewhere deep down inside.
So now, please feel free to share your own chilling stories in the comments below, or just read these tales of ours - and don't forget to check the locks in the evening before you go to bed. Just in case, because you know, anything can actually happen...
#16
I got up to take a leak at 4 am a couple weeks ago. I’m sitting there and hear a guy’s voice clear as a bell outside the bathroom window, which is right next to the front door. I got that adrenaline rush that you can feel go from head to toe, and was immediately done peeing. Not wanting to make a bunch of noise (old floors), I tiptoed out to the kitchen window, but didn’t see anyone out there. I looked for a while, then went to the front door, opened it, and peered around. There was something at my feet.
Apparently the Amazon delivery guy was on his phone as he dropped my package off.
Image credits: discussatron
#17
When I was 11yrs old we lived 16 miles outside of Pueblo Colorado around where the old Piñon truck stop used to be (there's a rest area close by the exit now).
Anyway, I had woke up for no reason to find my beagle dog at the foot of my bed, growling very low and quiet. So I laid still.
I heard whispering of like clothes, when you walk they swish. That noise.
Watched as some man stood in the doorway to mine and my sister's bedroom, walked down, did the same to my parents and brothers bedrooms and then left with a very quiet click of the sliding glass door in the kitchen.
The swish/whisper of someone walking quietly and the click of that door is why in the last 35 years I've always locked everything.
Image credits: Riyeko
#18
A m**h lab explosion a block away. I physically felt the boom.
Image credits: SeaSquash7373
#19
Camping and hearing a bear grunting and shuffling about just out of eye sight. Never did see him though.
Image credits: nevadapirate
#20
I used to rent a guest house on a large property in Napa and took my dog out for a quick walk before bed. Turned the corner in a dark part of the yard and heard a bobcat growl at us from about 40 feet away.
Lost a shoe hightailing back inside.
Image credits: JohnLeePettimore
#21
We used to have a cat and had a cat flap so it could come in and out of the house during the night. Our cat decided to bring us gifts in the form of small creatures she caught like mice.
One night she brought in a frog. It turns out frogs can scream.
My wife and I were awoken by a quiet but high pitched screaming noise downstairs. We didn't think it was quiet at the time because you don't typically scream quietly, it sounded more distant but still within our house.
I went downstairs where we had wooden flooring and there was blood spread across the hall. I could still hear screaming only now it was coupled with the sound of our cat running around the dining room, trying to injure and play with the dying frog.
I had to wait until the cat had pretty much k****d the frog and had it in her teeth to put them both outside.
But just imagine not knowing frogs can scream, hearing that in the night and going downstairs to find blood everywhere.
It also turns out frogs bleed a lot.
Image credits: kitjen
#22
A pack of coyotes.
Image credits: Viperniss
#23
If you are alone, in the middle of the woods, camping, at midnight, and have never heard a deaf person singing... Be ready for a ride.
Image credits: Rakidian
#24
I work at a group home for adults with developmental disabilities. A few years back I was working an evening shift with another female coworker. We had an “eloper” living in the house so there were sensors on all the doors and windows that alert us if someone opens them. We were the only people in the house other than the residents who were all asleep. We had a clear line of sight down the hallway, and the door leading from the hallway to the basement was locked, as were all the entrances to the house. The staff were the only people with the keys.
We were sitting on the couch going over the activity logs when all of a sudden the loud, robotic voice of the egress sensor announced, “BASEMENT. DOOR. OPEN.” I cannot stress enough that no one was in the basement at the time, or could even get to it. The door that led outside from the basement was a heavy metal door that takes effort to open. It wasn’t windy that day, but even if it was, the door was LOCKED.
Both of us looked at each other and I saw all the color drain from my coworker’s face. We ran to make sure the basement door was locked (it was), checked that all the residents were asleep in bed (they were), and returned to the living room. We both decided neither of us would go down to the basement, grabbed some heavy objects, and waited to see if we could hear someone walking up the stairs. No footsteps were ever heard, and we wrote it off as a weird glitch in the egress sensor (that never happened before or ever again).
Image credits: lylalexie
#25
Raccoons fighting over apples in the woods around my house.
Image credits: lizardfishfingers
#26
I was like 14 and I was return home by foot in the middle of the night, like 2 or 3 am.
For the first time in my life (I din't have pets) I hear a cat in heat making characteristic noises and I was scared af because their are so human like. The cat was behind some bushes so initially I didn't understand what happening. Likely I wasn't alone and the girl with me started laughing and explained me it was just a cat.
Image credits: OtterShaped
#27
My own screams. I have sleep paralysis.
Image credits: 925doorguy
#28
My pet caiman, Pookie, slithering over the top of his tank fence.
He wasn't malicious, but he did seek warmth- and I was sleeping nearby, naked.
Not something you want to roll over on in the night. .
Image credits: Milligoon
