r/LetsNotMeet | Creepy and True Reddit Stories • Collection

Old lady trapped in a muddy cellar

This encounter happened years ago but my recent perusing on /letsnotmeet reminded me that I should probably formulate this into words.

I grew up in a tiny French village in mid-northern France, in an area that is most well known for its massive forest. My little village was in the middle of this forest, surrounded by trees from all sides; most of its secluded population was of an elderly demographic. The forest was large enough that if you walked into it in one direction, it'd be hours (even days if you chose a bad trajectory) until you'd find any other proper civilisation, aside from the occasional lone road. Now don't get me wrong, the forest is lovely and I have spent many cherished memories there; but it's also rather secluded and I can only begin to imagine what mysterious things happen under the cover of so many dense twigs, branches and leaves.

Anyway, onto the story.

Every day to get to school, my mum would drive me and my sister to school in the next town over (the town was also in this forest). However, on this fateful morning, we had to stop the car mere seconds after driving off.

In the middle of this rather narrow and seldom-used road was an elderly woman in her nightgown, splattered with mud and bruises and seemingly exhausted beyond her wits. She was barefoot, her feet blackened by mud and caked with lashes of blood. She didn't flinch as the car crawled forward towards her, nor did she show any sign of relief as my mum stepped out of the car to greet her.

She was terribly confused and didn't seem entirely sure what to say or how to begin. For a moment she just babbled incomprehensibly, but within a few seconds, a (somewhat) coherent sentence began to form. She was repeating that she'd ran, she'd ran all night (it was around 7:30 AM in early spring so the sun had only just risen not long ago). She said she'd ran through the forest, not knowing where to go, but as she went on, it became clear that she had been trying to escape something.

She paused, catching her breath and gathering her thoughts. It was clear that this was all a mess in her mind, and just now was she trying to collect everything coherently.

Someone, she continued, had kept her locked up in a cellar. She didn't know where, or how long, or who it was that had locked her up, but she remembered it was very damp and muddy. She didn't remember how she got out of the cellar; all she knew was that she was in the dead of the forest in the dead of the night. So she ran. Ran as much as her frail body would allow.

At this point it seems like she had nothing more to say, for it seemed like her nighttime escape had culminated in us meeting her.

I don't exactly remember what she and my mum discussed next, but it resulted in my mother calling the old lady's son, who lived on the other side of the village. A few minutes later he arrived and told us that we should leave.

Fast-forward a few days, I ask my mum if she knew what became of the old lady after we left her. I'm not sure how my mum found out this next bit, but apparently a few men had broken into her house that night/morning, had beaten her and ransacked her home, stealing some of her priceless possessions. She had apparently fled for cover into the forest (which was only a few metres away from her house).

Now if that isn't creepy enough, a few extra details stick into my mind. First, when we found her in the middle of that narrow road, it turns out that she was standing right next to her house. Perhaps the burglars were still in her home as we spoke to her... her sense of time did seem distorted, after all. Secondly, no mention of the supposed cellar she was kept in was made. Had it been a fiction of her panic and delusion, or had she really been locked up in a cellar somewhere in the forest, only for no one to believe her? It seems unlikely, but you do occasionally stumble upon old and grotty stone huts and ruins in the forest. Perhaps some of them hide a few gruesome tales...

Unfortunately, we never really spoke to that family again, so we never got to find out about what really happened that night. I believe the elderly lady is now deceased; we will never fully find out the truth about that cellar. Nonetheless, whenever I return home and drive past that house in that narrow street, I can't help but remember the frail lady standing alone in her muddy nightgown.

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By: u/glitchedf0x

https://www.reddit.com/r/LetsNotMeet/comments/ekjtv9/old_lady_trapped_in_a_muddy_cellar/