Scary Moments in My Life

In light of it being October, the month of Halloween, I thought I would share some of the scariest moments in my life.

The first scariest moment took place a little after we moved to Franklin from Kansas. We moved here because of my dad's job, so there were other families that moved out here as well. One family was my aunt and uncle, Greg and Gina, with my cousins, Brandon and Corey. The Petraseks were the other family. They had three girls: Lauren, Kaitlin and Sarah. We all moved into the same neighborhood, so we would hang out every night and go on walks or whatever. 

This particular night, we are all hanging out at my cousins' house when we decide to go on a walk. Brandon just came home from soccer practice or working out or something, so he tells us he needs to take a shower and he'll catch up with us in a little bit. 

We all set out on what seems to be a night like any other night. In our neighborhood, we have these little stone walls that have the name of the subdivision on it. We start walking past one and we think we hear some kind of noise coming from behind the sign. I turn around and see the shadow of something moving, but I just assume it's some kind of an animal.

At this point, I start walking backwards to talk to everyone and I see this guy in a scream costume jump out from behind the sign. Naturally, we all freak out and take off running. We're just down the street from a family friend, the Collins, so we all start running toward their house to get away from the guy who is chasing us. 

*Take a moment to really visualize the situation. Four girls and one boy running down the streets of our neighborhood, screaming. I'm sure my hands were flailing around in the air, my face showing sheer terror. Closely following us is a man in a scream costume. This has got to be a scene straight from some cheesy horror movie. Also note that in the midst of our screaming, no one came to see what was going on....makes you feel safe, huh?

Everyone turns up the Collins' driveway....except me. In my state of panic, I totally forget to turn. So now, I'm running as fast as I can, but away from everyone else. This guy has the perfect opportunity to kidnap me because I have just isolated myself from the rest of the group. Typical Jess move. 

I notice that he's gaining some serious ground on me and decide there's no way I can outrun him. Rather than waste all my energy on continuing to run, I stop dead in my tracks, turn around and start wailing on him. Just blindly punching him. Of course I know this isn't going to stop him for long...I was like maybe 12 at the time. There's not much I can do for myself. I keep thinking, "If Brandon were here, he could have saved me."

In my head, I'm beginning to accept the fact that I'm about to be kidnapped. All of these thoughts of what will happen to me start to run through my mind. Until....I heard him laughing. I thought to myself, "I know that laugh." It was Brandon. As soon as we left, he jumped in the car and drove to where he knew we would pass by and hid behind the stone wall until we got there. I'm sure he didn't know that it would work out as well as it did. 

Fortunately, my scariest moment ended up being a joke. But, at the time, I really thought it was the end. 

So...this blog is dedicated to Brandon. Well done.

This is Brandon with his little girl Brooklyn.

All the cousins.

Me, Brandon, Dani and Corey as kids.

The cousins in our true form.