The Payphone Trick (#98)

In Ogden, between the hours of ten o’clock PM and two o’clock AM, a locked door in the back of a 24/7 convenience store will be opened. During these four hours, the third shift clerk will remain behind his counter if he can, leaving spills and other problems to sort themselves out until the door closes of its own accord. If you arrive during this hour, walk through the door and close it behind you.

The door leads into a small room made of bare concrete. To your immediate left is a disused washroom. Don’t open it under any circumstances, as they haven’t cut the bodies down since 1995. Instead, turn right and look at the payphone. It’s old enough that it still has metal keys and an AGT sticker. The handset has been separated from the phone itself, but if you lift it to your ear, you’ll hear a dial tone. Put a quarter into the phone, then dial. Never, under any circumstances, call a cell phone.

The phone will ring twice, and then you’ll hear whatever occurred in the room the phone is currently in on the day and at the time you’re using the phone in the year the quarter was minted. The only exception to this is if the quarter was minted in the year you were born, in which case you hear whatever happens in that room during the moment of your death.