Episode Recap: Nightmare on Chestnut Street

For Lindsey, Rebecca, and Amber, the fall of 2004 was supposed to be their last year of fun before they graduated from college and had to face the world. They decided to band together and get a place of their own. It was rough to find a three-bedroom place near campus, but when they landed in the office of a local realtor, their lives changed forever.

Lindsey's boyfriend of a year, Adam, helped them move into what seemed like a dream house. When Lindsey finished putting everything in her room and she and Adam were ready to rest for a bit, she noticed something very unusual: two large deadbolts on the back of her bedroom door. What on earth could they have been for? It was a college town; could they have been trying to keep out errant drunken roommates? Exhausted, Lindsey and Adam shrugged it off and crashed.

As she drifted off, Lindsey noted that the room got cold, and she felt a breeze. When she looked, the fan in the bedroom was running. Nobody had turned it on. She tried to go back to bed, but it came on again. Confused, Adam got out of bed and checked, only to discover that the fan wasn't even plugged in. While they were trying to figure that out, something began banging on the bedroom door. When they threw the deadbolts and opened it, ready to see Rebecca or Amber running down the stairs, there was nobody there.

That same night, Rebecca was desperate to finish a paper that was due when she could have sworn she heard pounding on a wall. Trying to tune it out, she was finally fed up when it sounded like Lindsey and Adam were stomping down the stairs. She opened her bedroom door, ready to chew them out for disturbing her study, but stopped in her tracks when there was nobody there.

Lindsey managed to finally get to sleep, but as soon as she nodded off, she realized she was dreaming. She was pinned to the bed, unable to move her arms or legs. She wanted to scream, but she couldn't. She saw a woman in the shadows, and when that woman got closer, Lindsey bolted awake. She was shaking, and her hair was plastered with sweat. Adam did what he could to bring her back to reality. No matter what, however, Lindsey could not shake the feeling that there was something else in the room with them.

One afternoon, Rebecca was in her room taking a nap. When she rolled over to face the window, she was terrified to see a large black spider crawling up the curtain. She backed away from it, unable to shake the feeling that something was using it to watch her. She took special note of a silver diamond on its back. Soon thereafter, the spider just fell to the floor and disappeared; Rebecca tore her room apart looking for it, but found nothing. Spooked, she went to the library to go through books until she found out what kind of spider it was. She couldn’t find a single spider in any reference that matched the one she’d seen.

Rebecca went back to the house to try to get some schoolwork done and soon heard the rumbling again. This time, it was accompanied by a cackling laugh.  Convinced it was Lindsey playing a prank, she tried to go back to bed. The next morning, Rebecca confronted Lindsey and Adam over the noise. She was convinced it was one or both of them making the noises that had kept her from sleeping. Rebecca shut herself off from her roommates, not sure if she could even trust them anymore.

Rebecca grew increasingly distant from her oldest and dearest friends until, finally, she moved out.

Late one night, as Lindsey slept alone in her room, her TV suddenly turned on by itself, tuned to nothing but static. Lindsey turned it off and tried to go back to sleep. Suddenly, she heard a horrific sound and found herself back in the nightmare. The woman in the shadows was there, and Lindsey knew that she didn't want to see the woman's face. That didn't stop the woman from coming so close that Lindsey could feel her hair. When she bolted awake screaming, Amber ran upstairs to talk her roommate back to reality.

One night when Adam was home alone channel-surfing, he suddenly didn't feel comfortable. When he got up and looked around, he realized that all of Lindsey's paintings that were hanging in the living room were staring at him. He ran out to his car and did everything he could not to look up at the windows. Unable to resist, he did, and saw the shadow of a woman where there shouldn't have been anything. He called Lindsey and told her what he'd seen, and they both knew it was real.

Adam took Lindsey to see his father, a sub-deacon in their church. Adam's father believed Lindsey immediately. He gave them a considerable amount of Holy Water and a religious icon for Lindsey to put in her bedroom. When they got back to the house, Lindsey sprinkled Holy Water in every room and hung the icon by her door. Amber thought they were losing their minds. After they'd finished, the air felt as though it cleared. For the first time since they'd moved in, Lindsey felt comfortable in her own bedroom.

It wasn't over, however. One night, as Adam slept upstairs while Lindsey was downstairs, he woke to banging noises. Investigating, he discovered that all of Lindsey's paintings that were hanging in the hall had fallen to the floor, save for one. Before he could even think about that, he heard Lindsey scream. He sprinted down to find her staring at more of her paintings that had come off of the walls. The house was not liking what they'd done, but Amber was still in denial that it was real.

One day, Amber rushed home from class for a quick bite before work when she heard something odd. She thought Adam or Lindsey might have come home, but she was alone. Dismissing it, she headed out and got in her car ... and saw the woman standing in the window. Amber finally believed.

Adam suggested they all draw a picture of what they'd seen. They all drew the same person.

The trio went to the local historical society to find out what had happened in the house. They learned that 90 years before, a doctor had lived there with his wife. Over the years, their marriage had broken down and she had an affair. The doctor lost his mind and horrifically murdered his wife. They all realized that she was who they'd been seeing.

The next time Lindsey saw the woman, her theory that the woman was trying to make her feel the same terror she'd felt was given even more backing. The woman chased Lindsey from the bathroom to the stairway to her room, where she grabbed Lindsey's leg and began trying to yank her back. Adam saved Lindsey from the growling manifestation, but it was enough for all of them. They moved out, and never looked back.