My Sugar Daddy Asks me Weird Stuff

His Tinder profile said he was 45, but when his pictures loaded, I couldn’t believe it. He looked like he was in his early thirties at most.

His bio was simple:

**“Looking for a sugar baby. $700 a week. No s*x.”**

It sounded like the kind of thing people warned you about online. A scam. A trap. Something that was obviously too good to be true. But I was a broke university student with rent due and barely enough money to cover groceries. I knew I was taking a risk, but I convinced myself that if anything felt wrong, I could just leave. I swiped right. A few seconds later, Tinder showed the notification. **It’s a match.** His name was Jack. We talked for a while, and he seemed surprisingly normal. He told me he owned his own business, lived alone, and just wanted someone he could trust to help him with small things. He never flirted or pushed boundaries. If anything, he was almost too formal. Then he asked if I wanted to earn some extra money. The first favor seemed harmless. He sent me an address and told me to pick up a package from a man named Julio. The house was in a part of town I had never been to before. It looked abandoned, with overgrown grass, broken fences, and windows that looked like they hadn’t been cleaned in years. When I knocked, the door opened almost immediately. Julio was huge. He had tattoos covering both arms and a face that looked like he had spent years getting into fights. He didn’t say much. He just handed me the package. Before I left, he stared at me for a few seconds and said: “Watch out.” I laughed nervously, thinking he was just trying to scare me. I drove to Jack’s house and followed his instructions exactly. Lock the door when entering. Lock it again when leaving.

Don’t talk to anyone.

Don’t open anything.

His house was beautiful. Not just expensive—beautiful. Huge rooms, expensive furniture, paintings on the walls, everything perfectly arranged.

But it was completely empty.

No family photos.

No personal belongings.

Nothing that made it feel like someone actually lived there.

I placed the package where Jack told me to leave it and was about to walk out when a phone started ringing.

The sound echoed through the entire house.

I looked around.

The caller ID said:

**Jack.**

I froze.

I picked up my phone, but before I could answer, I remembered something he had told me earlier.

“Only answer calls from Marvin.”

I ignored it.

A few minutes later, my phone buzzed again.

This time:

**Marvin.**

I answered.

“Did you leave already?” the voice asked.

I told him I was about to.

“Good,” he replied. “Don’t stay there longer than you need to.”

The call ended.

I didn’t ask questions.

After that, Jack kept giving me more jobs.

Each one was stranger than the last.

Picking things up.

Dropping things off.

Going places I had never heard of.

But every time, the money arrived immediately.

Over a few weeks, I made around $3,500.

I should have stopped.

I knew I should have.

But when you’re struggling financially, it becomes easy to ignore things that don’t make sense.

Then one day, Jack made me an offer.

“Spend one night at my house,” he said. “I’ll give you $1,000.”

I almost said no.

Then he sent the rules.

There were seven of them.

**1. Lock the door when you come in.**

**2. Only answer calls from Marvin.**

**3. Do not turn on any faucets between 9 PM and 11 PM.**

**4. Do not open the door for anyone after 10 PM.**

**5. If the end-of-hall closet door is open, sleep in the library. If it is closed, you may sleep in any bedroom.**

**6. The gardener comes at midnight. If he knocks on the windows, hide.**

**7. Turn the TV on and leave it playing static all night. Do not forget.**

I stared at the message for a long time.

The first two rules were strange.

The third was impossible to understand.

But the sixth one bothered me the most.

A gardener?

At midnight?

Knocking on windows?

I almost backed out.

But then I thought about the money.

So I went.

Jack’s house looked exactly the same as before.

Perfect.

Expensive.

Empty.

I entered, locked the door behind me, and checked the hallway closet.

It was closed.

According to the rules, I could sleep in any bedroom.

I chose one upstairs.

At 9 PM, I made sure I didn’t touch any faucets.

Not the sink.

Not the shower.

Nothing.

At 10 PM, I heard footsteps outside.

Someone walked slowly across the front porch.

I held my breath.

A knock came at the door.

Three slow knocks.

I didn’t move.

A few seconds passed.

Then another knock.

Harder this time.

I stayed completely silent.

Eventually, whoever was outside walked away.

At midnight, I heard something hit the window.

I sat up.

Another sound.

A scratch.

Then another.

I slowly moved toward the curtain and looked outside. There was a figure standing in the garden. At first, I thought it was a person wearing a uniform. The gardener. But something was wrong. The shape was too tall. Too thin. And it wasn’t holding any gardening tools. It just stood there, facing the house. Then it slowly lifted its hand. And knocked on the window. I immediately remembered the rule. **If he knocks on the windows, hide.** I turned away and ran into the library. I locked the door and sat behind a chair, trying not to make a sound. That was when I noticed something. The TV static downstairs had changed. It wasn’t random anymore. Through the silence, I could hear what sounded like whispering. Not from the television. From somewhere behind it. Something was moving through the house. Doors opened. Footsteps crossed the floors. The whispering got closer. But every time it reached a certain distance, the static on the TV would suddenly become louder. Almost like it was drowning something out. Keeping it away. I stayed hidden until morning. When the sun came up, everything was normal. No footsteps. No scratching. No figure outside. Jack arrived later that morning and handed me the money without asking questions. I wanted to ask him what happened. What was in those packages? Who was the gardener? Why did the TV need to stay on? But I already knew I didn’t want the answers. I never went back to that house. I deleted Jack’s number. I stopped answering unknown calls. And even now, I still think about those rules. Because the strangest thing isn’t that Jack knew something was going to happen. It’s that he knew exactly what I would need to do to survive it.