Camping

It’s been two years and some change since this event happened. I want to say that I am a logical person; mumbo-jumbo doesn’t exactly jive well with me. If something strange happens, I immediately try to figure out why in a scientific way. I think this night terrifies me because there is no real scientific explanation, no real closure on what the fuck happened to us during a simple camping trip.

I’ll get on with the story.

As a twenty-four year old mother fresh out of the Navy, I wanted to spend time with my three year old, Harlee. Working in the military meant I spent a lot of her life away from her and I wanted to reconnect.
It was a spontaneous decision. I was good at those. I didn’t want a camp ground. I didn’t want other people around me pretending to be camping while they settled on a piece of mowed clearing next to their car. I wanted real camping, authentic primitive camping. That’s actually much harder to find, believe it or not. I turned to Google, found a place about an hour away, and packed up the car.

I invited the people living with me. I had a pretty complicated living situation with my (now ex) husband Joe, his mistress Chelsea, and our male roommate John. At the time, we were all under a ton of relationship tension, trying to figure out what we were all doing without arguing. So we were being friendly, cordial even. They agreed to the camping trip. We figured it would be nice to “get away” together. We even brought our dog, Jake.

The second we were all in the car, I punched the address into my navigation system and off we went. That’s when the trouble started, and probably when we should have turned around.

It was about three pm-ish by the time we left. My navigation suggested about three hours to the camp grounds. That was enough time to hike the mile from the parking area to the campgrounds, set up camp, and enjoy the night before it became too dark. Satisfied, we broke out snacks and enjoyed some time swapping funny stories. My daughter enjoyed eating cookies in the car.

By six pm, we realized we couldn’t find the damned place. My navigation told me we were there, but it wasn’t a campground. Frustrations running high, I stopped at a Walmart and asked for directions to the campground. After they were done laughing in my face, the kind women told me I had overshot the campgrounds by an hour. She handed me an old fashioned map, showed me the route, and continued laughing as I purchased the map. I left feeling angry, but also weirded out. The lady had laughed way beyond what felt like normal; I chalked it up to being a bitch and went back to the car.

Once we were on the right track, our friendly banter started up again. It was starting to get dark, but I didn’t want to be discouraged. We could do this. It was a stupid camping trip; easy-peasy.

I realized just how wrong I was when it took another two hours to find the campground. There was supposed to be a big sign. A little dug out area for a car or three. It was now dark and that big sign turned out to be a little sign half hidden by trees. We had passed it for two hours, going back and forth, arguing and fighting about if we should just give up the damned search for this stupid place. That’s when John noticed the sign.

Gratefully, I parked in the little grass lot. Joe happily pointed out that there was the little trail we were looking for. It looked like a well travelled deer trail. I was pumped now; this was the primitive camping I was hoping for. We put on our backpacks full of gear and sprayed each other down with bug spray. I handed Harlee her bottle of water and took her hand. She was tired, but excited to be out of the car. Jake trotted beside us, pulling his leash, tense but happy.

We meandered down the path for about half a mile before coming into a clearing. There were large mounds in this clearing and a little half-sheltered information booth. I remembered quite clearly that the website had stated to walk a full mile before coming across any camp clearings, but no one wanted to listen to me. Everyone was tired, it was dark, and we wanted to just set up camp.

I set Harlee down by the shelter as it had started to drizzle. The weather didn’t call for rain, but it was super hot and humid; we welcomed the light rain. We tied Jake up to the shelter as John dug a fire pit. Joe and Chelsea started setting up the tent. Harlee stuck by John’s side while I decided to find some dry wood. That’s when curiosity took over and I peeked at the information booth. I expected trail numbers and a big map; instead, I read about the Native American burial grounds.

"Hey guys? This is an Indian burial ground." I told them, my voice shaking.

John and Joe shrugged. “We have Native American blood in us; I think we are good.”

Chelsea piped up. “I’m like, a quarter Native American.”

"Yeah, and Harlee is part Native American, too." Joe pointed out, smiling as if proud his genes were good for something.

I nodded at them. “I’m fucking Irish. I don’t want to camp next to the burial mounds. If we keep walking down the path-“

John shook his head. “We’ll be fine, Eve. We’re all tired, and I don’t feel like hiking any further.”

"Fine. If something happens, I want it publicly known that I did not want to camp here." I turned to the burial mounds. "I’m sorry. I mean no disrespect. Please let us camp here for the night."

The others laughed at me and went on to make jokes about offerings before settling into their tasks. I grabbed the axe we had brought, as well as my forearm sized knife, and decided to find some firewood. My daughter stayed with John, just in case I happened upon a wild animal and needed to fight or run.

"Oh, wow. Look, some idiot partied here and left trash." I muttered out loud.

Apparently Chelsea had followed me. “That’s disrespectful.”

I nodded. “Remind me, in case I forget, to pick that crap up before we leave. I don’t want any bad mojo.”

We decided to wander a bit down a separate path to find firewood. After we had struggled through some gigantic spider webs and had found a decent amount of wood, we wandered back to find a nice fire and our tent up. Jake was dozing peacefully by the tent and Harlee was playing in the dirt, content.

I smiled. Finally, camping! The crickets and frogs were croaking peacefully, the sky was thick with clouds but there was a decent breeze. If only it wasn’t so stiflingly humid…

I tried to get John alone to talk to him, but he was being withdrawn and gloomy. Joe and Chelsea wandered into the tent to relax and talk, which left me alone. I decided to get rid of some pent up frustration by hacking some firewood off a fallen tree down the main path, away from everyone, alone in the dark. My anger made me fearless…up until I made it to the tree.

I felt eyes on me. Not malicious eyes, but eyes none-the-less. As I walked down the path, I felt my anger ebb and fear fill it’s place. I was suddenly nervous. I’ve been camping before and have been watched by foxes, bears, etc; this didn’t feel like those times. I didn’t feel hunted, I just felt watched.

I tried to brush it away as being alone in the woods and having read too many horror stories. I started swinging the axe, and immediately felt better. I felt watched, but better. I swung until I had taken off most of the fallen tree’s bigger branches; my shoulders were aching and stiff. I grabbed my flashlight and went to leave when I heard something rustle in the bushes.

I jumped, axe in one hand, flashlight in the other. Chelsea came around the bend. My heart was in my throat, hammering, and I angrily asked what she was doing. She wanted to talk. I grabbed the newly cut fire wood and walked beside her, talking. After the talk, I wanted to go back to chopping at the damned tree, but I decided against it. I was too spooked.

I apparently wasn’t the only one spooked. When we got back, John and Joe were talking rapidly, wide-eyed. I dropped the firewood and asked what had happened.

"We saw a Native American woman!" Joe exclaimed, pointing to the place where I had seen the trash. "She was right there! John saw her too, didn’t you?!"

I looked around for a moment, perplexed and a bit incredulous, before realizing Harlee wasn’t around. “Where’s Harlee?” I demanded, suddenly afraid.

"In the tent, playing. She was getting eaten up by bugs even with the bug spray." Joe stated quickly. "Can you believe it? John, tell them!"

John didn’t say anything. He sat by the fire and poked at it, his eyes wide. For a moment, we were all silent, listening to the fire. It was as if we all felt it at the same time. That same feeling of being watched overwhelmed us, and I swallowed hard, my hand going to the knife at my hip.

"Do you guys feel-" I started.

At that moment, John jumped up and put his finger to his lips. “Shh! Do you hear that?” He asked, his eyes widening further.

We listened. I suddenly noticed all the normal forest noises had stopped. No crickets, no frogs, no hissing insects; just silence. And the pounding.

"Is that…drums?" Chelsea whispered. We were all standing, all crowding against each other.

"It sounds kind of like the ocean." I whispered back. "But we are smack in the middle of Florida; there is no ocean around here. Just a small lake."

"No, definitely drums." Joe said, his voice sombre.

The bushes across the fire rustled and we all jumped straight out of our skins, but the howl that followed the rustle was enough to elicit a scream from Chelsea. It sounded awful; like a woman being murdered viciously. It also sounded close. John turned to look at me and my eyes widened.

"Get in the tent!" I yelled. "Put another log on the fire; it could be a cougar!"

Florida had what they called panthers. They looked like mountain lions, and were one of the reasons I was carrying the big knife. Not that I could kill one, but I wasn’t going to go down without a fight if it did happen. The howl didn’t sound like the panther’s call (I had Googled it, just in case), but I wasn’t going to chance it. Jake, ever calm and noble, was snarling and yanking on his leash; I untied him and put him in the tent with us.

For a while, we all sat in the tent and listened. The strange silence had returned and we commented on it for a few minutes. Chelsea decided we should listen to some music on her phone, to help us focus on something else. I was watching the fire through the little mesh opening that served as our window. The fire was dying down. I didn’t like that, not even a bit.

"We need to put more wood on the fire." I said in the music laden silence.

No one offered to go out there. It had been about half an hour since the strange scream. My daughter was still politely playing with Jake and the toys we had brought her. It was strange that she was still up, and was so quiet the entire time, but we were all too high strung to really notice. Angry that the boys weren’t offering to stoke the fire, I grabbed the axe and a flashlight.

John shook his head. “Eve, the fire died. Look. It’s just embers. Don’t go out there; if it’s a cat, it’ll brave just one person.”

I shook my head and made for the door anyway. Just as I started to unzip the door, John gasped. I could see through the fabric of the tent as the fire blazed back to life on it’s own. I walked back over to the window. Harlee had decided to lay down now, and I gingerly stepped over her. The fire was crackling and bright, despite the logs being completely ash. Maybe a breeze helped? I thought.

"I’m going to put a log on it before it burns out." I muttered, trying to contain my fear with rationality.

Before anyone could protest, I zipped open the flap and stood up fully in the light of the fire. I checked the bushes for the tell-tale sign of glowing eyes, and saw nothing. I heard nothing. I swallowed hard and made my way to the logs and the fire, axe ready in case something jumped out at me.

I felt the eyes again. Not malicious, not hunted; just watched. It was the creepiest feeling I could possibly conceive; I’d rather something had jumped out at me. Instead, I put three logs on the strangely robust fire and, feigning calm, walked back to the tent.

"Lets try to sleep before the fire goes out. If we stay up like this, we’ll just continue to hear creepy stuff. It’s the middle of the woods, after all." I muttered, lying down beside my drowsy daughter.

John laid down on the other side of Harlee. Joe and Chelsea arranged themselves at our feet so that we were all comfortable. No blankets were needed in this heat. I draped my arm around my daughter. She closed her eyes and, as I closed mine, the screaming began.

My daughter sat straight up. She hadn’t been asleep a second. She clamped her hands over her ears and started singing “rain, rain go away”, screaming as if someone was stabbing her. We all bolted upright and I quickly grabbed her, trying to sooth her, trying to get her to pull her hands from her ears. My heart was hammering, everyone was staring at her with their mouths open; she wouldn’t stop! Screaming, singing, screaming, singing; tears were falling down her cheeks, but she wouldn’t stop.

Suddenly, she stopped mid-scream and opened her eyes. She looked lost in thought, older than three, as if she wasn’t even awake. She stated, calmly, “The Indians are coming.”

First, let me assure you that no one said anything about the burial grounds in front of her. She was three. She could form sentences, but I had never sung her Rain, rain, go away. She didn’t attend a day-care. No one else told her about the Native Americans. We had talked about the frogs and the crickets, but nothing else.

After she made that statement, the silent forest erupted. I have no better way to describe the sudden noise that bombarded us. There were hundreds of animals screaming, howling, growling, barking, hooting around us. Strong, steady, calm Jake was shivering and whimpering in the corner of the tent, far from Harlee and the door. My daughter went back to singing and screaming while the rest of us lost our fucking minds.

"What the hell is going on?!" Joe was screaming. "Do you hear the drums? It sounds like a fucking war!"

I put my daughter back on the floor. Her eyes were rolling in their sockets, and I didn’t know what to do. My heart was going to explode. My hand was on my knife, but what was that going to do?

"Didn’t the Indians imitate wildlife?" John yelled over the ridiculously loud gun shots, or was it thunder?

"Yes!" I muttered, my eyes wide. "Holy shit, yes, they did! I remember reading about that!"

We were yelling at each other now, over the bushes rustling and the loud banging and the horrible screams. There was that fucking owl again! The screaming cougar! The howling coyote! The wolf! The cat! The owl! So fucking close! I felt the panic attack coming, until I looked at Harlee again.

Then I was angry.

"Leave her alone!" I screamed and stood. "She’s fucking THREE! This is her first camping trip! LEAVE HER THE FUCK ALONE!" I was crying now, furious, ready to fight, wanting to fight, if only it would all just stop!

Just as suddenly as it started, it stopped. My daughter blinked a few times. She yawned and laid back down while we stared at her, incredulous. I was crying hard now, more in relief and disbelief than anything else. It was so quiet, I almost wished for the noise again. Then, a cricket. Soft at first, then louder. Finally, the forest was in full song again, and I collapsed back on my exhausted butt.

"What. The fuck. Just happened?" I asked tiredly.

We all stared at each other in confusion and fear. “I don’t know, but I think we should leave.” John said quietly. “I’m sorry, you were right; we shouldn’t have camped here.”

I nodded. “Let’s just try to sleep. It’s two in the morning; we’ll leave once the sun comes up.”

Everyone else nodded and we all laid back down. I gripped my sleeping daughter tightly. She was steadily breathing, absolutely fine, as if nothing had happened. I shivered, remembering her ungodly screams and the creepy singing. Finally, I started to doze.

SLAP!

I jerked awake. Someone had slapped me. I waited for someone to say they had smacked a mosquito off of my thigh, but no one said anything.

Finally, I turned to John. “Did you just slap me?” I asked, curious.

John turned over and shook his head. “I heard it though.”

"Joe, Chelsea? Did you slap me?" I asked, my voice shaking.

Both Joe and Chelsea sat up and shook their heads. I looked down at my thigh just to be sure. And there it was. A red welt in the shape of a hand. My heart started to pound again as I remembered my anger, my screaming. Did I just fuck up?

I opened my mouth, and shut it quickly. The silence was back. Something dripped on the tent and I wondered, for the briefest of moments, if it was raining. When I looked up, and the others looked with me, I let out the tiniest moan of despair. Blood. Blood had hit the tent.

All of my nightmares rose in my mind; what the fuck was hanging over our tent? A dead body? A mutilated animal? Something else equally fucked up and PTSD-inducing?

"Is…is that…?" John stuttered, pointing.

I didn’t know what to say because I couldn’t open my mouth to say anything. My daughter was stirring at this point. The silence was oppressive, almost daring. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know what to do.

And, at three thirty-seven in the morning, the forest erupted for the second time. As soon as the noise begun, my daughter was awake. She started singing. Everyone was screaming at this point, scared out of their minds, while I sat there in stunned silence. I couldn’t move. This wasn’t real life; this was some kind of scary movie you only see on TV. Maybe if I sat really still, it would all go away and someone would come out and tell me how silly I looked all scared on TV.

But no one came, and no one was making a fucking decision. “We are leaving!” I yelled over everyone else. “Let’s go; just stick your shit in the bags! Don’t leave anything behind.”

I started shoving miscellaneous objects into back packs. I couldn’t help my daughter; she just sat in the middle of the tent rocking back and forth, singing and screaming, her eyes rolling crazy in their sockets. I tried not to look at her as we finished cleaning up the inside. If I had, I’d probably cover my ears and sing a childhood song too.

Once we were done with the inside, the noises started to quiet outside. We jumped out of the tent anyway and started dismantling the tent. I kept a look out for any animals, or worse, while clutching my daughter’s forearm. She kept singing. I wanted to yell at her, to tell her to stop, but I couldn’t do it. I loved her so much, and I couldn’t believe this was happening to her. Instead, I focused on the grim task of making sure nothing was going to get us.

After we were all packed, we started down the path. We were being watched. I stopped, suddenly remembering the trash, and cursed under my breath.

"I have to get that garbage. I promised. There is no fucking way I’m backing out of that now." I growled, terrified.

Chelsea, surprisingly, went with me. We picked up the garbage and shoved it into our back packs before hurrying back to the others. John made sure the fire was completely covered with dirt for the second time. As we started down the path again, the eerie silence settled again. Our Watchers stayed with us the entire way. We could feel them.

Half-way back to the car, Harlee stopped and looked behind us. She muttered, tiredly, “Mommy, the Indians are coming.” She had that far-away look in her eye, as if she wasn’t quite standing on Earth, and she looked haggard.

I nodded. “Wave goodbye!” I muttered sarcastically. She waved. I tried not to shiver, but failed.

We threw our crap into the car and piled in. Regular forest noises surrounded us. You could almost believe nothing had happened. All four of us rolled our windows down and shouted apologies. As we started to drive, we even felt a bit silly. Terrified, but silly.

We were hungry, so we stopped at a Checkers. It was four in the morning. John stuck his head out the back window and asked the cashier “Have you ever been camping down the road?”

The woman shook her head. “No, here’s your food, sir.”

John looked her dead in the eye, grabbed his food, and told her, “Don’t. The fucking place is haunted.”

I drove off as the woman stared at us. Chelsea started the laughter. Then Joe. Then John. And finally me. We were all laughing hysterically. The adrenaline was over; we had made it. We didn’t die. We felt silly.

We never talked about that fucking place again, though every once in a while my now six year old will ask if I “remember the Indians”. Because she does. Rain, rain, go away…

—
Credits to: EvaStar