I'm 30, my best friend Mason is 29.
We've done enough shoulder season trips to think we're
careful, not brave. mid-october looked perfect for a quick
weekend near Estes Park. Cold nights, clear skies, elk
moving in the Meadows and not many people.
We drove up US 34 from Loveland, grabbed groceries at the Safeway
on Moraine Ave. and checked the forecast at Beaver Meadows
visitor Center. Lows right around freezing, calm
air, no storms moving in. Our plan was simple.
Stage at Elk Meadow Campground, crash there and in the morning
decide between Deer Mountain or Lumpy Ridge.
We paid at the self-serve kiosk, picked a site with a little
privacy and told ourselves we'd sleep better outside the town.
Noise. We don't drink on these trips,
no drugs. We hang food right, keep the
site tidy and point the car nose out for a clean exit.
That evening we boiled pasta on a pocket stove, cleaned up and
turned in early. I kept my headlamp, keys and
knife in the tents, mesh pocket shoes facing the door so I could
slip in fast. It felt routine, in a good way.
Sometime after two in the morning, I woke to the slow
crunch of footfalls in the Duff. Not heavy, not a bull elk
dragging a rack through branches.
The steps paused every few beats, like whoever it was kept
listening. My first thought was elk,
anyway. I've seen them wander through
this campground at night, but the rhythm stayed wrong.
I slid my hand over to the knife and nudged Mason's calf.
He went still. I unzipped the tent door an
inch. Under a thin layer of cloud, the
campground had just enough light to show shapes.
A man stepped through the edge of our sight.
Barefoot, torn denim jacket, no hat, no pack.
He moved carefully, but not like he was cold.
His toes were dark, nails thick with dirt or worse.
His cheeks looked raw, the kind of raw you get from exposure,
but not the blue white color you'd expect if he were
freezing. He sniffed the air, not at our
food hang, but toward the tent. He moved to the rope where our
bag swung between 2 trees, glanced up and ignored it.
He crouched right in front of our door and stayed there.
I could see the outline of his jaw through the nylon.
Mason's breathing went shallow. I kept one hand on the knife and
the other steadying the zipper so it wouldn't rattle.
The Crouch wasn't a stretch. It was a choice to get level
with the sleeping area. I counted to 60, then another
60. He didn't speak.
He didn't shake the tent, he just watched.
Headlights washed across the sights as a car moved along US
36 beyond the fence. The beam swept our way.
The man rose smoothly and jogged into the trees.
No stumble, no sound beyond that careful crunch.
When the sky lightened, we found the evidence I already knew
would be there. 2 sets of human tracks circling the tent, 1
narrow and barefoot with the big toe slightly splayed, the other
a wider boot tread. The loops went around twice, cut
toward the food hang, then returned to the tent.
No animal sign, no trash rated. Our cooler, still locked in the
car, was untouched. We packed the stove and
valuables, left the tent up and drove straight to Beaver Meadows
Visitor Center. When it opened, I gave the desk
Ranger a straight report times site number, behavior, the two
different tracks, and that the barefoot man crouched and stared
at our tent for several minutes. The Ranger listened like he'd
heard versions of this before. He said he'd notify Larimer
County Sheriff's Office because Elk Meadow is outside the park
boundary, then reminded us to keep food hung and not to
confront anyone lingering around the sights.
Call if something changes. He said.
It wasn't a brush off, it was the advice they give when people
are the problem. We went into town, got coffee,
and bought a cheap door alarm and extra paracord from a
hardware aisle back at the campground.
Around midday, we relocated to a site a few spaces closer to an
occupied fifth wheel. We rigged a simple ankle height
line around our tent with a camp mug clipped on so it would clink
if the line moved. We set our keys and headlamps
where we could grab them without searching.
The evening was loud in the normal way.
Elk bugled somewhere down toward Moraine Park.
Cold crept in as the last day hikers trickled past.
Only a handful of rigs remained. We ate, cleaned up and got
horizontal again, both of us pretending to read on our phones
until our eyes kept watering from the cold air.
The mug clinked once around 1:45, then again a higher sound,
like the line had been lifted instead of kicked.
The vestibule zipper twitched. Slow testing.
Mason's hand found my forearm. I slid my shoes on without tying
them. Two men spoke just outside, not
right at the door, but close enough that I felt the fabric
move a little with their steps. I couldn't make out words, only
the way one voice carried more weight.
A finger pressed into the nylon near my knee.
Whoever it was was mapping where bodies were.
I dialed 911 with the volume on mute and gave the dispatcher our
site number and a clean summary. She said an LCSO unit was on the
way, 15 to 20 minutes. We didn't announce anything.
We didn't cough or rustle or try to scare them off.
We stayed still. The heavier steps shifted to the
vestibule. The cord tightened, then
slackened. Someone tugged the zipper half
an inch and held. I pressed my palm against the
door to keep it closed, imagining the blade under my
other hand and what it would feel like if I had to use it
through nylon. I didn't want that.
I wanted the sheriff's headlights and an easy exit.
Lights swept the campground this time, turning in.
The men moved fast into the trees at the fence line, not
crashing, just gone. A sheriff's SUV rolled up
minutes later. The deputy kept his voice low,
moved his light like he knew the difference between searching and
waking people, and found partial prints behind the site, the same
barefoot pattern in the Duff and a heavier boot tread cutting
toward Mary's Lake Rd. Through a break in the split
rail, he knocked on the 5th wheel 2 spaces down.
No one there had seen anything. He offered to sit with us until
dawn or escort us out. Pride made us decide to hold.
I didn't sleep again. At first light.
We broke camp fast. Everything went into the car.
We told ourselves we'd at least see the elk in the open before
heading home. Drive by only, no hiking.
We turned left from the campground and pulled into a
paved turn out just past the Beaver Meadows entrance.
A few other cars idled with windows cracked.
I felt better with bodies around, even if no one knew us.
Across the Meadow, a denim jacket stood half inside a
Willow thicket. Bare legs, bare feet.
He wasn't glassing for animals. His head turned from pull out to
pull out and then it stopped on ours.
He stepped into the open and crossed the road down the line
from us, not looking at traffic. I hit the lock button anyway and
started the engine. Go, Mason said.
A second man stepped out from trees near the access drive.
Ball cap boots. He didn't block the lane.
He placed himself where we would roll if we pulled out.
I backed hard. Tires chirped on cold pavement
and turned toward town. In the side mirror, the barefoot
man broke into a run, his feet slapping asphalt, the other one
jogging the shoulder. They didn't shout.
They didn't wave their arms. They angled for our passenger
side like they knew the timing of the curve below the visitor
center. At the small roundabout by the
visitor center, they cut across the grass to keep us in view.
I took US 36 downhill past the park and ride.
An old sedan eased out from a gravel patch with hazard lights
blinking. It didn't block us completely.
It rolled just far enough to force a choice.
I shoulder checked for the right.
The barefoot man was already there, sprinting along the white
line, his hand looking for the seam of our passenger door.
A Colorado Parks and Wildlife truck appeared behind us and let
a quick siren chirp. The sedan jerked onto the
shoulder. The barefoot man veered into the
ditch. The man in boots disappeared
behind a sign. I stayed on the horn all the way
into Estes Park and pulled straight into the lot for the
Police Department. We gave statements to an officer
from Estes Park and the LCSO deputy who met us there.
Same facts, same times, same details.
I showed them the notes I'd typed after the first night.
Site number, direction of the fence break, the thing with the
zipper. The deputy nodded like that
matched other reports he'd heard.
They told us they were going to sweep the pull outs, the
trailheads and the storage lots down by Mary's Lake Rd.
People camp in the scrub there in the offseason.
Some are just broke and trying to stay warm.
Some test cars in tents. We went home that afternoon.
By the time we hit Loveland, the relief had faded into the kind
of fatigue you get after a narrow miss.
I slept hard that night, and when I woke up, the tent smell
on my skin made me flinch before I remembered I was in my
apartment late the next day, a Ranger called.
They'd found a makeshift camp behind a storage yard off Mary's
Lake Rd. Two men were detained there, and
1/3 was sighted near Lake Estes after he tried to flag drivers
with a My Car Won't Start story. The descriptions matched our
denim jacket and the boots. The barefoot guy had shoes, but
they didn't fit thrift store pickups, the Ranger guest, so he
sometimes took them off to move quieter and to break up tread
patterns. In their camp were food items,
hand tools, and small stuff that campers lose or report missing
when the season thins out. Tent stakes, cordage, a couple
of cheap headlamps, a multi tool, a bag of propane
canisters. Nothing like a weapon stockpile
enough to paint the picture. The Ranger didn't dress it up.
They've been testing zippers and looking for unlocked cars after
dark. He said, waiting for the easy
ones. You called at the right time.
A week later we got a short follow up.
The two main guys were charged with trespass and theft.
The driver with the hazards got a citation for assisting.
Our report was added to the stack.
If the DA needed us, someone would call.
No one did after that. What stuck with me wasn't any
supernatural idea. It was realizing how quickly a
quiet campground turns into a spreadsheet of your decisions.
Did you park nose out? Are your keys where your hand
lands in the dark? Do you know the road to town
without thinking? Do you get out the first night
or do you wait to see what happens the second?
If you camp late in the season around Estes Park, you'll hear
elk and Hwy. noise and maybe a tent zipper from someone who got
up to pee. If you hear slow, patient steps
that pause to listen, call, bring other people into it, move
your site closer to neighbors, or leave.
Don't run the stubborn experiment we ran.
I still like the sound of Duff under boots, but sometimes when
my apartment gets quiet and the fridge kicks on, I remember the
weight of a finger pressing into a nylon wall and the kind of
attention that doesn't come from animals or stories.
It comes from people who learn your routines and look for the
seam. That's all this was, and that's
exactly why it was terrifying. I grew up in the Silver Valley,
and if you spend enough winters there, you learn the back roads
the way other people learn family trees, who cut them, who
drove them before they were signed, where they wash out in
spring. My dad worked the mines when I
was little. I took a different path,
eventually got a steady job in northern Idaho, but I still hunt
and camp in the same hills. My son Ryan turned 16 this year.
He shoots well, carries his weight, and is old enough to
want memories that belong to him.
Early November, right before the heavy snow, felt like a last
chance trip. Short days, cold ground, clear
air. We'd camp above Kellogg near the
old Smelter ruins on the spur everyone calls Old Smelter Rd.
then hike the ridges the next morning and be home by Sunday
night. We rolled off I-90 at
Smelterville just after three, grabbed coffee at the gas
station and headed up the narrow Rd. that climbs into the timber
and old claims. Large needles lay in thick mats
where the wind had dropped them and the ground had that frozen
thawing look crunch on top. Mud underneath The smelter
foundation sits like a broken tooth in a small flat above the
Creek. You can still see the angles
where walls used to stand and the concrete is pitted and black
in places. Some people say the soil up
there is bad, others shrug and say it's been a long time.
I've camped worse places. We parked the truck on the
firmest patch of ground I could find, 30 yards from the ruins,
and set the tent. Canvas wall, stove, Jack Cots
Ryan gathered deadfall and I split kindling while the water
heated on the camp stove past the concrete.
The slope rose in a mess of Alder and fur, then broke into
open ground with slash piles and old dozer berms.
No houses up there, no lights after dark except what you
carry. That's part of what I wanted for
him. Silence.
You can measure the kind that makes you hear how loud your own
movements are. We ate early, venison backstrap
and potatoes in foil, then checked our hunting rifles, hung
the food and ran through morning plans.
Ridge trail to the east. Look for sign in the draws.
Cut back on the old Spur Rd. Ryan had been reading about the
mining days and asked me what it looked like when the stacks were
running. I only remember the tail end
night, orange over smoke, a smell like batteries, and my
dad's hands coming home black no matter how hard he scrubbed at
the sink. By 7 it was full dark.
The temperature dropped fast. Fire felt good.
Ryan told a story about a guy from school who swore he saw a
Mountain Lion cross a neighborhood yard and Post Falls
like it owned it. We laughed.
After a while we stopped talking and watched the fire.
The sound you get at night up there isn't quiet.
It's small things working, needles falling, frost forming,
the little clicks and adjustments of metal cooling.
I've heard those 1000 times and never thought much about them.
Around 8 though, I noticed a pattern that wasn't random.
Short, careful movement in the brush, stop.
Then three more steps, stop. Ryan heard it too.
He looked at me, not scared, but alert.
Deer, I said. Maybe elk nosing around the
edge. The wind ran in light gusts from
the east. Every time it shifted, a smell
came with it that didn't belong to cold dirt or wet leaves.
Not skunk, Not dead deer. A sour edge, like spoiled milk
and something iron. You smell that in the field
sometimes, when someone's gut shot an animal and it's laid up
a while. But there was no shot, and it
held even when the wind went steady and the fire burned
clean. Probably a carcass down in the
draw, I said. Coyotes working it, Keep your
light low if you need it. We put another log on and let
the night move. The careful steps came and went,
always sticking to the same depth beyond the light, like
something keeping the circle. I kept telling myself, dear, do
odd things and the smell would make sense in the morning.
Around 10, the fire settled into a bed of coals and the heat
became steady instead of bright. The wind shifted again.
The metallic edge got stronger enough to taste in the back of
the throat. Ryan coughed, then covered it
like he didn't want to give anything away.
He reached for his bolt action rifle and slid around in with
that smooth, quiet motion you get when you've practiced
because your dad made you. I checked my own deer rifle,
mostly so he would see me do it and not feel jumpy for having
his in hand. The dragging sound started close
to 11. A scrape first, then a definite
pull. Wait on dirt, Stop another pull.
Not wheels, not hooves. I pointed toward the truck, and
Ryan nodded. We didn't panic.
We stood up together and stepped to the far side of the fire,
where our packs and boots set. You can feel when something has
found you rather than just happened across you.
That's the closest I can get to describing it without dressing
it up. The sound circled, disappeared,
then came back from higher on the slope.
Every time it stopped. The night went solid.
At midnight I saw it. Not a full shape at first
movement at the edge of the glow just outside where the light
dies. Tall shoulders lifted high, like
someone carrying a load with the wrong muscles.
It moved without the swing you get when people walk relaxed.
The steps were long and fast, but flat, like each foot
expected the ground to give. A dark bundle hung over one
shoulder. It swayed heavy and bumped
against the figures back. I didn't say anything, I just
watched. It took two more steps and
turned its head. I saw the dark Oval where a face
would be and what looked like a cap pulled low.
There was no beam of light on it, no eye shine, nothing to
hang the shape on except angles. My body did that thing where it
gets ready all at once. I reached behind me and put a
hand on Ryan's coat without looking away.
He didn't speak. The figure stopped.
The bundle slid from its shoulder and hit the ground with
a dull thud, like wet fabric full of something dense.
Both hands came down to adjust whatever harness or strap had
been across its chest. I saw a brief flash of metal
buckle or ring caught by the coals.
It stood there for a second, facing us, not moving, and I
understood we were looking at each other.
Kill the Lantern, I said, low. Ryan clicked it off, and the
clearing compressed to the fire in the cold.
The figure started toward us. Not a charge, not posturing.
Just a straight walk that erased distance too fast.
That's what made it wrong. It came like somebody who had
done this before and didn't need to think about it.
Ryan's breath hitched. I stepped backward to the truck.
I said. My voice sounded like I had to
push it through something. We stomped the fire with our
boots. Embers scattered, then dimmed.
The dark pressed in. Every step we took toward the
truck felt loud, even though we tried for quiet.
Behind us, the footsteps changed from dirt to small stones and
then to the hard patch near the fire, and the pace quickened in
a way that made the hair on my forearms rise.
I didn't run. Running breaks you up.
I got to the driver's side, yanked the door and slid in with
my rifle across the seat. Ryan was already in and had his
rifle pointed down with the safety on like I drilled him to
do. The Dome light was off because
I'd killed it months before for exactly this kind of thing.
The key turned slow. The engine caught with a shutter
that told me it was colder than I'd thought.
Headlights flared. The beam hit the bundle first.
It wasn't a pack. It was a sleeping bag.
Dark blue, ripped in long tears and still zipped shut.
The zipper tab glinted. The bag bulged unevenly,
something inside had mass enough to flatten the grasses beneath,
and where the fabric was torn I saw the pail of stuffing or
something else, I don't know. I don't claim more than that.
Ryan made a sound I'd never heard from him, a half inhale
that locked his chest for a beat.
The figure didn't flinch at the lights.
It was closer than I wanted to see.
A long coat hung stiff over pants tucked into boots.
The shoulders were square and wrong in the coat, built out or
crooked, I couldn't tell. The head stayed down like
somebody peering from under a brim.
I couldn't make features. The smell hit us hard through
the trucks vents, sweet and sour and metallic, and that snapped
everything. Loose seat belt, I said.
He clicked it. I dropped the column shifter
into drive. The rear tires skated on the icy
top layer and then bit. Gravel pinged the undercarriage.
The figure took three more steps and blurred at the edge of the
beams as I turned. Then it was behind us and the
trees caught the light instead. Old Smelter Rd. isn't a place to
drive fast at night. There are ruts that will grab
your axle and ditches that come out of nowhere.
I drove fast anyway. The headlights showed a tunnel
of branches and the battered line of the road.
The truck heaved and thumped. I kept my hands steady and my
foot even. My mind tracked distance to the
highway like it could stitch it shorter.
No one followed within the lights.
Every turn felt like it would be the one where we'd meet
headlights coming the other way, but there weren't any.
We hit the town lights of Kellogg like coming out of
water. I overshot the turn for the
motel and took us straight to the Shoshone County Sheriff's
Office. The lot was mostly empty.
I parked crooked and left the truck running inside.
The night deputy looked tired until he saw our faces and our
rifles cased under our arms. Then he stood up straight.
I told him everything. I didn't try to make it sound
tidy. Ryan sat next to me and stared
at the floor, listening. The deputy nodded, the way cops
do when they're listening for the parts they can act on.
He asked where, how far up the spur, Exactly what I'd seen.
When I got to the sleeping bag, he asked me twice if I was sure
it was zipped. I said yes.
He asked if I'd touched anything.
I said no. He called someone in the back.
Within 15 minutes, two more cars rolled in, one with a crime
scene kit in the back. They asked us to hang around
town and to make a list of anything we'd left at camp.
They didn't tell us to go back. They didn't tell us not to.
Their eyes said enough. We checked into the Silver
Mountain Motel and agreed we wouldn't go home until someone
told us to. I slept in pieces.
Every time my eyes closed, I saw the bag on the ground in the
headlights and the way it held its shape.
Ryan didn't sleep. He lay on his side with his back
to me like he thought I wouldn't notice.
Around six, I gave up and turned on the news, kept the volume
low. We ate breakfast at the diner by
the freeway. A retired miner at the counter
looked over once, then again, then turned his stool.
Roads up there ain't for camping this time of year, he said.
Not a question. He had the kind of face that
gets carved by weather. We were headed out first thing I
said. He nodded.
Some folks don't come down in winter.
Claim jumpers, sometimes other kinds.
He took a sip of coffee. You leave it alone when the
smell's wrong. You did that.
By late morning, a detective met us at the station.
He had the grave, measured manner of a man who has
delivered news before. He thanked us for reporting,
said a team had secured the site and told us there would be an
investigation. He didn't tell us what they
found. When I asked.
He shook his head once and said you did the right thing.
Go home, we'll be in touch if we need you.
We drove back on I-90 with the heater blowing hard and the day
looking cleaner than it felt at Smelterville.
I glanced toward the hills and hated that I couldn't see any
part of where we'd been. Those ridges fold into each
other. You can be 100 yards off the
road and not exist to anyone at home.
I unloaded the rifles and made Ryan show me his hands.
They were steady. He said he was fine.
He wasn't. I wasn't either.
We didn't say that out loud. I made venison chili and we ate
too much of it and watched a dumb show.
The house felt small in a way that usually means safety.
That night, I locked the back door twice.
Two days later, a deputy from Shoshone called to confirm our
serial numbers on the rifles and asked if we'd be available if
needed. He didn't say for what.
A week after that, a short item ran in the paper about evidence
collected in connection with a suspected crime scene north of
Smelterville. No names, no details.
People at the grocery store talked over their carts like
they were standing at a fence. Somebody said the Sheriff's
Office had asked the Forest Service to close part of a Spur
Rd. due to unsafe conditions. Someone else said a game warden
told her to stop hiking alone near the old stacks.
In towns like ours, truth and rumor take the same routes. 3
weeks later, a detective sat at our kitchen table and unfolded a
single sheet of paper. He said they'd identified a
missing person from Spokane Valley using a dental match.
He said remains were recovered. He didn't use words like
accident. He didn't ask us to look at
photos. He asked one more time if either
of us had touched the sleeping bag.
We said no. He said there was an ongoing
investigation and thanked us again for leaving when we did
and calling when we did. He told me quietly, because Ryan
was in the next room, that the decision not to lift the bag,
not to poke at it or open it or try to be a hero in the dark had
likely kept us from being part of the case instead of witnesses
to it. I took Ryan for a drive after
the detective left. We didn't go near Kellogg.
We ran the Lake Rd. and looked at early ice new to the coves.
I told him fear is information, and that leaving is often the
smartest thing a man can do. I told him there's a kind of
person who uses places like Old Smelter Rd. the way a snare uses
a game trail, and that recognizing that has nothing to
do with being brave or not. He said he understood.
He kept his eyes on the water in spring, when the last of the
snow receded from the north faces.
I took a roundabout way back from a job and passed the turn
for the spur. There were fresh signs posted,
No trespassing, authorized vehicles only, and a new chain
across the rough entrance where people used to pull off to shoot
or drink. It wasn't much of A barrier.
It was enough to make me keep driving.
We never went back. The gear we left up there, a
folding saw, a camp chair, a small Lantern stopped mattering
the second I saw the bag. Sometimes I think about the
figures gate, that flat step that ate up ground like a
machine set for a job. I remind myself it was just a
person, because that's the most frightening and the most useful
way to hold it. A person did that.
A person carried that weight on a shoulder.
A person decided where to stop. When people ask why I keep a
hard rule about where we camp now, I tell them the truth.
We spent one night above Kellogg, near the old smelter.
We heard a dragging sound in the brush and smelled a thing.
I hope you never smell. We saw someone in our fire light
carrying a zipped sleeping bag that had no reason to be heavy.
We left. We drove to town and told the
sheriff. Someone's loved one got
identified somewhere. A family got an answer they've
been waiting on. If there's anything worth making
a rule around, it's that on clear winter mornings, you can
see the ridges above Smelterville from the freeway.
They stack up dark against the sky, fold after fold.
I still catch myself looking up as I pass, not because I want to
go there, but because those hills are a map of decisions.
We set up a tent, we made a fire, we listened, we left.
My son came home. That's the whole story and it's
enough. I grew up in West Virginia and
learned to camp from my dad before I learned to drive.
My younger brother Jason and I still try to get out a couple
times a year. We stick to public land, leave
no trace and keep our food put away.
We aren't thrill seekers. We go to fish, eat too much over
a fire and sleep hard. Early last October we picked a
spot I'd only heard about from an old Co worker, Lost Fork
Creek in the Monongahela National Forest, Tucker County
side. He said the trout were small but
aggressive and that if you were willing to rattle down a rough
service Rd. you could camp close enough to the water to fall
asleep to the sound of it. We left Elkins late morning,
stopped in Parsons for gas and ice and turned onto the Forest
Rd. just past Red Creek. The pavement gave up quick after
that. It was gravel, then two ruts
with weeds in the middle. The map showed a spur that went
toward Lost Fork Creek and we took it crawling along in 4
high. The trees closed in and the sky
went from blue to a dull Gray filter.
No bars on the phone, which we expected.
We passed one faded wooden sign with a Forest Service number I
don't remember, and one fire ring that looked like it hadn't
seen a flame in years. The clearing we chose sat about
50 yards from the water on a flat patch of dirt and leaves.
Someone had built a waist high ring of stones years ago.
There were no fresh tracks, no beer cans, no cut saplings.
If anyone had camped there recently, they were tidy.
We parked the truck nose out of the clearing in case we needed
to turn around fast, then set up two small tents, A tarp over the
cooking area, and hung a bear bag.
It was cold enough for your breath to show once the sun
dipped, but the day was bright and calm.
That first afternoon we fished. The Creek was narrow but lively,
clear enough to see small pools against the undercuts.
We kept a couple 8 inch trout and let the rest go.
We salted the fish, wrapped them in foil with a little butter,
and set them on the coals while a pot of coffee perked on a wire
grate. It felt like every other good
camp out we've had, quiet in a way you only get when you're a
long way off a highway. The only random sounds were
acorns dropping through branches and the occasional snap from the
fire. We turned in early.
Nothing happened the first night beyond normal woods noise.
I woke up once to pee and stood for a minute, watching my breath
in the beam of my headlamp. The Creek made a steady, low
sound. I could smell wet leaves in wood
smoke. Jason snored, which he denies,
and I slept again. Day 2.
We hiked upstream with light packs and found a wider bend
where the Creek slowed down. The air had that glassy feel you
get before a cold front. We saw no one, no distant
engines, no voices. Mid afternoon we headed back,
gathered more wood, and ate early.
By dark, the temperature had dropped hard enough that the
coffee felt mandatory. We let the fire sink to a steady
bed of coals and talked mostly about boring stuff, Jason's
transmission making a noise whether it was worth re roofing
the garage ourselves. The first splash came while I
was mid sentence. It wasn't a fish.
If you've spent time around water, you can tell the
difference. This was a heavy rock hitting
from up our side of the Creek, not far, probably 40 or 50 yards
upstream. We both went quiet. 10 minutes
later, another. The timing was weirdly even, not
frantic, not random. Same spot, same wait.
A third came after another stretch of silence.
It wasn't wind knocking something loose, it was placed.
Someone's messing with us, Jason said.
Maybe a fisherman, I said, though it was full, dark and
getting colder by the minute. We both stood, lights off,
trying to pick up any shape between the trunks.
The fire hissed a bit where a green stick had slipped into the
coals. Hey.
I yelled toward the sound. We're camping right here, Knock
it off. The rock tossing stopped.
The quiet that settled in after wasn't dramatic.
It was the kind of hush you notice when you realize how much
noise water covers. Then we heard footsteps on the
far bank. Slow, heavy, careful moving
along the narrow gravel edge. Crunch, pause, crunch.
The weight sounded like a person, not a deer.
We grabbed our lights and swept them, and for a split second I
caught a form between 2 trees. Tall, broad through the
shoulders, an old canvas coat hanging long.
The beam hit bark, hit leaves, then a pale shape that moved
fast out of sight, back behind a trunk.
No face, no details I could hold.
Hey. Jason said, louder this time.
That angry voice you get when you're spooked and don't want to
sound like it. We're armed.
He didn't wait for an answer. He pulled his lever action deer
rifle from the tent vestibule, thumbed the safety, and fired
straight up. The crack came back off the
slope across the Creek and died out.
I watched the spot where I'd seen the coat.
Nothing moved. Then, from somewhere a little
farther back in the trees, came a deep, wet coughing sound.
Short bursts, like someone trying to clear a chest that
won't cooperate. It wasn't theatrical.
It sounded like a real person who was sick or had been smoking
for 40 years. OK, I said, we're done, pack it.
We killed the fire with a pot of Creek water, stirred the ash and
poured another pot on for good measure.
We packed in silence, each of us pausing now and then to scan the
trees with our lights. No more rocks.
No more footsteps near the water.
Once up on the hill across the road, I saw a darker shape
inside the dark, just stillness that shouldn't have been there,
then nothing when I hit it with light.
The walk out was under 2 miles, but it felt longer because the
road got tight in places and the slope pushed down toward the
Creek on one side and up toward broken rock on the other.
We kept our headlamps pointed low so we wouldn't blind each
other and moved fast without running.
Not 20 yards into it, we heard something in the trees keeping
pace. To our right, leaves brushed.
A small branch shifted, then quiet, then the sound again.
When we moved. It never crashed, never rushed.
It just paralleled us, matching our walk.
When we stopped, it stopped. When we started, it started.
I would have written it off as nerves if Jason hadn't whispered
it's pacing us without me asking what he heard.
We hit the first tight spot where the road narrowed and
climbed a little. The slope on our right rose,
steep and close. I swung my light up and caught
eyeshine for a fraction of a second.
The height was wrong for a deer, too high and too steady.
Then it was gone. Not with a run, just with a
small shift deeper into the trees.
The smell of wood smoke drifted across us in a faint thread.
We didn't see a fire. There was nowhere flat enough
close by, and the scent faded fast.
We kept moving. I counted my steps out loud for
a while, just to keep my brain from jumping to the worst
conclusion. Around a bend, the truck finally
came into view, silver in the headlamps like a promise.
As soon as it did, the pacing stopped.
The woods didn't do anything dramatic.
The small noises just went back to what they'd been before.
We threw our bags in the bed, got in, and locked the doors
without speaking. I started the engine and kept it
in low until the road widened again.
Then we drove back toward Parsons like we were on rails.
Neither of us wanted to look in the mirrors.
We took a room at a cheap roadside motel.
The clerk asked if we were fishing and told us the state
was going to stock a different Creek the next week.
I nodded like I was listening. I slept in my jeans at 7 the
next morning, we went to the Ranger station.
I figured we should at least tell someone that there was a
person out there throwing rocks and pacing campers through the
trees. The Ranger who talked to us was
in his 50s. Calm the way people get when
nothing in the woods surprises them anymore.
I told him everything. The rocks, the coat, the
coughing, the pace in the tree line, the way it all stopped
when we got to our truck. I was careful not to add any
extra to make it sound more dramatic.
He listened until I finished and then asked what Rd. number we'd
taken in. I told him what I remembered,
the turn off past Red Creek and how the spur got tight.
He nodded and said Lost Fork. He didn't act shocked.
He didn't joke, He said. We've got a guy who lives out
there, has for a long time off the grid, keeps to himself most
of the year. He's not friendly in October.
There aren't enough people around, and he doesn't like
company close to the Creek. If you camp too near his area,
he'll try to make you leave. Rocks, footsteps.
Sometimes he coughs loud enough you can hear it across the
water. Jason asked if the man had a
name. Not one we use.
The Ranger said we don't have an address to put on a report, even
if we wanted to. People see him now and then in
an old coat. He knows the old logging paths
better than we do. There's no reception out there,
and he's got enough space to move.
We keep an eye on it when we can.
If you're set on camping in that district, stay E toward Red
Creek or South toward Otter Creek.
You'll be happier. So what do we do?
I asked. You already did it.
He said you left. I'll log your note.
If you go back into Lost Fork in the fall, stay well off the
water and don't set up at any old rings.
If he starts with the rocks, don't yell back and don't try to
chase him. Just leave.
He's not chasing you off the forest, he's chasing you off his
spot. He said his spot without drama.
Then he thanked us for coming in, reminded us of the fire
rules, and that was it. We got breakfast in Parsons, sat
quiet for a while, and drove home.
On the way, we passed 2 access points for Dolly Sods and agreed
out loud to stick to places with actual trails and other campers
for the rest of the season. We didn't tell the story to make
it sound supernatural, because there was nothing supernatural
about it. It was a person.
A big person in a coat who knows those woods better than we ever
will. I still camp.
I still fish. I will not camp near Lost Fork
Creek again. There's a difference between
solitude and someone else's backyard.
I can still hear that coughing when I think about it, and I can
still feel the steady pace in the trees lining up with our
steps. Nothing theatrical, just a
reminder that we weren't alone and that we'd wandered where we
weren't wanted. The next time we went out, we
camped near a maintained trail and woke up to two trail runners
laughing as they passed our sight at dawn.
That sound was a relief. A month later, I called the
Ranger station back to ask about Winter Rd. closures.
And the person who answered recognized my name.
He said the same thing the 1st Ranger did.
If we wanted quiet and safe, stick to Red Creek or Otter
Creek and give Lost Fork a wide berth in the shoulder seasons we
have. When people ask me for a good
fall spot, I give them those names and leave Lost Fork out of
it. Some places are pretty because
they're empty. Some places are empty because
someone made them that way. For what it's worth, I don't
think the man wanted to hurt us. He wanted us gone.
We went, that was the end of it. That's the whole story.
I'm not from Oregon, but I know the state well enough to pick a
quiet lake when I want one. Fall Creek Lake sits east of
Eugene, tucked into the foothills where the trees close
in and the air carries that sharp cold smell you only get in
October. The campground maps show plenty
of formal sites, but there are also pull outs and primitive
spots if you follow the narrow gravel roads along the shore.
That's what we were after. Space, a fire and a weekend
without anyone parked 10 feet away.
It was supposed to be our last easy trip before the heavy rain
set in. Rachel and I left Eugene after
lunch, stopped in Springfield for fuel and ice, and took the
highway out toward Lowell. By the time we turned off onto
Big Fall Creek Rd. the sky had that flat Gray look it gets
before dusk. The lake ran beside us on the
left. Quiet and slate colored the
surface so still the trees reflected in it like a second
shoreline. We passed a couple of day use
areas, a shuttered snack stand and a closed restroom building
with the doors chained. Farther on.
The asphalt gave way to good gravel, then to something
rougher. Potholes, washboard sections and
more fallen leaves than Rd. in places.
We found our spot at the end of a faint spur.
It opened to a small clearing about 20 yards from the water
with a blackened ring of stones where someone had built a fire
earlier in the season. No one was within sight.
It felt like we'd chosen the last open mouth of the lake, the
part where even the small boats don't bother to go.
We set the tent, staked the corners, and ran a tarp from a
low branch to keep the drizzle off the entrance.
I gathered wood while Rachel sorted the cook kit.
The air cooled fast. I could see my breath by the
time I got flame in the pit. The heat on my hands felt good,
almost medicinal. After we ate, we walked the
trail that hugged the shore. That's where we saw him.
He stood knee deep in the shallows with a rod in his hand,
slow casting toward a point that made a little pocket of calm
water. He was older, late 50s or early
60s, with a flattened posture like he'd done a lot of work
that never let his back fully straighten again.
An old green rain jacket hung open at the chest, and his jeans
were wet to the knees. He turned when he heard our
steps on the gravel and gave us a small wave.
Not friendly exactly, more like acknowledgement.
His face didn't match the wave. His eyes stayed on us a little
too long, tracking us the way you watch a car that might drift
into your lane. Evening, I said.
He didn't answer. He looked at Rachel, then at the
trail behind us, and then back at the lake.
The rod tip twitched, the line made a lazy arc and landed near
the point we walked on. When we were out of earshot,
Rachel said. No cooler, no bucket, no tackle
box. He could have stuff in the
truck, I said. What truck?
She asked. We hadn't seen one close by.
Back at camp. We added wood and sat close.
Rachel read on her phone until the battery ticked into the red
and she switched it off and put it away.
A breeze moved across the lake, nothing heavy, just enough to
push smoke past us in small waves.
Around 10, the drizzle got steadier.
We put out the fire, zipped the tent and crawled into sleeping
bags. The rain sounded like a constant
soft hiss on the tarp and the nylon above our heads.
I fell asleep fast. Sometime after midnight, I woke
up to a noise against the tent wall.
It wasn't scraping, it wasn't the sound of branches.
It was that faint dragging brush you get when something moves
close and the fabric trembles against it.
I lay still, breath held. After 5 or 6 seconds there was
another touch, higher this time, closer to the zipper.
Raccoon, I whispered to myself, because saying something out
loud sometimes makes it true. I unzipped, leaned out, and hit
the flashlight. The beam cut the clearing into
clean shapes, firing stacked wood.
The tarp line. Wet leaves are cooler.
The rain had stopped. No animal eyes reflected back,
no sound of claws scurrying off. Just the lake breathing quietly
at the edge of the dark. Anything.
Rachel asked behind me. Nothing there, I said, and let
the flap fall. I listened for another minute.
It stayed silent. I told myself a strap had worked
loose and tapped the nylon. I tightened a guy line, checked
the zip, and got back in. I slept, but lightly, the way
you sleep on planes, technically unconscious, but a sentence away
from waking. Morning came Gray and clean.
We made coffee and oatmeal and decided on a longer hike before
lunch. As we turned onto the main
trail, we saw the fisherman again, in the same general spot
as the night before. He didn't look surprised to see
us. He didn't look anything.
He reeled in, cast out, reeled in.
When we were adjacent to him, he gave the same small wave,
exactly the same shape of hand and wrist, like he'd practiced
it. I nodded back.
Rachel kept her eyes on the path.
Still no cooler, she said when we'd passed.
Maybe he's catching release, I said.
But even as I said it, I didn't buy it.
No net, no Stringer, no pliers clipped to a pocket, not even a
small tackle tray in the jacket. Just a rod in the water and that
stiff posture. The loop took us higher along
the shoreline and then dropped us back toward the road.
We returned to camp mid afternoon.
The temperature had dropped a few degrees.
We collected more wood and watched cloud bands creep over
the hills on the far side of the lake.
The idea of the noise from last night sat in my head like a
small weight. I didn't talk about it, but I
did something about it. In the glove compartment of the
car, behind the registration and a faded state parks map, I kept
a small luggage lock, the kind that threads through zipper
pulls on a backpack. I brought it back to the tent,
clicked it through the 2 metal loops on the main door and held
it up with a mock grand gesture. High security.
I said and made Rachel smile, but I wasn't really joking.
We ate early, by 9 the light around us felt thin and cold.
We doused the fire and retreated to the tent.
I lay awake longer than I wanted to, counting Rachel's breaths to
keep my own even. At some point I must have
slipped under, because the next thing I knew, Rachel's hand was
on my shoulder, squeezing hard. Do you hear that?
She whispered. I didn't at first, then I did.
It was the zipper. Not a fast pull, not that loud
rasp you'd hear if someone didn't care who noticed.
It was the slow test of tension, 1mm at a time, the way you open
something you don't want to disturb.
The fabric above the door vibrated as pressure shifted
against it. I slid my hand to the
flashlight. I knew where it was by feel.
I kept my thumb off the switch. Rachel's grip got tighter.
The sound continued. 2 inches of pull, then stop, then a little
more. The lock should have stopped it.
I pictured the two little metal loops threaded together.
I pictured a hand worrying at them in the dark.
I held the light low against my chest.
I waited until the sound hovered right above the poles.
Then I turned the light on and shot the beam straight through
the nylon at the zipper. The thin fabric glowed pale, and
for a fraction of a second a shadow cut across it, taller
than I'd expected. A shoulder and a head, the
outline of a forearm raised. Footsteps followed, quick ones,
not trying to hide, now crunching through wet leaves,
not toward the road, but deeper into the trees on the inland
side of the clearing. I tracked the beam along the
seams, then killed it and listened.
The footsteps faded, then nothing, Not even the sound of
the lake. We sat like that for a long
time. We didn't talk much.
There wasn't anything to say that didn't sound like a guess.
At one point I said if he's still out there, he knows we're
awake. And that made Rachel's breathing
go shallow, so I stopped talking altogether.
I held the flashlight in my hand until my fingers hurt.
First light took its time arriving.
When it did, it came in a dull block.
We unzipped and stepped out. The air carried the damp smell
of soaked dirt. The clearing looked normal until
we looked down. There were boot prints around
the tent, big ones, probably a size 11 or 12 by my eyeballing.
They came in from the trees, circled wide once tighter again,
and then stopped in front of the door.
The mud was fresh enough to hold small tread marks.
I crouched and measured one with my palm.
The toes had pressed deeper than the heels, like the person was
leaned forward, weight over the balls of the feet.
The zipper was down, maybe an inch.
The tiny brass lock wasn't there.
Rachel reached for the poles, then stopped, like the zipper
might bite. Don't touch it, she said, and
didn't know why she was saying it until the words were out.
We packed. It took 10 minutes.
I shoved the coolers and the cook kit in the back of the car
and collapsed the tent in three movements, pins still stuck
through the corner loops. My hands shook as I bent poles.
The clearing felt different in daylight, exposed, not safe.
We took the trail back to the main road.
I kept turning to look behind us, checking for movement that
never came. The world was quiet in the way
it gets after a long night. Everything muted, like sound
itself is tired. We didn't pass anyone at the
trailhead. 2 vehicles sat in the lot, our car and a white older
model Chevy truck with peeling paint and a dented rear bumper.
It was parked at a slight angle, nose toward the trees, like
someone had pulled in fast and cut the wheel late.
The bed held a sun bleached sleeping bag and a jumble of
fishing line that had knotted on itself.
An empty soda bottle rolled in a groove near the tailgate.
Rachel slowed. Is that his?
She asked. I don't know, I said, but I knew
it was the only truck here. The driver's window was up.
The passenger's window was down an inch.
Through the glass on the floorboard, I saw shoes.
Women's shoes, flats and cheap sandals. 2 pairs of running
shoes, all in different sizes, all clean.
Not lined up, not tucked away, just piled like they'd been
kicked. There, sitting on the seat above
them, was a plastic grocery bag, tied in a knot.
I could make out a brush through the thin film of the bag.
A hair brush. Long strands of hair were
pitched across the bristles, dark and tangled.
My brain took in the details at a very slow speed, like it was
trying to spare me the full picture by limiting bandwidth.
I felt Rachel's hand on my elbow.
She didn't squeeze. She didn't have to.
I could feel her trembling. I put my free hand over hers and
steered us to our car. We loaded the last of the gear.
I looked up once and saw movement across the lot 30 yards
away, on the far side of the trees, a man stepped out from
the shade. Same posture, same green jacket,
no rod in his hand. He looked at us, no expression.
His eyes tracked the way they had the day before, following
the space between us, then settling on the line of the
road. I turned the key.
The engine caught on the first try, thank God.
We backed out, pulled onto the gravel and didn't speak until we
hit pavement again, Sheriff Rachel said.
Sheriff I agreed. We drove straight into Eugene.
The Lane County Sheriff's Office sits in a squat complex not far
from the river. We parked, walked in carrying
nothing, and told the duty deputy we needed to report
something. The man behind the glass didn't
interrupt. He handed us a form, then came
around to a small interview room and let us talk it out.
I told him everything, starting with the first wave on the
trail. I described the tent, the lock,
the zipper noise at 3:00 in the morning, the footsteps.
I described the prints. When I got to the part about the
truck, I paused and realized I'd been clenching my jaw hard
enough to make my teeth ache. Did you get a plate?
He asked. No, I said.
I didn't want to get closer. He noted that, tapped the pen
once, and moved on. You said women's shoes, he said.
Different sizes, I nodded. Rachel did, too.
She was holding her hands folded tight against her stomach, like
she was trying to keep everything inside.
Any other details on the truck? He asked.
White Chevy, I said. Older body style, big dent in
the rear passenger window, down a little.
He asked us to draw a rough map of where we'd camped.
We did, he wrote. Big Fall Creek Rd. across the
top in neat block letters. He asked if we'd touched the
zipper that morning. We said no.
He asked if anything was missing from our camp.
I said I didn't think so, and then remembered the lock.
The lock's gone, I said, and reached into the top pocket of
my backpack to show him how we'd had it rigged.
It was in there. I felt it before I saw it, the
little brass square cold against my fingertips.
I pulled it out. My stomach dropped in a clean,
simple line. I put this through the poles, I
said, staring at it in my palm. It wasn't on the 10th this
morning. Could it have fallen off inside?
The deputy asked, not unkindly. No, I said.
I would have stepped on it in the night.
I would have heard it. It clicked closed.
He didn't argue. He wrote something down, stood
and excused himself for a minute.
He came back with a small paper bag and asked if we'd mind
dropping the lock into it. I did.
The bag made a dry shushing sound when I let go.
Look, he said, speaking like someone who had to weigh his
words. We've had some problems out
there from time to time. Nothing I can promise is
connected, but your report is helpful.
He took our numbers and asked us not to go back to the lake that
day. He didn't need to ask.
We went home and scrubbed our gear in the driveway.
I found muddy leaf bits folded into the tent seams and flushed
them down the sink like they carried something you could wash
off. That night we slept with the
bedroom window latched and a light left on in the hallway.
I'd never been someone who needed that.
Two weeks later I got a voicemail from a number I didn't
recognize. It was the deputy.
He thanked us for coming in. They'd identified the man we
described and found his truck parked off a pull out near the
upper end of the lake. He'd been living out of it.
They'd asked him questions and collected items from the cab and
the bed. He didn't say what those items
were, just that they'd been catalogued.
He asked me to call back if I remembered anything else.
At the end of the message, he added one more thing.
Your campsite, he said, was the farthest one out that weekend.
Given how quiet it was, that might have made you more
interesting. He left it there.
He didn't have to say more. That line settled into me in a
way the night sounds hadn't. I kept seeing the Prince around
the tent, each one a real shape pressed into the mud.
Wait behind it, a person leaning forward to listen, the way you
lean when you adjust a watch band.
I kept seeing the lock in my palm in the interview room, and
I kept trying to figure the steps that put it in my
backpack. I had one answer I didn't want
to test. He'd reached into the tent far
enough to remove it, then slid it inside, smooth as threading a
needle. I've camped since then.
I don't let fear build a fence around my life, but I don't pick
the farthest spot anymore, not when the season's over and the
last boats are back on their trailers.
I don't walk past a fisherman without looking twice to see
what he doesn't have with him. And if I hear nylon move against
a hand again, I'm not sitting still.
I'm getting in the car and going, Even if it's three in the
morning and the road out is bad. If you camp near Fall Creek Lake
in October and you see an older man on the shoreline without a
cooler or a tackle box, that's your sign to choose a different
direction. If you lock your tent,
understand what a lock like that can and can't do.
It buys seconds. It doesn't buy safety.
We got lucky. Lucky that the beam hit when it
did. Lucky that the footsteps went
the other way. Lucky that we had a car, a road
and daylight ahead of us. We drove to the Sheriff's
Office, told the truth, and someone listened.
That's the part I hold on to. That and this isolation is part
of the draw out there, but it's also how some people choose
their targets. Don't make it easy for them.
I camp alone a lot. I'm 34, live in Salt Lake City,
and when work stacks up I drive South until the scenery changes
my head in late September. Last year I took a long weekend
and aimed for Dead Horse Point State Park outside Moab.
I've stayed at the main campground before, but I wanted
quiet. I studied the maps, found a
legal Backcountry site a few miles beyond the paved viewpoint
area, and drove in on a rough spur off the Access Rd.
No cell service out there, just pale dirt, juniper scrub, and
that red rock that makes the Colorado River look unreal from
the cliffs. I parked late afternoon, hiked
in a short way with my pack, and set up on a flat bench of
sandstone about 200 yards from the Canyon rim.
The drop on that side is serious, straight down to the
river. I pitched a small two person
tent, stacked A windbreak out of flattish rocks, and made a
cooking spot with my stove. I had 4 liters of water, a
headlamp with fresh batteries, a basic first aid kit and a
compact 9mm I keep in a lock box in the truck.
I brought it to the tent because I was alone in a long way from
help. The plan was simple.
Two nights hike, some slick rock roots during the day, read and
rest at night. The first evening went like a
lot of desert trips. I ate, watched the Sky Go black
faster than it does in the mountains and listen to small
noises carry in the dry air. Around 10 I crawled into my bag
and fell asleep fast. Sometime after midnight I woke
up. At first I thought it was a
dream. Because I was hearing a man
calling for help. The voice wasn't loud, but it
was clear. I unzipped the door and sat up.
The calls came from the direction of the rim.
Short bursts, then long stretches of quiet.
They sounded like a person trying to conserve energy.
Help, please overhear. I grabbed my headlamp and
stepped out. The air had dropped into the
40s. I could see my breath.
Hey, I shouted. Where are you?
The answer didn't come right away.
I stood there with the beam sweeping through junipers and
boulders. The light vanished into the open
space above the Canyon. I took a few steps toward the
rim, then stopped. I've done enough trips to know
how fast people get into trouble when they leave a safe spot in
the dark. I yelled again, promising to
help, asking for a direction. Then the voice came back, close
enough to feel wrong. Not the words.
I'm over here, my words, where are you?
Copied back at me in the same tone I had just used.
Not similar, the same. For a second I froze, waiting
for a laugh or an explanation. None came.
The night went quiet in a way that doesn't feel like quiet.
I backed up to the tent and reached inside for my jacket.
I told myself there were campers somewhere else on the bench,
someone with a messed up sense of humor, and my nerves filled
in the rest. I stood there sticking to that
idea for maybe 30 seconds before the voice came again.
It said where are you? But this time it chopped the
last word like the person was running out of air.
It was still my voice. I added fuel to the little fire.
I'd kept going for warmth, then sat on a rock with the
flashlight across my knees. I listened hard.
No rhythmic scuff of someone walking, no clink of metal, no
breath. Just space and my pulse.
That's when I saw the coyote. It was just outside the circle
of light, standing where the fire made the rocks glow.
I've seen plenty of coyotes. This one was thin and modeled
with rough patches missing from its coat.
It stood facing me and didn't move.
Not a twitch. I kept the light on its chest
and tried to make sense of how still it stayed.
After half a minute, it tilted its head farther than I thought
it could, held it there, then leveled it again.
No flinch from the lamp, no blink.
I picked up my pack and worked in the 9mm.
The coyote took a step forward, not a normal trot or slink.
It shifted up rear first, like it didn't understand the order
of its own joints, and stood taller.
Then it walked two steps upright.
The gait wasn't smooth. One knee drifted in, then out,
like someone working through a limp, the same uneven rhythm I'd
heard in the voice, Stumbling, then steady, then stumbling
again. I've been scared plenty of times
in the Backcountry. Bears in the Uintas, A
thunderstorm that pinned me behind a boulder for 1/2 hour
above Alta. This was different.
I wasn't looking at a big animal.
I was looking at a wrong one. I racked the slide quietly and
shouldered the pack. Hey, I said, like I was talking
to a dog. You don't want any closer.
No, the coyote crouched. Sound came out of it, not a
howl. It started with a bark and
immediately shifted into my voice saying where are you?
I didn't answer. I kicked dirt over the coals,
swung the pack on and grabbed my trekking pole.
My truck was back on the dirt Rd. up a faint trail that cut N
through low brush and slick rock pavement.
I hit the path and moved fast without running.
I don't run at night off trail in the desert.
A single bad step near those cracks and drop offs can wreck
your ankle and leave you done. I focused the beam on the next
rock, the next patch of sand, the next branch.
Something paralleled me to my right.
Not all the time, just often enough that I noticed a pattern.
I'd step then after the gap of a held breath, I'd hear a soft
crunch of grit that matched the distance of my last step.
If I stopped, it stopped. If I counted 3 slow steps, I got
3 crunches after. When I angled the light hard
over, I saw brush and rock and nothing else.
About a mile from camp the path slid into a shallow wash filled
with round stones. My boots made too much noise.
I took it slow and tried to keep my feet on bigger rocks.
The wash made a weak S curve and the walls got a bit higher.
The beam reached farther down the bend and caught.
I shine ahead 2 points low to the ground.
They hovered there, then rose. The height changed quickly from
maybe 2 feet to something taller than me.
The eye reflection slid behind a juniper trunk.
I felt my mouth go dry. I kept moving.
Behind me, a voice spoke in short pieces, not full
sentences. Chunks of things I had said to
myself earlier in the tent. Two nights.
Windbreak truck. The sound drifted through the
rocks, like someone practicing lines and getting the words
right but the pace wrong. I stayed with the trail through
small Cairns I'd set earlier. Every few minutes I scanned
behind me. Nothing there.
The night takes away distance. Everything around me felt either
20 feet away or endless. I kept to the habits that make
it home. Check footing, drink a little,
breathe. Keep the light where you need
it. My mind wanted to jump ahead, to
the truck, to the keys, to the feel of the bench seat.
I kept reeling it back to the next step.
The land levelled out near the road.
Sand took over from rock. The headlamp beam showed a faint
set of tire tracks and beside them, Prince.
I didn't register at first because my brain filed them as
some weird shadow pulled by the light.
Then I aimed the beam straight down and felt my stomach drop.
Bare feet, no tread pattern, no toast.
Play like an ape. Just long flat shapes with
rounded ends and a deep bite in the sand where the ball would
be. They were too large for a
person. I wear elevens.
I laid my boot next to 1 and it extended past my heel and past
my toe. Easy.
Maybe 16 inches. The stride between them didn't
make sense either. Too long, like something that
didn't care about distance. They led from the middle of the
road toward the direction of my campsite.
I've never been religious. I still said a quiet thank you
that the Prince pointed away from me.
I turned my back on them and followed the road to the truck.
The shape of it looked staged in the headlamp, like an object in
a photo you're not supposed to trust.
And then I put my hand on the door handle and the relief hit
so hard I wobbled. I opened the door and tossed the
pack in. That's when the voice came again
from down the road behind me. One line thrown hard.
Where are you? It was mine, tight, with the
same fear I had felt an hour earlier.
I got in and shut the door. I didn't check the back seat.
I didn't aim the light anywhere except at the key ring.
The engine turned and caught. I put it in gear and rolled
forward. With the headlights bright on
the road, I kept it slow over the worst washboard, then faster
when the surface improved. I didn't look in the mirrors.
By the time I hit the paved section near the park entrance,
the morning was pale. The turn for Hwy. 191 came up
and I took it toward Moab. I didn't see anyone on the
shoulder or any vehicles pulled off.
My hands shook on the wheel until the sun broke the horizon.
I stopped at the Moab diner because it was open and because
I needed other people around me. I sat at the counter, ordered
coffee and eggs and told the short version to the guy 2
stools down when he asked if I was OK.
He was probably in his 60s local by the way he talked about town.
When I described the voice copying mine, he kept his eyes
on his plate and said don't answer calls from the canyons at
night. He didn't explain, he didn't
need to. I didn't argue and I didn't try
to make it sound logical. I finished eating and went to
the Ranger station. The Ranger on duty listened and
took notes. She was professional and didn't
roll her eyes. She said they get reports every
so often. Strange sounds, figures at the
edge of light, tracks that don't line up with footwear.
Sometimes they find campers who got turned around in the dark
and made it a mile in the wrong direction.
Sometimes they find nothing. She offered to accompany me back
that afternoon to retrieve whatever I'd left.
We drove out together in a state truck.
A second Ranger followed. We hiked in at noon, sun high.
No mystery about what anything was.
My tent was still there, stakes in door open.
My sleeping bag was half out like I'd pulled it with my foot.
The fire ring was scattered. No large tracks remained near
camp, the surface was too hard. In softer patches under the
junipers we found prints that could have been coyote, but they
were odd. Front set strangely close to the
rears. Occasional scuffs as if
something had slipped and caught itself.
The Rangers photographed them and shrugged in the same motion.
Animals misstep too. People Missy things in the dark.
They helped me pack the tent and stove.
We walked back to the road and loaded up.
On the drive out we stopped at the spot where I'd seen the
large prints along the road. Daylight showed the same
impressions I'd seen by headlamp, only faint, now drying
at the edges. The longer I looked, the less
sure I felt. Could 2 overlapping tracks, deer
and human make that shape? Could a boot with the tread worn
smooth leave something that looked barefoot on fine sand?
The Rangers didn't press it. They took a few more photos,
nodded, and we headed for the highway.
That night I slept at a motel in Moab with the curtains open and
the TV on low. The next day I drove back to
Salt Lake and put my gear away like I always do.
Wash the cook pot, hang the tent to dry, count the fuel
canisters. I oiled the 9mm and locked it
up. The routine helped.
I've camped since then. I've gone back to the desert
too, but not near Dead Horse Point and not alone.
When friends ask why, I tell them it's a long way down from
those cliffs and you can't get turned around at night if you
never step outside. That's the practical reason.
The other reason is a thing I keep to myself.
Every once in a while a phrase will slip out of my mouth and
I'll hear it like a recording a second later in my head.
The same rise and fall, the same exact pacing.
It's just memory doing what memory does, replaying my own
voice back at me. That's what I tell myself, and
if I'm on a trip and a person calls for help from the rim
after dark, I wait for daylight and then I go.
I bring more people. If someone needs real help,
we'll find them. If it's something else, it can
keep its distance. The tent I left that night is
back in my gear closet. The only damage is a melted spot
on the corner where I buried the coals too fast.
It smells faintly like smoke and desert dust when I pull it out.
It still works fine. I set it up with friends now,
and I'm the one who makes sure the fire is dead before we turn
in. When the sun drops near Moab,
the cliffs cut the light like a knife.
We talk a little softer and stay closer to camp, and if someone
says where are you after dark, nobody answers.
We wait for morning and then we go where we can see our feet.
That's how you leave the desert on your own terms.
That's how I did.