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Category:
Horror
Publisher: Shannon L. Buck
Type: Fiction
Pages: 24
Copyright: January 31, 2016
Price: $3.99 (eBook)
The darkest of The Camp Series stories, Hidden Camp is also the longest. Will Jessica and her cousins learn the truth about the Boogie Man. About, at least, some of the mysteries of the mountain. Follow along on an adventure of frightening truths.
There are secrets on the mountain. Things adults know but don't tell their children. The young hear bits and pieces of conversations and become intrigued. They want to explore. Discover.
Without knowing all the details, they can't make good decisions. Their curiosity takes them on journey's they later wish they never went on. It shows them things they wish they never saw.
Some places on the mountain are haunted by those who lived before. People who died violent deaths, or those who did the killing. Bad things do not only happen to adults on the mountain. Children are not safe either.
Sometimes, a fabled monster turns out to be real.
Excerpt
One night, after dinner, we were sitting around the big table out at camp. The adults hadn’t begun playing cards yet. Some of us kids were though, and the others were either finishing up eating or drawing pictures and then coloring them in. We were talking about what we were going to do the next day.
“Well,” said Carl. “We could go try to find the hidden camp.”
“Where is it?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he laughed. “Seriously, it is somewhere in the woods. But it is not easy to find. The camp is in the woods across the field at the right of the camp. It is dark and scary when you get deep into the woods, but I think the hidden camp is before that. Do you want to look for it with me?”
“Yes,” I replied. “Who else wants to go?”
Jenny and Alex agreed to go, but the grownups said the rest of the kids were too young.
We all went out to the outhouse, two of us going in at a time before the long night. We waited for each other and walked back to the camp together, having learned last year to go as a group after dark, after what had happened to Aunties boyfriend. We couldn’t believe it when we heard the Boogie Man had gotten him.
I laid awake longer than the others that night, wondering about the hidden camp. Wondering what it looked like, as I listened to the wind howling outside. It was a cool spring evening. Every so often, I'd hear Grampy moving the logs in the wood stove with the iron poker. All the adults were going to bed early tonight so that they could get up early and do repairs on Nana's and Pa’s camp in the morning.
*****
Next morning, we woke to the smell of griddle cakes. That meant Grammy was cooking, and we all got dressed under our own blankets. It was chilly this early in the spring, but we could hear Grampy stoking the fire in the wood stove again. We could smell the smoke, too. It would be warm in the big room.
We'd gone out and hugged Grammy before going to the outhouse, and then hurried back so that our breakfast wouldn’t get cold. Those griddle cakes were so good with the maple syrup. We even had a glass of milk to go with them.
When it was time for the aunts to do the dishes, they found that the pump was not working. Two of the uncles would have to stay at the camp today with Grampy and see if they could figure out what was wrong. For now, we kids had to lug buckets of water in so the aunts could do the dishes, then Grammy would feed the adults.
Carl, Jenny, Alex, and I went out into the small patch of trees in back of the camp and filled one pail of water at a time. The boys took the first two buckets in, then came back to lug in the other two buckets that Jenny and I had filled. Then we walked down the road to visit Nana and Pa before everyone else got there.
I'd always loved their little camp. There bed was right in the living room. There was a wall at the head and another at the foot of the bed, as well as one with a window along the outer wall. The bed fit snugly against all three walls and there were six built in drawers beneath, three on top of three. Nana had made a curtain and hung it from the ceiling in front of the bed for privacy.
There was a only one bedroom in this little camp, at the back, where all seven of their children slept when they were young until they'd moved to town. Then, they slept in that room whenever they came up to camp for a visit.
“I really love your camp, Pa,” I said after Nana had given us each a cookie. Pa said, “I do, too. Nana and I worked hard during the war for the chance to have this camp and all the others. We had even lived here during that time. The big camp, the one that all of you children always stay at, had been a prison camp, where our soldiers had kept the German prisoners during the war. We had been allowed to stay in this small camp for free, and Nana cooked meals for the prisoners and workers of the prison while I helped with maintenance, carrying water, chopping wood and such.
“I'd been allowed to purchase all of the land, including all of the camps on it, at a very reasonable price after the war due to this service. There were a total of four camps close together, all still standing, and it was said that there was another one in the woods somewhere.”
We were very excited over the mention of another camp. “Is that the hidden camp, Pa?” I asked, giving him a hug. “The hidden camp? Ah...yes. I recollect hearing stories about the camp in the woods. Only, back then, it was called the disappearing camp.”
“Where is it Pa?” asked Jenny excitedly.
“Well, I really don’t know. I have never seen it. How about you, Nana?” He asked, winking at her, a big grin spreading across his face. “Have you ever seen the disappearing camp?”
“I can’t say that I have,” she replied. “I always thought it was just a story. An old ghost story.”
“Hmm. Could be, I s’pose,” he replied in a low, questioning tone.
“Pa,” Alex said. “Can you tell us where it is supposed to be?”
“It was said that it was across the way in the woods on the other side of that field,” he said, pointing out the window, in the direction Carl had thought it was. “I suspect you are planning on going on an adventure today. Am I right?”
“Yes, Pa,” replied Carl. “We would like to try to find the hidden camp.”
“Well, I’m not really sure that it would be a good idea. It was said to be haunted. I heard that some people had been tortured in that camp, and that they had died there. The spirits of these people were supposed to have haunted the camp.”
“Was this when the prisoners were at the camp, Pa?” I asked.
“No. The tortures and killings would have taken place years before. I do not know the whole story, but I do know that a pretty sick man and his children had done the killing. There was something really messed up with them. No one ever knew where the mother was. Maybe you kids shouldn’t try finding the place?”
“Do you believe in ghosts, Pa?” I asked.
“I don’t know. I have never seen one. You’re going to try to find the camp no matter what I say, aren’t you?”
We all smiled sheepishly and Nana said, “Well, then. I’ll make you all lunch to bring along. If you are not back before the dark, though, we will be coming to look for you.” She looked worried as she made us sandwiches, and packed them into bags with crackers and more cookies. She also put water in canteens for each of us. During this time, Pa was saying “You children be careful out there. And you boys look after the girls. It is a man’s job to protect the women. This is a serious responsibility.”
Nana and Pa waved as we made our way across the dirt road and into the field, looking on worriedly. We set out just as the men were coming down to help Pa do some repairs on the small camp. We could hear their low voices, and a hearty laugh every so often as we were walking across the field.
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