Campout

Campout
Ron Bruno

    I couldn’t wait till Memorial Day. Just one more day away for the big camping trip. Hanging out with friends, drinking and eating and just bullshittin’ about anything and everything. A whole weekend of just relaxing by a fire and getting bombed. The night before we were leaving. Me and Tommy, (Tommy is my best friend) went to go get some beer for the trip, since we always seem to drink more than everyone else, I knew we would need it.
   “I’ll pick you up around eight” I yelled to him as I dropped him off at his house.
   The next morning I packed up my truck and headed over to Tom’s house. It was going to be about a two hour drive and we were planning on meeting everyone else around ten. We stopped to pick up some coffee and headed off. “ Dude, ya got the directions right?” I asked, in a smartass way.
    “Do I look like an idiot Rob?” He answered right back.
    “Well-” I said with a smirk.
   We finally made it to our site. We checked in at the office, and the owner showed us which direction to go to get to our site, and that a few of our group already arrived. We had to fill out a form on how not to wander into other sites and how we shouldn’t wander to far from our site because we could easily get lost. So after this little lecture we were off to our site. When we got there we noticed Kelly was setting up her tent. We also saw Frank’s car, but we didn’t see him.
    “Hey Kelly, Whats up? Where’s Frank?” Tom yelled out.
     “He’s taking a piss” she replied. We parked the truck and started unloading everything.
     “What’s up guy’s?” Tommy called out as he zipped his pants.
    “Nothing much what’s going on?” I asked back.
    “Nothing much, just ready to set up my tent and drink some beer” he replied. As we were setting up the tents Joe and Kim showed up with Andy. Joe and Kim were a couple and Andy was pretty much the third wheel, but unfortunately for Kim, Andy and Joe were best friends . So they were hardly ever alone. As a matter of fact I’m surprised Andy had his own tent. After a while, everybody was all settled with their tent’s and it was time to start drinking. Tommy had the grill going so we finally had some food going also.
   A few hours went by and we started to get a little bored. It was about four o’clock, so we had a few hours before it got dark. Andy had an idea of taking a hike through the woods. Everybody agreed and grabbed a few beers and we were ready to go.
   “Do we even know where we’re going and how the hell to get back?” Kim asked.
    “Of course we do” I replied. Even though I had no clue. Being a guy I had to make believe I knew where I was going.
   Some time passed and it was starting to get dark, so we decided to head back. But as soon as we were about to head back Tommy noticed something up ahead. “Hey guys, check that out,” he said, pointing in front of him. "It looks like a little shack or something. Let’s check it out” The girls were hesitant at first, but finally we convinced them to go, and that nothing would happen to them.
   As we came up to the shack we noticed that the one window it had was boarded up from the inside, so we couldn’t see what was inside. We also noticed that the door had double locks on it. That made me even more curious about what may be inside.
    “What the hell is this place doing here in the middle of nowhere locked up like this?” Frank asked.
    “Maybe someone hid some bodies in there” Andy joked. “Rob, let’s get out of here, this is a little too spooky for me” Kelly said. As soon as she said that, a noise came out from the woods.
    “What was that?" Kim cried out.
    “Probably just a deer or something” Tom replied.
    “I don’t know dude, that sounded like someone walking” I answered right back. I saw that the girls were a little shaken up now, so I told them we should just head back. It was getting really dark now and it would be even harder to find our way back anyway.
   We finally made it back to camp, and I sense of relief actually came over me. I wanted the girls and everyone else to get their minds off of what we heard so I brought up the idea of a drinking game.
    “Damn good idea,” Andy said.
    “Yeah that sounds cool, lets play guys,” Kelly also agreed.
    “As long as who or whatever doesn’t decide to come back here I’m up for that,” Kim said.
    “It was probably the person that owns that shed and they don’t want anyone to go there, so they tried to scare us away.” Andy said.
    “Well it worked” Kelly replied.
   As usual me and Tom were kicking ass in the drinking game. We always were the last ones left still drinking, hence the extra beer we bought. It wasn’t long before Frank was passed out in his tent, and just a little while after him Kim and Joe went in their tents. About an hour later Andy was the next victim. Kelly actually lasted longer than I thought, but finally she gave in and went to her tent as well.
     “As usual it’s just you and me Rob,” Tommy said to me. “But I’m bushed and I’m ready to hit the sheets myself.
    “That’s cool go ahead, I’m not really that tired yet. I’ll be up for a while” I said. As soon as he walked to his tent, a noise came from out in the woods.
     “Ya heard that right?” Tommy asked.
    “Damn right I heard that” I said.
    “Do you think it’s the same person we heard out there from before?” Tommy asked.
    “I have no idea Tom” I answered. I grabbed my flashlight and started to shine it out into the woods. “I can’t see a thing” I said.
     “Maybe they're gone” Tom said.
    “Probably, but listen, I’m not really tired yet, so why don’t you go to sleep and I’ll stay up for a while, sort of like keeping watch” I suggested.
    “Are you sure?” Tom asked.
    “Yeah dude go ahead nothing’s gonna happen, I’m cool out here” I said.
   “Oh my god my head is killing me” I said as I woke up. “Last time I drink that much again” I thought to myself. I didn’t even get to sleep in my tent last night. It looks like everyone is still sleeping. I looked at my watch, it was already ten o’clock. I think it’s time to wake them up and get something to eat.
   I went over to Tommy’s tent and started to shake it and call his name, no answer. I opened his tent and he wasn’t there. Probably out taking a piss. I went over to Joe and Kim’s tent, and tried waking them the same way and no answer. I opened up their tent and they were gone too. Did they all go together or what? Then I checked Frank’s and the same thing, gone, I went to Andy’s and he too was missing. Where the hell is everybody. I looked over by the cars and they were still there, so they couldn’t drive anywhere. Is this a joke or something I thought. I had no idea what to do. Should I go look for them? But where would I look? What if I leave and they come back and I’m gone? Shit!
    “This better not be a joke you guys” I yelled out to the woods. Well I had no choice but to go look for them. I started to think about the shack and the noises we heard. I hope that had nothing to do with this. Would they really have gone there this morning? No way, they seemed too scared last night. I hope I could remember how to get there.
   I started to my search and as I walked I was yelling out for them as well. No answer at all. Now I started to get a little scared. I saw the shack up ahead, but I didn’t see them.
    “Damn it” I let out a yell. Once I got to the shack I saw that the locks were still in place, so they couldn’t have gone inside. A sudden feeling came upon me as if to tell me to open this shack. But how? And why? They can’t be in there. I looked frantically around for something strong to bust open these locks. I finally found a rock that I thought could do the trick. After several smashes to the locks I got them to break off. I could feel the sweat pour off my forehead, my hands were shaking, I was in total fear of what I may find in there. I started to open the door. As soon as it opened a crack, a stench so foul came pouring out. I thought I would throw up. Then there right in front of me were my friends. Murdered. There was blood everywhere. I couldn’t believe and didn’t want to believe what I was seeing. I saw an axe right next to Tommy, and I saw that whatever sick bastard did this actually chopped off some of their limbs.
    “Wake up Rob” I screamed. “Wake up” I started crying, and slammed the door behind me and ran as fast as I could through the woods. I started to ask myself, why not me? Why all of them, but not me? I was in my chair out in the open and this Psycho didn’t kill me. Wait a minute how didn’t I hear all of that? There had to be so much noise, screaming and crying, and I heard nothing. Damn it, what if I heard, I may have been able to save them. I finally reached my car and headed for the front office. I called the police from the payphone they had outside the office and explained what happened. They told me they would send someone right away.
   Not too long after my call the police arrived and out came the owner from the office. I took them right to the shack to show them the horror I saw. One of the officers pulled out his gun and headed for the door, the other officer had his gun out and was looking around. The first officer opened the door and I saw him looking around. He turned and looked at me.
    “That’s how I found them Officer,” I said to him.
    “Is this some sort of sick joke son?” the cop yelled out. I looked at him as if he was blind.
    “What the hell are you talking about?” I asked him.
    “Come here kid” he said to me. I walked over and looked inside. All I saw was old tools and garbage all over.
    “Wait a minute, what the hell is going on here, I swear to God all my friend’s were just in here,” I yelled to the cop. “I saw them, there was blood all over the place and an axe that must have been used to kill them.”
    “Well then, where did they go?” the second cop questioned.
    “Look I don’t know what’s going on here, but I’m telling you what I saw” I replied. Just then the owner spoke up.
    “Excuse me officer but this young man checked in last night, but he checked in all alone. I have his receipt here too. There was no one else with him at all.”
    “Are you crazy, are you all crazy?” I screamed out.
    “I was going to ask you the same question” the first cop replied.
    “I can prove to you I wasn’t alone, back at my site, you can see all the tent’s and the cars, then you’ll see I’m not crazy,” I said with a smirk.
   We arrived at the site and I couldn’t believe my eyes. Where did all the tents go I thought, and the cars, where are the God Damn cars? Am I dreaming? Am I really crazy?
    “Well son, where are the tents and cars?” the second cop asked.
    “I can’t explain any of this, we were here last night drinking and hanging out, we even took a walk to that shack last night and we heard noises.” I said. “We got scared and came right back to camp and started drinking and everyone fell asleep and the next thing I knew everybody was gone. But their tents and cars were still here” The first cop went over to the chair that I was sitting in and he picked up an empty bottle of Jack.
    “Well at least you were right about one thing, there was drinking done here, but it looks like you were having a party by yourself”
    “Yeah kid, maybe you just had to much to drink and you dreamt all of this” the other cop said.
    “You know what’s weird about this story” the owner said. “A few years before I bought this campsite, there was really a murder here, and they actually found bodies in that shack, Damn I wish I would have taken that thing down, but I never got around to it. I actually thought nobody would even bother with it. But they found the bodies, well all but one they said. It was a bunch of college kids I think they said. They identified all the bodies, but then they realized that one of the members of that group was missing. They had a search party and everything and never found him. They never did find out who did it, and for all they know the one that was missing could have been the killer.”
    “Well it seems like nothing is really wrong here and there’s no evidence that anything even happened, except for you drinking too much kid, so I suggest you pack up your stuff, go get some coffee and head on home,” the first cop said. The owner just agreed with him and walked away. I just stood there confused and scared. I started to pack up my stuff and load my truck.
   As I drove off I realized how much I missed my friends. I know it’s been a few years since their murder but I still miss them. Why did I do it? I wish I could get better, but maybe in time I’ll be able to stop all this killing. I wonder if I can find someone to go camping for the fourth of July weekend? A huge smile came to my face. I’m sure I can find new friends. There will always be more.

THE END

Ron Bruno

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