A very scary story

Well, you know, for me

A few months before I was married I had a sort of wild panic that perhaps I hadn’t lived my single life to the fullest and I asked myself if there was anything I needed to do before I was no longer my own. I decided to sleep outside by myself. So one evening, I took a little tent across the pond, up the hill and before the terraces that were once planted in crops by the old man who used to farm our place, Shade Henderson. I made a little fire and my dog Amos was with me. I was very happy. I was thinking about my future, of course, and the man I would marry and my heart was so full I didn’t even think of being afraid. I remember thinking, too, about my friend Dr. Keith, who I was working for at the time. That day he had told me more stories from his childhood…

His best friends were Harold and Thomas. They built a Model Ford together one summer, borrowing the engine from an old grist mill. One Autumn night, they camped in Ghost Forest, which was full of horse bones. Worse night of my life, Dr. Keith said, why do kids want to do that to themselves? I smiled into the bright comfort of the fire, thinking about those silly boys. 

And then the sun went down. I crept in my tent and listened at first to the familiar night noises of the frogs and crickets. Then I noticed another noise, soft at first but growing louder. It was a crunching. I went outside and shone the flashlight all around. It was coming from the trees. I pulled a branch down and saw them: Caterpillars. They were everywhere. I began to see them in the grass too. Billions of them. The crunching was deafening. Well I can deal with this, I thought, and climbed back into my tent, but it began to feel like the ground was moving beneath me.

Amos started to get antsy, and that’s when a piercing blood-curdling scream came from the woods. My loyal companion took off, like a bat out of hell, towards the house. My heart was racing and my mind too, trying to work out a reasonable explanation, when the noise came again. Even the caterpillars were quiet for a moment, taking it in. Then again came the scream and I, with little dignity, hauled tail in the trail of Amos back to the house. I ran up the hill, unlocked the house (Amos was pressed again the front door) and my heart was still racing as I climbed on the kitchen counter, washed my feet in the sink, and ran and jumped into bed.

Andrew was working night shift at the hospital but he texted to ask how I was doing. I looked at the clock and it was only 11:00. I felt so ridiculous.  

What do you think it was? I asked him.

Maybe a peacock? He texted back.

Of course. There are distant neighbors who have peacocks. One of them must’ve escaped. I played youtube clips of peacock noises, and it did sound very similar. I opened my window to feel the cool night air and listened, but didn’t hear any distant screaming, or caterpillars crunching either. I was soon asleep. But before I drifted off, my conclusion from my lone camping experience was that, yes, I was completely ready to get married, and no, there wasn’t anything (else) I needed to do to make a fool of myself before then.