Originally Posted 10/07/05 at the LiveJournal community ImagineInk. The theme was Myths/Legends.

The BearLake Monster

High up in the mountains that border Idaho and Utah, there lies a body of water known as BearLake. The lake is a leftover from prehistoric times, a remnant of the ancient LakeBonneville. Although the water is barely above freezing temperatures, even at the height of summer, the lake has long been a recreational place for humans. There, they gather to swim and camp on the shores, catching fish and breathing the pure mountain air.

But this water holds a dark secret. There is a story told by the elders, a chilling tale spun by those who have spent their lives near the shores of BearLake. Gather round, my children, and listen…

“Yeah, right,” Chad muttered, elbowing his younger teenage brother as he spoke. “Next thing you know, she’s gonna send us out on a snipe hunt.”

“Do you mind?” his mother snapped. “I’m trying to set the mood here. You might’ve heard the story before, but that doesn’t mean you should ruin it for your brother!”

“Sorry,” said Chad. He began to dig a long finger into the wet brown sand at his feet, carving a picture of some hideous-looking creature. “I’ll shut up now.”

“Once upon a time there was a family, much like ours, who decided to enjoy an outing here at Bear Lake,” his mother continued in a low, raspy voice. “Like us, they were having a wonderful time, enjoying the cool breezes and the summer waves. The children played in the lake for hours. The mother was nearby, watching over them as they frolicked in the water.”

“Frolicked?” Timothy, the younger teen, interrupted. He momentarily stopped plucking at the bark of the log on which he was sitting. “Mom, nobody frolics. That sounds totally lame!”

“Lame like you, douche-bag,” Chad taunted, giving him a shove off the log. Timothy yelped, grabbing onto Chad as he fell. His brother went down with him, and the two boys started wrestling in the sand.

Their mother rolled her eyes. “I wanted girls,” she muttered, “sweet little girls who would be polite and I could put pretty things in their hair. They would be adorable daughters who would never dream of interrupting their mother. But would your father listen? No, he had to go and give me sons…”

“So then what happened, Mom?” Chad climbed back onto the log, trying to bring her attention back to the story. His mother had that dangerous look in her eyes, a warning look that said he and his brother were this close to bodily harm. Since Dad wasn’t here to rescue them – not that he would – it was probably time to behave.

Timothy sat down next to Chad. “Yeah, what happened?” he chimed in, picking up on the dangerous vibes coming from his mother. He wasn’t the smartest kid in the world, but he had an excellent sense of self-preservation, a skill honed to perfection simply by being the younger sibling.

Their mother threw another stick on the campfire. The orange and red flames grew higher for a moment, illuminating the night and casting a creepy shadow across her face. “Later that night, the family was sitting around the campfire, singing and talking. The mother got up to fetch another soda from the cooler, which was placed near the water.

“The others were engrossed in their chatter, and it took them a while to realize the mother hadn’t returned. It was the oldest child who first realized his mother was missing,” she said softly, lowering her voice so they could barely hear it. “He’d last seen her walking toward the cooler. Now…she was nowhere in sight.”

The boys had stopped wiggling, and now all that could be heard was the crackling of the campfire. “What happened to her?” Timothy asked, his eyes wide.

“At first the children thought she had wandered off,” their mom told them. “But she never returned, and by morning a search party had been organized. A short distance from the trees, they found her glasses. The frames were bent and twisted, as if they had been ripped from her face. A further search revealed tiny red droplets of blood scattered across the sand. Even worse…” their mother paused and gave a hard swallow. “Lying next to the shore, they found…her hand.”

“Just the hand?” Chad whispered. This was a different version of the story than the one he’d heard before. “How did they know the hand was hers?”

“Her wedding set was still on the ring finger,” his mother intoned solemnly. “That was the only part of her they ever found. To this day, no one knows what happened to her. There were some who speculated that she’d been murdered by an escaped convict; others wondered if she’d been attacked by a wild animal. The police eventually closed the case, declaring it to be unsolvable. But there was one thing they didn’t talk about, a clue that nobody wanted to mention.”

“What was it?” Timothy wanted to know. His voice caught, cracking with tension. “What did they find?”

Their mother leaned forward. “Leading up to the shore and back, there was a set of footprints,” she said slowly. “But these were no human footprints. They were strange-looking, all sprawled out, like some creature with webbed feet had walked ashore. And to this day, some people claim that on dark nights such as this, they’ve seen a horrible creature emerge from the depths of Bear Lake.”

A twig snapped behind them, making the boys jump. “Aaagh! What was that?” Chad exclaimed, grabbing hold of his mother’s flannel sleeve.

“Oh, that’s just some night critter,” his mother grunted, shaking him off. “It’s probably a skunk. Why don’t you go check it out?”

“Mom!” Timothy protested. “That’s not cool! What if it’s the Bear Lake Monster?”

“If it was the Bear Lake Monster, I’m sure he’d have eaten you by now,” his mother pointed out. “Open your ears – the crickets are still chirping. Trust me, if there was something dangerous out there, they would have gone completely silent.”

“Yeah, right,” Chad said nervously. Still, his eyes darted around the perimeter of the campfire in fear.

His mother stretched and yawned. “It’s getting late. I’m going to grab a bottle of water from the cooler and catch some shut-eye. You boys should get some rest, too.”

“You’re going to the cooler?” Timothy all but screeched. “You can’t go to the cooler! It’s down by the lake!”

“Duh,” his mother replied. “That’s how we keep it cold, seeing how the ice has melted.” She stood up.

“No!” the boys yelled. “We’ll get it for you!” Together, they raced from the campsite to the lake shore.

Their mother sniggered as they left. “Works every time,” she chuckled. “I won’t have to lift a finger around here for the next two days.”

She was so amused by the boys’ reaction that she failed to notice when the crickets stopped chirping.

……

A/N: I am very open to constructive criticism - let me know what you think.