Camp is a style that prefers outrageous and exaggerated substance—a palate for bad taste. A camp is a temporary lodge typically dwelled in by travelers or adventurers. And Camp Camp is, well, the story you are about to read, both campy in its style and substance, and named, ever so fittingly, after the nickname given to Camp Niilhaasi—the Camp Camp.
Camp Niilhaasi got its unfortunately fortunate nickname from the nearby silver waters of Lake Niilhaasi, and the legend harbored beneath. See, at Lake Niilhaasi, there’s something of an urban myth that’s served as the lake's, and surrounding campgrounds', claim to fame: the Niilhassi River Monkey.
Now, if you’ve never heard of the “river monkey”, you’d be forgiven, because essentially it doesn’t exist. At least, to some. To others, the river monkey is a deeply endearing icon of the lakeside forests of North America; a less-respected Bigfoot or Nessie in virtually every way—yet it, too, has its share of disciples. And most of them—rather conveniently—live within fifty miles of the Niilhassi. Which, mind you, is not a river, but a lake. So, the whole ‘River Monkey’ name in and of itself doesn’t make a lick of sense. And neither does the legend at large.
Now, you’d think that an oversized, river-dwelling primate would be the last thing on people’s minds—but you’d also be wrong. See, people eat this kind of thing up, especially in the middle of nowhere, where the only thing to do is hunt down a fictionalized monkey man.
“Of course, he’s real,” the hick spat, depositing the rest of his loogy aside his boot, and grinding it into the dirt, “no one ain’t seem ‘em ‘cause he’s hidin’.”
“Why’s he hiding?” Ella asked cynically, jotting an ‘X’ adjacent to the two others, winning her seventh game of tic tac toe against herself—her only worthy opponent. She did have some notes on the page, but her mind had clocked out hours ago.
Was this really worth it—driving all the way out to tum-fuk-tu, wasting who-knows how much precious petroleum, just to interview some backwoods, probably inbred, tin-foil-hat-wearing, conspiracy nut—all in the name of a cheap buck? She didn’t have that answer. She never did. But she was there, wasn’t she? Smack-dab in the middle of nowhere. And this wasn’t the first time.
What was it last month, again? Bat-boy? That was a good one. How about the woman that was having sex with her husband’s ghost? Or the guy who claimed he was molested by a yeti? There were some weird folks that lived out in the middle of nowhere.
And, of course, by the middle of nowhere, she meant the Podunks—pocketed little cesspools squirming with the kookiest weirdos on God’s green earth. And, if you could believe it, some of those weirdos made the other weirdos look like beacons of normalcy by sheer comparison—which only proved just how whacky some people could get when cut off from the outside world. Thankfully, most of the fringe types were harmless folks, but every now and again there’d be one that’d stir the pot, tip the scale from conspiracy to collusion—like those crackpots that cut crop circles—the ones that gave them all a bad rap.
And if they didn’t—she most certainly could.
“Well, think about it,” the man said, interrupting her inner monologue abruptly, dribble still dribbled on his scruffy chin, “if he’s caught, the gov’n’ment will ‘pro’ly cut ‘em up and experiment ‘n shit on him!”
“Mmhmm,” Ella nodded, biting her tongue, “anything else?”
The man stood, obtusely quiet, until he sprang alert, “Oh, yeah!” he said, rushing back into his home. Not five seconds later did he emerge with a folded-up piece of paper, handing it over to the Ella. “I drew this as soon as I saw ‘em. The po’lice told me it wasn’t ev’dence, but I swear he look exactly like that.”
It was the most crudely drawn picture of a monkey she had ever seen—so much so that it looked like a fourth-grader would’ve laughed at it. She couldn’t help but crack a grin, one that only widened when she noticed the same, faded print on the man’s wife-beater. He must’ve noticed her eyesight as he, too, looked down at the scribbling on the shirt, and smiled a toothy grin.
“You like it?” he asked, eyes wide, “Ol’ Niilhaasi liked it so much they started selling it on t-shirts. I make royalties now.”
“Where do they sell it?” Ella asked.
“The gift shop. I got some extras if you want one. What, uh, size is you?” the man asked, looking down at the woman’s blouse and embarrassingly twitching back to eye contact with a nervous smile.
“I’m…good. Thanks. That’ll be all,” Ella nodded, with a click of her tongue and pen.
Of all the Podunks she had traversed in her travels, this one was the podunkiest. Ella and her brand-new Lincoln Continental, now in need of a fresh wash, stuck out like a sore thumb amidst the vast array of dilapidated houses and shacks that aligned the dirt road leading to her undesirable destination: Camp Niilhassi—which was a place that should’ve only been visited by middle schoolers with an undeveloped brain. Yet, the good ol’ Downtown Tattletale insisted that Ella Lancaster drive her sweet ass a thousand miles into the boonies to milk yet another tragedy, all in the name of exploitation.
It was a young boy this time—thirteen-year-old Cody Hodgson. And unlike the guy that got fondled by the abominable snowman, this kid wasn’t able to book an interview—because he went missing. She could see the cover now, “YOUNG CAMPER SNATCHED BY RIVER MONKEY.” Not the kind of thing the parents probably wanted to read, but according to the charts, twenty-or-so odd million subscribers did.
The approaching fork in the road picked at the question feasting on her mind: continue on or go home? The fast lane back the way she came was right there, after all. But if she chose it, she could kiss that overdue promotion goodbye. But maybe she didn’t want it. It was the sleaziest tabloid in town after all, not exactly a career she saw herself in. But it paid the bills.
So, with an internal release, Ella let her foot off the brake and traveled onward.
It was the dog days of summer for sure. But not even the dog dared to stick its snout into the sun. Instead, it merely licked itself under the shade of an overgrown oak, wrapped in the same metal chain that drooped from its neck. Not far away, beside an old school bus whose yellow had faded a sickly white, was a mailbox, perhaps fashioned in that same shade of oak, which looked as if it had been hit a dozen or so times by a stray pickup. And though it couldn’t sing like a dog, the worn and rusted hinges on that box attested to the history and reputation of Camp Niilhaasi—which had seen its fair share of eviction slips over the years. Yet here it stood anyway.
The only thing not standing, in fact, was the operator of the fine establishment, a gentleman by the name of Stanley Reece, who at one time was something of a lively, happy-go-lucky son of a gun, now diminished to something of a neurotic—rocking back and forth on the porch swing that hung against the camp office window and murmuring nonsensicles himself. Then, in an instant, a brand-spanking-new Lincoln continental pulled through the brush and broke to a stop atop the dusty gravel—a sight for sore eyes for Stanley, considering all the cops in and out of the place over the last four days. But when he noticed a fancy-pants blouse and smug, chiseled woman step from the elegant upholstery, something told him his worry wasn’t for nothing.
He descended the porch and skipped across the hot dirt on the balls of his bare and calloused feet. And when he reached Ella he smiled—not genuinely, of course, but wide enough to pass off his falsetto tone as genuine.
“Good afternoon, ma’am. What brings ya ‘round these parts?”
He smelled like smoke—somewhere in between a cigarette and campfire. He probably hadn’t showered in days, made apparent by the caked-on layers of sweat that clung to his face, and the unkempt ball of hair on his head that looked like a sleeping cat. A dead, sleeping cat.
“I take it you’re Stanley Reece?”
The man nodded, clumsily.
“I’m Ella. I’m with the Downtown Tattletale. I have some questions about Cody Hodgson.”
The man ran his fingers through the dead cat on his head, sighing heavily.
“Lemme level with ya, ma’am,” the man pleaded, that falsetto tone dropping like a bead of sweat, which, rest assured, were dropping too, “I can tell ya all ‘bout the differences between a clove hitch and a half hitch. Hell, I can show ya how to kayak, shoot an arrow, and start a bonfire before it’d be time to eat lunch. But listen, I dunno how to answer all these legal questions. Hell, I didn’t even finish high school.”
Ella didn’t bother with her notebook this time. She nodded out of what little, genuine pity she had for the well-meaning man and rephrased her prompt.
“All I wanna know is what happened. From your point-of-view.”
“Well, I mean…I didn’t see much of anything. I was gettin’ supper ready and some of the campers swarmed me—told me ‘bout Cody. Immediately, I thought the worst. Hell, I didn’t know if the kid could swim. But the cops never found any body in the lake. He’s just…gone.”
Ella nodded, biting her lip before asking, “What campers?”
“Oh, friends of his, I take it—dozen or so boys. They all felt terrible. See, they told me that they’d told Cody that if he went into the outhouse a spider would crawl up his butthole and lay eggs in his stomach. Kids, right? Anyways, the kid refused to even look at the damn latrine, so he decided to go pop-a-squat out in the woods. After ‘bout…forty-five minutes or so, when supper was almost ready, one of our counselors asked his cabinmates where Cody was, and they didn’t know. Then they all came to me.”
Ella logged the story in the back of her mind, like chicken scratch on her soggy brain. She could tell that Stanley couldn’t stand another question about the boy, so she opted to ask what was, in her eyes, a seemingly harmless one:
“So, do you think it was the monkey?”
Stanley swallowed back any words he might’ve been rash to say. Clearly, he had something on his mind, but his shifty eyes suggested that he might’ve not been at liberty to say it. After two more glances, east and westward, confirming that no one else was around, he moved in closer on Ella, who could smell the sweat that had seeped under his pits.
“That monkey,” he said, “is the reason this camp is still standin’. People love that shit—oh, pardon my French—so much so that we got a damn gift shop ‘bout ‘em. So…real, not real…doesn’t matter to me. He sells. And I didn’t even go to business school, ma’am.”
“So, you’re saying it’s a hoax?”
“All I’m sayin’…is that we’re ‘bout to get a lot more business.”
‘River Monkey for President’ and ‘I Survived the River Monkey and All I Got Was This Lousy T-shirt’ were just some of the designs in the gift shop, not to mention the hick’s eye-witness drawing, available in six different colors. There were plushies, coffee mugs, and even a bobblehead pen of the thing. But what struck her as most intriguing was a wall of masks—plastic pieces of garbage covered in faux hair that felt like peach fuzz glued to a to-go box. And aside from the fact that they were almost out of stock and selling for twenty-five dollars, she couldn’t get over the fact that they might’ve been a clue in this whole thing. With her disposable, she snapped a shot.
“I take it you won’t be buyin’ nothin’,” a moist voice said. Ella turned sharply around with a gasp and noticed a young woman—no older than 23—standing behind the counter and chewing on a wad of gum. The pigtails from her hair bounced with every smack from her lips, and Ella wondered why she didn’t notice her there before. But the real question was why she was there at all.
“Sorry,” Ella said with a relieving breath, “I didn’t see you there. I thought you were- “
“The River Monkey? Yeah, I get that a lot.” The girl reached into her jaw and removed the wad, sticking it beneath the countertop, alongside a dozen or so other flavors.
“You believe in that thing?” Ella asked. The girl shrugged. “I was gonna say Stanley but…that too,” Ella nodded with a half-smile. “Who are- ?”
“I’m Stanley’s girlfriend,” the girl said before Ella had time to finish, “I keep watch over the shop and bookkeepin’. You’re that lady from the papers, huh?” she asked. She was far too young to be Stanley’s girlfriend, but it seemed like that wasn’t gonna stop them. Not out here.
“The Downtown Tattletale, yes,” Ella said, stepping closer to the register counter.
“Yeah, I’ve read it before. You make us country folk look like hillbillies,” she said, a sour look on her face, “We’re not all crazy, y’know?”
Ella nodded softly, “I know. Sorry.” It was a relief saying that word, for what might’ve been the first time.
“Oh, it’s alright,” the girl said, noticing the embarrassment on Ella’s face. “The name’s Angie,” she said as she extended her hand.
“Ella.” The girl’s hand was softer than she expected, and yet her grip was firmer.
“Those masks sell well?” Ella asked. Angie looked over her shoulder and nodded.
“Oh, yeah. Most popular thing we sell. The campers like to scare each other, ‘specially ‘round the fire, telling ghost stories and whatnot and then poppin’ out in masks. It’s pretty funny.”
“I bet,” Ella said with a smile. “Y’ever think their pranks go…too far?” Angie shrugged.
“I dunno,” she said, “One time we had a kid fall into the river with his pants down. I guess his friends might’ve taken that one a little too far.” Ella nodded in understanding, stepping even closer to the countertop. Another step and she would’ve been touching it.
“Reason I ask,” she said, “is ‘cause Stanley said this kid had bullies. Y’think they’d ever do anything to…hurt him?”
Angie chewed on the question for a second, popping a quarter into the gumball machine on the counter and twisting, a bright red sphere barely dropping into her hand before she jammed it into her mouth and crunched. The rack of masks stared back at her from across the wooden shack, and she put two and two together.
“Are you sayin’ they framed the River Monkey?”
Ella shrugged, “Are you?”
Angie couldn’t answer that one.
“I think it’d be hard to mistake a giant monkey for a twelve-year-old kid in a Halloween mask,” Angie said, duly noting the rack of masks. It was clear that the implication was a bit steep, even for Ella.
“How about employees?” she said, “Could any of them have done it?”
“The counselors?” Angie asked. Her voice was raised. Surely, any finger pointed at one of them was four pointed back at herself. Or was it three? “If you’re askin’ if they’d kidnap a kid, you’d best talk to Stan—and not even he’d know,” she said, a shot of hot air escaping her nostrils as she chortled, “What? You think we run background checks out here?”
Ella knew they didn’t. It could’ve been anyone.
And anyone came in the form of a crudely torn piece of paper wedged, ever-so-conveniently, beneath the driver-side windshield wiper of her Lincoln. She had just finished photographing the place as the sun began setting, and if she was going to reach the hotel before midnight, she needed to get going—the one-laned country roads stretched on for miles, and it wasn’t like she could take the freeway. Angie and Stanley bid her farewell with a parting gift, or perhaps just a bribe to keep her article positive—a t-shirt, with a doodle that was all too familiar to her by this point. She smiled and thanked them and turned for the car. And that’s when she saw it: the paper.
It looked as if it had been ripped from a spiral notebook—the paper moist and grungy and smeared with a nearly illegible semblance of letters. Yet, somehow, she could faintly read the words: I KNOW, followed by an address—a tip. It would’ve been foolish for any woman, especially one as young and ambitious as Ella, to drive out to some lonesome house in the middle of nowhere, and in the middle of the night, and waltz right through the front door. God knows what might’ve been waiting for her.
But, then again, Ella was young, and she was ambitious.
The drive was only about five miles or so, yet the curved and treacherous terrain made the spindling journey last about an hour. All the while, the moon’s reflection off the Niilhassi acted as a sort of guide—the only beacon of light aside from her zig-zagging high beams, which weren’t doing her much good anyway. She had almost struck two trees and killed a deer, so it was a relief when she caught the first glimpse of a house—the first one she had seen in, what felt like, miles.
It was a solitary, beat-up-looking place, engulfed in a nearly endless darkness if not for the single bulb that illuminated the front porch. What the light revealed was about as tired looking as she must’ve been, and for a moment, in her state of numbed weariness, it dawned on her that this whole thing might’ve been one big practical joke—a wild goose chase orchestrated by some dumb kids or a pissed-off camp operator and his girlfriend. She was a fool. And though she should’ve turned back, something in her, call it her drive or that sheer ambition, forced her from that Lincoln, up the front steps, and onto the welcome mat—which, if it we’re trying to welcome her, definitely missed its hospitable mark, being about as tattered and worn as the note from her windshield.
“He’lo?” The voice was about as abrupt as the entire situation was, and yet she still wasn’t expecting it. She was spooked. Through a crack in the door, she should make out a dimly lit face—a man, his skin lumpy and stretched, with jet-black hair jetting out of his ears and nose.
“Sorry,” she said, composing herself, “Are you the one that left the note on my car?”
The man nodded, “Yes.” He tried to pull open the door when it snagged on the metal chain. He tried again, harder this time.
“You’ve got to unlatch the- “ Ella started, but before she could finish the man ripped the chain from the dry rotted wood, its hinges squealing as it opened wide, filling the dark house with the same, dull glow of the porchlight. “Thanks,” she murmured and stepped inside.
The first step she took forced her to dip about a half-inch or so into the floor, her weight forcing the wood to creak. She caught her bearings and surveyed the house as she approached a dining room table amidst what was, largely, an empty room cast in the blackness of night. And rolling in from that darkness became a pungent, rancid smell—perhaps a whiff of mucky lake water through an opened window, or a dead critter beneath the elevated flooring. Either way, it stunk like a skunk. And the man seemed not to notice, or not to care.
“I know what hap’ned,” he said, bending down to sit across from her at the table, interrupting her self-talk. The chair bowed at his sitting, for he was a larger man, and it creaked similarly to the floor.
“And who are you, exactly?” she smiled, despite her facial muscles stiffening. The man took in a long, deep breath.
“I’m the bus driv’r,” he said, his voice low and drawled, as if he was drugged or on drugs, “I drive the bus for the camp.” Ella nodded excitedly. Surely an employee, especially one with knowledge of the campgrounds, such as a bus driver, would’ve known something of note. She took out her pad and pen.
“And what did you see, sir?”
The man breathed in, “I am the Riv’r Monkey,” he said. Ella laughed, but the man remained firm in his expression. “Stanl’y,” he continued, “makes me dress up, like a monkey.” The man stood and stomped over to the closet, pulling it open and retrieving, from its depths, a large, fur suit—brown and matted, like any run-of-the-mill gorilla suit from the five-and-dime Halloween store. The man dragged the suit over to the table and laid it across the tempered wood. Ella ran her fingers through the fur and stared up at the man, whose demeanor was still unchanged.
“W-why does he make you play dress up?” she said, a smile cracking her lips open.
“Said it’s good for the camp,” the man said, “legends of the Riv’r Monkey br’ng tourists and dollars.”
“And the kid?” Ella immediately said.
“He’s okay,” the man smiled elastically, “he’s in on the joke.” Ella blew out a confused sigh, rummaging her fingers through her long, silky hair as what was a built-up and somewhat nervous laugh belched out from within her.
“So, it was a publicity stunt?” she laughed, shaking her head, “I knew it. I damn well knew it. W-what about the papers? The news?”
“All in on the joke,” he said, “br’ngs tourists and dollars.” Ella slapped the table, a smile wider than her cheeks spread across her face. Of all the kooky stories she had heard over the years, over her many travels nationwide, this one was the kookiest. She pulled out her disposable camera and aimed it readily at the suit draped over the table’s ledge. Before she pushed the little, black button, she stopped herself and glanced up at the towering man.
“You don’t mind, do you?”
“No,” the man said, lifting a large hand. She snapped away.
After she was finished snapping, she politely thanked the man and stood from her seat. This was going to make one hell of a story, and if she could manage an interview with Cody Hodgson, it might even make the front page of the next issue, she thought.
“Thank you, Mister- ?”
“Bob,” the man said.
“Bob. Thank you.” Ella turned to face the door when the long road ahead dawned on her. It’d be hours before she’d reach the hotel. “Might I use your bathroom?” she asked, turning back around to face him. Bob looked off into the shadowy darkness, assumedly toward the bathroom in question, and nodded his head slowly. “I’ll only take a moment,” she said before entering the darkness and finding her place.
It was colder in this part of the house, and after her eyes adjusted, she could make out the frame of a door filled with the hue from a nearby window, overlooking Lake Niilhassi. It really was a beautiful sight, but her enjoyment was cut short by the returning stench that quickly filled the room, even stronger than it was before. She locked the bathroom door and, not unlike her, began to snoop diligently. And when she stuck her nose too close to the shower curtain, she backed away, knowing all-too-well that she had found the source of the smell.
With one tug, she pulled the curtain back and a wall of that same stench hit her in the face. She teared up with one breath, stepped back, and had to force her eyes open to see what it was: a black mass, lying in the tub. It was a body, that of a shriveled, eaten away young boy—Cody Hodgson, no doubt.
Before a moment to process, there was a thud at the door, a jiggling of the handle, before Bob’s voice—muted and monotone—pushed through from the other side.
“Open the door,” he said. The handle jiggled again.
“What the hell is this?” Ella screamed. Bob didn’t answer. And after a deafening silent moment, there was another loud thud from the other side of the door.
“Open the door,” the voice said. It was Bob’s, but it was far deeper than even a moment before. Ella didn’t respond. She had already shuffled along the bathroom wall to the window, trying to pry the rusted metal open. It wouldn’t budge.
The handle began jiggling faster, the thuds ramping into a succession of loud, heavy bangs.
“Open! Open! Open!” the voice screeched. It was deep and booming. It no longer sounded human, as if Bob was completely replaced by something awful, and animal. The repeated lone word from the voice began to lose all semblance of meaning—as though the voice itself didn’t even know what it was trying to say. The handle kept spastically shaking until it flew off the hinges, falling to the floor and rattling. Then, suddenly, two long, hairy fingers poked through the hole where the handle once sat and scrapped at the wood violently. When they made little progress, they retreated, and the hole was instead filled by the nostrils of something, huffing deeply through the small opening. The noises it made were panicked and shrill—like that of a tortured chimpanzee.
Ella screamed, thrusting her pen into the brittle glass window with all her might. Two jabs and it cracked, three and it shattered, and one leap off the toilet, and she fell a story down and into the muddy grass below. She would’ve never loved the feel of mud and grass against her skin, but now it was the only thing she wanted to feel—relief. She jumped to her feet and dashed for the car, not turning back. She could hear rummaging from within the house as she fled.
A boost of adrenaline filled her as she turned the corner of the house and saw the Lincoln Continental, and with a final gust, she reached the car, flung open the door, and jumped inside, locking it immediately. She caught her breath, but only for a moment, as she shoved the key into the ignition and turned it. The high beams flashed on, and that’s when she, finally, saw it: the Niilhassi River Monkey.
It was halfway from the house to the lake—sprinting with all its might with a jagged stagger. It must’ve been seven feet tall and covered in a mangy coat of jet-black hair. And unlike the image in her head, it was lanky, not bulky like the traditional apes she’d seen at the zoo. And, at the same time, it was like the image she had seen—the ugly one the hick had drawn—it really was that ugly.
In its arm, it held Cody Hodgson—what was left of the boy, anyway. He was hanging from its gangly hand, which nearly touched the ground. And from what she could tell, there was something else hanging off of its wet fur—skin; a type of rubbery suit fastened from human skin, which at one point she might’ve called Bob.
It took a final glance over to the headlights—its beady eyes glowing with the reflection of the high beams—and jumped into the gloomy water without another beat. Ella, without waiting around herself, put the car in reverse and high-tailed it out of there.
All she had after that were a panic attack and a couple of pictures—mostly of a run-down summer camp and a dirty old monkey suit, which wasn’t exactly going to make her story any easier. The house, she’d come to find out, was abandoned, and the body of little Cody Hodgson was, as she knew it, vacated from its premises—either in the stomach of that thing or somewhere along the bottom of the Niilhassi.
The only thing left she had to go off of was her own testimony which, given her track record of falsified tales, wouldn’t’ve held up all too well either. No one would ever believe her. Not even the folks back at the Downtown Tattletale, who never took any of this shit seriously anyway. And who could blame them? Who could blame her?
That’s, at least, the story they’re going with at ol’ Camp Camp—with variations here and there, of course. Some of the times the yarn is spun around the fire, the campers go into the gory details of how the River Monkey ate her guts out. That one usually ruins most of the groups’ appetite for s’mores. Or some of the times, fueled by her lust for that promotion of hers, Ella becomes the River Monkey herself—a clever ‘lil plot twist for a bunch of middle schoolers, don’t you think?
The truth of the matter—if such a thing even exists for such a ridiculous, campy story—is that we’ll never truly know. We either listen to the witness of a pathological liar, a greedy summer camp, a handful of conspiracy theorists, or a bunch of middle schoolers.
Funny. That’s exactly how the River Monkey would’ve liked it.
Written by MakRalston
Content is available under CC BY-SA