The Pennsylvania Squonk

“Now that it’s dark, let the spooks begin.”

We sat around the campfire, surrounded by hemlocks and the night sky, our bellies full of hot apple cider. The park was quiet all but for Billy, beginning his scary story with a flashlight propped below his chin. After a day of hiking together along a trail and swimming in the lake, Julian, Maggie, and I listened with sleepy twinkles in our eyes. It was the night before Halloween.

“They call it the Squonk …” He began, “some say it was born from an evil swamp and migrated here to terrorize the parks of Northern Pennsylvania.” 

We looked around at each other, unimpressed. What’s so horrifying about a creature named “Squonk”? 

“It’s covered in warts and moles, tainted with the scent of earthy gas, with yellow tusks and sharp claws, and you’ll know it’s coming to get you because of its cries … waaaah, waaah, waah.” 

Billy mimicked the weeps of the creature, wiping the tears like his hands were not hands but Squonk claws. 

Maggie rolled her eyes. Nothing seemed to scare her, plus she’d had enough of his shenanigans throughout the years. Julian seemed a little creeped. And let’s just say, I was the baby of the group. I shivered as if from the cold, trying to shake off the eerie feeling. 

“It leaves its trail of goopy wet tears through the park and finally, ultimately, when it finds you and it grabs you — they say you turn into a pile of tears yourself, a puddle, never to be seen again.”

Billy turned off his flashlight, smirking with satisfaction at giving me, his younger brother, the chills. 

“Yawn,” Maggie stated, standing up from her chair. “Bor-ring … I’m going to sleep.” 

When the fire was extinguished, darkness engulfed everything. All that lit up our surroundings were the stars. Everyone headed into their tents to sleep. But in mine, I laid awake, unable to. This wasn’t like when we were little kids in Cook Forest, and I could crawl into Billy’s tent and stay with him because I was scared of the dark. I was 13, and I had begged for him to take me along with his friends for the trip, telling our parents that I was old enough. 

I was awake for a few hours, jolting at every snap of twig and bug chirp, when suddenly I heard it. I sat up and listened hard to ensure I wasn’t losing my mind. It was the sound of a long, monsterish weeping. A violent cry coming from afar. 

I curled up in my sleeping bag and rocked back and forth. If only Billy could see me. Suddenly, my tent started to unzip. My teeth were chattering. I wanted to cry out for help. 

“AHHH!” I screamed and hid my head in my pillow, only to hear laughing. 

I looked up. It was Billy, Maggie, and Julian. 

“Go to sleep, kid. Stop being a scaredy cat.” 

It took me two more hours before I finally did fall asleep. 

I woke up to Maggie’s scream and rolled my eyes. Here they go again, I thought. I rubbed my eyes and left the tent. There Maggie and Billy stood, looking into Julian’s tent. Staring at his absence and the puddle by his pillowcase.

“Is this another one of your jokes? It’s not funny.” I said in a huff.

But the look on Billy’s face told me this was no joke. It was the same face he’d made when we were kids and an owl swooped down from a tree branch and scared the bones out of his skin. 

Julian was really gone … and the Squonk was actually real. 

We walked along the path, following the trail blazes, hoping to find some signs of Julian, but with no luck. 

“Let’s split up.” Billy suggested. 

Maggie walked north, I took east, and Billy took to the west. They were trying not to freak out just yet. To them, there was no way the Squonk could be real. The puddle had to be a spilled canteen. Julian had to just be exploring, okay and un-Squonked. But I, the scaredy cat, knew better. 

We planned to meet back where we started in an hour. As I traversed through the branches and bristles, I silently begged that the Squonk was nocturnal. That in the daylight, I’d be safe. But fog engulfed the forest, swirling between the hemlocks and red oaks. The only sound was my feet crunching leaves. A cricket here and there. In the spooky haze, I grew chills, expecting at any moment, the Squonk to come running — its terrifying claws careening through the dirt, its weepy eyes shooting daggers between wrinkly skin. Every step I took was with trepidation. 

I heard a rustle from behind and spun around quickly, tripping on a vine and falling face-first into the park dirt, my heart pounding a million miles a split second. I looked up with horror, expecting the creature to stand before me ready to turn me to a patch of tears. But a mere squirrel ran from the brush, acorn in hand, and darted away. I felt silly, hopping to my feet in my own embarrassment. 

But suddenly, I looked down and noticed my chest was wet. I had fallen into the path of  a long trail of salty water, twisting and turning through the soil, traveling north in Maggie’s direction. My heart rate picked up once more. 

Then I heard the cries. Different from last night. Not made by a group of pranksters looking to scare a younger brother, but a true creature yelping through the trees, gravelly and otherworldly. The weeping stopped. I looked around me frantically. It could be coming from anywhere. 

Then when I heard Maggie scream, I began running, darting to anywhere away from where I was.

But along the way I saw Billy. And there he stood, looking down over a puddle in disbelief. 

“It took Maggie too.” 

—

Now, we were determined. Or at least Billy was. I liked his friends well enough, but if I had the choice, I’d have packed my things and ran as far from this park as possible. The sun was beginning to set, the fog grew stronger — and it hadn’t helped that it was Halloween, the spookiest day of the year. 

“Let’s head back to the campsite,” Billy said, “And stop being a baby.” 

He could sense it in me. As we walked back to our tents, Billy taking the lead, I spun around over and over, constantly checking if we were being followed. 

After a few minutes, I dropped my flashlight and watched it roll to the side, into a bush. 

“Shoot.”

I walked over and dug my hand around searching. Then I heard a cry and Billy yell. I turned around, flashlight now in hand, and he was gone, without a trace — except for a puddle where his feet once stood. 

In the distance, I heard the crying continue. Then past echoes in my ear. Billy and his friends laughing at my own adolescence. I was tired of being the “baby.” Now was the moment to muster the courage, come face to face with the Squonk and my fears, and avenge Billy and Maggie and Julian. 

I took deep breaths then darted into the forest, following the path of cries. The fog was hefty, the darkness was descending, but I continued on, trudging through leaves, each step growing closer to the sound of weeping. I was hopping between puddles of Squonk tears, surely the many victims it took in this park. I knew I was entering its territory, diving headfirst into the belly of the beast. But I fought back fear with the thought of Billy and his friends, defeating the Squonk who dared show its gnarly face on all days, Halloween, and coming out of it a grown-up, no longer the kiddo. 

Finally, I stopped in my tracks. There, only a few feet away, stood the Squonk. Uglier than I had even imagined and crying out horrid noises. I was frozen solid, feet cemented to the forest grounds. And the Squonk drew closer. I could smell that swamp scent, pungent and unbearable. I could hear its sad squeals. I could feel its breath. 

Now, only inches away, I readied myself for an attack. I shut my eyes tight and held out my fists, hoping I’d have a chance to strike before turning to tears myself. 

Closer, closer, closer. It was right in front of me now. 

—

When I looked down, I was surprised to find that my body was still a body, not a wet spot. But was more surprised to find the Squonk was not grabbing at me with its ferocious claws or biting me with its gnarled tusk-teeth. 

It nudged me with its head, slowly, softly, and sniffled. 

“What?” I couldn’t believe it. 

It looked up at me with puppy dog eyes. And suddenly, from beyond the Squonk, walking out of its cave, appeared Julian, Maggie, and my big brother, Billy. The Squonk wasn’t a monster at all. The Squonk was in fact a sweetheart. 

The story goes that the Squonk in all its swamp-smell and un-beauty, wanders the park weeping. Not in search of a young group of friends to scare and turn to tears, but just for a group of friends. The creature was lonely, that’s all. And took Maggie and Julian and Billy back to its cave to keep it company. It was an outsider in this forest, just like me. It’s not the Squonk’s fault it was born smelly and quite unattractive. No, it’s what on the inside that counts. 

I wiped the Squonk’s tears. Patted it on the head. And ran over to Billy to give him a hug, melting into his arms in relief. I had worked up the courage to be a big kid, and found a not-so monstrous monster in the process. The Squonk, our friend, was never to be alone again — for every year on Halloween, we’d return, following the path I took that fateful day, no longer covered in tears, to that very cave. 

Because everyone deserves some company on the spookiest day of the year, even the good ol’ monster, the Squonk. nster, the Squonk.