This story happened when I was 16. I was living in a small town on the east coast of the US. Our town was once much bigger and more exciting, back when living in a port city bordering the Atlantic Ocean still meant something, but it had lost much of its charm and population during the early 1900s, and, while I was growing up, it only had about 3,000-4,500 residents. Most of its inhabitants were retired pensioners, looking to spend their final decades in a place where you could feel the sting of salt water and watch ships pass on a distant horizon. As such, I only had one real friend as a teenage boy in that crusty old town: Marcus.
Marcus and I were the same age and, after he moved next door when I was 10, we soon became utterly inseparable. He was my best friend, my confidant, almost like the brother that I never had. We would spend the warm summer days splashing in the ocean, chasing each other out to the pier, and fooling around in a treehouse that we built together when we were 13. As we got older, our curfews were extended, and we began to hang out and play games at night as well. It is on one of these nights that my story takes place.
This particular day, Marcus and I had both been cooped up doing chores while the sun was out, and, by the time that we could finally meet up at the gap in the old metal fence where the beach could be accessed, the sky was already the dark purple-indigo of late twilight. Marcus was buzzing with excitement when I met him, and, as we walked down to where the water hissed against the rocky shore, he explained this new game that he had created. It was a cross between hide-and-seek and tag, and the rules were simple. One person would run off and hide somewhere on the beach and, after counting for 1 minute, the other person would come and find them, using a flashlight that he had brought from home. When the light from the flashlight hit the hider, they would run, and the other person would chase them until they either caught them or gave up. Then, the roles would reverse and we would play again.
We played a few rounds without incident, but, on probably our 4th or 5th round, everything went wrong. I was “seeking,” and, as I turned my back and started counting, Marcus ran off quickly into the inky darkness of the beach. Unlike the other rounds however, I started to hear weird sounds at about the 20 second mark. First, there was a lot of splashing, and I chuckled, thinking that Marcus had probably tripped and fallen into the water. The next sounds were more concerning. It sounded like something heavy falling to the sand, then a struggle, then a choked gasp, and then silence. I was worried, but I figured that Marcus was just trying to mess with me, and I started after him after my countdown had finished. As I swept my flashlight along the beach, I was surprised that the light hit him after only a few seconds of walking, as it looked like he was just standing, facing the water, a couple of yards from where we had started. He didn’t start running, just kept staring out across the dark ocean. “Marcus?” I whispered softly as I crept closer to him, and, just like that, his head whipped around to face me. And then it was my turn to run.
I ran back through the dark neighborhoods as fast as my sneakered feet could take me, conscious of the second beat of footsteps just behind me. I knew all too well that, in my hurry to flee the beach, I had failed to pick up my wallet and keys from where I had left them by the fence gap, and I wouldn’t be able to get back in my house. Luckily, I spotted my saving grace hanging from the oak tree in my front yard, swinging gently in the night breeze: the ladder to our treehouse. How I managed to keep my limbs steady enough to climb the ladder and pull it back up before that…thing…reached me I don’t know, but I do know that, as I leaned against the far wall of the treehouse and panted, legs and lungs aching from my sprint, I heard “Marcus” stop at the base of the tree. I didn’t dare look down, but I know that it stayed there all night. I know this because it started whistling. Its whistle was horrible, halting and watery but still somehow clear enough to be eerily melodic. Whatever it was whistling was a song of its own design (or, at least, a song I didn’t know), and it continued to whistle until just before dawn, at which point I heard its song retreating back in the direction of the sea.
I don’t know when it was that my parents found me, shaking and inconsolable in my old rotting treehouse. I don’t know when it was that Marcus’ parents raised the alarm, sending the whole town searching for the missing boy, and I don’t know exactly how many months it was before it was called off and Marcus was declared dead. But I do know that their search was in vain. They were never going to find Marcus alive, and I doubt that they ever stood a chance of finding him dead either. I hope that whatever it was that emerged from the sea that night and took my friend went right back to the depths that it came from, and I hope that it never returns.
I only saw its face for a second, but that second will stick in my mind forever. Its skin was blueish-gray and starting to come loose in places. Its jaw hung open, and its swollen, purple tongue hung out of its mouth like a gigantic dead slug. And its eyes were glassy, dark-circled and bulging out of its gaunt skull. It looked…drowned.