My Sister And I: A dark, violent, gripping and twisted tale of horrifying terror in the Scottish Highlands.

by Sean-Paul Thomas

  He taught us how to make dangerous weapons from the earth’s natural resources so that we could hunt and kill larger animals like dogs, deer, stray goats, cows, horses, and yes, even people sometimes too, for when the time came. Which it eventually did, but much sooner than I thought it might. But I’ll come to that later.

  He taught us how to make fire by using two pieces of dried wood and a little bit of kindle (dry grass or an old bird’s nest). But most important of all, he taught us how to look after ourselves. How to survive in the world when we had nothing on our person but our own two hands to assist us.

  My sister was always the one that showed much more of a keen and eager interest in these mundane and torturous survival skills and monthly exercise drills that our father constantly put us through, than I.

  She adored them so much and learned so quickly and skilfully, even finding ways to apply them into her everyday way of living, that she always looked forward to father's next lessons, tasks, and adventures more than anything else in her life.

  To put it into context, she was the perfect little student for him and he was the ideal teacher for her. Father psychopath and daughter psychopath, side by side.

  For the first few years and up until the age of ten, my father enjoyed nothing more than taking his girls way out into the remotest regions of the Scottish wilderness for days, sometimes weeks on end, and camping out from scratch.

  We’d leave the old family farm house, which had apparently been passed down to him by his own father, at first light and make our way hiking across the mountains and valleys, always in a different direction each time, with no food, no water, no rucksacks, or camping equipment to our names. Just the wind, rain, and rare Scottish sunshine on our backs.

  It was a challenge from him to see how long we could survive out there in the bare-knuckled wild. How long we could keep it all together inside, mentally and physically, until he decided that we'd had enough or until one of us became badly ill or severely dehydrated or poisoned by some random inedible berry or mushroom or uncooked piece of squirrel which, nine times out of ten, was usually, always me.

  That first hour or so of starting out from the house, with nothing in your hands and only the cold Scottish sun on your back, and that intense pressure and excitement to find some water, make a fire, catch and cook some food, then to find and make a new shelter out of branches and leaves or anything you could find before the sun went down. That was always his favourite part—my sister’s too— That first part of the adventure when you truly thought you could die out there unless you got your fuckin’ arse in gear (my father’s words again).

  From a very young age, I always knew that this life was not for me. And I would have to bide my time until either my father died—hopefully soon, tragically and painfully, perhaps while off on one of his into-the wild expeditions - or, I became an adult, by law, and could finally go off on my own and do whatever the hell I wanted to do with my life without his demanding sergeant major voice and presence echoing through my ears twenty-four hours a day.

  Which is funny, since he did use to be a sergeant in the British army for a number of years, or so he told us, before my sister and I came along and well before he ever met our mysterious mother, who he very rarely ever mentioned or talked about, still.

  The best explanation I ever got out of him one time before he smacked me senseless was that she left us a very long time ago, almost immediately after we were born, to return to her native home of Glasgow. Full stop - Now, no more silly fuckin’ questions (his words again)

  It wasn't until our eleventh birthday that my father first made us go survival camping all by ourselves and without the aid and assistance of his presence, skills and knowledge.

  He’d led us up to a vast mountain forest himself. The one that sat a few miles along the coast from our old, secluded farm house. But that was as far as his adult supervision was willing to take us on that first occasion.

  He’d even let me practice my driving skills on that rare occasion. Letting me drive along the old Highland country backroad up towards the forest that would become our new home for the next few days. It was usually always my sister he’d let drive. He praised her nonstop on her fearless driving too, so I was a little apprehensive to say the least.

  Everything was going swimmingly on the short journey. Dad even seemed slightly impressed by my slow, but steady and careful driving, even though it was hard to tell from his stern facial expressions that I was making any kind of impression, but I’d learnt over the years that if he wasn’t speaking or criticising, then everything was ok.

  When I stopped the car just a few yards shy on the edge of the thick woods, I suddenly stalled it. It was my own fault for being far too eager to park up and exit the vehicle. My sister sniggered in the back. Dad gently shook his head. Now he was disappointed.

  “Almost a gold star ma wee doll, but no quite”

  As we climbed out of the car my sister asked if she could drive back when the adventure exercise was over.

  “We’ll see” my dad replied as he beckoned us to walk further towards the forest. As my sister and I wandered off without saying goodbye, it was just our way. Dad sat resting up against the car bonnet with his arms folded watching us go.

  “Remember what ah taught ye’s, aye?” he called out to us. We both turned back to face him one last time.

  “You’ll stay in that forest there for three days and three nights and no more. Then al come back and get ye’s, right here, right on this very fuckin spot, ye hear? On the dawn of the fourth day. Dae ye’s understand me girls, aye?” he continued while mostly making eye contact with my sister throughout his entire speech.

  “Yes, sir,” my sister eagerly replied, drowning out my own meek answer of acknowledgement.

  “The idea is tae survive oot here, girls…” he continued in his thick scotch dialect. A dialect that I had strongly tried my best to disassociate myself with while my sister fully embraced it. “…for as long as ye’s can. And just like ma auld man used tae say. Survival of the fittest is what this world will come tae soon enough when the shite really hits the fan. So, go intae they woods. Make your fires. Make your shelters. Find your water and hunt your food tae feed your wee empty bellies. Live well and die free oot there. Ye’s got that? Just like ah fuckin’ taught ye’s, aye?”

  I remembered his eyes finally turning to meet mine for the first time that day right after he’d made that little speech.

  “Just like ah taught both of ye’s. Now, fuck off oot ma sight and get tae it. Chop fuckin’ chop.”

  In silence, my sister and I turned from Dad and casually made our way into the vast and daunting, dark woods, which lay there in an unwelcoming wait of our presence.

  We were children about to embark upon a world that most westernised adults, in this day and age, barely even understood yet alone could survive more than a few hours in.

  I always wondered what my father would do or say, or how he would react if anything seriously bad ever did happen to either me or my sister while out on these ridiculous survival adventures. If one of us got badly hurt or even, heaven forbid, died a gruesome, grisly death amidst the trees or the unforgiving mountain top terrains.

  I really don’t think he’d be that bothered at all, to tell you the truth. He'd most likely just shrug it off more than anything. Give some stupid explanation that we had lived more than most people in the west do in ten lifetimes and died a good death too while we were at it. And of course, we’d died free. Which was the most important thing of all in his book.

  Deep down inside, I knew that he was absolutely fucking insane. But what could I do? I was an eleven-year-old girl and he was my father. He was my world. He was my pain, my torture, my teacher, my tormentor. He was the only thing that I knew.

  “And remember this in all, girls,” he shouted after us as we reached the first few rows of dark green trees on the edge of the woods. “Al be watchin’, ye’s. You’ll no ken when or from where. But al be around w
atchin’ ye’s for sure. So, dae me proud in there girls. Dae me fuckin’ proud.”

  In silence we continued to walk into the thick dark forest as my father’s words fell from my ears like water off a duck’s back.

  Chapter 3

  For twin sisters we didn’t particularly like to talk much, even to each other for that matter. But that didn’t mean we weren’t close. Far from it. I would do absolutely anything for my sister and she for me if the circumstances ever arose—and it did on a few occasions. But it just seemed like the only thing about our crazy situation that we could talk about—really talk deeply about—was our father, and I knew that none of us really wanted to ever go there.

  Perhaps if our feelings were mutual regarding our father, tormentor, and protector, then yes, it might be just about a bearable place to venture and plan some kind of escape from his abuse. And let’s get this straight: Even though it was never sexual it was child abuse.

  But because I knew for certain that my sister loved and respected my father so much more than I could ever allow myself to do, then he and his extremist ways were always going to be like treading on thin ice as far as she was concerned.

  For most of that morning, on the first day of our venture into the forest, we scoured the entire place for an ideal camping spot to base ourselves on. After over an hour of searching my sister found the most perfect little site, just like she always did, since I was only too happy to just let her get on with it, letting her take charge of the situation and bark her orders.

  If I’d ever happened to be in those woods all by myself then I'd be more than happy to just crawl into the nearest dark, damp hole in the ground or hollowed out tree I could find, eating nothing but the small, edible fruits, plants, and insects in my vicinity while making a lovely little warm fire for myself to get me through the long, cold, dark nights.

  That was all I really needed in those situations to see me through, until my father came a calling to take me back home again.

  My sister hated sitting around though. She absolutely loathed and detested it and always had to be doing something, or checking up on something, or making that something just a little bigger, better, stronger. She could never sit still for a moment while I, on the other hand, could quite happily sit quietly and meekly for hours on end, gradually blending into the mundane background, even fantasising from time to time about one day disappearing into the bland background for good.

  My sister told me to go and find anything that we could collect water in then get onto finding enough wood to start a fire with, while she swiftly went to work on making a shelter for us to live in out of branches, sticks and logs.

  When she was done with that task, she went about setting up her snare traps in and around any animal holes in the ground she could find using some old string and wire she'd found lying around while making the shelter.

  She never used to be too bothered about catching animals on the first day of these expeditions. Her priority was always setting up camp first before sourcing water and getting a fire started. She always enjoyed having the second and third day open to go out and hunt, after we'd made our base.

  In fact, dare I say, this was her second favourite part of the survival adventure after setting off into the unknown. She loved a good hunt and kill. Savoured it so much that it became almost like an obsession to her over the years. I could sense it in her bones and entire demeanour like some faint and foul rotten odour in the air that followed her around day after day and she couldn’t do a damn thing to get rid of it and so it just consumed her until it finally became a part of her.

  She loved the thrill of the kill even more than our own father did, and that took some doing. It also scared the hell out of me an awful lot too.

  I should have known at that point which direction my sister’s future was heading, but we were still kids at the end of the day and I always just assumed that we'd both grow out of it in the end, or that our father would finally get bored of it all and let us just be normal children for once in our miserable, pathetic lives, even though we were practically teenagers now.

  And then he would let us go out and have other teenage friends with teenage dreams and teenage dramas and adventures. And all of our own making too and not forced upon us by his strict hand and one-sided views and opinions of the world.

  Sadly though, that day never came.

  My sister finally finished building our sturdy and well-hidden shelter and by the evening I had our fire lit and roaring fiercely beside it, all by using two dry sticks and rubbing them furiously together for just over an hour with my tiny turf of dry kindle, waiting to catch the sparks just like father had taught me to. We had this all achieved well before sunset too.

  That was one good thing about living in Scotland in the summer. The weather might be miserable as hell and unpredictable to say the least, but those long summer days and nights, when the sun never set until way after ten o’clock at night, were absolute bliss during our camping expeditions. And as you can no doubt imagine, I wasn't a particular big fan of the dark.

  For our water situation, we hadn't managed to find any nearby streams or lochs jus yet, although we did know of one huge loch a few miles north of our camp that we'd visited often with our father, but that could wait until morning.

  I'd found some plastic bags along with some plastic bottles scattered around the woods, most likely dumped by campers in the area who couldn't be bothered to carry their crap home with them.

  The plastic bags, I'd tied to some thick tree branches around our shelter using our shoe laces and other bits of string and wire I’d found to secure them. In time, the dew from the leaves dripped into the bags and into the bottles that I'd shoved into some of the thinner tree branches.

  Later that night my sister went out to check up on her traps. Traps that she usually left until morning, but because we'd done such a quick and grand job of building up our camp site so fast, she wanted to give us a little reward for all our hard work.

  She returned to camp twenty minutes later looking absolutely chuffed to bits with herself. In one hand she carried a bird’s nest filled with four, un-hatched, eggs, and in her other hand, swinging by its limp tale, was a fully grown, adult rabbit.

  When she placed the rabbit down beside the fire, I noticed that the poor little creature seemed to be whimpering and limping badly, still barely alive. My sister, of course, had known this ever since she'd released it from its snare trap. But instead of wringing or breaking the poor creature’s neck and putting it out of its damn misery like any normal human being would, she instead broke its little legs and paws so that even if she dropped it accidentally or put it down on the ground it wouldn't be able to dash off anywhere in a hurry.

  I remembered feeling quite angry at her for that. Being forced to witness another animals’ torture and suffering. I watched in utter disgust as my sister then sat down beside me and let the poor rabbit crawl around in agonizing circles, going absolutely bloody nowhere, just round and round in great distress, beside the fire.

  Soon, she cracked open two of the eggs from the bird’s nest and swallowed the contents raw and whole. She offered me the other two and without words I took the welcomed food offering and swiftly gulped them down.

  All eyes then turned back to the poor suffering rabbit. My sister lay down on her belly and supported her chin with her hands. She took great delight in just watching the bunny as it desperately tried to limp, crawl, and hop away while struggling to keep itself in a straight line.

  When she started petting the bloody thing, before swiping it up off the ground to hug and hold in her arms like a warm cuddly toy, that was the final straw for me. I jumped to my feet, enraged, and grabbed the little rabbit from her grasp.

  Before she had time to clamber to her feet and wrestle the creature back, I'd already swung its head hard against the nearest tree, bashing its skull to smithereens and putting it well and truly out of its misery.

  My sister frowned, placed her hands upon her h
ips, and let out a frustrated sigh. With a bitter disgust she spat down onto the raging fire before stomping towards me. She ripped the dead rabbit out of my grasp and threw it to the dirt floor beside the shelter.

  She then took out her small pen knife and dropped to her knees right next to the dead animal. Without even pausing for breath or hesitating to see where the best place would be to start cutting it up, she slit the rabbit's furry skin from head to tail, revealing a bright red streak of flesh before proceeding to gut the thing from the inside out like she’d done it a thousand times before. And of course, she had.

  An hour later we were both sharing our first meal out in the wild together. A slow roasted rabbit with a side salad of dandelions.

  For after dinner drinks we drained the mouthfuls of water that had accumulated inside the plastic bags and bottles attached to the trees throughout the day.

  The next morning, we went for a long wander east through the forest. When we finally came out on the other side, we were pleasantly surprised to find another small hidden loch, one that we hadn't even known had existed, even though we'd grown up and lived in that wild, secluded area our entire lives.

  The loch was quiet and beautiful and would be a good source of water and food for us in the days still to come. The only problem was we weren't alone. On our far-right hand-side and halfway along the upper sandy beach on the eastern shore, if we squinted our eyes just about right, we could make out a single green tent.

  My sister felt enraged and immediately wanted to investigate further, so we cautiously approached the lonely looking campsite, sticking to the edge of the forest and well undercover as we circled the perimeter of the loch shore.

  When we reached directly opposite the tent, we left the cover of the forest and crawled through the long wild grass, moving as closely to it as we possibly could without being seen or heard.

  I thought that it might be the wind at first but it didn't seem strong enough. Something was clearly moving from within, gently causing random ripples down both sides of the tent, before suddenly becoming more violent.