“Plus, the van stinks,” she says. “Like literally. I think your dog needs a bath, too. He reeks.”
This is probably also true, but I’m not about to admit defeat. “Yeah, well, you don’t smell so good yourself.”
Russ clears his throat and points to a booth near the back, right next to where we sat yesterday. The man sitting there could have been a double for Grizzly Adams. His broad, weathered face is creased with age, and his faded flannel shirt is torn and patched in places. He sits with a stained shoebox ceremoniously situated on the table in front of him. His thick hands rest on the box, and his deep-set brown eyes scan the room. This must be our man.
I shake off my sister’s petty immaturity and grab the voice recorder from my pocket. Pasting on a smile, I approach his booth and hold out my hand. “Are you George Smith?”
He grunts and levers himself to his feet. “Yup, that’s me. You the pair-e-normal investigators?” He enunciates paranormal carefully, like it’s unfamiliar to him.
“Yes, sir.”
His hand, calloused from hard work, encloses mine. “Sit, please.” He gestures at the booth.
Jess and I sit across from him, and Russ pulls up a chair and gets out a GoPro.
“Is it all right if we record and film this conversation?” I set the voice recorder on the table. “It’s so we don’t miss anything.”
I pause, waiting for his answer. This part always gets to me. If they refuse, we can’t broadcast anything, and it makes for a terrible show.
He waves my question away. “Shit, I don’t care.”
“Awesome.” Relief floods through me. I take the release forms from my bag, and he signs them without reading them. Then I turn on the recorder while Russ flicks on the GoPro. He pans the camera from Jess and me to George Smith then back again, getting the introductory footage that we can pull stills from later. I don’t have to ask if he’s live streaming this, because he won’t be. This way, we can cut out any useless bits or people who walk past and don’t give permission to be on video.
I start out the conversation by introducing who we are and what we’re doing here. Before I can ask George to do the same, he waves at me to stop.
“Let’s cut to the chase here, Ms. Brady,” he says, his voice gruff. “I’ve been living here all my life. My parents lived here before me, and their parents before them and so on and so forth. I’ve seen some things, crazy things, and if you’re who you say you are, then I got all the proof you need.” He pats the box, but his eyes narrow speculatively on us.
I lean forward a bit, hoping he can see the earnestness in my eyes. “We’re here to find the truth, Mr. Smith, no matter what it is. We’ve investigated hundreds of cases—some of them real and some of them fake. Either way, we’d love to see the evidence you’ve brought us.”
His lips crack into a wide yellow smile. “We’ll see about that,” he says. “Most people, they say they’re ready for the truth, but when it comes down to it, they run like the dickens.” He carefully lifts the top of the box and sets it down next to him. Russ, Jess, and I lean forward, camera poised. Inside, a stale aroma wafts out of the box. It smells woodsy and old. On top, several Polaroid pictures fan out, face down, their backs covered in faintly scrawled words. I reach out but hesitate until the old man nods me forward.
“Go ahead,” he says. “It don’t bite.”
Carefully, I pick up the first picture and set it on the table so Russ can get a close-up with his camera. I make a mental note to ask George if we can scan the photos after our interview. The first one shows a yellowed image of a footprint, barely delineated from the dirt and brush around it. A beer can rests on its side next to it, presumably for size comparison. The print is easily twice the size of the can. I flip the picture over. June 17, 1982 is inscribed on the back.
George taps the picture. “I took this one about a hundred yards out my back door,” he says proudly. “Damn near scared the shit out of me, too.”
Several of the photographs show more footprints, and I dutifully hold them out for Russ to film. Beneath them are three little sandwich baggies, and I hold one up to the light. Several coarse brownish-black hairs are clumped together in the center of the bag. A piece of masking tape, curling on one edge, says October 15th, 2001.
George puffs out his chest and smiles. “That piece took me a week of watching to find,” he says. “Set up a dead deer carcass and kept checking up on it.”
“Ever thought about a trail camera?” Russ asks.
George frowns. “A what?”
I guess that answers that question. Jess snickers. George scowls at her, and I elbow her in the side. She’s not winning us any brownie points.
I turn my attention back to our host. “It’s a camera you can attach to a tree to record video and pictures of anything that triggers it.”
George scratches his head. “I wouldn’t know anything about working something like that,” he says. “I get my evidence the old-fashioned way.”
I know when to let it go. “And you’ve found some wonderful evidence.”
“Oh, just you wait,” George says, his eyes twinkling. He pulls out a gallon-sized clear plastic bag with oblong brown lumps in it. They disintegrate under his fingers, even though he barely touches them through the plastic.
“What’s that?” I ask. Russ zooms in with the camera.
A grin stretches across George’s face. “Bigfoot shit.”
Seriously? The camera bobs as Russ tries to cover his snort with a cough. Jess bites her lip to keep from grinning.
I clear my throat. “Are... are you sure?”
He nods. “Yes. I was watching ‘em, taking pictures, and writing down notes. When I saw the big one drop a load, I waited until they moved on and collected the evidence.”
Evidence. This is disgusting.
He offers me the bag. “Here. Take a look.” He chuckles. “But I wouldn’t open ‘er. It was a doozy.”
So as not to offend our host, I take the bag by my fingertips and set it on the table so Russ can get some pictures of it. But when I glance at him, he’s barely holding it together, so I kick his shin under the table. Come on, be a professional.
“That’s... that’s incredible,” I say.
“I know,” George says. “It’s one of the best pieces of evidence I’ve found.” Poop forgotten, he rummages through several more plastic baggies and pulls out a long piece of crumbling cement. “Check this out,” he says, placing it on the table so gently that he’s almost reverent in his care. It’s a plaster cast of a footprint, just like the ones we’ve seen people online take of these things.
Tentatively, I reach out and touch it. It’s easily twice the size of my hand and had to fit diagonally in the box or it would have been too large. It’s got five toes, like a human foot, and tapers into the heel, complete with crisscrossing lines. Bits of grass and debris cling to the sides, and dirt still hides in the creases.
“I found this here track about five years ago. My niece was up visiting, and she convinced me to get a cast of it. This is the best one I got. I have four more at the cabin, but this one’s clearer than the rest.”
“How many times have you seen the creature?”
George throws his head back and laughs. “I been here all my life, and I’ve lived in my cabin for forty years, but best I can figure, it has a pretty big range. I’ve only seen it a couple dozen times or so, I think.”
“Have you told the cops?”
He laughs again. “I’ve known Sheriff Sinclair since the day he was born. I called him once, but he didn’t take me seriously. He’s a good fella, that one, but he don’t suffer fools lightly, and he thinks I’m crazy as hell. Just because my grandpa used to make moonshine up in those woods and went crazy and shot himself and his brother don’t mean I’d do the same thing. Hell, I don’t even drink hooch.”
A waitress comes and gets our drink orders. George asks for a coffee, and we all get waters. It’s cheaper, and I don’t know how much I’m going to
have to spend for a hotel tonight.
“This is incredible,” Jess says, tracing the grooves in the footprint with a finger.
George leans back, his flannel-clad chest puffing out. “Damn straight. Everybody thinks I’m crazy, but I’m not. They’re out there, just waiting for someone to find them. And I did, and now you’re here too. Now we’ll get to go on TV and tell the world the truth.”
I share a look with my companions. If George thinks we’re part of a cable network, he’ll be sorely mistaken. I mean, we have our audience, but it’s not as big as he’s thinking. Then again, if he thinks trail cams are modern, newfangled technology, then our platform would blow his mind.
“So,” he says, leaning across the table, his eyes twinkling. “Want me to take you there?”
My pulse starts racing. “Yes, definitely. When?”
“I ain’t got nothing going on, so why don’t we go now?” George asks. Then he narrows his eyes, as if realizing something for the first time, and peers around the restaurant. “But where’s your camera crew? Are they hiding?”
I point at Russ holding the GoPro. “We’re low-budget,” I say. “Russ, Jess, and I will get all the footage we need.”
“Oh,” he says, nodding sagely. “You’re one of them reality TV shows, like Survivor, then?”
“Yes,” I say, my voice flat. “We’re just like Survivor.”
George slaps his hand on the table. “Well, why didn’t you say that? I love that show. Could you get me in touch with the folks who run it? I’d love to show them kids a thing or two.”
Jess hides behind her hair, and Russ stands up then shoves his chair into the table as an excuse not to answer. Cowards.
“I’ll get right on that,” I say.
Chapter 12
George Smith’s house isn’t really a house. It’s more a supersized hunting blind constructed of weathered wood, mismatched windows with more gaps around the outside than glass I can see through, and a door from a mobile home. An old green-and-white plastic folding chair is parked on what would have been the front porch, if there was a porch, and there’s an empty coffee can nestled right next to it.
I wrinkle my nose in disgust when I realize it’s not empty. Does everyone chew tobacco in this town? That’s disgusting. With Bear leashed safely at my side so he doesn’t pee on more evidence, we follow George to the front door. I pull my dog away before he can lift his leg on the coffee can, and he gives me a dirty look. I hear you, buddy. If it wasn’t for George, I’d let you pee there.
Our host flings the door open—there’s no lock—and gestures for us to go inside. “Come in, come in. You’re gonna love all of this.”
I nod at Russ and Jess. “Go ahead and take the initial footage first, then I’ll come in, and we’ll finish the interview.” They nod and, cameras in tow, enter the darkened doorway behind our guide.
The inside of the cabin is dark, not because the windows have shades, but because the two windows there are nearly opaque with dust and grime and almost impossible to see through. It’d almost be a cool frosted effect, if it was done on purpose and not because the owner hadn’t bothered to clean them.
A twin-sized bed is tucked into the far corner of the room, and across from that is a half-sized fridge, stove, and a sink with a couple of boards stacked up on crates as the kitchen counter. A folding table serves as the dining room table, and there are three mismatched folding chairs tucked up against it. Across from the kitchen is a small rabbit-eared TV that also sits on a couple of crates, in front of an old, ratty yellow-plaid couch. Behind that, several paper boxes are stacked up against the wall, all marked with a year and the word EVIDENCE in black marker.
George points at the couch. “Have a seat. I’ll bring out the first box.”
Three hours later, we’ve pored through the first stack of boxes, looking at everything from photographs to plaster casts and hair samples. Another box overflows with spiral-bound single-subject notebooks. We haven’t touched those yet, and I’m not looking forward to it. We need to get out there and search for the creature, not read notes written decades ago that are so faded we can barely read them.
“Can you take us to the site where you last saw the creatures?” I ask.
George nods. “Sure thing. Best to do it at dusk, though. They don’t come out much during the day. Or at least not around the creek where I see them.”
Jess jots down some notes in case we don’t get to go with George later. “Is it close by?” she asks.
A shrewd look crosses George’s face. “Close enough. You ain’t gonna find it without me, though, so don’t you worry about it. I’ll take you there tonight if you want.”
I lean back, tamping down the disappointment that I have to wait several more hours. “That’d be great, if you don’t mind.”
“I don’t mind at all.” He glances out the window at the sun hanging high in the sky. “See you back around five-thirty, six o’clock?” He uses the couch to push himself to his feet.
“We’ll be here.” I stand up and dust myself off. Jess and Russ do the same. “Thank you so much for your time and sharing your collection of evidence. We really appreciate it.” I shake his hand.
“You’re welcome,” he says.
Russ takes another panning video of the inside of the house, while Jess snaps a few more pictures. I wake Bear up from where he’s nestled next to the fireplace, and we head for the door. On our way to the van, my phone rings.
“Oh my God,” Ceri squeals. “You’ll never guess what I just got my dad to do.”
I put her on speakerphone and pause next to the driver’s side door. Jess and Russ crowd around my phone. “What did you get your dad to do?”
Russ backs away with a video camera, recording my phone conversation with Ceri. I wish he wouldn’t do that, but he says it makes it seem more realistic and helps the audience be in the moment.
“I got him to agree to go on your show.”
My heart skips a beat. I was not expecting that. Not at all. “Really? That’s awesome! How did you get him to do that?”
“I don’t know, just a little bit of daughterly persuasion,” she says smugly. “Works every time.”
The part of me that feels the loss of my own parents cracks open, and the gaping chasm of pain I felt when they died radiates through my body. I can’t look at Jess, but I feel the weight of her standing close to me. I shouldn’t have put the phone on speaker. I force a brief laugh. “That is awesome. When does he want to do it?”
“He said he could do it whenever. Today’s his day off,” she says. “Let me warn you, he said he can’t give you any details from the case, nor can he let you see any of the evidence. But he did say that he would talk to you.”
“What does he want to talk about, then?” I ask. It’s not as if we want to sit around and chitchat about the weather. But if we can get him to trust us, it could help the case.
“I told him how you are investigating anyway, whether or not you have his permission, and he said that he could talk about the area and what’s common knowledge about the disappearances, just nothing they haven’t released to the public.”
“Is he going to warn us to stay off the case?”
Ceri laughs. “Probably, but I also told him how you guys weren’t going anywhere until you solve the case. I also sent him a link to your website with my login information. Hopefully he’ll check it out and realize that I was serious. You guys don’t mess around, and you don’t give up, either.”
Great. Hopefully he won’t take a hardline approach and hold that against us. We’re not the enemy, even though sometimes the cops think we are. I take a deep breath. “Where do you want to meet?”
“Our house. He said that if he did this at the station, he’d never hear the end of it.”
He’s probably right. Ceri rattles off the address, and Jess scribbles it in her notes.
“We’ll be right there.”
Chapter 13
Ceri’s house is a single-story b
rick ranch we can only find by turning right at the library and driving until we reach the end of the road. White shutters decorate every window, and the door is dark green. A paved driveway leads from the road to a double car garage. The sheriff’s dark-blue SUV is parked in front of the garage, next to a little white Nissan. That has to be Ceri’s car.
Ceri meets us at the door, her brown hair pulled high in a ponytail, grinning from ear to ear. “Oh my God,” she says. “I can’t believe my dad actually agreed to talk to you and that I get to watch the interview. This is so awesome!”
She grabs my free hand and squeezes it enthusiastically. I returned the gesture, albeit with a little less excitement, then gesture at Russ and Jess. “Is he inside?” Bear’s tail waves enthusiastically, and she scratches his head as he gives her several doggy kisses. “Do you think he’ll mind if we film this?” I have the film release forms in my bag, just waiting for his signature.
“He’s in the kitchen,” she says. “Come on, I’ll show you the way.”
Russ grabs a Go Pro and starts filming. We never know when we might get something good. Ceri leads us into an open living room decorated in browns and greens, past an old oak dining room table, and into a small white-tiled kitchen with dark cherrywood cabinets and gray granite counter tops. Her dad leans against the counter, sipping a mug of coffee.
“Dad, this is Meredith, Ross, and Jess. They are from Brady Paranormal Investigations. Oh, and that’s Bear.”
One of his eyebrows hitches. “I remember.” Okay, so he’s not one of our fans. I can deal with that if he’s still willing to give us an interview. Seconds tick by, creating an uncomfortable stillness.
“Thank you for agreeing to an interview,” I say.
The sheriff grunts in response.
“So where do you want to do this?” Ceri asks me.
“Um”—I glance around the room—“the table would work fine, if you don’t mind.”
Ceri leads the way, and her dad reluctantly pushes himself away from the counter and follows us to the table. I loop Bear’s leash around one of the spires in my chair and set him down.
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