The Legend of the Lake

May 1st, 1933

8:00 AM

The sound of the wind whistles through the risen mainsail. It’s our first outing in May. The air is cool and tight. The fog blocks all visibility out on the lake. Only figures and blobs are to be seen, other than Andreas. Though we are next to each other, he is the helmsman for today. We switch every weekend. Last week was me, this week is him, and so on. Otherwise, we would always be bumping into each other.

But even with the fog, everything is still going accordingly. It’s all smooth sailing ahead. That is until distant watermarks came to the surface.

There’s lurking in the lake.

***

May 1st, 1933

5:15 AM

I awake early next to Andreas. It is Saturday morning, our first sailing day ever since the weather began to warm up. However, the forecast for today was foggy and potential precipitation, so we set the alarm extra early to allow for Andreas’ personal forecasting.

He likes to think he has this great intuition with the weather. That he is connected to it because of his ancestors; who were also all men that thought they could somehow guess the weather correctly. Scottish men think they can get away with anything. But, it makes him happy, so we woke up before the sunrise.

We are both creatures of habits. We’ve been living almost the same way since we wed 15 years ago. It will be 16 in July. I get out of bed first, begin to make porridge for breakfast, and sit by the windowsill and sit with a book, and place the newspaper across the table from me to get it ready for Andreas. Normally, I relax into the sound of the creatures outside. Today, I hear no birds. No red squirrels are foraging for acorns nor the neighborhood cat roaming the garden.

An unusual stillness lays upon our home.

I don’t think much of it and hover back over the porridge, stirring it occasionally so it doesn’t stick to the pot. This is when Andreas finally hops out of bed.

“Mornin’ Lorna, nice smelling porridge you got there.”

He wanders onto the dreary front porch announcing, “Looks like we’re up for some sailing today. No rain until tomorrow, just some overcast. No dreich day over here!”

“Very nice, Andreas. Now come on in and eat your porridge, why don’t you?”

We sit at the table as the sun rises slowly emptying our bowls, sipping on some tea, and flipping through pages.

The next morning, the pages had our names all over it.

***

8:15 AM

I point out a large blob in the water to Andreas, “And, do you see the darkness in the water up a little North?”

“Barely...must be deeper water over there, should be alright.”

We continue sailing for a little while. The thought left Andreas’ mind but stuck with me. My eyes stayed glued on the hardly-visible dark blob in the ocean.

I begin to relax, unsticking my eyes from the spot, until I see a piece of the blob move. I am quickly reassured by Andreas that it must be the sunlight refracting off of the water in a weird way caused by our ripples. Although Andreas tries to remain calm, I can tell he is skeptical and isn’t fully convinced of his story.

Unsure of what decision to make, we slow the boat down before going any further. I can feel my tight and damp skin begin to crawl, as if my gut is telling me something is out of the ordinary. My nerves begin to spark, leaving sweat droplets on my hairline. I notice Andreas’ hands are getting clammy like they always do when he is anxious, annoyed, or scared. It’s one of his big tells. The wave of discomfort washes over us and we are immediately swept into the fear of the unknown.

I quickly try to listen to my intuition and turn to Andreas to say, “We need to turn around now,” but before I could udder out the words, the big, dark blob moves towards the surface.

It isn’t a blob.

It’s a big, dark sea monster.

Slowly, our boat begins to rock back and forth. At first, it isn’t too noticeable but it suddenly begins thrashing us back and forth as this concealed animal moves its way to the surface.

“Andreas! Go to the outboard motor, try and get it up and running and I will take over the sail! GO!”

“Thank God for new technology,” I think.

As he fumbles to the back, banging his arm on the side of the boat from the imbalance on the way, I begin to grab the ropes to the sail to adjust our direction. I can barely grip the floor and hang onto the entangled mess as I hear the sound of the motor revving up.

I put my faith in Andreas and after what seems like a year, we begin to start moving in the opposite direction.

However, the water around us is still not calm.

Uncertain if this animal is swimming in our direction, we try not to look back until we get our gripping and the boat is steady. Or at least as steady as we can get it.

When the motor fully takes over and I can let Andreas resume position as helmsman, I glance back.

In the near distance, a large animal emerged from the water. My body freezes. I had never seen anything like it.

It had a long neck, resembling a giraffe...but even more so, it looked like one of the dinosaurs I see in the books called a Brontosaurus. Its grotesque body, long and thick, isn’t quite like a snake but is the only comparison that pops into my mind.

Our boat paled in comparison to the largeness of this monster. It towered over the height of our sail.

Fearful that Andreas would lock up once seeing this monster, I direct his eyes to the coast, “Whatever you do, do NOT look behind you.”

He looked back.

Another thing I had hoped to never see, the face of Andreas as his heart dropped into his stomach, unable to mutter a word, except; “Its teeth!”

Andreas’ pale face showed me all I needed to know to take control of the boat once again. As he hurls his breakfast off the side of the boat I kick up the speed, this larger-than-life monster steadily becoming smaller with distance.

This precise picture is forever locked in my mind.

***

May 2nd, 1933

5:15 AM

Our morning routine remains the same, but neither of us slept.

When we got back yesterday afternoon, we ran to the town center to frantically recite our story. We were hounded by the newspaper journalists, neighbors, police, and other sailors alike. Many of them set sail before sunset to go back into the lake that we fled, to hunt down the sea monster.

They found nothing.

And yet, they still believed us.

The story made the cover of the front page, titled: “The Loch Ness Monster...it's real.”

Now, it sits in Andreas’ lap as we are unable to stomach our bowls of porridge, unsure if we will ever set sail again.