The Summer Sandwich

We couldn't have possibly known that things would turn out like this when we hid Dillon's peanut butter and tuna sandwich beneath the loose board of our cabin last year at summer camp. At the time we were hoping it would just be a gross prank that would pay off next year when we all returned for another month of hanging out in the woods. We were so naïve.

Mark was the first of us to arrive at camp this year, the first to enter our usual cabin, and the first to lift up the loose floorboard. Daniel and Scott found him passed out on the ground next to the opened floor, they said the smell was enough to make them vomit. The counselors were able to pull Mark out of the cabin and he woke up a short while later. By the time Nick, Dillon, and myself all arrived at camp the counselors had locked up our normal cabin and informed us we would be sharing a cabin with another group until they could clean out the mold and make sure our cabin was safe to return to.

Mark didn't talk much for the rest of the day, he seemed pretty out of it. We tried making fun of him for passing out to see if we could get a reaction from him but the most we got was a head nod before he turned back to stare at the direction of our cabin. Outside of our prank being a little too gross, everything seemed fine, a normal start to summer camp.

It wasn't until later that night when things started to get weird. I woke up in the middle of the night after hearing someone in the cabin shuffling about. It was dark and I couldn't see anything until I turned on my flashlight and pointed it towards the sound. I was expecting to surprise one of my bunk mates who was probably just getting up to go pee outside. Instead, what I saw was probably the grossest form of payback I could have imagined. Mark was standing directly over Dillon who was asleep with his mouth open. He looked directly at me with a thousand-yard stare when I shinned the flashlight on him. Confused I whispered, "Mark, are ya ok buddy?" Without a response he turned his attention towards a sleeping Dillon and began vomiting directly into his open mouth.

"What the fuck!" I shouted startling my other bunk mates awake. Dillon thrashed awake and rolled off his bed coughing and gagging like he had just been drowning. The stench was terrible and as the intense odor filled the room other campers began to wake up and barf. Dillon tried to run out of the cabin, but he slipped on some of Nick's puke and fell backward. Before I even realized what was happening Mark was on him again with a fresh deluge of chunky vomit. It was probably the most disgusting site I had ever seen. Panic erupted as other campers in our cabin began running for the door in an attempt to escape the smell that was permeating the small space.

Nick, Daniel, Scott, and I all made it out with minimal vomit on us and we hauled ass into the woods. The other campers that we were sharing the bunk with scattered into different directions, some alone, some in groups. We assumed somebody had run off to get the counselors for help. We didn't run too far as it was pretty dark outside, and I didn't want to get lost in the woods. Instead, we ducked down in some bushes and kept an eye on our cabin trying to calm down and figure out what the hell just happened in there.

About fifteen minutes had passed and just as I was about to work up the courage to go peek inside, Dillon stepped out of the cabin, foul smelling upchuck covering his pajamas, he was followed by Mark and both of them started to head off in the direction of our old cabin that the counselors had locked down. I motioned for the others to follow me as I tried to quietly sneak along the edge of the forest keeping tabs on the pair. It wasn't an easy task considering how dark it was and looking back on it now, I'm pretty sure the two of them heard all the noise we were making in our attempt to be stealthy.

We saw the two of them wander around to the side of the cabin and watched as Dillon gave Mark a boost to reach one of the windows. We saw him break the glass and crawl through the opening. Once he was inside Dillon just stood there staring at the wall. I figured that now was the time to act and we left the cover of the tree line, bee lining it towards Dillon. Once we made it to him Daniel began whisper shouting, "What the hell are you guys doing, you're go-." He began gagging as we got close enough to smell the terrible stench of the vomit covering his clothes. Dillon didn't say a word as he slowly turned around, setting his sights directly on Daniel, he let out a barely audible sound as he turned around like an old door creaking open. Before we had time to respond he was lunging at Daniel grabbing him by the shoulders forcing him to the ground. His terrified shriek was cut short as Dillon began hurling into his open mouth, turning the scream into a gurgle.

I ran around to the front of the cabin, having seen more than enough vomit to mouth contact for the night, Nick and Scott followed close behind. As we rounded the corner and started to make our way towards the counselor’s cabin, we heard a loud crashing noise, before we could react Scott was knocked to the ground as the door to our old cabin flew through the air, hitting him hard. He cried out in pain, and I could see his collar bone protruding out. In the doorway of our old cabin stood Mark, or what used to be Mark.

He looked different now, wrong. His limbs were misshapen, and his fingers were too long. He had some kind of fungus growing around his mouth and running down his arms. He was holding something in his hand, and I could see him chewing. The terrible odor that wafted in our direction was indescribable and, in that moment, I realized what he was holding. Dillon's peanut butter and tuna sandwich, the gross and terrible prank that led to this disaster. Mark was eating that year-old mold covered monstrosity and it was changing him, molding him into something horrifying. His attention shifted toward Scott who was laid out on the ground crying in pain.

A long fleshy tube-like tongue shot out of Marks mouth and attached itself to Scott's face. His screams turned into muffled gurgling, and we could see a thick ichor leaking out of the sides of the fleshy mask. We didn't think twice, we ran as fast as we could screaming in a frenzied panic as we made our way towards the counselor's cabin. We could see flashlights coming our way and could make out some familiar voices, some of the other campers must have already told the counselors about the vomit in the cabin, but they only knew part of the story. We frantically tried to warn them about what was happening and told them how Scott broke his collar bone, but they didn't want to listen.

One of the counselors escorted us back to their cabin and the other three went to go find Mark and the others. We begged them not to go but they went anyway. The counselor who was charged with, "babysitting." us as he so eloquently put it called the cops and emergency services as soon as we got back to their cabin. We tried to tell him that we needed to get out of here, we couldn't afford to waste time waiting for the police. He called us hysterical children and told us we were freaking out over nothing. After about fifteen minutes of waiting the doorknob to the cabin began to rattle and then stopped. An uneasy silence washed over us before three slow knocks sounded against the door. "That is obviously the knock of some one that's going to murder all of us." I said incredulously. The counselor scoffed at my remark and walked over to the door looking through the peephole, "It's just Rob." He said unlocking the door for his fellow counselor before any of us could protest.

The instant the counselor turned the lock the door flung open knocking him to the ground. Rob came crashing down on his fellow counselor, pinning him beneath his weight. The pinned counselor screamed in utter terror as Rob's mouth split open in four different directions and latched onto his face. More of that thick stinking ichor pouring out and being forced into the pinned counselor’s mouth. Nick tried to make a run for it but there was only one way in or out of the cabin and he was quickly grabbed by the other counselor who had gone to find our fallen friends. His terrified screams were the last I ever heard of him as Mark latched onto his face with his fleshy tube tongue and began injecting the ichor directly into his mouth.

The other campers that had been inside of the counselor’s cabin with us all began to scream and tried to escape in various different ways, all of which failed. One by one they were picked off by my fallen friends, I hid in a nearby closet praying that they wouldn't find me and force feed me their vomit. I was frozen in absolute terror, until all of a sudden, I could just barely make out the sound of a police siren outside. The room had fallen completely silent, and I could see the shadow of a figure standing just outside of the closet I was hiding in. It let out a low growl and I covered my nose and mouth to keep myself from gagging on the stench that was seeping in through the cracks. It was only for a few seconds, but it felt like an eternity before the figure outside ran off. It sounded like it was joined by the other monstrosities that were formerly my friends and I heard a police officer shout at them to stop.

Slowly I opened the door and peaked outside, the cabin was completely trashed, broken furniture scattered about everywhere, and that awful smelling chunky ichor was splashed about all over the place. I carefully made my way out of the cabin with my hands raised in the air. I barely remember being grabbed by the police and put in an ambulance. I must have passed out because when I woke up, I was in a hospital bed with my parents freaking out next to me. Over the next couple of weeks, I was questioned repeatedly by the police and despite telling them exactly what had happened, nobody believed me.

Since the authorities couldn't piece together what had happened, they chopped it up to an attack by feral people that supposedly live deep in those woods. Apparently, it's more likely that some hills have eyes hillbillies are running around murdering and eating campers than a moldy old sandwich turned all of my friends into vomiting nightmare creatures. Currently I'm seeing a therapist to help me work through my PTSD as a result from surviving such a traumatic event. She's nice but she thinks I'm making all of this up too as some kind of coping mechanism, but I know what happened and when she finds the peanut butter and tuna sandwich I hid in her office, everyone will know the truth.