A woman recalls her encounters with an entity while growing up near Coulterville, California. Was it a skinwalker? What other malevolency could this have been?
The following account was recently offered to me:
"This has been something that’s haunted me since I was six years old, since my first encounter with it. I have had dreams about this, and two very specific encounters with the creature. I’m sharing this story so I could possibly find help on what to do or how to get rid of this creature that’s been hunting me since I can remember. Just for background, I am a 21-year-old female and still worry about this creature finding me, but I’ll get into detail why later. For now, here’s my story.
I would always go camping with my grandparents, who I call my Gammy and Gampy, at the end of my school years. I would always look forward to it since I grew up loving the outdoors and the woods. I especially loved camping, loving the idea of having s’mores, taking long hikes, being around the campfire, and of course the wild life we would see. Now I grew up in California, mostly near cities, so the forest was like my true home to me. I always preferred being near trees and dirt rather than buildings and crowded places. Besides, the woods were much quieter and more peaceful. I always felt safe when I was there, like nothing could ever hurt me.
But something strange would always happen at the end of the month of May. I would have this reoccurring dream during the last week of my school year. I would be in the woods, walking alone down a dirt trail, the woods were always strangely quiet. I would continue to walk this path until I saw this red fox poke it’s head from behind a tree. Its eyes were always strangely human-like, but they were yellow and somehow looked like teddy bear eyes, and it would just stare at me. It wouldn’t make a sound at all; it would just watch me. Usually in my dream I would go up and pet it, that making the fox finally make a noise, usually a soft growl. Then I would continue walking, and it would follow me. The first time I would have this dream was when I was actually around 5-years-old, and it lasted until I was about perhaps 11. Over the years it would be the same exact thing, I would walk in the woods, find this fox, pet it, then continue my hike with it alongside me. But about having this dream for the fourth time, it would start to walk behind me. That’s when I started to feel uneasy about this “fox”. I could hear it making odd noises, but every time I went back to look, it was just walking like nothing was wrong, even, somehow, giving me a smile…
Sorry to go on about a dream but, I now believe that it was a warning of the creature. Now that the dream is out of the way, I can talk about my first true encounter. I was six years old and was going on a camping trip with my Gammy and Gampy for about a week. Of course, I was very excited for it, being able to barely keep myself in my school seat for the last day of kindergarten. They had picked me up right as the bell had rung and already had the camping trailer attached to my Gampy’s truck. I remember he drove an old red truck that only had three seats, me always being in the middle. It took about two hours to get there, and another good hour to find our usual camping spot. It was deep into the woods and far from other people, as my Gammy wasn’t too fond of being around other people while we camped. As they were setting up the camping trailer, I wandered around the campsite, loving to dig in the dirt for bugs. I had sat down on the dirt and started to dig, but I noticed how strangely quiet the woods were. It was never quiet, not even in the dead of night. I thought it was odd, but being only six I didn’t think too hard about it. As I continued to dig for bugs however, I thought I heard my Gammy call for me. She would usually call me Sugar Booger, that being a nickname she gave me since I was born. That’s what I had heard, but it sounded like she was very far away and somewhat sick.
I looked up where I heard it come from, that being from the woods. But there was no way she was there, because she was still unloading stuff from the truck. Even at the age of 6, it didn’t feel right, so I walked closer to my grandparents and stayed next to them. I soon forgot about my weird encounter though as we began to have fun. For the rest of that day, we played card games, sat next to the campfire as we ate dinner, and stared up into the stars. I always loved seeing the stars, there never being any where I lived at. We started to get sleepy around 9PM I believe, and we started to get ready for bed. There were bunk beds that me and my Gammy would sleep on, keeping our luggage on the top bunk and we would sleep on the bottom bunk. Due to my Gampy’s snoring, he would sleep on the couch of the trailer. I would always sleep next to the trailer window just in case I couldn’t sleep and wanted to look outside. I fell asleep pretty quickly though, that being the last day of school and all, it was pretty exhausting.
I remember waking up maybe hours later, it still being pitch black outside. It wasn’t weird for me to wake up late in the night, since I always have had sleeping issues. I rolled onto my side trying to fall back asleep, until I heard
My eyes immediately shot open as I heard my nickname being spoken, but I knew it wasn’t either of my grandparents. They were both asleep and never were known to sleep talk before. I started to feel this horrible feeling in my gut, like whatever I was hearing wanted to really hurt me. Even at the age of 6 I knew this wasn’t normal. Then I started to hear tapping at the trailer window, it was soft, but loud enough for me to hear it.
I just sat there, frozen in fear. I was trying to just brush it off as tree branches or rain, but I just knew that wasn’t it. I could tell that it was really someone, or something, tapping on the window. Then I decided to be brave and look. Big mistake. I pulled the curtain away to only peek, and all I saw, were these large yellow eyes. They seemed glassy, yet, not entirely real. They looked like giant teddy bear eyes, but cold and unwelcoming. I remember in that moment I panicked, and quickly closed the curtain back up. I then hid under the blanket, that being the only thing I knew to do when I saw a monster. I could feel tears falling down my face, I never had been so terrified in my life. I just curled up into my Gammy’s side and clung to her all night long, that damn tapping only getting louder and more persistent throughout the night.
I don’t remember falling asleep, but somehow, I did. I do remember my Gampy waking me up around noon, saying how if I got up quick enough, we could still go fishing. I honestly didn’t want to leave the trailer at all, terrified that whatever I saw the night before would be out there. I did eventually go outside, but I was constantly looking around, horrified that whatever saw me last night would get me. My Gammy immediately knew I was scared and pulled me into a hug when she saw me, asking what was wrong. I did tell her what I saw and heard, and surprisingly, she believed me. The next thing I knew she was telling my Gampy that we were moving campsites. It took a bit to convince him, but he did eventually start to pack up and hook the trailer onto his truck. I was put into the truck so I could properly sleep, but I just couldn’t. I kept feeling that I was being watched, thinking that every little noise was that thing I saw, that if I closed my eyes even for a second, it would get me. My Gammy wasn’t too far from me when I heard it again. But this time, it was my actual name.
In that moment, I had never seen my Gammy move so fast. She looked up into the bushes where we heard it, then to me. She then got in the truck with me and pulled me into a tight, protective hug. I began to cry all over again, telling her how I wanted to just go back home. That’s when my Gampy got into the truck as well, and since I was sobbing so hard to the point I was coughing, he agreed we could go home. We started to head out of the campsite, still hurt that this trip had been ruined by something. But I still didn’t know what. That’s when something in my head told me to look back. I slowly did so, feeling an ice-cold fear wash over me as I saw something. A red fox, sitting in the middle of the campsite, sitting there with large yellow eyes. The same red fox from my dream, somehow, curling its lips into an eerie smile.
After that encounter, we never did go back to that campsite. We did continue to camp, but in more populated areas. I didn’t tell my grandma what I saw, but she had told me to trust my gut. She knew that I was sensitive to certain entities, and that would help me if I trusted it. Now this would be the end of the story, but I’m afraid it isn’t. There was one more encounter I had with the creature, and it was much more terrifying than the first time.
The second encounter I had was when I was 17, many years later. By this time, I knew very well what a skin walker was now, and I was still very paranoid every time I went near wooded areas. I still worried about seeing that “fox”, but I never really thought about it too much. Me and my two younger siblings were staying at a relative’s house for Christmas, them living way up into a mountain area. I think they were my great aunt and uncle, but I’m not sure. Where they lived, there was no service at all, so unless we hooked up onto their Wi-Fi, we had no phones. I didn’t mind the house, still loving the woods no matter what happened. Although at night I hated how they didn’t close the window curtains, making it easy to anything outside to see inside. But I did feel safe while inside the house, knowing that they wouldn’t let anything hurt us kids. Luckily it didn’t snow where they lived, so we could go outside and run around. They also had this beautiful black lab, being about a year old, named Pam. She was very playful and normally wouldn’t listen to anyone but my uncle. Although she was easily excitable, she was a good puppy.
One of the days we were there, my little sister and our aunt went out to the store for a nice girl’s day. Although I’m a girl, I wanted to go hiking with my uncle and my little brother. We left pretty early since the hike we were doing was four hours of walking into town. It was a really chilly morning but since we were doing so much walking, it felt great. We also decided to take Pam, it being a good way for her to get exercise and have fun. About maybe an hour into our walk, I started to slow down a bit, wanting to enjoy the beautiful forest. It was so peaceful; I could have honestly stayed there. But as we continued to walk, I started to feel something odd. I noticed how quiet the forest had suddenly become, hearing only our footsteps and my brother talking to our uncle. Pam noticed it too, her ears going straight up and growling softly. I started to pick up my pace to get next to my brother, worried that possibly a coyote or mountain lion was nearby. I knew though that they wouldn’t be out at this time though, even if they were they didn’t walk near the roads. My little brother was only 9 at that time, and being the oldest sibling, my natural instincts to protect him kicked in.
My uncle noticed the silence as well, telling us to stay close to him and Pam, who was now next to me and still growling. I began to feel that horrible feeling again, that ice cold fear I once felt when I was 6. I tried so hard to not think of the creature, but it was all I could worry about. I was scared, I felt like I was back to being that scared little 6-year-old girl again. I had to stop for a moment though, seeing my shoe lace came undone. I quickly kneeled down to tie it back up, trying to hurry and just get out of there. That’s when I heard it.
In that moment, my heart dropped into my stomach. My eyes were widened and I could just feel myself start to shake from fear. It was right next to me. I heard it clear as day. I slowly turned my head, and there it was. That same red fox, still having those horrid yellow eyes, and that same demented smile. Only this time I saw it much more clearly. Its fur looked so matted and disgusting, the smell it had was like rotten, decaying flesh mixed with garbage. Its limbs were much too long for a normal fox, the back legs bending completely the wrong way. Those eyes were still the worst thing about it, but now they looked emptier than I had remembered. I wanted to scream, to run, to cry, but I just couldn’t. I was frozen as I was, too scared to even blink. Then I heard it speak again, this time however, it had mimicked my little brother’s voice.
Before anything else could happen, Pam suddenly jumped in front of me and started to bark like mad, snapping and growling so aggressively that it scared me out of my frozen trance. When I looked back, it was gone. I used that moment to run over to my brother and uncle, who didn’t see what I saw as they were too far ahead now. But I heard my uncle start to pray and sing a song under his breath, keeping my brother and myself close to him. I was just too scared to even look back, so I just kept my eyes on the ground and refused to stop walking. Pam had stopped barking, but she was still loudly growling and never left my side as we continued our hike. My little brother was a bit worried, but he just thought it was a coyote. When we finally made it into town, my uncle had called our aunt and told her to pick us up, saying something about how it wasn’t safe for us to walk back. Thankfully she did come and get us, but she was confused since we talked about that hike for days. On the car ride back, Pam never left me alone, she was right with me the entire time. She knew that thing was after me, and she protected me. I was very grateful that she was with us, who knows what would have happened if she wasn’t.
When we got back to the house, I was talked to by my uncle and aunt. Once I told them what happened and what I saw, they had started to pray and check that all the locks were shut tight, my aunt putting something around the doors. I now believe it was probably ashes, but I never did find out. Unfortunately, this made our Christmas vacation cut short, as they were worried that I was not safe while still in the woods. We had to be taken home the next day, them making an excuse of how there was an emergency with a friend and that they had to help them out. I felt horrible that this Christmas was ruined, but once I did leave the woods, I truly felt safe again. Before they had to drive back home though, they told me that it wasn’t my fault, and that luckily it didn’t hurt me or the other kids. It did make me feel a bit better, but it still brought up a lot of questions and worries.
It was still around. How? Why? What did it want with ME? Does it want my skin? My soul? Was I just going to be tormented by this thing forever? I still don’t have answers to these questions, and that’s what really scares me. Now, I’ve longed moved from California and now live in Kentucky. I do live in woods, but so far, that thing hasn’t found me. I know that seems very stupid on my part, but life had changed a lot when I was growing up. I was given no other option to live somewhere else and my grandpa in Kentucky was kind enough to let me live with him, so please don’t call me an idiot for moving to the woods when I had no other choice. Anyways, while I am happy it hasn’t found me, I’m still worried. Can it still find me? Is it still hunting me? I’m not close to anyone who knows truly on how to get rid of this thing, and that’s why I’m telling my story now so I can possibly find help. So please, if there’s anyone out there who does know, help me." SA
NOTE: I am contacting the experiencer in order to assess what this entity really was. Lon
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