Ouija Board

Like every other group of high school friends that summer, Greg, Tina, and Layla were out glamping at the Jellystone Park Camp Site, a family friendly natural park, for the most part. One night, Tina found an ouija board at the cafeteria and decides to coax Greg and Layla to try it. To their surprise, something actually replied.

That day, I really couldn’t understand why Greg was being so fussy about the hike, if he didn’t want to come along he should’ve just stayed at the campsite. Why would he go camping with us just to stay at the tent the whole time though? Isn’t the whole point of camping, even if it was glamping, is to immerse yourself in nature as much you can?

But in hindsight, perhaps we should’ve listened to Greg and stayed put.

The hike started out great. It was bright sunny day, birds were chirping, and Greg was still finding things to be fussy about. One minute it was bugs, the next it was weeds, and then it was some nonexistent leeches. We handed him the bug spray and it managed to shut him up a little bit though.

Layla was good with a compass, she’d been here a couple time before with family, so we trusted her when she said we should go a little bit off track.

“It’s the long way around, we’ll eventually rejoin the actual trek, but this is the more scenic route.”

And she was right. We came across a clearing that overlooked the valley. Breathtaking hills rolled, covered in evergreen trees, as far as your eyes could see. A river ran somewhere down there, you could hear it, almost feel the cold-refreshing-water on your skin .

Suddenly, we heard the bushes rustling behind us. None of us registered it as something malicious, I think we all must’ve thought it was some hiker, it’s not like Layla’s path was such a hidden gem.

But he came straight at us, axe swinging wildly in the air. Greg managed to dodge him in the nick of time, barely escaping with his head in tact. The axed man stumbled and we ran like hell! Back to the direction we came from. Layla led the way.

We could hear him screaming behind us.

“What the hell!” Shouted Greg.

“Just focus on getting back to the trek, people on camp will know what to do!” Barked Layla, and we all silently agreed.

We could still hear the man yelling behind us, screaming all sorts of obscenities.

“The guys fucking crazy!” I exclaimed.

“Ya think?” Said Greg, exasperated.

We kept running and running through the woods, and eventually we did find the trek, and somehow…somehow we ran all the way back to camp.

We reached the campsite’s entrance and saw it was full of people. Families with small kids were milling about, everything seemed so normal, but out of breath. We looked behind our shoulders, expecting the crazy man to be chasing us, but he was gone.

“Huh… the crowd must’ve scared him off,” said Greg.

“Yeah but we have tell someone about it, I’ll head on over to the office and warn them,” Layla reasoned before she immediately stormed off.

I stood there catching my breath and looked at Greg.

“Tina,” he said heaving, “I’m going back to the tent, I cant…”

And that was a good enough plan. I followed him back to the tent, and found that I couldn’t do anything but scroll through my phone. My nerves were all over the place. And eventually I managed to fall asleep.

When I woke up, it was dark outside. I couldn’t find my phone and Layla was also nowhere to be found. But Greg was asleep beside me, I could tell he was in a bad shape… and I could tell I was hungry. Poor guy, he didn’t even want to go on the hike in the first place, the least I could do was get us all some food. And maybe Layla took my phone? I wasn’t too worried then, maybe it was somewhere in the tent, Greg could just be sleeping over it.

On my way to the cafeteria, I registered how empty the place was. I guess families with kids turned in early?

But the cafeteria was also eerily empty.

“Hello?” I called out.

No one replied, there was no lunch lady behind the counter, and the buffet was empty. I guess I must’ve really overslept? Was it actually close to midnight? Or two am?

Where was Layla? Did they make her crash at the office? That’s a bit weird, nothing’s making sense.

I gave up. Going back to the tent sounded like the next logical move. Maybe Layla was back, she could’ve just been out to the toilet or something.

But right before I left the cafeteria, at the corner of my eye, I saw something on a table. It was an ouija board! Planchette included!

“Huh?” I chuckled to myself. That’s funny, it’s the ultimate campsite game right? I’m sure they’ll let me borrow this, could be a great way to take our minds off of what happened that afternoon.

As predicted, Greg was fussy about it. Layla was still not around, but you know… I wasn’t really worried about her, she’s probably somewhere hooking up with some guy, some hot dad looking for a summer fling. Wouldn’t be the first time that that’s happened.

I managed to wrangle Greg into it. And there we were, sat in front of each other, one finger each on the planchette.

“Wait what are we supposed to do? How do we start this thing?” Asked Greg.

“I guess… we just have to call upon the spirits, and talk to them?”

Suddenly, the planchette moved! Greg’s eyes went wide.

“TINA! TINA! Tell me you’re doing that!” He screamed.

I couldn’t control my excitement, I must’ve been grinning ear to ear when I told Greg it wasn’t me. He looked scared, and but began focusing at the board as I did. It was moving from letter to letter.

G…

R…

E…

“Oh hell no! Is it spelling my name?”

G…

“Greg!” I shouted, “That’s right, that’s Greg, I’m Tina, nice to meet you. Who are we talking to?”

The planchette kept moving. W…H…O…

“Who…”

W…A-

“Was.” Said Greg, reading the planchette.

“The…”

“Axed man,” I said, finishing the sentence.

“The axed man?” Greg asked, “From earlier today? We don’t know who he was, he just came at us! Did he kill you? Is that why you want to know?”

The planchette began moving on its own again.

This time it spelled out, “N…O…”, I read it out loud, “No, I…M…L…A…Y…”

“No, I’m Layla, u died,” whispered Greg as he read the board.

We sat there in silence trying to process the information. That’s why the whole camp was empty, and why it was so dark outside. We must’ve died this afternoon. The axed man got to us after all.

Somehow Layla survived and she was the one contacting us with an ouija board, not the other way around.

Greg looked up at me with tears in his eyes. I felt the same way…

“Greg, we don’t know who he was right?”

“No, we should tell her that and…I guess let them handle it?”

“Yes… It’s the most logical thing to do next,” I scoffed, we were dead and somehow living in the after life… two ghosts…still trying to figure out what was the most logical next thing to do.