I have a story.

Those four simple words came out of my older brother's mouth.

Back at that very night on July 24th, 2009, over a decade ago, a night that has since haunted

and left me curious of what was truly wandering in the woodlands of that little oak forest.

I've spent hours every night, for the past year, trying to find anything online that

would at least give me something as simple as the name of that forest.

But I've never found it.

I stared up at him, looking at his pale round face illuminated by the orange glow or the

campfire, separating the two of us.

I glared for a split second, cleared my throat as I hadn't said anything to anyone for

the past few hours, and spoke with a condescending but humoring tone to my voice.

I was not a disbeliever in cryptid schools, and any monster lurked in the dark crevices

of the earth, whether they were undiscovered beings, creatures, or something else entirely.

But I obviously knew that whatever was going to come out of my brother's mouth was going

to be a load of baloney.

Allow me to describe what I mean.

He's not a good liar, but always seemed to find it amusing, no matter the situation.

He'd tell my mother with a straight face that he didn't take one of my belongings, even

though he was obviously hiding it behind his back.

He'd tell my frustrated dad, who had just read his not-so-successful report card, that

C in algebra was a typo.

In the end, my parents also had to sarcastically tell him that they believe him, and no matter

...