Ross Showalter
1. THE DISPATCHDo Werewolves Live in the Pacific Northwest?
r/UnresolvedMysteries
Posted by u/NotATwilightFan at 2:12 AM on February 16, 2022. [archived]
My dad and I moved to Riverbend, a small town thirty minutes east of Seattle, Washington, five months ago. I supposedly lived here when I was a baby, but I don’t recall anything about here. Redding and Riverbend are similar, but Riverbend is colder. A lot colder. That extends to the people: the Seattle freeze is all too real. I’ve cut my hair and bought new clothes, and I’m still treated with apprehension. I eat lunches in the guidance counselor’s office and spend free time on here, on Reddit.
Every night, I hear howls. I asked the guidance counselor once if she could hear the howls too. She frowned at me and said, I don’t hear anything. I don’t understand how she couldn’t. The howls are so loud, cutting clear through the night, clear even through my closed bedroom window.
When I asked my dad, he laughed. He said opportunists live around here, cashing in on Twilight folklore. He’d asked about it too, after the second month of howls, and his co-workers told him of people who set up speakers and play wolf howls. Tourists near Snoqualmie live for that shit and eat it up.
That doesn’t excuse my dad leaving the doors unlocked at night multiple times, even after I’ve locked up. I secretly think he wants Mom to drive up here and for them to get back together. There’s a picture of the two of them, smiling at each other, on his bedside table.
I’ve found animal scratches on the house, dog bowls on the back porch. Dad has only said, Living here is different than living in Redding. Don’t worry about it. He’s been quieter, more distant, and I can’t figure out why.
After the fifth month of howls, I was going crazy. I’d asked for earplugs, then sleeping pills; Mom gave me noise-canceling headphones for Christmas. Nothing blocked the howls out. So, one night, when it wasn’t raining, I took our car and drove around the greater Snoqualmie area, trying to see where the hell the speakers were.
I didn’t know what I would do if I found them. Unplug them? I just wanted some fucking sleep.
Nothing. I drove up and down so many roads and found nothing. I drove through Snoqualmie, drove all the way west to Issaquah and back, and I even went further north to Fall City. I drove for almost three hours. Nothing.
I know how this sounds. I probably sound like a geeky teenager whose nerves got the best of them. I can’t explain not finding the speakers. I can’t explain how I hear howls and no one else does.
EDIT: There was a moment where the howls got louder. In the middle of coming home from Fall City, I heard the howls get closer and closer. I slowed down, thinking they could be in front of me somewhere.
Then there came another howl. It sounded as if it was on the highway, right behind my car. I felt the noise reverberate in my bones. I felt my back stiffen. I felt my mouth open, but I don’t know what came out. I don’t know if anything came out.
I pulled over on the shoulder, got out, got a flashlight. I shone it around, tried to see if there were any speakers in trees, any sign of wolf’s paws, anything.
All the tree trunks were bare. The branches waved in the night. The next howl was distant.
/ / /
CallMeAJackass at 2:32 AM on February 16, 2022. [Top comment]
Someone’s been drinking the Twilight Kool-Aid.
NotATwilightFan [OP] at 7:16 AM on February 16, 2022.
I’ve never read Twilight or seen the movies. That was before my time.
NormalllGuy at 8:41 AM on February 16, 2022.
Everyone’s seen the Twilight movies. You saying you haven’t just ousts you as a Twilight fan. Do you think Taylor Lautner is hot?
/ / /
RiverGirl at 2:22 AM on February 16, 2022.
It’s probably coyotes. There are a hundred times more coyotes in Washington State than there are wolves.
NotATwilightFan [OP] at 7:32 AM on February 16, 2022.
I listened to coyote howls. They sound nothing like what I heard.
NormalllGuy at 8:45 AM on February 16, 2022.
Oh, great. Now she’s a howling expert.
/ / /
RiverGirl at 2:33 AM on February 16, 2022.
What made you move here, by the way?
NotATwilightFan [OP] at 7:39 AM on February 16, 2022
My parents divorced. My parents, for as long as I can remember, always fought. There was always this tension between them, something I couldn’t understand. They came to a breaking point, and broke. When Mom and Dad came out of the courtroom after the divorce was finalized, only Dad was crying.
I’ll love you until the day I die, Dad told Mom. And Mom just nodded and walked away, though I could hear her breathing hard as she passed me. Fifteen years of marriage gone like that—not even an acknowledgment.
Dad won custody of me. Moving here was the first thing we did after that.
/ / /
FarmerDude5689 at 3:32 AM on February 16, 2022.
It’s owls. They can get cacophonic sometimes. Mom can’t sleep sometimes either, with all their hooting.
NormalllGuy at 8:46 AM on February 16, 2022.
The owls are not what they seem!!!
/ / /
Zakaryyyyyyyy at 4:46 AM on February 16, 2022
This should be under r/nosleep
/ / /
FarmerDude5689 at 7:19 AM on February 16, 2022.
I know where the speakers are, FWIW. They’re close to Snoqualmie, away from Riverbend. You must be sensitive to sound if you can hear them.
NotATwilightFan [OP] at 7:42 AM on February 16, 2022.
Do you know how to unplug them? My insomnia’s already bad as it is. This makes it ten times worse.
FarmerDude5689 at 7:45 AM on February 16, 2022.
They’re on private property. If you meet me after school, I can show you where they are. You can talk with the owners. DM me.
NormalllGuy at 7:50 AM on February 16, 2022.
Weird way to pick up a girl, dude.
FarmerDude5689 at 4:19 PM on February 16, 2022.
We just met. He’s not a girl. His name is Colin.
/ / /
NotATwilightFan [OP] at 4:30 PM on February 16, 2022.
I’m now with FarmerDude, whose real name is Troy. We’re in the driveway of a house on the edge of town, in a grassy pasture that stretches and stretches and then backs up against forest. It’s the perfect place to frolic.
The farmhouse itself is a ramshackle white beast, something out of a painting. Troy drove several miles on gravel to get here, so I almost forgive myself for overlooking this place. Almost.
I can see the speakers behind the house, pointed to the sky. They’re a black ink blot on this idyllic scene. The sight of them annoys me. They seem to be emitting something even now, something that makes the space behind my forehead itch.
Troy knows the family, so he’ll vouch I’m local and not merely a grumpy tourist. I’m about to ask them if they could turn it down. We’ll see what happens.
/ / /
FarmerDude5689 at 7:19 PM on February 17, 2022.
There were never speakers.
KellyOkie555391 at 7:32 PM on February 17, 2022.
?????
FarmerDude5689 at 12:03 AM on February 18, 2022.
The speakers were a decoy, that’s all. The family knew how to attract the creatures who could howl.
BloodyLycanthrope234 on 12:42 AM on February 18, 2022.
What on earth are you talking about?
/ / /
Guest at 9:06 PM at February 18, 2022.
Your mother and I disagreed in how we were going to raise you.
You scared the nurses when you came into this world. We moved from Snoqualmie to Redding in hopes that ten years would go by, and people would forget. But people remembered, even when you didn’t.
Your mother wanted to tell you what we are when you turned sixteen. I wanted to wait until you turned eighteen.
We should have been transparent with you from the beginning, about who we are and what we are. Your mother wanted to live free amongst our kind. I wanted a simpler life, a quieter life, a life that wasn’t spent in the shadows.
If you come back, I promise I’ll tell you everything. If you go back to your mother in California, I’ll understand. I tried my best, Colin. I did what I thought was best for you.
If you want to talk about this, come home. I’ll leave the door unlocked for you.
—Dad
/ / /
Moderator at 9:23 PM on February 20, 2022.
I’m locking this thread. OP is now a missing person. If seen, his location should be reported to the police: king5.com/article/news/investigations/family-murdered-in-mysterious-animal-attack-high-school-sophomore-missing
2. BUREAU INVENTORYA stack of books and story printouts—I’m very much a reference person; I ask myself what I’ve read of other people’s writing, and why it moves me to have it nearby.
Coffee or, less frequently, cranberry juice
Fruit bars
Lined notebook, used frequently for envisioning a story’s shape
Apple Music on iPhone, and Bluetooth hearing aids—because I was trained to use my hearing aids to interact with the world around me, I like to use music to immerse myself into the fictional scenarios I create. I listen to everything from Phoebe Bridgers to Sam Cooke to Johann Sebastian Bach to Angelo Badalamenti.
A question to drive the writing forward
3. BIOGRAPHYRoss Showalter’s stories, essays, and criticism have published in the New York Times, Electric Literature, The Rumpus, Catapult, Literary Hub, and elsewhere. He currently teaches creative writing in UCLA Extension Writers’ Program.