The Ghost of Ontario (Part 1) (10 Grade Draft)

Chapter 23: Campsite of the Dead

        It happened so fast! One minute, I was flailing in the lake like I was drunk or something, and the next, from out of nowhere, I felt a powerful pair of hands grab me by the waist underwater. "HE'S GOT ME!!" I shouted at the tops of my lungs. I waited for the Ghost of Ontario to pull me underwater.

I heard Dad yell my name one last time. "Kylie! What's got you?!"

"THE GHOST OF ONTARIO!!" I shrieked, "IT WAS NICE KNOWNG YOU, CAMP JUNIPER! AHHH!!" From underwater, the hands moved up to my arms and grasped them. "THIS IS IT!!" I shouted, "MY LIFE IS OVER!!" Warm tears streamed down my cheeks, "OH, GOD! OH, GOD! OH, GOD!"

Nonetheless, just when I thought for sure the Ghost of Ontario would drag me underwater, from it burst out a wet, non-ghost head, and a male voice shouted, "Don't yell! I've got you!"

"What the?!" I screamed, "Who are you?!" I turned my head and gasped. It was him! It was the beautiful, teenage boy I saw at the first portage!

His soggy, scraggly, brown hair flopped down over his shoulders, and to me, he yelled, "Stop panicking! You can trust me!" He looked even more smoking with wet hair. I knew it wasn't a hallucination! I knew I saw a boy, and here he was!

My entire face turned red. I knew it did. I almost forgot that I was floating in the Death Lake.

The boy grasped my arms and kicked his legs. He started to drag me through the water. He actually was a really skilled swimmer. Stupid me! I thought it was the Ghost of Ontario that grabbed me! But it wasn't! It was a boy, and he definitely wasn't a ghost. He wasn't dead. He was very alive. He swam like a professional through the water. He soon stopped, and still holding me, he peered up to the floating orange light. I looked up with him. I gulped. Maybe the light was the Ghost of Ontario? It wasn't. It was something else.

The boy called up to it. "Ro, lead them to the island!" Even his voice was sexy! I was confused. There was "Ro" again. Who was Ro?

The light started to move again. The voices of my family members started to fade the further I got away from them.

"Where are you taking me?!" I asked the boy. My teeth chattered from both fear and cold.

The boy didn't answer. Instead, he continued to drag me.

While he did so, I studied him very carefully. He definitely was around my age, either fifteen or sixteen, and he definitely had a Native American-like appearance to him. "What are you doing?" I asked him, "My family is back there!"

He again didn't answer.

        Suddenly, my feet hit sand. I felt the bottom of the lake. I gasped and peered into the water. By this time, the fog was starting to lift. Since the water was so clear in the Lady Evelyn-Smoothwater Provincial Park, I saw my feet. I peered forward and gasped again. In front of me stood an island. The boy had dragged me to an island. 

He pulled me up onto a small beach and sat me down. Immediately, he tended to me. He unbuckled my life vest and pulled it off. He plopped it down next to me and next took off my green jacket, plopping it down on top of it.

I shivered and wrapped my arms around my body. I was speechless. I had no idea what to say.

Momentarily, the boy left me and vanished around a small point on the island. He soon returned, and I saw that he was carrying an old blanket over his shoulder. Now where he got the blanket, I had no idea, but he definitely had one.

I stared. The spotlight again shone on only the boy.

He stopped in front of me and kneeled, wrapping the blanket around my shoulders.