I saw the reflection of the eyes on the metallic “Ozette Lake Camp” sign. It was a pitch black night, but somehow I could see them clear as day. I turned around with a start, terrified that it was a bear or a cougar, but when I shined my flashlight all I saw was a deer staring back at me.

I heaved a sigh of relief, and cursed under my breath. I returned to my task of hastily filling out the campsite registration card so we would not awake to a knock on our car camper when a ranger came through. I slipped it into the metal box, and turned to walk back to my campsite, to find the deer still staring at me.

I had thought my flashlight had scared it stiff, but I realized it had not moved in the five minutes my flashlight had shown elsewhere, and had simply been staring at me the entire time. As I slowly walked back, for some reason I felt compelled not to take my eyes off of it, and I watched as its eyes followed me, until the white orbs retreated into the dark.

I got back to our campsite as my boyfriend James was just finishing dinner. The camp was empty except for us, so we had picked the first site we saw that let us park our SUV to face Ozette Lake, so we could wake up to a nice view. I picked up my bowl of hastily prepared stew, and ate with him in the dark.

He cleared his throat, “You’re quiet, what’s up?”

“There was a deer at the campsite registration kiosk.”

He chuckled a bit “I imagine there’s plenty of deer, I saw a whole herd grazing as we were driving up the road to get here.”

“This one was different. It was staring at me”

I could hear him slurping his food down quickly, doubtless as anxious for sleep as me. “So what? It was probably frightened.”

I gulped. “Yeah, I guess.”

He sat his bowl down, and started cleaning the pot he had used. “Anyways, I have the bed in the back of the car setup, let’s get to sleep so we can wake up early tomorrow, Sand Point isn’t going to hike itself.”

With that, we both climbed into bed, locked the car, and went to sleep. It only took five minutes before I heard him snoring. I smiled to myself at how easy he slept, and tried to put the deer out of my mind as I fell asleep.

I woke up with a start. My boyfriend was snoring softly, still fast asleep. Something deep inside told me something was wrong. I looked out the window next to me. It was still dark outside, but the clouds had cleared a bit to reveal a sliver of the moon. In the moonlight I could just barely make out a figure, maybe 20 ft from the car.

It was the deer. The same deer. I couldn’t see it very well, and it isn’t like I can usually tell two deer apart, but somehow I knew it was the same one. It was still staring at me. I felt my heart beat faster and my stomach churn. Something about this just felt off.

But I thought about what my boyfriend had said. It was just a deer. Maybe I was wrong and it wasn’t even the same deer. It had probably just seen me move inside the car, and was scared. Besides, the doors were locked, I was entirely safe. I did my best to fall asleep quickly.

We woke up to a beautiful orange sunrise on the lake. We got out of the car, and started stretching and preparing breakfast. The camp toilets were out of service for the season, and so we each took a turn at walking the quarter mile to the toilet by the day-use parking to use the restroom.

The hike we had planned started out amazing, a walk on a boardwalk in a beautiful forest, out to a desolate beach with waves crashing over the rocks. My boyfriend and I laughed at my worries about the deer, and somehow in the daylight, all of them seemed to melt away. It all seemed so silly to me.

As we walked the beach, we eventually came upon the giant rocky hill at Sand Point. I was the first of us to manage to scramble up it, excited to see the view of the coast and forest from the top. I took photos in every direction, and breathed in the ocean air. I stared back at the way we came for a few minutes, admiring how beautiful the forest was from above.

Then I saw it.

At the very edge of the trees I could just barely make out a deer. It was staring at me, its head pointed up to see me atop the rock. I started hyperventilating, and looked down at my boyfriend still scrambling up the rock. I told him I wanted to leave. He asked why, and I dodged the question and told him I just wasn’t feeling good. He was disappointed at cutting our hike short, but said okay. When I looked back up towards the forest, the deer was gone.

We hiked back to the car quickly, the forest seemed quieter than before, it made me uneasy. I knew I’d have to tell my boyfriend sooner or later why we were leaving, but I didn’t want to fight, I just wanted to get home.

I packed up the campsite while my boyfriend made one last stop at the toilet. By the time he came back, our campsite was packed up back into the car, and we set off down the 20 miles of gravel road to get started on the three hour drive back to Seattle.

We arrived home, and as soon as we got in the door I felt better. Life went back to normal, and I started to think I had just been crazy and imagined the whole thing.

Then I got the call.

It was 9:00 PM yesterday when my phone rang, I picked it up to hear a voice on the other end that sounded very tired.

It was the park service. They had gotten my number from my campsite registration, and wanted to interview me. A body had been found in the toilet near the day-use parking lot. I felt my stomach drop as they went on to describe the body, describing my boyfriend down to his birthmark.

I looked towards the kitchen where I could hear him making our dinner. I got up as quietly as I could, and crept out the front door and into my car. After locking the car doors I just sat there in shock, not sure what I should do next. I looked up at my rear view mirror to back out of my driveway.

It was only then that I saw my boyfriend. He standing behind my car, silently staring at me.