The Mistake

                What the Hell was I thinking? Actually, I guess I wasn’t. At least, not with my brain. This girl told me that she was taking cryptozoology classes because she had always been interested and had seen Bigfoot when she was camping with her parents years ago. Something has to influence someone’s decision to earn a useless degree, right? Maybe she just hoped to get on the Discovery Channel one day or something. I don’t really know. I just know she was smoking hot. I’ll do anything for a tall blonde with big, um, eyes. Yeah. No matter how stupid it is.

              Anyway, I was looking for something cool to do on a Wednesday night, hoping to find a decent flyer on the bulletin board in the Student Union. Poetry readings at the coffee house? No. Angry chick band at the Basement Bar? Hell no. Spanking it to internet porn in my dorm room and most likely getting caught by my roommate? Again? Probably. That’s when she came up to post hers. A chance to fly to Puerto Rico with the most beautiful chick I’d seen since Kathy Ireland and hunt for some monster that doesn’t even exist? And finding a reason to slip into her tent in the middle of the night? Sign me up. Twice.

                She saw me take an interest. In the poster, not her perky C-cups, which she almost caught me checking out. There was some conversation started up about this Chupacabra thing. Whatever. When she said it meant “goat sucker,” I silently gave it to her as a nickname. I also wished I was a goat.

              Anyway, seems like the next thing I know, we’re on a plane to this tropical island paradise. To spend a week together. With like nine other dudes. Fuck these nerds. Well, the hot chick nerd. Not the dudes. I can bullshit my way through talking about made-up monsters. Just enough to get her to think I’m interested and drop her panties. Then she’ll be stuck with me, no pun intended. Okay. Pun intended.

                So, we get to this beautiful island. And make it to our guide that is going to lead us into the jungle. Damn it! He’s tall, and dark, and handsome. And he has that damn sexy Latin accent. How can I compete with that? She’s hanging on his every word. I just want to punch him in the back of his head. But, that would be bad, since he would probably kill me and let the jaguars eat my corpse. If there are jaguars there. Or maybe the Chupacabra will eat me.

             On the trek into the dense forests, our guide relays stories of sightings and close encounters. He had a few eyewitness accounts on video, which he played on the small screen in the center console of the Range Rover we were riding in. Animals with puncture wounds and no blood? Seriously? I think I messed up. Even if the monster isn’t real, something out here could fuck us up. I should have known, any woman that would talk to me would be crazy enough to try to hunt this kind of thing. Where’s my gun? Maybe I should have taken this thing a little more seriously before now.

               Our guide brings us to a very small pull-off at the end of the path that didn’t go very far into the trees. Maybe a quarter of a mile, where a few trees had been removed so the guides could park their trucks. Great. All the stories we heard on the way have me paranoid. Every little sound makes me think a vampire beast is going to jump out and suck me dry. And not in the good way. I can’t even focus on being Don Juan, with the fear and being eaten alive by the bugs. Why are they so big here? They are all over the place. I just want to set up my tent and relax before something here kills me.

                So we walk through this steamy jungle for about 6 hours. Yeah, 6 hours. The guide shows us evidence of the creature having been there. And proceeds to tell us this is where we will be setting up camp for the night. Wonderful. Nothing beats sleeping in the lair of the beast that wants to have you for dinner. But hey, I guess that would be the best chance to actually find the thing, right? If you haven’t noticed, I changed my mind. The Chupacabra is real. I should’ve stayed in Lincoln. There aren’t any Chupacabras in Nebraska. There’s actually nothing in Nebraska, really. Oh, what I wouldn’t do for a corn field full of drunk coeds about now.

                We set up camp. These nylon tents may be waterproof, but I doubt they’re monster proof. As we sit around the campfire, I feel a little better. Almost like home. Except there are motion capture cameras, and infrared cameras, and aluminum cans strung together and placed as tripwire. That was my idea. After an hour or so of conversation, and constantly thinking something is right behind me, I decide to go to bed. Before I drift off, I hear the others starting to follow my lead. It’s strange, as exhausted as I am, I can’t quite get to sleep. But I’m close.

               Just then, I hear rustling just outside my tent, and the unzipping of the door. She must have only been interested in the guide for his knowledge of the Chupacabra and the area. Because she was in my tent now. Take that, you nerds!

                “You lied to me didn’t you? You were never into cryptozoology, were you?”

                 “How could you tell?”

                 “I just can. But you’ve actually shown a genuine interest. Why the change of heart?”

                “You. I was just gonna try to hook up with you in Puerto Rico. But the stories and videos captured my interest.” She took off her white t-shirt and leaned in to kiss me. Wow. Until the heavy footsteps around camp. We first really noticed the sound of the cans. You’re welcome. And then the smell. I handed her her shirt and we went out to meet everyone else. The air reeked of stale blood and the smell of a terrarium when it needs cleaned. The guide tried to get us to huddle around the fire. One guy had to check out the glimmers of red light he noticed in the bushes. Bad idea. In an instant, he was snatched by some reptilian creature as it hissed and retreated, presumably to consume its easy catch.

               One by one, these assholes continued to try to glimpse the beast or capture it on film. Sorry, but when I watch a guy get ripped out of his shoes, I’m not gonna try to go after whatever took him. He’s dead, doesn’t mean I have to follow suit. The humid night air was filled for what seemed like an eternity with sounds of screams, snapping of branches, cracking of bone, and other indeterminable horrific noises. All I could think of was getting out alive. An animal that hadn’t been proven to exist to the masses would have to settle for the other carcasses. I refuse to be dinner for some monster. I’m walking out of this jungle alive if I have anything to say about it. Just you watch.

                 The guide became useless. Apparently, he had never encountered anything like this. He was too freaked out to think. As he stood there frozen with panic, the creature swooped in and snatched him. Great. Now we definitely won’t get a refund. I just hope he left the keys to the Rover in his tent.  Only one way to find out. I gripped her hand with a G.I. Joe kung fu grip as we headed to find the keys. I could hear rustling ahead. I suddenly stopped and tackled her to the ground just in time to miss the razor-sharp talons swooping at us. Almost. It doesn’t feel all that great to have dirty cutting tools rip into the flesh of your deltoids as you fall. Awesome, Abercrombie discontinued this shirt last month. So much for my favorite t-shirt. I asked the terrified blonde under me if she was injured. You know, the whole point of coming on this stupid trip was to have her panting beneath me, but somehow I thought it would be a little more enjoyable than this.

               I pulled her to her feet and sprinted toward the guide’s tent as the carnage continued around us. I bet this is kinda how it felt storming the beaches at Normandy. Or at least what it looked like in Saving Private Ryan. Death and dismemberment all around. I hoped she shit her pants with fear, so that she couldn’t make fun of me when we got back to civilization. Shut up.

                 Thank the good Lord, this guy left the keys in his tent! I turned to show her just in time to see her head snatched off her body by that monster. At least I wouldn’t have anything to slow me down. I ran. I wasn’t sure if it was the right direction. It was dark. The fire had been extinguished amidst the chaos. I just didn’t want to stick around. Ever try to run with an asscrack full of feces? Not fun.

               By some miracle, I had gone the right way. I was just able to make out the Rover by the light of the moon. This whole trip was the worst mistake I ever made, but at least I was free from the horror. Or so I thought. The thud ahead of me made me stop. Two little red lights close to the ground. Then two more. Apparently the Chupacabra had babies. Three of them. I could tell when I saw the two big reddish orange orbs light up above the little red ones. And the stench. So close to the truck. The monster stood straight up and let out a shriek unlike anything I had ever heard before. I was paralyzed with fear as it started toward me. Oh, shit… ay to find out. I gripped her hand as Ily