This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.
The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/Jay_Tee13 on 2024-09-13 17:25:09+00:00.
If I had a dollar for every time I’d told the detectives this story, maybe I’d have enough to retire. Fly off to an island and drink my way to a not-so-early grave. I remember our last conversation well enough.
“Ok, buddy, we’re right here. If you hurry, we can hit the wave pool before we go.”
I ruffled Will’s hair, gave him a little push.
He folded his arms, defiant.
“The racing slide. It’s the funnest one.”
“Most fun,” I corrected. “And whatever you say, Willy.”
He nodded with a ‘hmph’, satisfied, and scurried off.
He weaved his way through the molasses of the crowd, splitting families and couples as he homed in on the dilapidated port-a-potty.
This was one of the few recent attempts Will had dared to use the bathroom all by himself. He was capping a good run, but being out of the house, I kept an eye on the door for any signs of distress.
Said it a hundred times; I would’ve noticed anyone coming or going. Maybe five seconds I looked away. Was that enough time for him to jump out? And, what, run off in the opposite direction?
About five minutes after he had gone, I got up. I leaned on a casual arm against the port-a-potty. In a whisper-shout over the drone of the few hundred happy pool-goers behind me:
“Buddy, its me. How’s it going in there?”
There was movement inside, I swear it. I swear it wasn’t my imagination, I heard something.
I turned and saw my wife; dip’n’dots in one hand and waving with the other. Can’t call it a day at the water park without ice cream.
I smiled and wrinkled my nose as a joke.
“Alright, Will, I’m coming in.”
The door was unlocked. I made an effort to open it as little as possible and slip inside.
I did a double take. Turned a full 360. Checked the neighboring port-a-potty and returned. No, he couldn’t have… I peered down, past the toilet seat. Log sized turds floated in the septic stew below.
“Will?”
I stepped outside and circled the port-a-potty.
“Will?” I called again.
My wife appeared next to me holding Lila’s hand.
“What happened, where’s Will?” she asked.
“I-I don’t know, he was inside. Lila, did you see him leave at all?”
My daughter shook her head, thrusting a spoonful of dots into her mouth.
“You were supposed to be watching him,” my wife said.
“I know!” I grabbed the arm of a man nearby, “Excuse me sir, did you see my son leave this port-a-potty here?”
I described Will in detail. He saw the desperation in my eyes but shook his head.
“Sorry. Try the lifeguard station. I’m sure this happens all the time.”
He wished us luck and I thanked him. My wife was beginning to cry. She was starting to scare Lila. I ran ahead, cutting through one of the splash pads and hopping the fence to the lifeguard station.
“Oh, excuse me, sir,” some acne-riddled teenager with a red and white uniform stood up from behind the desk. “You –”
“My son, I can’t find my son. Is there some announcement you can make, something?”
The teen closed his eyes. “Yea, give me one sec. I kind of new, so, I think –”
“I don’t have a second. If you can’t help, then get me a god-damned manager!” I snarled.
A petite girl, also in high school by the looks of it, turned the corner, oblivious to the nature of the conversation.
“Hey, you can’t talk to him like that,” she pouted. “There’s no need to be rude.”
I stabbed my finger at her, my temper at the end of its wick.
“I’ll be as rude as I damn-well like. Get me a fucking manager or I’ll go back there and find one.”
The police were called. Primarily, for me. I was screaming, knocking things over, “foaming at the mouth” my wife said. The cops said I would have to calm down or they’d handcuff me. They sent out an announcement over the park’s PA system.
“William, your parents are looking for you at the lifeguard station. If you can find a lifeguard, we can get you back together as soon as possible.”
“Don’t worry,” the lifeguard manager said. “We radio’d all our employees. He’ll be back in no time at all.”
As it turns out, lost and found children in places like these is fairly common.
The problem was, Will never turned up.
How do you go home after that? We stayed as long as we could, but it’s not like we could sleep on the slides. So, the same day I left for the water park with my family, we returned, one short. Lila didn’t know what was happening. We told her Will had gotten lost and the police were looking for him. She asked why we weren’t looking for him. She began to cry.
The funny thing about humans is how simultaneously effective and ineffective we are at lying to ourselves. Because a deep part of yourself, something in your core where you know you can trust it, smells the bullshit. And yet we’ll take that lie and run, far as we can, until our legs give out or we crash face first into a wall.
After the first day, that piece of me in my core knew I’d never see Will again. But I ran like Hell. My lust for closure deflated my marriage like a water balloon with a leak. I was stupid to think I wouldn’t get laughed out of the court during custody proceedings.
But the one reprieve I had came yesterday. If I couldn’t have answers, if I couldn’t have my family or my son back, then I’d have some sweet revenge.
This last year, I’d been leading media campaigns, doing interviews, degrading myself to what I used to frown on and call an activist. All to destroy the water park that took my son.
The park was small, got a lot of bad press in the local outlets where most of their customers were. Apparently, this wasn’t the first incident in the park’s history, far from it actually, having a long list of lawsuits and scandals. But it was the last straw, and eventually, they were forced to close.
Yesterday, was the first day of the demolition. I watched it in person. One man audience. And it felt good.
I was getting ready to leave around mid-day when a commotion in the site held me.
“Axe! Grab the axe!”
The crew was in mayhem, and advantageous to my curiosity, no one was around to stop me hopping the barrier to get a closer look.
“It’s dead. Stop, it’s dead!”
I was too far to see what the men were standing over and crept closer.
“Fucker, that’s a world record!”
“Call someone.”
“Who?”
“The police. Animal control, call someone, Christ’s sake.”
“Where did you find it?”
“In here!”
“Well go check it. Be careful, too.”
I felt my way along a bulldozer, close enough now, and stuck my head past the edge. The scene made my knees buckle. I couldn’t comprehend what I was looking at.
Dead, and covered in hacks and slash marks, was a python. Never mind a snake, it was the largest animal I’d even seen up close, long as a school bus, longer even, stretched out. Despite its size, it looked thin, as if it hadn’t eaten in weeks.
“Tell me what happened,” one of the construction crew asked a younger member.
“W-we was using the machine and clearing the area like’s you said. Went and knocked over them port-a-potty’s and the dragon came, rearing its head. Out one of them holes beneath.”
The crew began to buzz, taking pictures of the beast and kicking it.
The construction man nodded and called for the worker who had gone to check the hole.
“Come on out. That’s a shit hole, nothing to find.”
“B-boss!”
The site fell silent.
“What is it?”
“There’s bones. There’s bones down here!”
I slept in the bathtub that night. Locked the door to the bathroom too. I don’t know. I just didn’t feel safe.
After all the pieces were collected, the bones they found belonged to 10 unique skeletons. It was a reticulated python, the invasive one, 26 feet long. Found the humidity of the park nice and chose a place it wouldn’t be found.
Headlined the local paper for a day before it was pulled. Previous owners of the park still had some influence in the area.
And what did I get. Closure? I would have rather been buried with my unanswered questions.