Aluminum Canoes

The following story was published to the Lunatics Project podcast, run by Abby and Alan, on November 18th, 2025. All of the stories from this episode are worth listening to, and you should check them out; but, Aluminum Canoes starts about 1 hour and 4 minutes in. In the podcast, thl story is narrated by Peter Papazoglou; but, the text of the story is below.

Camp Summerstar, 1974

James Wren turned saucer white. The other canoe rolled more harshly than he expected, catapulting three boys into the tepid lake water. Two flailed like human-colored campfires above the crisp lake’s face while the third went under after the canoe bobbed and hammered back down on the back of the boy’s head.

Camp Coosada, 1975

James Wren sat around a camp fire with nine other boys, one camp counselor. The counselor passed around a flashlight – the designated “speaking” totem. The holder of the flashlight had to tell their scariest story while lighting their face from beneath the chin. The counselor started the ritual, spoke of a Native American ghost what would kill those young boys that disrespected the land upon which this camp was built. Convenient. One of the boys told a story about a lake-dwelling siren that would tempt you down to the shore with her wily ways which were more or less sexual in nature (though, from the sound of it, mostly “more”). Another told of an evil thing that lived in the woods here. Some kind of albino bigfoot that ate camp-aged boys because they tasted better than the girls at the sister camp across the valley.

James didn’t have to tell a story. When he put the light to his chin, he spoke of the icy terror that filled his veins as his friend he had just confessed to loving the day before sank to the bottom of the lake, tracing his downward path with a mellifluous stream of blood that flowed from the base of his skull. It was deemed an accident — and it was — but James still saw the boy in his dreams bloated and wrapped in pondweed as he regurgitated his drowned lungs into James Wren’s mouth, as if to kiss him to death.

The boys became statues. They sat silently as they listened to James’s story.

After a long silence, the counselor grabbed the light back from James, rough enough to startle the boy. A graveyard simple joke that turned graveyard deadly: Turn the other canoe over. It was a dare to impress the lead counselor (the only girl at the camp) who never noticed any of the campers. All the boys were supposed to laugh after. James knew his friend would understand.

The counselor started to speak about the camp fire and how things around the fire were sacred. He said something about how he didn’t want the boys from Cabin D talking to the other counselors about what happened here tonight, just like last night, whatever that meant. He said the others shouldn’t share James’s story, and that it was a stupid accident. The counselor complained that it didn’t count as a spooky story anyway.

James sat embarrassed, staring down into the fire. Stupid idea to talk about that. The boy next to him scooted a few inches away, signaling to the others he had nothing to do with it.

A rustle from the brush nearby startled a boy at the camp fire. What the fuck was that? he squealed. The counselor chastised the boy for his language and gave the signal to the Cabin D boys that it was time to put the fire out and get to bed. Before one of the boys from Cabin D could throw the water bucket across the flames, another cried out in terror. By the time anyone could turn to see what caused the boy’s cry, the counselor had fallen to his knees in front of the fire, wheezing like his throat was full of cotton. His eyes filled with red arteries bursting their way toward his pupils. His head turned grape purple at his bulging temples. The boys didn’t know where to turn or what to do. All except one.

James sat silently, still staring into the fire, as the panic ensued. He looked over to a thick patch of supplejack and remained unsurprised as a bloated, pondweed constricted figure pushed its way through the brush into the light of the fire. The thing was hunched over and heaving, struggling for breath of its own, when a boy other than James noticed the beast.

In unison, the boys screamed. The creature lurched up and drew a deep breath, like a soft scream. It was purple of skin and green of veins, and it grabbed the kneeling counselor, collapsing on his mouth. It vomited blackish-green pond scum into the man’s throat.

The boys fled into the woods in every direction, wailing as they ran. All except one. All except James Wren, who sat on his tree trunk and silently watched the lacustrine figure empty its lungs into the wriggling camp counselor. As the man slowly drowned on the deposits of the pond, James stared at his shoes, dangling from the trunk. He let himself breathe a sigh of relief and basked in a rare moment of internal serenity. James thought, I always knew you’d come back for me.