Camping With Yowies

• Katharyn Ryan, Grade 10
• Short Story
• 2010

For a second, we stood stock still, listening to the rustles in the bush.
“Probably just a wombat,” I whispered to the other four.
Suddenly, we saw a dark shape lumbering towards us. Losing all composure, Sonya, Katie, Alanna, Sophie, and I screamed, clutching at each others’ hands, before having the sense to run stumbling to the tents, diving into them. The figure could easily have heard us, yet we hoped with all of our hearts that it put the sound down to natural bush noises. Hardly possible, but still, we hoped.
We waited in silence. Living statues.
It was then that I wondered; How did we get here?

It had been last week when Katie had had the brilliant notion of camping in the bush near my house. I was quick to agree, but our other friends needed to be convinced.
“What about snakes?” Sophie quivered.
“And goannas?” Alanna put in.
“What about Yowies?” Sonya asked, terrified.
“What about Yowies?” Jake, one of their classmates, said in a loud voice, earning a laugh from Michael.
Sonya looked furious and the others were still scared, but it was too late now: Katie was rattling off a camping list.
We were going bush; snakes, goannas, Yowies and all.

We tried our best to set up camp the next day; some tents collapsed barely after being erected. Whatever fears the others had were promptly forgotten when Katie and I produced two bulging bags of junk food.
For the first few hours we were relaxed and busy, talking and telling jokes. When the darkness of night fell, we started to scare ourselves silly by telling each other ghost stories.
Quite suddenly, we realised that we didn’t need the ghost stories.
“What was that?” Sophie asked, as a crack echoed across our campsite.
“A tree branch.”
“A possum.”
“A Yowie!” Sonya exclaimed, and we broke into nervous giggles.
“Shush!” Alanna hissed, glancing around, “it can probably hear us.”
An ear-piercing howl broke out from our left, making us shriek with fear. We stayed very close and extremely quiet, hardly daring to talk. A small animal scuttled across where we sat, earning another scream from Sonya.
I heard the rustles of a bush no less than five metres away from us, and saw the gleaming pair of eyes from within.

The next day at daybreak, we set the record for the fastest time packing up a campsite. Sonya pointed out the previously full food packets to us.
“Just a possum,” Katie said firmly.
I didn’t want to argue with Katie, but when I looked at the tracks it had left, I realised that it wasn’t a possum at all. Who knows? Maybe Sonya’s Yowies are real.

Jake was in hysterics when he met up with Michael the next day.
“Did you hear about Linda’s camping trip?”
“Well, yeah, she gibbered something about Yowies. Why?”
Keeping his face straight, Jake said, “Actually, I know the Yowies in that area pretty well…”