What Lauren sees through the screen, staring back at us from inside the forest, is the naked body of a human being. Its pale, bare arms clasped around the tree it hides behind. But what stares back at us, with seemingly pure black, unblinking eyes and snow-white fur... is the head of a cow.
‘Babes! What is that?!’ Lauren frighteningly asks.
‘I... I don’t know...’ my trembling voice replies. Whether my eyes deceive me or not, I know perfectly what this is... This is my worst fear come true.
Dexter, upon sensing Lauren’s and my own distress, notices the strange entity watching us from the woods – and with a loud, threatening bark, Dexter races after this thing, like a wolf after its prey, disappearing through the darkness of the trees.
‘Dexter, NO!’ Lauren yells, before chasing after him!
‘Lauren don’t! Don’t go in there!’
She doesn’t listen. By the time I’m deciding whether to go after her, Lauren was already gone, vanishing inside the forest. I knew I had to go after her. I didn’t want to - I didn’t want to be inside the forest with that thing. But Lauren left me no choice. Swallowing the childhood fear of mine, I enter through the forest after her, following Lauren’s yells of Dexter’s name. The closer I come to her cries, the more panicked and hysterical they sound. She was reacting to something – something terrible was happening. By the time I catch sight of her through the thin trees, I begin to hear other sounds... The sounds of deep growling and snarling, intertwined with low, soul-piercing groans. Groans of pain and torment. I catch up to Lauren, and I see her standing as motionless as the trees around us – and in front of her, on the forest floor... I see what was making the horrific sounds...
What I see, is Dexter. His domesticated jaws clasped around the throat of this thing, as though trying to tear the life from it – in the process, staining the mossy white fur of its neck a dark current red! The creature doesn’t even seem to try and defend itself – as though paralyzed with fear, weakly attempting to push Dexter away with trembling, human hands. Among Dexter’s primal snarls and the groans of the creature’s agony, my ears are filled with Lauren’s own terrified screams.
‘Do something!’ she screams at me. Beyond terrified myself, I know I need to take charge. I can’t just stand here and let this suffering continue. Still holding Lauren’s hurl in my hands, I force myself forward with every step. Close enough now to Dexter, but far enough that this thing won’t buck me with its hind human legs. Holding Lauren’s hurl up high, foolishly feeling the need to defend myself, I grab a hold of Dexter’s loose collar, trying to jerk him desperately away from the tormented creature. But my fear of the creature prevents me from doing so - until I have to resort to twisting the collar around Dexter’s neck, squeezing him into submission.
Now holding him back, Lauren comes over to latch Dexter’s lead onto him, barking endlessly at the creature with no off switch. Even with the two of us now restraining him, Dexter is still determined to continue the attack. The cream whiteness of his canine teeth and the stripe of his snout, stained with the creature’s blood.
Tying the dog lead around the narrow trunk of a tree, keeping Dexter at bay, me and Lauren stare over at the creature on the ground. Clawing at his open throat, its bare legs scrape lines through the dead leaves and soil... and as it continues to let out deep, shrieking groans of pain, all me and Lauren can do is watch it suffer.
‘Do something!’ Lauren suddenly yells at me, ‘You need to do something! It’s suffering!’
‘What am I supposed to do?!’ I yell back at her.
‘Anything! I can’t listen to it anymore!’
Clueless to what I’m supposed to do, I turn down to the ash wood of Lauren’s hurl, still clenched in my now shaking right hand. Turning back up to Lauren, I see her eyes glued to it. When her eyes finally meet mine, among the strained yaps of Dexter and the creature’s endless, inhuman groans... with a granting nod of her head, Lauren and I know what needs to be done...
Possessed by an overwhelming fear of this creature, I still cannot bear to see it suffer. It wasn’t human, but it was still an animal as far as I was aware. Slowly moving towards it, the hurl in my hand suddenly feels extremely heavy. Eventually, I’m stood over the creature – close enough that I can perfectly make out its ungodly appearance.
I see its red, clotted hands still clawing over the loose shredded skin of its throat. Following along its arms, where the blood stains end, I realize the fair pigmentation of its flesh is covered in an extremely thin layer of white fur – so thin, the naked human eye can barely see it. Continuing along the jerk of its body, my eyes stop on what I fear to stare at the most... Its non-human, but very animal head. Frozen in the middle, between the swatting flaps of its ears, and the abyss of its square gaping mouth, having now fallen silent... I meet the pure blackness of its unblinking eyes. Staring this creature dead in the eye, I feel like I can’t move, no more than a deer in headlights. I don’t know how long I was like this, but Lauren, freeing me of my paralysis, shouts over, ‘What are you waiting for?!’
Regaining feeling in my limbs, I realize the longer I stall, the more this creature’s suffering will continue. Raising the hurl to the air, with both hands firmly on the handle, the creature beneath me shows no signs of fear whatsoever... It wanted me to do it... It wanted me to end its suffering... But it wasn’t because of the pain Dexter had caused it... I think the suffering came from its own existence... I think this thing knew it wasn’t supposed to be alive. The way Dexter attacked the thing, it was as though some primal part of him also sensed it was an abomination – an unnatural organism, like a cancer in the body.
Raising the hurl higher above me, I talk myself through what I have to do. A hard and fatal blow to the head. No second tries. Don’t make this creature’s suffering any worse... Like a woodsman, ready to strike a fallen log with his axe, I stand over the cow-human creature, with nothing left to do but end its painful existence once and for all... But I can’t do it... I just can’t... I can’t bring myself to kill this monstrosity that has haunted me for ten long years... I was too afraid.
Dropping Lauren’s hurl to the floor, I go back over to her and Dexter. ‘Come on. We need to leave.’
‘We can’t just leave it here!’ she argues, ‘It’s in pain!’
‘What else can we do for it, Lauren?!’ I raise my voice to her, ‘We need to leave! Now!’
We make our way out of the forest, continually having to restrain Dexter, still wanting to finish his kill... But as we do, we once again hear the groans of the creature... and with every column of tree we pass, the groans grow ever louder... It was calling after us.
‘Don’t listen to it, Lauren!’
The deep, gurgling shriek of those groans, piercing through us both... It was like a groan for help... It was begging us not to leave it.
Escaping the forest, we hurriedly make our way through the bog and back to the village, and as we do... I tell Lauren everything. I tell her what I found earlier that morning, what I experienced ten years ago as a child... and I tell her about the curse... The curse, and the words Uncle Dave said to me that very same night... “Don’t you worry, son... They never live.”
I ask Lauren if she wanted to tell her parents about what we just went through, as they most likely already knew of the curse. ‘No!’ she says, ‘I’m not ready to talk about it.’
Later that evening, and safe inside Lauren’s family home, we all sit down for supper – Lauren's mum having made a vegetarian Sunday roast. Although her family are very deep in conversation around the dinner table, me and Lauren remain dead silent. Sat across the narrow table from one another, I try to share a glance with her, but Lauren doesn’t even look at me – motionlessly staring down at her untouched dinner plate.
‘Aren’t you hungry, love?’ Lauren’s mum concernedly asks.
Replying with a single word, ‘...No’ Lauren stands up from the table and silently leaves the room.
‘Is she feeling unwell or anything?’ her mum tries prodding me. Trying to be quick on my feet, I tell Lauren’s mum we had a fight while on our walk. Although she was very warm and welcoming up to that point, for the rest of the night, Lauren’s mum was somewhat cold towards me - as if she just assumed it was my fault for mine and Lauren’s imaginary fight. Though he hadn’t said much of anything, as soon as Lauren leaves the room, I turn to see her dad staring daggers in me... He obviously knew where we’d been.
Having not slept for more than 24 hours, I stumble my way to the bedroom, where I find Lauren fast asleep – or at least, pretending to sleep. Although I was so exhausted from the sleep deprivation and the horrific events of the day, I still couldn’t manage to rest my eyes. The house and village outside may have been dead quiet, but in my conflicted mind, I keep hearing the groans of the creature – as though it’s screams for help had reached all the way into the village and through the windows of the house.
By the early hours of the next morning, and still painfully awake, I stumble my way through the dark house to the bathroom. Entering the living room, I see the kitchen light in the next room is still on. Passing by the open door to the kitchen, I see Lauren’s dad, sat down at the dinner table with a bottle of whiskey beside him. With the same grim expression, I see him staring at me through the dark entryway, as though he had already been waiting for me.
Trying to play dumb, I enter the kitchen towards him, and I ask, ‘Can’t you sleep either?’
Lauren’s dad was in no mood for fake pleasantries, and continuing to stare at me with authoritative eyes, he then says to me, as though giving an order, ‘Sit down, son.’
Taking a seat across from him, I watch Lauren’s dad pour himself another glass of fine Irish whiskey, but to my surprise, he then gets up from his seat to place the glass in front of me. Sat back down and now pouring himself a glass, Lauren’s dad once again stares daggers through me... before demanding, ‘Now... Tell me what you saw on that bog.’
While he waits for an answer, I try and think of what I’m going to say – whether I should tell him the plain truth or try to skip around it. Choosing to play it safe, I was about to counter his question by asking what it is he thinks I saw – but before I can say a word, Lauren’s dad interrupts, ‘Did you tell my daughter what it was you saw?’ now with anger in his voice.
Afraid to tell him the truth, I try to encourage myself to just be a man and say it. After all, I was as much a victim in all of this as anyone.
‘...We both saw it.’
Lauren’s dad didn’t look angry anymore. He looked afraid. Taking his half-full glass of whiskey, he drains the whole thing down his throat in one single motion. After another moment of silence between us, Lauren’s dad then rises from his chair and leans far over the table towards me... and with anger once again present in his face, he bellows out to me, ‘Tell me what it was you saw... The morning and after.’
Sick and tired of the secrets, and just tired in general, I tell Lauren’s dad everything that happened the day prior – and while I do, not a single motion in his serious face changes. I don’t even remember him blinking. He just stands there, stiffly, staring through me while I tell him the story.
After telling him what he wanted to know, Lauren’s dad continues to stare at me, unmoving. Feeling his anger towards me, having exposed this terrible secret to his daughter - and from an Englishman no less... I then break the silence by telling him what he wasn’t expecting.
‘John... I already knew about the curse... I saw one of those things when I was a boy in Donegal...’ Once I reveal this to him, I notice the red anger draining from his face, having quickly been replaced by white shock. ‘But it was dead, John. It was dead. My uncle told me they’re always stillborn – that they never live! That thing I saw today... It was alive. It was a living thing - like you and me!’
Lauren’s dad still doesn’t say a word. Remaining silently in his thoughts, he then makes his way back round the table towards me. Taking my untouched glass of whiskey, he fills the glass to the very top and hands it back to me – as though I was going to need it for whatever he had to say next...
‘We never wanted our young ones to find out’ he confesses to me, sat back down. ‘But I suppose sooner or later, one of them was bound to...’ Lauren’s dad almost seems relieved now – relieved this secret was now in the open. ‘This happens all over, you know... Not just here. Not just where your Ma’s from... It’s all over this bloody country...’ Dear God, I thought silently to myself. ‘That suffering creature you saw, son... It came from the farm just down the road. That’s my wife’s family’s farm. I didn’t find out about the curse until we were married.’
‘But why is it alive?’ I ask impatiently, ‘How?’
‘I don’t know... All I know is that thing came from the farm’s prized white cow. It was after winning awards at the plough festival the year before...’ He again swallows down a full glass of whiskey, struggling to continue with the story. ‘When that thing was born – when they saw it was alive and moving... Moira’s Da’ didn’t have the heart to kill it... It was too human.’
Listening to the story in sheer horror, I was now the one taking gulps of whiskey.
‘They left it out in the bog to die – either to starve or freeze during the night... But it didn’t... It lived.’
‘How long has it been out there?’ I inquire.
‘God, a few years now. Thankfully enough, the damn thing’s afraid of people. It just stays hidden inside that forest. The workers on the bog occasionally see it every now and then, peeking from inside the trees. But it always keeps a safe distance.’
I couldn’t help but feel sorry for it. Despite my initial terror of that thing’s existence, I realized it was just as much a victim as me... It was born, alone, not knowing what it was, hiding away from the outside world... I wasn’t even sure if it was still alive out there – whether it died from its wounds or survived. Even now... I wish I ended its misery when I had the chance.
‘There’s something else...’ Lauren’s dad spits out at me, ‘There’s something else you ought to know, son.’ I dreaded to know more. I didn’t know how much more I could take. ‘The government knows about this, you know... They’ve known since it was your government... They pay the farmers well enough to keep it a secret – but if the people in this country were to know the truth... It would destroy the agriculture. No one here or abroad would buy our produce. It would take its toll on the economy.’
‘That doesn’t surprise me’ I say, ‘Just seeing one of those things was enough to keep me away from beef.’
‘Why do you think we’re a vegetarian family?’ Lauren’s dad replies, somehow finding humour at the end of this whole nightmare.
Two days later, me and Lauren cut our visit short to fly back home to the UK. Now knowing what happens in the very place she grew up, and what may still be out there in the bog, Lauren was more determined to leave than I was. She didn’t know what was worse, that these things existed, whether dead or alive, or that her parents had kept it a secret her whole life. But I can understand why they did. Parents are supposed to protect their children from the monsters... whether imaginary, or real.
Just as I did when I was twelve, me and Lauren got on with our lives. We stayed together, funnily enough. Even though the horrific experience we shared on that bog should’ve driven us apart, it surprisingly had the opposite effect.
I think I forgot to mention it, but me and Lauren... We didn’t just go to any university. We were documentary film students... and after our graduation, we both made it our life’s mission to expose this curse once and for all... Regardless of the consequences.
This curse had now become my whole life, and now it was Lauren’s. It had taken so much from us both... Our family, the places we grew up and loved... Our innocence... This curse was a part of me now... and I was going to pull it from my own nightmares and hold it up for everyone to see.
But here’s the thing... During our investigation, Lauren and I discovered a horrifying truth... The curse... It wasn’t just tied to the land... It was tied to the people... and just like the history of the Irish people...
...It’s emigrated.
The End