Before I begin writing about what I experienced, I feel it is important to explain a few things. My experience happened when I was fairly young so, while I am certain it happened, there are still details I am blurry about. As this is a website about people's personal experiences with the paranormal, I will assume you are open minded about my story and the only reason I am putting it up today is because I am trying to find out anything I can about what I experienced as it disturbs me to this day.
I am unsure of my exact age at the time; however, I believe I would have been between 8 and 10 years old. My friend Gareth was having a party at his grandparents house near where I live. I do not remember what the party was for but I do know that there was a lot of people there and all brought their kids. In total there were around 15 of us children. His grandparents live in a large manor house with a fairly large area of land, most of which is woodland. Years later we discovered that this house is apparently extremely haunted and believed to be cursed including the grounds just outside of the house; however, this is irrelevant to the story. I feel as what we experienced had nothing to do with spirits or whatever and I myself am very skeptical about the whole curse thing.
Sometime late in the afternoon while we were swimming in the pool, my friend Gareth began claiming he had seen something at the treeline. Being young kids, we were not overly worried and were actually more curious so we got out to go see what it was. When we reached the trees we saw nothing. For the next hour or so my friend kept claiming to see a black figure hunched in the woods and again we found nothing. I have always been a natural leader so, seeing that he was starting to become worried (and being very ignorant in my youth), I gathered up the other children and told them that we saw something in the woods and it was our job to keep everyone safe so we should arm ourselves with sticks and rocks and look for it. At this point Rob (the eldest of all of us by 2 years) asked what we were looking for. We told him nothing, as I wanted to make sure that my friend wasn't lying. If it was really out there they would see it and I would compare the description.
Every child was in the woods looking in groups. Myself and Gareth being the only one to go in a group of two. I don't remember how long we looked but I believe it was a very short amount of time, we saw a large black creature run past. I remember it wasn't close but it was close enough for us both to say that we had see a large black creature without the slightest bit of doubt.
We returned to the treeline near the pool when we were approached by my friend Rob. I remember the terror in his face when he said that the others had seen something and that we had to come fast. We walked with him just inside the woodland where all the others were hiding in an old ruined pig pen. I asked what they saw and a few of the younger children said they had been walking in a direction (I don't remember which but I know it was deeper into the woodland) and when they looked ahead a large black dog ran away. Everyone looked terrified and this is when I got worried.
To this day I do not know why I was so calm about it. It did not scare me, it made me angry that it was here. (It's important to explain that in my area of Shropshire there is a huge black cat that roams the lands, so many people have seen it. It's not even a legend or myth. It's pretty much confirmed it exists and is believed to be a jungle cat of some kind. Look it up if you are interested, it's easy to find.) Believing that it was the large black cat most people had seen in the area, and fearing for the others, I took Gareth and Rob aside and told them we should send the others into the house and search the woods alone.
I believe we had told the adults about what we had seen but as far as I remember they had blown it off and it was therefore our job to find this thing and kill it (to this day I wish I could have gone back in time and slapped myself for suggesting something so stupid). So off we went in the direction the others had seen it go. Deeper into the woods we found a clearing, the ground was dead beyond the trees aside from the occasional clump of long grass. You could feel there was something wrong with the place, although as I write this I think it may have been the feeling of being watched, which we were.
We stood there looking around and I don't remember who called attention to it but on the far side of the clearing on the tree line sat a huge black dog. Gareth ran immediately, leaving myself and Rob staring at it in disbelief. Shortly after he ran too leaving me behind, though I do not know if it was because I was not scared or so scared I could not move. It was roughly twice the size of a Labrador, hunched with large white teeth. The thing that truly scares me is that I remember what it looked like very clearly, except the eyes. It had large perfectly round white eyes. The reason this is so scary to me is because I swear that that is not how they looked. I asked Gareth and Rob earlier this month what they remember of how it looked and neither could recall how the eyes looked. I turned and ran. I found the other two not far from the clearing. They had waited for me.
We walked back in silence and I don't remember why but either Rob vanished or me and Gareth went back in or maybe went a different way, I'm not sure. This was the last time we saw it I believe, however I may be wrong because we only remembered this last part a short while ago. While we were alone walking back it was sitting in our pathway. I have no real memory of what happened. I only remember it sitting there staring at us with its massive white eyes (the name I have now given it, not knowing what the hell it was). It didn't move it just sat there, baring its huge teeth. Then I remember going home.
We did not speak of that day again until some time last year when my friend brought up the time we saw the jungle cat. I saw it in his face as he said it that he remembered that it wasn't a cat, and it all came flooding back to both of us. Stories like these can be blown out of proportion especially as we were children, so I asked him questions about that day knowing my own answer to see if they were similar. Most of them were. The eyes are what I remember most and what worried me was when he described the creature he did not describe the eyes so I asked him about them. He couldn't remember them no matter how hard he tried. As I said earlier all I see are 2 white disks and at the back of my mind I know that's wrong.
There was one thing I missed out of the story as I'm not convinced this happened at all, but when we saw it last I swear it spoke. I have no memory of it or anything, but I just feel like the words are at the back of my mind and I can't recall them.
I'm not looking for recognition for this story. To be honest I'm so paranoid about it I'm worried if I talk about it too much it will come back or something. So if anyone knows anything about it or has any questions or whatever, I'd like to hear it, as all I want to know is what the hell did I see.
Whether you believe me or not is up to you and to be honest, I don't think I would 100% believe this story if I heard it from someone. But just know that information is the only reason I've put this up here, hoping someone may have heard of this or know what it is.
Sorry if this isn't very well written. I was writing while trying to remember the details so maybe it's a bit muddled. Either way any help is appreciated. Also, I can rarely get on the internet anymore so it may be a while before I can read any responses. Either way please tell me what you can or what you think.
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