Like a wendigo almost, but not quite the same. They never seemed evil either, just scared me at first.
Two siblings were sitting around swapping favourite childhood memories when the oldest brought up something never really said out loud before: the creatures that used to show up behind their old house. The youngest, a sister, stopped right there. She had seen the very same things. Their stories lined up so closely that they both got spooked and had to change the subject.
The family lived in St. Helens, in northwestern Oregon, in a house with a big stretch of woods out back. The kids played and explored back there all the time. Every so often the oldest would catch movement at the edge of their vision, turn, and find one of two animals they could never quite name. Never both at once.
The first was tall, dark and very lanky. It walked on all fours and looked sickly, with leathery skin and only a little hair on its legs and neck. Something stuck up from its head, big ears or maybe antlers, impossible to say. Look straight at it and it froze. Then it bolted deeper into the trees, and as it ran its outline seemed to blur and shift, as if it couldn't hold its shape while moving. You could hear the branches snapping as it went.
The second one was scarier. Same long legs, same ears or antlers, but a much heavier body and more hair. It always stood somewhere dark, never in the open, and nobody ever saw it move. It just stood there, and if you blinked or looked away it was gone. This was the one with a face you could actually see: huge, milky white eyes with no pupils, watching from between the trees. Both were about the size of a big horse. The closest our witness can get to describing them is a cross between a deer, a man and a bear (the big one) or a sick wolf (the smaller one).
At first it was terrifying. Before the smaller one showed up there was a feeling of being watched, and before the big one, real dread. But over the years the fear wore off. Our witness started whispering hello to them, and they seemed to linger a few seconds longer after that. Something said not to try getting closer, and as long as the distance was respected, it actually felt safer knowing they were out there.
The little sister's memories filled in some details. The smaller one often stood with one or both front legs folded up against its chest and only put them down to walk. Its feet looked like something between paws and odd hands, with long, finger-like toes. She used to leave them leftovers and even books, and the oldest built them a lean-to in the woods. (A man without a home ended up moving into it, and the police eventually gave him a ride to a shelter and the kids had to take it down.)
The last clear sighting was on a rainy night after a run of nightmares, lying awake listening to the rain. Once our witness's eyes adjusted to the dark, there was the big one in the trees outside the bedroom window, its pale eyes standing out against the black. It was a jolt at first, then a wave of calm, and sleep came easily. The nightmares stopped after that.
Our witness is the first to say they might have just been a couple of strange or sickly animals. That never felt right, though, and both siblings remember them the same way, as something that watched over the kids back there.