The Mallard Lakes Glare

Just past dusk one October evening, a teenager named Garrett M. was walking his dog along Mallard Lakes Drive in Lexington when his pup suddenly froze—ears up, tail tucked, growling low at the woods beyond the sidewalk.

At first, Garrett thought it was a deer. Then he saw it: something tall and too thin crouched between two pines, its eyes glowing… all three of them." It was staring straight through me," he said. "Not just watching, studying. Like I’d walked into its space." The figure didn’t move, didn’t flinch, just stood there in silence. Garrett turned to run, but heard something scrape against the curb behind him. When he glanced back, the figure was gone. All that remained were three long scratches in the sidewalk and a wet feather caught on a bush. Local pets had been going missing that month, chalked up to coyotes, they said. But Garrett swears the thing he saw wasn’t an animal.

“It had a torn hockey sweater on. Garnet. And I swear, it was smiling.”

Since that night, a few residents have reported seeing movement in the trees near the trail behind the subdivision, especially around Halloween. Some say they hear soft scraping along the storm drains. Others say their porch lights flicker when they try to retell the story. Nobody walks alone after dark on Mallard Lakes Drive anymore. Not since the Creeper looked back.