The Secret Pact: My Grandpa Met Bigfoot Every Night. When He Died, The Forest Started Taking Things.

For three months before my grandfather passed, a Bigfoot sat with him every single evening at exactly 7:00 p.m. I thought he was losing his mind when he first told me about his visitor. But the night I finally saw it for myself—a seven-and-a-half-foot creature settling down beside Grandpa’s rocking chair like they were old friends—I realized the world was stranger than I’d ever imagined. And when Grandpa was gone, when that thing showed up at 7:00 p.m. to find an empty chair, everything started going very, very wrong.

My name is Arthur Jenkins, and I’m 34 years old. I work as an electrical contractor in Bellingham, Washington. But for the past six months, I’d been spending most of my weekends at my grandfather’s property about forty miles outside of town. Grandpa Roy was eighty years old. Since my grandmother Helen passed away two years prior in 1996, he’d been living alone on their twenty-acre homestead nestled in the foothills of the North Cascades. It was October 1998, and the fall colors were spectacular up here, the maples turning brilliant red and gold, the Douglas firs dark green against the autumn sky.

 

Grandpa’s property was beautiful, isolated, and exactly the kind of place someone could live their whole life without seeing another soul if they wanted to. The house was a two-story craftsman that Grandpa built himself in 1952, right after he came back from Korea. It had a wide wraparound porch, a metal roof that sounded like rolling thunder even in a light drizzle, and windows that looked out over dense, endless forest on three sides. The nearest neighbor was four miles down a gravel road that turned to mud whenever it rained, which was often.

I’d been worried about Grandpa living alone out here. He was slowing down, arthritis in his knees, hearing not what it used to be, and that stubborn independence that makes old men refuse help even when they desperately need it. So, I’d made a habit of driving up every Friday after work, spending the weekend doing repairs, checking on him, and making sure he was eating properly.

That Friday in mid-October, I pulled up in my 1995 Ford F-150 around 6:00 p.m. The truck was loaded with groceries and some materials to fix the sagging gutter on the east side of the house. Grandpa was on the porch in his usual spot, his old wooden rocking chair, a familiar patchwork quilt over his lap despite the mild temperature. His transistor radio was playing country music from an AM station out of Bellingham.

“Arthur,” he waved as I got out of the truck. “You’re later than usual.”

“Traffic was hell coming through town,” I said, climbing the porch steps. “How you been, Grandpa?”

“Can’t complain. Well, I could, but nobody’d listen,” he grinned—the same joke he’d been making my whole life. “You staying the weekend?”

“That’s the plan. Brought your groceries. And I’m going to fix that gutter tomorrow if the weather holds.”

“Good. Good. You’ll stay for dinner? I got some stew on the stove.”

We ate together: Grandpa’s venison stew, which he’d been making the same way for fifty years. We caught up on family news. After dinner, as I was washing dishes, Grandpa stood up with a grunt.

“Well, it’s almost seven,” he said, checking his wristwatch, an old Timex he’d worn since before I was born.

“You turning in already? It’s still early.”

“Nah, just going to sit on the porch for a spell. I do that every evening now. 7:00 like clockwork.”

Something in his tone made me pause. “Every evening?”

“Every single one. Haven’t missed a night in three months.”

“Why? What happens at seven?”

Grandpa smiled mysteriously. “You’ll see. Come on out around 7:15, not before. And when you come out, don’t make any sudden moves. Don’t make loud noises. Just sit quiet and watch.”

“Grandpa, what are you talking about?”

“You’ll see,” he repeated, and headed for the porch.

I finished the dishes, increasingly curious and a little concerned. Was this some kind of dementia? Some obsessive behavior brought on by grief or isolation? I’d read about that happening to elderly people living alone.

At 7:12, I grabbed a beer from the fridge and quietly opened the screen door to the porch. Grandpa was in his rocking chair, the quilt over his lap, completely still. He glanced at me and put a finger to his lips. I settled into the other rocking chair as quietly as I could.

“What are we—” I started to whisper.

“Shh. Just watch the treeline there by the big cedar.”

I followed his gaze to the edge of the clearing about fifty yards from the house. The sun had set, and the light was that deep blue-gray of twilight. I could see the forest, dark and dense, and the massive cedar tree Grandpa was indicating.

For a long moment, nothing happened. I was about to ask Grandpa what we were waiting for when I saw movement. Something large emerged from the trees. At first, I thought it was a bear—we had black bears in this area—but the shape was wrong. Too upright, too human-shaped, too tall.

“Jesus Christ,” I whispered.

“Language,” Grandpa said mildly.

The thing, the creature, walked toward the house on two legs. As it got closer, details became clearer in the fading light. It was massive, easily seven and a half feet tall, covered in dark reddish-brown fur, like a heavily built suit of shaggy iron. The body structure was like an immensely muscular human, but the proportions were exaggerated: arms too long, shoulders too broad, torso too thick. Its gait was slow, deliberate, and undeniably intelligent.

My hand gripped the arm of the rocking chair so hard my knuckles went white. Every instinct was screaming at me to run inside, lock the doors, and grab a weapon. But Grandpa sat there calmly, actually smiling.

The creature approached to within twenty feet of the porch and stopped. And then, with surprising grace for something so large, it sat down on the ground, cross-legged, like a person settling down to have a conversation.

“Evening, friend,” Grandpa said conversationally. “This here’s my grandson, Arthur. Arthur, meet my visitor.”

The creature’s head turned slightly to look at me. I couldn’t see much detail in the low light, but I could see eyes—dark, wide, and reflective—fixing on me with obvious intelligence.

“Grandpa,” I managed to say, my voice shaking. “What the hell is that?”

“Don’t rightly know what to call it. Bigfoot, I suppose. Sasquatch, whatever name you want to put on it. Been coming around every evening for three months now, right at 7:00.”

“Three months, and you didn’t tell anyone?”

“Who’d believe me? Besides, didn’t seem right to tell. This is between him and me.” Grandpa rocked gently in his chair. “First time he showed up, I nearly had a heart attack. But he just sat down right where he is now and stayed for about an hour. Didn’t do nothing. Didn’t make a sound. Just sat. Next night, same thing. 7:00, he shows up, sits down, stays for a while, then leaves like clockwork.”

I stared at the creature. It was staring back, but not aggressively—just observing. Its chest rose and fell with slow, steady breaths. One massive hand rested on its knee, fingers thick and powerful, but remarkably humanlike.

“What does it want?” I whispered.

“Company, near as I can figure. Same thing I want.” Grandpa’s voice was soft, tinged with something that sounded like sadness. “Gets lonely up here by myself. I think he’s lonely, too. So, we sit together. Don’t need to talk. Don’t need to do anything. Just not alone for a while.”

We sat there in silence. Minutes passed—five, ten, fifteen. The only sounds were the crickets, the distant hoot of an owl, and the occasional creak of Grandpa’s rocking chair. Finally, around 7:45, the creature stood up slowly, carefully, with that same surprising grace. It looked at Grandpa for a long moment, then turned and walked back toward the treeline. Within seconds, it had disappeared into the forest, silent as a ghost.

I let out a shaky exhale. “That,” Grandpa said, “is my evening visitor. Hasn’t missed a night in three months.”

“Grandpa, this is… this is incredible. This is impossible. Do you know what this means? There’s a real Bigfoot and it’s been—”

“And nobody needs to know about it,” Grandpa interrupted firmly. “You hear me, Arthur? Nobody. Not your sister, not your mother, not your friends. This stays between us. This creature’s been living in these woods probably longer than I’ve been alive, and it’s managed to stay hidden because people like us keep our mouth shut. You start telling people, they’ll come with guns and cameras and helicopters. They’ll tear up these woods trying to find him, and they’ll either kill him or catch him. Neither of those is right.”

He paused, rocking. “I think maybe… maybe it recognizes something in me. Two old beings coming to the end of things, needing to not be quite so alone.”

The way he said it, coming to the end of things, sent a chill through me. “Grandpa, you’re not—”

“I’m eighty years old, Arthur. I’m not going to live forever. Neither is he, probably. We’re just two creatures who understand what it’s like to watch the world change, to be the last of something, to know that time’s running short.”

We went inside eventually, but I couldn’t stop thinking about what I’d seen. A real living Bigfoot, sitting with my grandfather like an old friend. I spent that entire weekend at Grandpa’s place, and every evening at 7:00 p.m., the creature returned like clockwork, same routine, same spot. By Sunday evening, I’d almost gotten used to it. Almost.

“You notice how he always sits in the same spot?” Grandpa asked during Saturday’s visit. “Exactly the same distance, never closer, never farther. That’s respect, Arthur. He’s respecting boundaries.”

Sunday evening’s visit was the same as the others. The creature appeared at 7:00 p.m., sat, stayed, left. But as it was leaving, it paused at the treeline and looked back at us, at Grandpa specifically, for longer than usual, maybe ten seconds. Then it disappeared into the darkness.

“That was different,” I observed.

“Yeah,” Grandpa agreed quietly. “Yeah, it was.”

I had to go back to Bellingham on Monday morning. I had jobs scheduled for the week, but something made me uneasy about leaving Grandpa alone. “You call me if anything changes,” I said as I loaded my truck. “Anything at all. And I’m coming back next Friday.”

“I’m fine, Arthur. Stop fussing.” But he didn’t look fine. He looked tired, older than he had even a few days ago. The week passed slowly. I called Grandpa every evening around 6:30, before his visitor arrived. He always sounded cheerful, always said everything was fine. “Hasn’t missed once,” he said on Thursday. “7:00, regular as taxes.”

Friday afternoon, I loaded up the truck again and headed to Grandpa’s place. I arrived around 5:30. Grandpa was in his chair on the porch, bundled in his quilt despite the mild October temperature.

“You’re early,” he said, smiling weakly. “Good. Was hoping you’d get here in time for the evening visit.”

“You feeling okay? You look cold.”

“Just getting old, Arthur. The chill gets into your bones at my age.”

I made us spaghetti from a jar—nothing fancy—and noticed Grandpa barely touched his. “You sure you’re feeling all right?”

“Just not as hungry as I used to be. Save it for tomorrow. I’ll have it for lunch.”

At 6:50, we took our positions on the porch. The October evening was clear and cool. At exactly 7:00 p.m., the creature emerged from the forest. But this time, something was different. It walked to its usual spot and sat down, but it didn’t settle into that calm, still posture. It seemed agitated. Its head kept turning, scanning the forest behind it, then looking back at us, at Grandpa.

“He’s nervous about something,” Grandpa observed. “Wonder what’s got him spooked.”

We sat in silence for about ten minutes. The creature remained tense, alert. Then it did something it had never done before: it stood up and took three steps closer to the porch. I felt my muscles tense, ready to move, but Grandpa held up a hand.

“Easy. Let’s see what he wants.”

The creature stood there, now only about fifteen feet from us, and made a sound. Low and resonant, like a very deep hum—not threatening, but questioning, maybe.

“I’m all right, friend,” Grandpa said softly. “Don’t you worry about me.”

The creature tilted its head, still making that humming sound. Then it did something that made my skin prickle. It reached out one massive hand and pointed. Not at me, not at the chair, but at Grandpa’s chest, specifically at his heart.

“He knows,” Grandpa whispered, a look of awe and resignation on his face. “Somehow, he knows.”

“Knows what?”

“That I’m not doing so well. That things are winding down.”

Grandpa stood up slowly, the quilt falling from his lap. The creature watched intently as Grandpa moved to the porch railing, bringing him closer to it.

“I’m old,” Grandpa said to the creature. “Real old, and I’m tired. Been tired for a while now, but I appreciate you coming by every evening. Appreciate the company. You’re a good friend.”

The creature lowered its hand and made another sound, softer, almost sad. They stood like that for a long moment, man and creature, looking at each other across fifteen feet of darkening October evening. Then the creature turned and walked back to the forest, but slower than usual. At the treeline, it stopped and looked back again, holding Grandpa’s gaze for a long time before disappearing into the shadows.

“When were you going to tell me you’re sick?” I demanded, helping Grandpa back into his chair.

“Didn’t want to worry you. Doctor says it’s my heart, wearing out like an old engine. Nothing much to be done at my age except take some pills and try to stay comfortable. How long have you known? Few months. Right around the time he started showing up, actually. Funny timing, that.”

That night, lying in the guest bed, I heard sounds from outside. Movement in the forest, closer to the house than I’d heard before. I looked out the window. In the moonlight, I could see a massive shape moving through the trees about thirty yards from the house. The creature. It was circling the property slowly, like it was standing guard, or like it was worried.

The weekend passed, and every evening the creature came, but each visit it seemed more agitated. On Sunday evening, it barely sat at all, standing for most of the forty-five minutes, constantly shifting its weight and looking around.

“He’s upset,” Grandpa said. “Can tell something’s coming.”

“What do you mean, something’s coming?”

“End of things. He can sense it. Animals can do that sometimes. Know when someone’s time is near. Guess he’s no different.”

Monday morning, I left for Bellingham again, even more reluctant than the previous week. All week I called every evening. Grandpa always answered, always said the creature had shown up right on schedule. But Wednesday night, something in his voice sounded off.

“Just tired, Arthur. Think I’m going to turn in early tonight. Don’t worry about me.”

Thursday, I called at 6:30 p.m. No answer. I called again at 7:00 p.m. No answer. At 7:30, I was halfway to my truck when my phone rang.

It was the county sheriff’s department. A neighbor four miles down the road had noticed Grandpa’s lights hadn’t come on that evening, had driven up to check on him, and found him in his rocking chair on the porch. He looked peaceful, like he was just sleeping, but he was gone. His heart had given out sometime around 6:45 p.m. The coroner estimated it was about fifteen minutes before 7:00. Fifteen minutes before his visitor was due to arrive.

I drove up to Grandpa’s place that night numb with grief. The sheriff’s deputy was still there finishing paperwork. They had already taken Grandpa’s body to the county morgue. After the deputy left, I sat on the porch in the darkness. It was almost 10:00 p.m. now. The evening visit had been hours ago. I wondered if the creature had come, if it had found an empty chair, if it had understood what the absence meant.

I spent that first night in Grandpa’s house alone, unable to sleep, listening to the silence. The emptiness was overwhelming.

Friday dragged on in a haze of phone calls and paperwork. Around 5:00 p.m., I made myself some coffee and sat on the porch. The October afternoon was cooling down, the sun getting lower. The chair next to me, Grandpa’s chair, sat empty, the quilt still draped over it where he’d left it.

At 6:55, I felt my stomach tighten. Five minutes.

At 7:00 p.m. exactly, the creature emerged from the forest. It walked to its usual spot with the same steady gait I’d seen before. But when it got there and sat down, it immediately looked toward the porch, toward the empty chair. For a long moment, the creature just stared. Then its head tilted, that questioning gesture I’d seen before. It made a sound, that low humming vocalization, but louder than usual, questioning where.

“He’s gone,” I said quietly, my voice raspy. “He passed away yesterday evening, right before you would have gotten here.”

The creature stood up, took several steps closer to the porch, stopping about ten feet away. Close enough that I could see its face clearly in the fading light. The eyes were dark and intelligent, and in them, I saw something that looked unmistakably like confusion, then distress.

It made another sound, different from before. Higher pitched, almost like calling, like it was calling for Grandpa.

“He’s not coming back,” I said, my voice breaking. “I’m sorry. He’s gone.”

The creature’s massive chest heaved, a deep, shuddering breath. Then it made a sound I’ll never forget. A low, mournful vocalization that started deep and rose in pitch, echoing across the clearing and into the forest. It wasn’t quite a howl, wasn’t quite a moan. It was grief. Pure, undeniable grief. The sound went on for maybe ten seconds, and when it ended, the creature turned and walked back to the forest. Not with its usual measured pace, but faster, almost stumbling.

I sat there on the porch as darkness fell, tears running down my face, mourning both my grandfather and the impossible creature that had just learned what loss felt like.

That night, the forest was restless. I heard movement much closer to the house than usual, branches breaking, and the occasional mournful vocalization. The creature was out there, circling, searching, trying to understand why its friend wasn’t there anymore.

Around 2:00 a.m., I heard something on the porch. I got up quietly and looked through the window. The creature was standing right there, not five feet from the door, looking at Grandpa’s empty rocking chair. It reached out one massive hand and touched the chair, making it rock gently. Then it made that sound again: grief, confusion, loss, all rolled into one impossible vocalization.

Saturday morning, I found evidence of the creature’s presence everywhere. Massive footprints in the soft earth, much closer than they’d ever been before. A section of porch railing that looked like it had been gripped hard enough to crack the wood. Scratches on the side of the house near Grandpa’s bedroom window—deep gouges in the wooden siding, like something had been trying to see inside.

“Jesus,” I muttered, examining the damage. “He’s looking for Grandpa.”

Then I noticed the first missing item. The little hand-painted ceramic bird Grandpa always kept on the railing, a gift from my grandmother, was gone.

That evening at 7:00 p.m., the creature came again. This time, it didn’t sit. It stood at its usual spot, staring at the empty chair, and made that calling sound. Louder this time, more insistent.

“He’s not here!” I called out, rising from my chair. “I’m sorry, but he’s gone! He’s not coming back!”

The creature’s head snapped toward me, and for the first time, I saw something that might have been anger, or perhaps desperate frustration, in its expression. It made a sharp, loud vocalization, almost like a bark, that made me jump. Then it charged.

Not at me, not exactly. It ran toward the porch, covering the distance in seconds, and slammed both hands against the wooden railing. The entire structure shook. It wasn’t trying to hurt me, not yet. It was venting, raging at the empty chair and the empty house that held the memory of its friend.

Then, as fast as the rage came, it stopped. The creature backed away one step, its eyes still locked on me, breathing heavily.

And then, it took something else.

With a swift, practiced motion, the creature reached out, plucked the thin, old quilt from Grandpa’s rocking chair, and retreated. It held the quilt gingerly in one massive, fur-covered hand, turning it over as if inspecting it for a hidden meaning, before disappearing into the treeline.

I stood there, paralyzed, holding a useless beer bottle. The creature hadn’t hurt me, but it had vandalized the house and taken an artifact of Grandpa’s. This was no longer a respectful visitor; it was a desperate, intelligent creature whose grief was turning it into a scavenger, an obsessed thief.

Sunday morning, I woke up to more signs of its desperate scavenging. The small wooden toolbox Grandpa kept by the woodshed, containing his gardening shears and a few favorite hand tools, was overturned and empty. His old, worn leather pipe bag and the distinctive curved briar pipe that sat on the porch table were gone. It wasn’t just looking for Grandpa; it was collecting relics of him, trying to grasp onto the physical remnants of the man who had shared his evenings.

I knew I couldn’t stay. The funeral was Monday, and the house needed to be secured before my sister and mother arrived. But I couldn’t just leave it. The creature’s aggression was escalating, fueled by its immense loss.

At 6:30 p.m. Sunday, I stood on the porch, a knot of dread in my stomach. I carried one last item: Grandpa’s old transistor radio. The one that played country music every night. It was an object of comfort to Grandpa, but it was also a source of noise, a human signal.

I walked to the spot where the creature sat every night. I placed the radio on the ground, face-up, and stepped back to the porch railing.

“Look,” I called out into the dimming woods, my voice surprisingly steady. “I have to leave now. He’s gone. I’m taking him to rest. I know you were his friend.”

I pointed to the radio. “This was his. I’m leaving it here for you. Don’t come to the house anymore. I won’t be here.”

I felt insane, talking to a myth, but I had to try to communicate, to substitute one artifact for the man. I didn’t wait for 7:00. I sprinted inside, locked the heavy wooden door, and pulled the curtains shut. I drove off the property at 6:45 p.m., looking in the rearview mirror as I hit the gravel road.

At 7:00 p.m. on the dot, I saw movement. The creature emerged, not from the usual spot, but from a thicket closer to the road. It looked towards the house, then down at the ground where the radio sat. I saw it approach the radio, its massive shape backlit by the last sliver of sun. Then, slowly, it picked up the radio and held it to its head. I imagined the crackle of country music filling the silence.

The creature didn’t move toward the house. It stood perfectly still, clutching the radio. I hit the gas, speeding away from the silence and the forest, from the creature that had lost its only human friend.

I went to the funeral, numb. I returned to the homestead a week later, accompanied by a locksmith and a security contractor. The house was untouched, locked tight. The porch was empty.

But when I went to the spot by the big cedar, the radio was gone. And in its place, nestled in the freshly dug earth, was a single, smooth river stone, cold and gray. It was an impossible exchange, a primal offering.

I understood then that I had won a small, terrifying victory. The creature’s grief had driven it to rage and theft, but my offering had stopped the violence. Yet, the price was that the property was forever marked.

The forest has a new tenant, an invisible guardian waiting for a companion that will never come back. I sold Grandpa’s property five months later to a logging company. I couldn’t stay there. I couldn’t live in a place where I knew, every evening at 7:00 p.m., a seven-and-a-half-foot creature would be waiting in the dark, watching the empty porch, clutching a quilt and a briar pipe, listening to the static of an old AM radio, grieving the loss of the only human who ever truly understood him. Everything went wrong the moment he lost his friend, and I was just the unfortunate heir left to clean up the wreckage of an impossible, silent pact.

The Bigfoot never met my grandpa again, but the forest never let me forget that he was there.