The Ledger of Marymere
Most people knew the Storm King Ranger Station.
Hikers passed it every summer, snapping photos of its weathered logs and moss-draped roof. It was a landmark, a piece of history nestled between the trees—a place to admire, not to fear.
And Marymere Falls?
That was the kind of place families visited on weekend outings, a short and easy hike to a stunning cascade, its waters tumbling over basalt cliffs into the pool below. People took wedding photos there. Children splashed in the shallows when the weather was warm.
There was nothing haunted about Marymere Falls.
At least, that’s what everyone thought.
Elena had grown up here. She had spent summers leading hikes along the trails, winters watching the falls turn to ice. She had stood in the ranger station a dozen times before, listening to tourists ask the same questions—How do you get to the falls? Is there an easier way up to Mount Storm King?
They never asked about the ledger.
Because no one knew it existed.
Not the copy in the visitor center, filled with guestbook scribbles and trail reports. The real ledger—the one she had found tucked into the cabin’s rafters last winter when a storm had driven her inside.
She hadn’t meant to take it.
But the moment her fingers had brushed the cracked leather, a strange urgency had filled her. She had stuffed it into her pack, taken it home, and told herself she would return it when the weather cleared.
Except… she hadn’t.
And she had started dreaming.
Dreams of the falls unfrozen in winter.
Dreams of footsteps in the snow that didn’t belong to her.
Dreams of a name she didn’t recognize, whispered in the voice of someone from long ago.
Tonight, she was going back.
—————————————————————————-
The air was still as she approached the cabin, the snow thick underfoot.
By now, she had read every word of the ledger, traced the final entries with her fingertips, felt the weight of their meaning.
December 9th, 1932.
The water is not frozen.
December 10th, 1932.
I heard it again. Not the wind.
December 11th, 1932.
Someone is in the water.
December 12th, 1932.
Returning to Marymere. If I do not come back—
The ink had smeared, like a hand had moved across it too fast.
Elena had spent weeks searching for records of the ranger who wrote it. There was no mention of a disappearance. No missing person reports. Nothing. It was as if he had never existed.
And yet—
His handwriting was there. The words, the fear, the warning.
She reached the cabin door. It groaned open beneath her touch, just as it had last winter. The inside smelled the same—aged wood, dust, and a faint dampness, like the lingering chill of melting ice.
Elena’s gaze swept the room, landing on the desk. Her breath caught.
The ledger was there.
But she had taken it. It should have been at home, buried beneath the books on her nightstand.
And yet, here it was—open to the last page.
Fresh ink bled across the yellowed paper.
You should not have come back.
The wind howled through the trees outside.
Elena turned slowly toward the open door.
The trail to Marymere Falls stretched ahead, bathed in the silver glow of the moon.
And in the distance, beneath the frozen rush of the waterfall—
Something moved.
Something that shouldn’t be there.
Something that had been waiting.
The Ledger of Marymere is a winter story that’s been taking shape in my mind, set around the Storm King Ranger Station and Marymere Falls—places both well-known yet steeped in an eerie sense of forgotten history. When Elena stumbles upon an old ranger’s ledger from 1932, its entries detailing unsettling encounters near the falls, she finds herself drawn into a mystery long buried. But as fresh ink begins appearing in the book and something shifts beneath the frozen waterfall, she realizes that some stories are best left undisturbed—and some voices never truly fade.
I keep wondering: what if a ranger’s ledger from 1932 resurfaced, its final pages hinting at something inexplicable near the falls? There’s something compelling about familiar landscapes holding unseen histories, about forgotten narratives lingering just out of sight. I think I’ll follow this trail a little further—see where it leads.
