I love a good mystery. It’s probably in my top 3 things I love. That list looks a little something like this:

1. A good mystery
2. A mediocre mystery
3. A bad mystery

I was the kid with the Scooby Doo bucket hat at camp. Because I like dogs? No. I like mysteries. And there’s so many of them in our day-to-day lives. You find a random grocery list on the SkyTrain? Mystery. Your teacher hasn’t replied to you in 3 days? Mystery. You discover a treasure map drawn into the book you borrowed from the library? Ooooou, that’s a good mystery. Only two of those mysteries happened to me this week, and I managed to solve one of them (thank you for getting back to me Kevin). Anywho, there has been one mystery in particular that has plagued me since I started the Radio Arts & Entertainment program. I honestly drive by it every time I come to campus. I see it and swerve a little bit because I can’t take my eyes off of it. It’s the mystery of the red camper van.

I first noticed this red camper van when I was leaving the campus for the day. I had parked in lot F so I turned onto Wayburne Drive and started heading towards Canada Way. I was following the slight bend in when all of a sudden I noticed there was a red camper van parked in the entrance to this abandoned parking lot. Alas, I tried to slow down to get a better looky-loo but there were people behind me. I told myself next time I would definitely stop and check it out. This happened about twenty more times. I would be driving home and then there it is, I would already have passed it. I stayed awake one night trying to think of why it was parked there. Maybe the owner worked nearby and it made commuting that much easier. Maybe the owner couldn’t afford the insane cost of rent in Vancouver and decided to slum it in a parking lot next to the BCIT campus. Were they a student? Were they some nomadic person who was really vibing with that parking lot? Had they ran out of gas on the way somewhere, pulled over into this parking lot and then spontaneously combusted? The possibilities seemed endless.

Sometimes mysteries can be confusing (geralt / Pixabay)

I told some of my classmates about it. There even was a school project where we had to solve a mystery for a podcast we were making. 

“There’s a mysterious red camper van just up the street we could investigate!” I passionately suggested. 

“That seems too hard.” They apathecially replied. 

It seemed like this was going to be a solo case. The next day, a Saturday noless, I came to school for the sole purpose of checking out the mysterious camper van. I parked and then walked to the strangely abandoned parking lot where the van had set up shop. I brought with me my audio recorder, a microphone and a pair of headphones – just in case the person would let me interview them. I also brought cashews in an old tortilla bag because I left the house in a rush and I couldn’t find any normal Ziplock baggies. I walk up the sidewalk, cross the road and approach the red van. It looked to be in pretty good condition on the side that faced towards the Wayburne. I walked around it and that’s when I noticed a new clue — I love clues. I’m going to update my top three list right now before I forget.

1. A good mystery
2. A mediocre mystery
3. Clues

The first clue I noticed was that the licence plates were still on it. How long were they planning to leave the vehicle here? A year? Forever? 5ever? I made my way around to the other side of the van. This is when the mysterious lost a bit of its magic. Not because I realised it was a bad mystery, I will go to my grave believing that this is a good mystery. It was when I saw the passenger side that I realised this probably wasn’t a fun getaway for whoever was living here – if they were at all. I see that the rear passenger side window is broken and an attempt to cover it with a black garbage bag. The tape wasn’t working and now the garbage bag sadly sagged off the side. It was lightly raining when I visited the van and it was starting to dampen the off-white curtains that were inside. I couldn’t bring myself to look inside – it felt wrong. I even tried to put the garbage bag back up but the tape had lost all of its stickiness. I stood there for a minute trying to decide what to do next. Do I wait for a bit and see if anyone comes back? The rain picks up and an idea pops into my brain. I eat all my cashews (yes, this is part of the idea). I turn the bag inside out and I pull out my notebook and a pen. I write a note saying who I am asking who they are and leave my email and my phone number. I put the note into the old tortilla bag and put it under the windshield wiper. Then I leave.

The mysterious red camper van (Andrew Hynes)

The next day I left town to drive up to Prince George to visit my partner for spring break. I constantly check my phone to see if there are any missed calls or emails. Nothing. I get to Prince George and promptly fall asleep. When I wake up there is a missed call from a 1-800 number. I immediately think: does the mysterious red van owner work at a call centre and tried to contact me while on the job? I call back but it just rings and rings. The plot thickens. Or maybe this has nothing to do with the plot, maybe the plot has the same thickness. I never got another call from that number.

When I get back to school a week later I drive past the red camper van and see that the tortilla bag is still pinched against the windshield. Maybe the 1-800 number was just a 1-800 number and not a mysterious red van driving stranger trying to reveal their identity to me.

I still notice the red camper van when I’m leaving school and last week I noticed something new. The tortilla bag on the windshield was gone. Maybe it finally blew away or maybe someone not connected to the red van took it…or maybe the owner got my message and is trying to make out my phone number digits on a water stained page. I do not know, because it’s a mystery.