"The Faces At Pine Dunes"

by Ramsey Campbell
originally published New Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos, Arkham House, 1980

Michael lives with his parents in a "caravan", which is apparently what the Brits call a trailer.  He doesn't like his life very much and he doesn't like his parents much either - dad's an overbearing obese blob, and mom is doormat personified.  He does kinda like the trailer park they've moved into this time - by the sea, near some very dense woods.  He'd like to settle down here, never in his life having stayed in one place very long (it seems mom`n'dad live the gypsy life).  Mom doesn't like it though, and seems troubled that Michael does.

Mike tales a stroll through the dark woods, and seems to think something very large is stalking him through the trees.  He makes it into the village nearby and stops in a club.  A cute girl named June, who says she's tripping on acid, flirts with him.  Like any self-respecting 20 year-old, even one as socially challenged as Mike, he's happy about this.  June suggests he take a job at the club, which is advertising for a trainee barman.

Mike starts working at the club.  His parents are acting strange - going out late at night without explanation.  Dad seems to like the idea of Mike settling in with a job and a girl.  Mom doesn't.  

Mike learns that Pine Dunes has long been considered a hub of witchcraft activity.  And there have long been legends of something terrible, and big, lurking in the woods.  And of a pit full of gloopy monsters.  He finds that his parents have spent their lives following a kind of circuit of hubs of witchcraft activity, apparently starting, and now returning, to Pine Dunes.  He figures they must be witches.  He comes to believe his dad is drugging his mom to keep her submissive as they get up to some sinister activity.  

Determined that something is going down that night, Mike takes June deep into the woods, to a clearing he believes his parents will be doing their witchy deeds in.   Something large and dark seems to be stalking them through the woods.  In the clearing, they find a pit, and gloopy, expanding flesh-blobs that appear to be his parents, and voices telling them things about the spawn of the Great Old Ones, which Mike, apparently, is one...

This is a very, very effective story that implies a theme similar to "The Dunwich Horror" et al - of miscegnated human/Old One hybrid horrors - some who don't realize they are - until later.  As is typical with Campbell, much lies between the lines, and much is unclear, or subjective - exactly what Mike and June are experiencing/seeing at the end is uncertain - yet clearly terrible.  I find this one of Campbell's creepiest and most disturbing tales, and wholly successful.