“Hello?” I called out, immediately feeling stupid for announcing my presence to whatever was moving in the shadows. But the alternative was standing there like prey, and some stubborn part of my personality had never learned when to shut up and run.
No answer. Just the whisper of wind through pine needles and the distant sound of my own breathing, too loud in the cathedral quiet of old growth forest.
I raised my camera again, this time with the telephoto lens, zooming in on the space where I'd seen movement. Nothing but trees and shadows.
But then I saw him.
Just for a split second, caught between tree trunks like a figure in a half-remembered dream. Broad shoulders, skin that looked pale against the forest gloom, and something about the way he moved that made my breath catch in my throat.
I knew those shoulders.
But this couldn't be Evan. Because Evan would be at work or home or anywhere that normal people went on Wednesday afternoons. He wouldn't be wandering shirtless through the deep forest like some kind of mythological creature stepped out of the stories people told around campfires.
Would he?
I lowered my camera, squinting through shadows that seemed to shift and flow like living things. The figure was gone, vanished into the green maze as if he'd never existed at all. But my pulse was still racing, and something deep in my chest was singing with recognition that my rational mind couldn't explain.
I should have left then. Should have packed up my gear and hiked back to the main trail, should have gone home to explain to my parents why I'd spent the afternoon chasing ghosts through the woods instead of doing productive things like jobhunting or figuring out what the hell I was going to do with the rest of my life.
Instead, I followed.
The path wasn't really a path, more like a suggestion worn into the forest floor by feet that knew where they were going. I moved as quietly as I could, trying to remember the tracking skills Evan had tried to teach me during our teenage expeditions, when I'd been more interested in photographing him than learning to read sign.
Ironic that those skills might actually matter now.
The forest grew thicker as I went deeper, old growth pines giving way to a tangle of undergrowth and fallen trees that made navigation treacherous. But the light was getting stranger too, taking on that golden quality that only happened during magic hour, when the sun hung low enough to turn ordinary landscapes into art.
I lifted my camera again, more from habit than conscious thought, and started documenting the journey. The way ferns unfurled like green prayers. How moss covered everything in velvet silence. The sense that I was walking through a cathedral built by something older and wiser than human hands.
That's when I heard it.
A sound that wasn't quite a growl, wasn't quite a sigh, but something in between that made every primitive instinct I had scream warnings. It echoed through the trees like a voice from another world, carrying notes of wildness and want and something that tasted like danger when I tried to swallow around my suddenly dry throat.
I froze, camera halfway to my eye, every muscle in my body locked in the kind of stillness that came from prey animals who knew they were being hunted. Because that sound hadn't come from any animal I could name, hadn't fit into any category my city-educated brain knew how to process.
It had sounded almost human. Almost.
But not quite.
The silence stretched until I thought I might suffocate on it, broken only by the thunderous sound of my own heartbeat and the whisper of wind through branches that seemed to lean closer, as if the forest itself was listening.
Then I saw the clearing.
It opened up ahead like a theater stage, perfectly round and carpeted with grass that looked too green, too lush for late October. Ancient trees formed the boundaries, their trunks so massive they could have housed entire families, their branches reaching overhead to create a canopy that filtered light into something that looked almost holy.
And in the center of that sacred space, kneeling on the grass was Evan.
My breath left my lungs in a rush that sounded too loud in the cathedral quiet. Because it was definitely him, no mistaking the line of his shoulders or the way his dark hair caught what light filtered through the canopy. But he was different too, changed in ways that went beyond the obvious fact that he was half-naked in the middle of the forest.
His skin looked strange, almost luminous, like it was lit from within by some internal fire. Muscles I remembered as impressive had become something that bordered on inhuman, carved definition that spoke of strength beyond what any normal person should possess. And the way he held himself, the careful tension in every line of his body, suggested he was preparing for something that required more than human capability.
I should have called out to him. Should have announced my presence, asked if he was okay, done any of the normal things that people did when they encountered their former best friends kneeling naked in the woods like they were about to perform some kind of ritual.
Instead, I crouched behind a fallen log and raised my camera, some photographer's instinct overriding common sense and basic decency.
Evan's breathing was visible in the cooling air, steam rising from skin that looked flushed and fever-bright. His hands were pressed flat against the earth, fingers spread wide like he was trying to draw something up from the ground itself. And the sounds he was making—low, almost inaudible groans that spoke of effort and strain and something that might have been pain if it weren't also clearly something else entirely.
Then his spine arched, vertebrae popping in a cascade of sound that made me flinch behind my camera. Because that wasn't normal, wasn't the kind of thing that happened to people who weren't experiencing some kind of medical emergency. But Evan didn't look distressed. He looked like someone surrendering to something inevitable, something that had been building inside him until it couldn't be contained anymore.
