“You could go on the hike if you don’t like it,” Kelly replies pointedly.
Stephanie plops her misshapen poppet onto the table and stands up. “All done. That hike sounds great. Maybe we can catch up with everyone?”
“Fine, I’m no good at sewing anyways,” Audrey replies, leaving me looking between the sad piece of fabric and black spool of thread and the door.
I let out an audibly loud sigh and push away from the table.
“I guess we’re going hiking,” I say as I gather my backpack and shuck it onto my shoulders, making sure the straps are tightly secured.
As we leave, there’s an odd sensation that washes over me while Kelly watches us leave. The last thing I see is her plucking Stephanie’s and Audrey’s poor excuses of a poppet up from the table with a wicked gleam in her eyes and a cruel tilt to her mouth.
It’s fake, Lydia. It’s just fake. Nothing to worry about, I tell myself before the door closes behind us and we make our way onto the path.
What started out as a mildly warm day, has crossed over into boiling. Sweat gathers on my lower back and chest almost instantly as we make our way to the trail.
We catch up to our group easily and they give us the biggest ‘I told you so’ look.
“So, arts and crafts was a bust?” Faye asks, handing me a spare water bottle.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” I say taking a drink of water that I pulled out from my backpack. It truly was such a disappointment and has me wondering how in the hell this place has so many glowing reviews.
She looks relieved to see us, though, because Iris and McKenzie both seem tense as if they’ve been fighting again.
Tension wraps itself around me like a blanket feeling its palpable weight sit on my body, readying myself for another round of scares. Whoever thought of this place is one sadistic mother fucker. My friends chat amongst themselves as my eyes sweep the tree line for potential threats. It’s quiet and I wonder where everyone has gone to.
The path takes us around the lake and into the forest, as the sun twinkles through the leaves glittering like a disco ball and making it seem like we’re on a normal hike. It’s beautiful and peaceful enough that it nearly lulls me into a false sense of security.
Just as I feel my shoulders dropping from my ears, a twig snaps from behind us and my adrenaline skyrockets. I don’t even bother to look what the noise was caused from before I take off running on pure instinct.
“Woah, what’s going on?” I hear my friends ask as I whizz past them.
“Don’t be scared, sweetheart. We don’t bite,” a masculine voice calls out with a chuckle.
“Lydia, it’s fine. I promise,” Audrey calls out. She’s the least likely of my friends to fuck with me, so I chance a look over my shoulder to find that it’s just the group of guys that are in the cabin over from ours. My feet slow, and I grip my thighs with my hands trying to catch my breath, feeling a wave of embarrassment churn in my stomach.
There are about six or seven guys all dressed similarly, with khaki shorts and a variety of t-shirts. They all vaguely resemble each other as well so it’s a toss-up if they’re friends or brothers.
“What are you all doing here?” Faye asks, immediately cozying up to the tallest one in the group. She can make friends with a lamppost. It’s always been her specialty to talk to strangers easily, and I both envy and admire her for it. The guy she’s latched on to has light brown hair and a prominent fiveo’clock shadow. He’s decent enough to look at as he smiles down at my gorgeous friend.
“Getting some fresh air and living out our dreams of acting like we’re in a real-life horror movie,” he says with a wink. Then he does a terrible fake-scare that makes Faye let out a giggle.
The two of them fall into step easily and Faye visibly melts at his attention. I smile at my friend. She mouths “He’s cute!” At me and I give her a thumbs up.
The group of guys melds with ours as we make our way around the lake. We find out they’re from Toledo, on summer break from their college where they’re in their last year of.
They’re younger than us, but not by much.
We walk together, the knowledge of not being scared yet, ebbing at my psyche as I try to maintain a conversation with a guy that’s wearing a red shirt with an angry looking eagle on it. Something about his vibe is off and has me keeping quiet, listening to him drone on about some podcast he’s apart of. What is it with all these dudes and podcasts?
“… and I’m partnering with an energy drink this month. I could probably get you a discount.”
I realize he’s waiting for me to say something back as I’ve let my thoughts wander. He’s looking at me with his bushy eyebrows raised that makes him look like a child waiting for my approval.
“Oh— uh. Yeah,” is all I can think to say to him though. Knowing his type, if I were to mention that I loathe energy drinks because they make my chest feel fluttery would just result in having him mansplain to me, and I’m not in the mood to entertain men with big egos and probably a small dick. The only reason I’m listening to him now is because there’s nowhere else to go.
As we walk, the area becomes darker and more foreboding. The trees are thicker here, and the sky is hardly visible. Whilethe heat still hangs in the air, the temperature dips enough to offer a temporary relief. But instead of feeling relief, the hair on the back of my neck stands on end and that feeling of being watched comes back in full force.
“We should get a drink after this,” he says, climbing over a fallen tree. It’s cumbersome and eats up most of the path. The way the tree lays looks as if it were cut down intentionally.
