Page 28 of While They Watch

I can’t look away, frozen in terror as I wait for it to come at me. This is it. It takes a step toward me. I bend over grabbing another rock and hurl it. This time, I watch as it hits the creature. I stand up tall and shout, “I said stop! Leave!” It doesn’t seem to hear me. Instead, it mirrors me, standing up to its full height. It opens its mouth unnaturally wide, its mouth filled with inhuman, sharp teeth. I shudder as it lets out a deafening shriek that’s so loud the ground vibrates underneath me. I can’t hold back any longer. This thing has no intention of leaving, so I turn and take off into the night, not looking back. I feel the sharp stings of more small branches and twigs cutting into my face and arms as I run through, but I don’t stop. I can hear the creature behind me, quickly catching up. I break the first rule and look back. Then, I’m falling. I feel my body rolling and sliding down what seems to be a hill because I can’t stop. I hit the ground hard as I flail helplessly for a long time. There’s no time to react before my head hits the ground. The nature around me seems to be zooming in and out. My vision and hearing feel like a buzzing static before everything goes dark.

_____

I’m floating above my body, looking down. Everything is shifting in and out of focus, the image altering and stabilizing. It’s hard to get a grasp on what’s happening. I’m sinking down, closer to my body which is asleep. I watch someone stroking my hair but I’m unsure who. All I can see is long, boney fingers running though the strands. Then there is pain before I’m falling.

My eyes open as I gasp, startled awake. I feel so stiff, I can’t sit up. I focus on turning my head and looking around but it’s slow. It takes me a few moments to remember what happened and where I am.

It’s light out. I look up at the sky and the sun is high. I was out all night. That knowledge frightens me. I slowly push myself up until I’m sitting and scan down my body. I’m seemingly still in one piece. There’s nothing around me except the same monotonous looking trees and birds. Their singing makes the dull, aching pain in my head turn into a throbbing that matches the feeling on my forehead. Slowly, I bring my hand up, lightly touching the area that hurts. There’s a huge bump already forming where I must have hit it. “Shit,” I say as I hunch forward and sigh. My poor head will never be the same.

Just then, I realized, I left all my things behind. I don’t have Luke’s backpack. I glance around trying to orient myself, but I already know I’m completely turned around. It doesn’t make sense to go wandering through the woods trying to find the bag, as much as I want to. I’ll have to make do with what I have on my back. It isn’t a lot, but it’s not nothing either. I have warm clothes, my phone… my ring. I catch a glimpse of it on my finger and think of Luke. I miss him.

When I stand up, my legs feel unsteady and achy. My head pounds harder once I’m upright, so much so that I almost fall back over, but I catch myself and force my body to straighten and stand up tall. I see the bear spray lying in the grass just a few steps from me. I can’t believe I somehow managed to hold onto it as I ran and fell. I limp over to it and slowly bend over and grab it. My entire body hurts. Fingers crossed I don’t completely fall apart in the next hour.

Once again, I’m back to this never-ending walk that’s starting to feel more like a death march. I hear constant whispers in the trees, words I can barely make out and some I don’t understand at all. I know one of them is following me. It’s matching my every step, but it never comes out. It only watches me.

Paranoia is taking over and I become sure I can see Luke behind every tree, sometimes my mother singing to me and I even hear a hospital monitor beeping. I cover my ears trying to drown out the noise, but that only makes it louder. It’s coming from inside my own mind and the more I fight it the worse it becomes. I try to focus. All I have to do is put one foot in front of the other but I’m in such a daze, I can barely see what’s in front of me.

Something bumps into my leg, so softly I barely register to look, but when I hear a yip, I glance down. My silent wish has come true. It’s my fox. It’s standing at my feet, looking up at me. The sight of it warms my heart and clears my mind.

“Oh my god… Hi, little guy.” I kneel, impulsively reaching out to pet it. To my surprise, it doesn’t flinch away, instead letting me stroke its head before it yips again and scampers away. Before I lose sight of it, it looks back at me and stops. I guess it wants me to follow again and I have no reason not to listen. Maybe this is the universe finally sending me some help. I don’t follow for very long before it runs back toward me, jumping onto its hind legs and stretching its front legs up and onto me. I take my boldness to another level and lean down to pick it up. It doesn’t fight me, seeming quite content in my arms. I stand there, smiling ear to ear, contact with another living thing feels beautiful and comforting.

As I’m standing still, enjoying this moment, I hear a strange noise. I don’t recognize what it is at first. It sounds alien out here, it doesn’t belong in my memorized sounds of this forest. I hear it again and this time I know. It was the sound of a car, tires on a road. That clearly manmade sound fills me with hope. I run toward it as I cling to my new friend. Panic, desire and anticipation– I’m feeling it all stronger than I ever have. “Please please please...”

Just like that, I burst out of the trees and am standing on a paved road. I can’t believe it. Everything I was feeling comes together to completely overwhelm me. This is what I’ve been looking for, but in an instant, I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what I envisioned, but I guess I just thought that once I found the road, I wouldn’t have to do anything else. Someone would be here to pick up the pieces. I didn’t count on having to make more decisions.

My body is shaking as I slowly turn, trying to figure out where I am. There are trees on both sides of the road and it goes as far as the eye can see in both directions, but this is it. Someone will find me now. A car will come; it’s only a matter of time. I look down to thank the fox, but my arms are empty as they cradle nothing but air.

Chapter Twenty-Five

The only thing I can do now is follow this road and hope it leads me out or better yet, that someone stumbles upon me. My mind and body already feel lighter just being out of the dense, never-ending trees.

I obsessively look back and forth, desperately wanting a car to show up in the distance. I have to remind myself to stay patient, the hard part is over, and it’s only a matter of time. I walk for a long time as the road winds through the forest. The winding road mixed with the density of the trees around me keeps me on high alert. I try to stay extra aware of my surroundings as this path still feels dangerous and eerie. It would be ridiculous and tragic to get hit by a car when I’m so close to making it out.

In the last hour, the nausea and a headache have fully set in, making me wonder if I have a concussion. I’m exhausted to a level I’ve never experienced before. I can barely pick my feet up off the ground, as they instead drag along the hard road. My mind becomes more frazzled with each slow limp. In my haze I think to myself that I don’t remember these roads. The ones we drove through didn’t twist and turn this much and I wish now that I had been paying closer attention. My mind is playing constant tricks on me now as I keep hearing cars driving or horns honking but when I try to find it, there’s nothing.

It’s hard to tell how many creatures have been stalking me, but I know for sure that at least one is still following me. I can hear it in the trees alongside me, staying just deep enough that I can’t see it. I feel too tired, numb, and cold to fully care, but I try to stay somewhat observant and keep track of where it is. I don’t want to let myself become too scared of it at the same time; I don’t need to be taking emotional steps backwards.

The only thing keeping me as calm and focused as I am is the comforting sight of mile markers. They remind me that I’m moving even if it’s slow. I’ve walked a few miles in what I think has been a couple hours. The sun is still high in the sky–today is the last day.

“Hey!” Someone calls from behind me. I spin around, looking for what I hope is someone to save me, but the road is empty. “Help me. Please!” The voice starts dull and slow but picks up quickly into a screech. My stomach drops as I hear it tearing through the trees. A woman staggers out and onto the road. When she sees me, she runs over as she continues to plead for help. I’m frozen in place as she closes the distance between us, until she’s standing right in front of me. She looks toward me but not into my eyes. “I need help. Come with me. Help me.” Her eyes are wide and crazed as she grabs my arms and starts pulling me. I yank my arm from her grasp as intense unease settles into my stomach. Something doesn’t feel right. Her eyes don’t match the emotion the rest of her face is showing. Her mouth is barely open even as she cries and speaks. She grabs me again and tugs me hard enough that I lurch forward. In a panic, I pull away from her again and fall backward. I look up at her and now that I have some space between us, I can really see her. She’s wearing a bright, green jacket. The memory of the same winter jacket stained with blood surfaces and I force myself to look up at her face. Even with her tortured expression, she is beautiful. The long, dark, tangled hair makes it real. She can’t be here. This woman is dead. I killed her.

What hits me next is her voice; I recognize it. I’ve heard it before but in my memory it’s joyful and laughing and I realize who she is. I can see her clearly as she spins in circles, dancing and happy with her long hair flowing all around.

This isn’t a woman at all. In an instant, her eyes are no longer wide and frazzled. Her expression becomes hard and unreadable as she stares at me, like she can read my thoughts. She stands still and silent, no longer crying or pleading, and then her body starts twitching. Her head tilts side to side as she slowly smiles. A horrible, inhuman smile and in an instant she changes. A bullet hole replaces one of her eyes as she takes a slow step toward me, “Look what you did. Why won’t you help me, Hanna?” I take a matching step backwards, not daring to blink again as I watch blood start to pour out of the wound.

“You’re not real,” I say quietly, almost a whisper. A gentle reminder to myself before it lunges forward, arms outstretched. It becomes less and less human the closer it gets. It dawns on me that I still have the bear spray. Frantically, I reach in and grab it. Just as the creature is a step away, I squeeze the trigger.

As a terrible shriek echoes across the open space, I don’t wait to see what happens next, instead I turn and run. I push my legs to keep moving even as my foot is begging me to stop. My vision starts to blur as the burning in my eyes becomes more prevalent. Once I notice it, it’s all I can feel. My nose and eyes are on fire. The spray must have blown back onto me.

The creature’s shrill cries behind me remind me I can’t afford to stop. Don’t look back. It's become so blurry I can barely see but suddenly I think I see a mailbox ahead of me. I almost crash as I grab hold of it and feel for the familiar flag or house numbers. I want to make sure it’s real before I take another chance. Hope swells in my chest as my fingers find the flag. There could be a house. I sprint down what I hope is a driveway, no longer feeling the pain in my foot or eyes, and I pray. Please let there be someone here.

My eyes clear just as I emerge onto a property with a cabin that looks almost exactly like the one Luke and I rented. It’s the same shape with the same porch and windows. The only difference is that this one is loved and taken care of. As I’m looking around, I don’t realize that I’ve stopped moving until something crunches behind me and I’m snapped back to reality. I run the rest of the way up to the porch, stumbling up the steps and to the front door and pound against it wildly.

“Hello?! Is anyone here? Please! I need help!” I scream at the door as I peer through the small window, so similar to the one from our cabin. Intense emotion floods through me as I see two women rushing down the hallway toward me.

One of them opens the door, “Can I help you?”

“Something is out here. Please, help me. Please, let me in!” I see her look behind me, scanning the property with a worried look on her face before she settles her gaze back on me. She looks at me like I’m crazy, so I glance quickly behind me. No one is there. Sheepishly, I turn back to her. “I know how this must look, but please, I was staying at a vacation rental somewhere near here, with my boyfriend and he got really sick and… and… someone was stalking us. Luke… he couldn’t walk and I had to leave to find help. I left him...” My voice breaks, my body somehow managing to shed a few tears. “He’s still there and he’s very sick. I need help. Can I please just use your phone to call for help?” As I’m speaking, I see both of their faces soften, their eyes fill with worry before she steps back and ushers me inside.