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I look back into the car. “But you’re seeing this, too, right?”

“His leg. Yes.”

“We were only gone a few minutes. We barely walked into the woods. He was screaming, just the same as he had been. And then it stopped. How does something rip off his leg and we don’t hear that kind of screaming. How does it happen so fast?”

“I’m guessing something killed him quickly and then ripped him free afterward.”

“He was in his pajamas. And that foot is bare.”

Say this isn’t normal. Why aren’t you saying none of this is normal?

I need him to admit it, so I can, the dam bursting, all my fears flooding out, carried on the wave of certainty and not paranoia.

This isn’t natural. Something very unnatural is happening, and we need to talk about it.

But he says nothing.

My hands shake so hard I fumble the flashlight, and Henry steadies it, not taking it from me.

“I shouldn’t have left him,” I whisper. “I should have let you take the flashlight and go find the crowbar.”

“I’m really glad you didn’t. Because I don’t think you could have stopped whatever—whatever did this.” He glances at the severed leg and swallows. “We need to stick together. Flashlight. Metal rod. Two pairs of eyes.”

I look away. “I joked about it when he stopped screaming.”

Henry’s voice drops. “I joked back.”

“I kept wishing he’d stop. Just stop. And he did.”

Henry steps around me and ducks his head, getting closer to my field of vision and snagging my gaze. “We didn’t cause this. I think the screaming attracted something. Or the blood. That’s not to blame him. The poor guy was in shock. But it wasn’t us. If you’d stayed…? Well, you’re a whole lot smaller than me, and I don’t think I could have stopped something that could rip off…” He trails off.

My gaze follows his as he straightens. “What is it? What are we talking about?”

“I don’t know.”

“In the forest, you said you mistook fungus for a hand.”

A humorless quirk of his lips. “Zombies didn’t do this, Ellie.”

“But you thought it was a zombie.”

“I have…” He makes a face. “An irrational fear of them. I guess I was just more on edge than I thought. Seeing things, like you.”

That doesn’t work for me, and I don’t think it works for him either, as hard as he’s trying to sell it. But I’m doing the same, aren’t I? When I see something strange out here, I explain it away so I don’t seem like I’ve lost my mind.

“Forget zombies,” I say, and he audibly exhales in relief. “What could do this?”

“I don’t know, but I think we just need to get back to that bar.”

I remember the woman on the barstool, the water beneath her. Is that the answer? Go back to the bar?

I’m staring down at the damp asphalt. I’m not really seeing it, just staring and thinking when something catches my eye. Blood. In the flashlight beam, I can see a trail of blood from the car to the forest. Drag marks show where the poor man had been hauled along, but there’s something else.

I walk over and shine the light down onto a spot beside that trail of blood. More blood, but in a pattern that looks circular yet familiar.

“Henry?” I say.

“Hmm?”