CHAPTER 4
B R O O K E
FELLSMERE, VIRGINIA
AUGUST 5, 2013
10:03 P.M.
My
flashlight battery was running out.
I turned it
on and off at different points, trying to keep it alive for as long as I could.
There was no way I’d be able to get back home that night, and by the looks of
it, no one was coming. I was gonna have to sleep in the woods, and after what
I’d seen that night, that was going to be much harder then than it would’ve
been three hours beforehand.
Everything
seemed so much creepier then. The wind, the trees, the crickets. Just half an
hour previously I passed a tall, spindly tree that had its arms spread out wide
like tentacles on an octopus. I swear, one of them moved a little.
The car
wreck site hadn’t changed. Still just a bunch of car in a lot of places. I
decided that the most comfortable and the safest place to sleep would be in the
backseat of the vehicle, since it was still mostly intact. Using my low-light
flashlight, I tried to make my way to the car. But as soon as I did, I found
something that wasn’t there before: a round hole in the backseat window, large,
about the size of my head. Shards of glass sat on the black leather seat, and
so did a heavy-looking rock. It made my heart leap to think who could have
thrown that kind of object through a car window, even more so that someone had
actually come near my car.
Cautious, I opened the backseat door,
and the rest of the window shattered, a few shards of glass cutting my hands
and making me cuss under my breath.
On the rock
was a message, sending what felt like a scream into the back of my throat. But
I was too intrigued to actually make any noise.
UNDER
THE WHEEL
Under the
wheel? What the heck did that mean? The engraving in the stone looked old; very
old. And it was perfectly carved. Confused and beginning to get scared, I slammed
the door shut and stepped back. Using the last juice of the flashlight’s
battery, I gazed around the crash site. Sure enough, just a few meters away,
there was the fourth wheel, the tire popped with a sharp white rock sticking
into the rubber. I rushed over to it and lifted it up. And beneath the wheel
was my phone, perfectly intact.
All my fear
went away. I could call my parents.
I grabbed the
phone, turning it on. Its battery was just barely still running. A miracle. But
I was about to call Mom when I saw that I had a new text from an unidentified
number. It was a photo.
One of the forest path.
My heart jumped when I saw it, and that
time, I screamed, my shrill voice echoing throughout the woods.
It was a
skull. A horrible, white, misty human skull, its mouth open as if laughing at
me. A chill ran down my spine and I fell to the ground, dropping the flashlight
and letting it sit on the ground, pointing up the path. All the trees seemed to
be leaning over me, as if alive. As if watching me.
The photo
came with a message, too. I scrolled down just enough to read it.
Don’t let
the darkness hinder you.
-S.G.
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