I just didn’t know what that reason was.
My boots crunched on the gravel as I crossed the road to walk along the dirt near the trees.
“Ugh, gross.” I pulled up my shirt to cover my nose. The wind had shifted, carrying with it the awful stench of a dead animal, sour and rotten. I looked into the trees, expecting to see a dead racoon or maybe a deer.
But there was something else standing between the trees.
In the dim light, I thought I was just looking at some bleached, gnarled branches between the maze of trees. The bone-gray limbs were patched with moss and spread out, some high and some low, reminding me of a spider’s web. But it was not a web, not a spider. At the conjunction of those strange, branch-like appendages was a rib-cage with taut, graying flesh stretched over the bones. There was a spindly, spine-like neck, and a canid skull with the jaw hanging open and a long black tongue lolling out.
I blinked rapidly, my heart pounding. Were my eyes tricking me? It was at least fifty yards away. I pushed up my glasses, leaning down in an attempt to get a clearer view through the branches. It looked like a mutated, rotting dead animal. It wasn’t moving. It was even more still than the trees themselves.
It was probably some kind of creepy art installation.
In fact, it had to be an art installation. Those long spindly limbs were just wood. The “ribs” were covered with some kind of goopy, painted cloth, or maybe silicone. I shook myself, shuddering as I began to walk away. The Art Festival had only been a few days ago — maybe it was common for sculptures to be set up around town. I would have to find out who was responsible for the piece. It was brilliantly placed and eerily realistic, exactly the kind of creepy shit I liked.
Goosebumps prickled up my back, and I walked a little faster. Something still smelled awful.
A twig snapped behind me. I swallowed hard and kept walking. I wasn’t about to indulge that prickly, nagging fear.
There was nothing to be afraid of.
Snap.
I wasn’t far from my driveway. I could see it up ahead.
I stopped walking.
There had been a sound beside me, something between a bark and ragged cough. And that smell, God. Why was it so strong?
I turned around.
The road was empty. The streetlights had popped on, casting little pools of light leading back toward campus. But there was no one there. Not a single soul. I peered through the trees, through the catacombs of crisscrossed branches, back toward that creepy sculpture.
It was gone.
There was a roaring sound in my ears, like the ocean filling my head in waves of terror. I took a step back, then another. My eyes darted across the road, toward every little growing shadow. I had to be wrong. I had to be. Where the hell —
The glow of headlights suddenly appeared behind me. I turned, to see a small white truck speeding down the road. The tires crunched as they came to a sudden halt beside me, and I narrowed my eyes in the dark as I attempted to make out the driver through the tinted windows.
The passenger door was shoved open from the inside, and from the driver’s seat, Leon glared at me.
“Get in.”
I was so freaked out I didn’t even pause to consider that maybe hopping into his car wasn’t the safest idea. It had to be safer than whatever I had just heard in the woods. The moment my door was closed he flipped a U-turn, driving back in the direction of my cabin.
“What are you doing walking in the dark?” His voice was tense, furious. He kept glancing in the rearview mirror. What the hell had I done to make him so mad?
“I’m going home. I always walk.”
“You think it’s a good idea for a tiny girl like you to be walking through the woods in the dark?” he snapped.
“What the hell is your problem?” I glared at him from across the seat. “If you’re just going to yell at me then let me out. It’s none of your business where I walk, or when I walk, or how!” His fingers tightened on the steering wheel, his jaw clenched. But he didn’t say anything. He just kept glancing in the rearview mirror. What was he doing out here anyway? I hadn’t seen him on campus that day and had assumed it was his day off.
Not that I specifically looked for him on campus.
“Take me home,” I demanded, when seconds had passed and he was still silent. He snorted.
“Yeah, that’s what I’m doing.” Without any directions from me, he turned onto the narrow dirt drive that led back into the trees toward my house. My eyes widened, my stomach doing a nervous little flip as I gulped.
“How do you know I live here?” That felt like a dangerous question to ask. I really needed to do a better job of thinking these things through. “Have you…have you followed me home? Have you been watching me?”