Something touched her leg and Mandy flinched and screamed and took off again, not caring that she was going deeper into the woods, only wanting to make sure whatever that was didn’t do it again.
She dodged trees and bushes, nearly tripped over a root but caught herself at the last second and continued on, further into the dark. She felt things against her arms, things that could have been leaves, but could just as easily have been the wings of bats. A spider web wrapped around her face when she ran through it, and she clawed madly at it, wanting to get it off before the spider, which she just knew had been in the web when she hit it and was now on her, could get to her face.
She wondered if there were snakes out here as well, and what would happen if she stepped on one? Would its natural reflex be to strike at her and bite, or would her foot kill it too quickly? She didn’t want to find out.
Voices whispered to her from the night, but those may have been the sounds of her own fears speaking to her, the murmurings of doubt in her ear.
She found herself crying as she ran, the realization of how trapped she was finally weighing completely on her. She could keep running, but she was just getting more and more lost and she had no faith that she would eventually get through the woods and wind up wherever she should wind up if this were a normal place. No, she knew if she kept going she’d be out here for hours, maybe longer, because the Home wouldn’t let her go. But if she turned around, was she any better off? She could run back in the direction of the Home, and it would probably let her out of the woods, but she’d be right back where she started, trapped on the grounds with no other option but to go back inside, and she already knew that wasn’t any kind of option at all. Plus, if she turned around, she’d just be heading right back toward whatever had touched her leg.
She wanted to stop and catch her breath while she decided on her next move, but something told her that to stop out here, to be still in the middle of these woods, would be an even bigger mistake. The trees closed in around her and she felt the weight of every trunk, felt the entanglement of every root and the claustrophobia of every branch wrapping around her until it felt like she couldn’t breathe. She had to get out of here. It was no longer about which direction led to the better destination; if she didn’t get to some clearing, out of the trees, Mandy was going to suffocate.
She couldn’t help it, she turned and ran back toward the Home, because she knew there was fresh, open air there. She focused her eyes as she ran, trying desperately to see whatever might be in front of her, in case it was the thing that touched her. All she saw was the dark. In fact, she wasn’t even entirely sure she’d turned in the right direction. She could be heading anywhere and not know it.
Something touched her on the back, just a flitting, fleeting brush between the shoulder blades. She ran faster. Something brushed her arm and she told herself it was just leaves. Something skimmed the top of her head and she yelled and ducked and almost went face first into the dirt.
Her feet ached; she’d been on the them for how many hours? Her lungs felt like they could burst any minute and Mandy would fall like a deflated balloon, gasping and wheezing and reaching out for help that wasn’t there. She would be swarmed by vermin and eaten alive. She would hook her foot in a root, snap her ankle, and lie here screaming and crying and no one would hear her. Katie wasn’t coming, she realized. She hadn’t even bothered to answer her text. Mandy was alone with no one to help her.
Soon she was being bombarded but she couldn’t see by what. The hits just came, over and over, as if small birds were dive bombing her. She felt them hit her head then fly away. Things reached for her legs in the dark. She got hit in the chest, but shrugged it off and kept running.
She prayed she was going in the right direction at least. Something smacked her in the face and it stung her eye, so she was running through the dark woods, squinting, rubbing her eye and trying to keep her balance. She felt the ground tilt as if she were suddenly on a hill, and she reached out to steady herself against a tree, but something stung her and she recoiled and lost her sense direction.
Her hand burned. Whatever stung her, it wasn’t like a bee or something small; it felt more like the bark of the tree itself had been covered in something small and prickly, like itchweed on a grand scale. She tried to rub her palm against her pants, but the burning continued.
She had thought--hoped--that turning back toward the Home, whatever force was at work would let her out of the woods sooner, but it was taking longer to get out than it had taken to get lost in the first place, which made her think she had picked the wrong direction after all and was only getting more lost.
She wondered if she would see the dawn. Not that she thought she would die before the night was over, but if space could be affected, could time as well? Would it always be night? Or if she was out here long enough, running and trying to get out, would the sun eventually peek above the treetops and let her see where she was? And if it did, would she see the things that kept swiping at her? She wasn’t sure she wanted to see them.
They still pelted her back and head. She almost tripped over something that tried to grab her ankle, but she twisted her foot away and slipped its grip. She let the tears flow from her stinging eye. She couldn’t let herself be slowed down.
The woods continued their attack, but she flew past the trees and whatever else was out there, even though her entire body felt like it was in the middle of turning to water. Her muscles were liquid and nearly useless. Her lungs felt like boiling water had been poured into them. She felt like her thighs were being put through a meat grinder with each new step. Her head wanted to fall against her chest and her eyes wanted to close, but Mandy wanted to live to see the next day, which she knew wouldn’t happen if she stopped running, let alone let herself pass out.
She ran. And just as those voices started coming back, the ones that tried to tell her she would never get out of these woods, she broke through the last tree and collapsed on the Mertland Childrens' Home lawn, the grass prickly against her skin, but cool and damp, and the air out here was refreshing. She crawled and pulled herself further onto the grounds, away from the woods.
She imagined she heard something snarling behind her, but hidden in the trees, and hopefully it was something that wouldn’t come out. She curled up on the grass, dragging her exhausted limbs up close to her body.
She looked behind her to make sure she was clear, and she thought she saw what looked like light glinting off dozens of sets of eyes, all over the place, some high, some low, but whatever they could be attached to--if she was even seeing them for real--was too well hidden in the trees.
She crawled forward a little more, not content to be out of the woods. She wanted to be away from them as well, but right now her body needed to rest.
Her mouth was so dry her tongue felt swollen. She wondered if there was a garden hose, or even just the tap for one, out here somewhere. The blood rushed to her head and made her brain throb inside her skull. She was finally able to rub away the stinging in her eye.
She opened her palm and tried to see if it was swollen, but it suddenly didn’t hurt anymore. She touched it with her other hand, but it felt fine. Whatever it was, maybe it only worked in the woods.
God, I just want to go to sleep, she thought. I want to sleep and wake up in the morning and be back at Katie’s on her couch. But sleep was a dangerous thought, because she felt if she really wanted to, she could probably convince herself it was a good idea right now. She wasn’t in the woods anymore, so whatever was in them, she was safe from it. She wasn’t in the building, so whatever was in there, she was safe from that, too.
But as she lay there in the grass, in the dark, trying to feel her body recover from what she’d just put it through, her brain told her that to stay here, out in the open, was a bad idea. The dangers out here were different, but no less vicious. As she lay there, feeling the silence and stillness around her for the first time, she sensed it. Whatever it was, she had no idea, but the
re was something.
She fought to keep her eyes open, but she felt her body weaken with every labored exhale. She managed to work her left hand under her body and lift, rolling herself over onto her back. She was able to open her eyes and look up at the sky, but all she saw was a dirty grey blanket with the silhouettes of trees superimposed over it.
The only sound in the world was her breathing. She felt as if she were laying back in the bathtub with her head underwater and only her face exposed. Everything around her was dead silent. She looked at the woods and those eyes watched her. Her breath caught like a drowning victim and she expected whatever they were to leap out of the woods anyway and drag her back.
She scrambled to her feet and ran to the rear of the building, then stopped and looked back to make sure they hadn’t begun to creep out from the trees.
The area was clear.
She pulled her phone from her pocket and looked at the screen. Nothing. What the holy fuck was going on? She got Katie’s voicemail, she had left a message. Katie never took this long to reply, not when it was important.
She tried again. This time it didn’t even ring, just went straight to voicemail.
That’s weird, she thought. She’s turned her phone off. But to do that, she had to have had it in her hands, she had to have seen that I called. Where is she? Why didn’t she call me back?
Mandy’s concern and confusion played over in her mind and suddenly she knew why Katie hadn’t called her back. She was with Sam. It made perfect sense. Sam had wanted to be with Katie, but didn’t know how to tell her, so he’d concocted some stupid argument and used that as his weak excuse to move out. How long had they been seeing each other?
And Katie, her best friend . . . that’s where Katie had been yesterday morning when Mandy woke up on her couch. She hadn’t been called to work, she was somewhere with Sam. Maybe Sam had been staying with Katie those few weeks Mandy hadn’t seen him. Except for that night. When they realized Mandy would be there all night, he’d probably rented a room somewhere and Katie had waited until Mandy fell asleep, then left her note about being called to work and she’d snuck out and they’d spent the night together. Or they’d spent the night at Mandy and Sam’s apartment.
Fucking bitch. And that cocksucker, Mandy couldn’t believe how fucking big his balls were to do this to her. She would make sure they were so sorry, though. They had fucked over the wrong girl and she couldn’t believe it had taken her so long to see it. She had been so stupid.
And, shit, she realized, without one of them . . . how was she supposed to get out of here? Unless the ghosts had decided to give her car back. She wasn’t going to find out sulking back here in the dark.
Mandy looked into the woods again, but now the glowing eyes were gone and it was only dark trees and shadows she saw. She pocketed the phone again and took off around the building. She didn’t walk, Mandy stalked. Each step was a boot in the face of Sam and Katie. Her fists clenched and she grit her teeth, wishing she were grinding their bones between them. She wanted to hit one of them, and this time it didn’t matter which one.
When she got to the front of the building, she saw the fog rolling in, so thick she couldn’t see more than five feet ahead of her.
As if she didn’t feel isolated enough, now she felt absolutely trapped inside this pocket of air with who knew what swirling about outside, just waiting for the right moment to strike at her.
She didn’t want to wander too far; no sense purposely moving toward whatever might be out there. Of course, it could be that there was nothing out there and she was only letting her fear get to her. Yes, she thought, that was possible. But after everything she’d seen tonight already, she wasn’t counting on that being the case.
Instead, as much as she hated it, she backed up toward the stairs leading to the Home’s front door. She wasn’t going inside and she wasn’t looking at the building, but she needed something solid to anchor her.
When she felt the stairs tap the back of her leg, she stopped and lowered herself to the second step, rested her arms on her knees and leaned forward to catch her breath. She stared out into the fog, trying to see, but this stuff was thick.
So instead she listened. She tried closing her eyes, hoping to heighten the sense like a blind person, but only a few seconds of not being able to see anything at all and she opened then again quickly, expecting something was probably coming at her from the fog. There was nothing in front of her, but it was a good thing she’d opened her eyes anyway; she was now standing ten feet away from the steps, the fog inches from her nose.
Mandy gasped and backed up again, too quick, she almost tripped over her own feet and could have hit her head on the stairs. She got her footing and found the steps and sat back down, then tried to listen to her surroundings again, this time with her eyes wide open.
She heard it. It was there, she realized, the whole time, but it played like background music, just under the surface, and she didn’t recognize it at first for what it was. But now that she was listening, it was clear as day. A low, tortured moan came from the fog. No, it came from all around her, as if the property itself were moaning. It was sad, despondent, almost hopeless. It was what despair sounded like.
Then she heard something else, like shuffling in the grass, as if someone were walking toward her, but slowly, as if to conceal the sound of their approach.
She held her breath and waited, wanting to be ready for whatever this place was going to throw at her next. The footsteps approached in the grass. Then she heard another set coming up the sidewalk (the sidewalk that should have taken her to the parking lot, but somehow didn’t). Someone else trying to sneak up. Then someone off to her far right, a second set coming through the grass. She wondered how far away they were, just inside the fog or was the night air carrying their footsteps a good distance? Could be either; in this stillness she suspected she’d have heard them even if they’d been a hundred feet away.
Then the footsteps came a little faster, the owners walking at a more steady pace. Then they came even faster, at a power-walking speed. Then they were jogging, then running, and Mandy felt herself stand up and move back a couple of steps. She glanced down and saw she was on the fourth step. Whoever was in the fog was running full speed at her, and when they got close enough they would leap and attack her. She moved up another step. Then another.
She looked down and was standing on the concrete pad of the porch before the front doors. The footsteps were just on the other side of the fog. They stopped. Mandy flinched, backed up, panicked and turned around to pull the door open and step inside before they got her.
She slammed the door and there was silence. She turned around. The foyer was empty. But across the distance, she saw the little boy reading his book.
There was her purse, where she left it. She picked it up; she was keeping it with her from now on. With Katie off fucking Mandy’s ex, it was up to Mandy to get herself out of here, and for that she’d need the keys. Third shift would be arriving soon, and she would get out then. So she told herself.
Then she thought, maybe that was third shift arriving just now. She pulled her phone out and looked at the time. No, it wasn’t quite midnight, and they didn’t show until one.
Ok, then she would sit here, like she’d planned to do in the first place, and not move until they got here. She wasn’t calling Katie, or anyone else, so the search for a landline was moot at this point and now there was nothing to make her move again.
But what if sitting here turns out to be just as safe as sitting on the steps had been?
You don’t know sitting there was unsafe. Nothing came out of the fog, nothing touched or threatened me.
Yeah, she thought, you tell yourself whatever you have to.
She sat on the bench.
“I have to get the fuck out of here,” she said.
She glanced over at the boy and he was watching her. She stared back, wondering if he could see her, or if he was just replaying a set of motions he�
��d been through in life. Then she remembered he had been watching her from the window earlier.
She kept staring and after a few moments the boy raised his hand and pointed down the hallway. He looked Mandy in the eyes. He was a bit of a distance away, but she could tell that much. She wondered what he was pointing at.
When he just kept pointing and staring she asked, “What is it?”
She didn’t know if she expected an answer--didn’t know if she wanted one--but he just kept staring and pointing.
She looked away. She watched the front door, wondering if whatever was out there was still running or if it would soon burst through the doors.
She looked away, telling herself that wasn’t going to happen. But after the night she’d had, could she really be that certain? She looked over at the boy again and he hadn’t moved, still sitting there, staring, pointing.
She pulled her phone from her pocket again and checked the time. Ten to midnight. And still no messages from Sam or Katie.
She wanted to tell herself she was being stupid, that Katie would never do that to her. She was pretty sure Sam hadn’t even liked Katie the whole time they’d been together and had only tolerated her for Mandy’s sake. But that could have been his game, to keep her from being suspicious. She wondered how long they’d been fucking. Because she wasn’t suspecting anything anymore, she felt now that she knew it with one hundred percent certainty. They were fucking behind Mandy’s back for who knew how long, and they’d just tried to keep on playing her for a fool, and now Mandy was glad that prick had moved out. He could stay at Katie’s cramped apartment and deal with her constant inattention. Mandy was moving on with her life, and she could just make a totally clean break now, make new friends, start a fresh life with no one who knew her before, no one who knew Sam or Katie or the history Mandy had with them. She could put them behind her, they would be in her past and she would live in the present and never think about those two worthless--
A sound startled her, something loud, something insistent. She looked over and the boy had slammed his open palm down on the table to get her attention.
The Ghosts of Mertland (An Angel Hill novel) Page 12