Watch Your Step

Vulture

My friends Eddie, James, and Ashley always like to take me with them even though I was an awkward scrawny kid. They would throw rocks on my window pane every morning with their bikes and wide smiles.

"Come on Franky!" Eddie, the oldest and tallest of us, would yell.

"We're going to see the vulture the other kids were talking about," James, the smartest of us, said who would always inform today's agenda.

"Bring your camera with you," added Ashley with her sweet-toothed grin and freckled cheeks. I was always drawn to come out of my shell.

I only live with my father because my mother left us and never came home. Before my father succumbed to alcoholism, he had bought me a small BMAX bike that unchains after a number of pedals. So I had to fix it every now and then and my friends would always wait for me. Despite my bike's imperfections, it doesn't matter, with my friends, I feel like I could go anywhere.

Eddie was always up front, maybe because he was the tallest and unofficially our leader, we all followed him. Next James, then Ashley, then me.

James was very talkative, he's most of the time the only one talking even when we were riding our bikes. Ashley always listens, his older brother Eddie — not so much and so do I.

But Ashley would relay to me what James was saying, "They said it's a big black bird that escaped the zoo!" The way her hair blows in the wind like an enchanted dance never ceases to mesmerize me.

"We're here!" Eddie announced as we found ourselves in a far-flung forest but the road still stretches out here.

Then I saw it immediately. A rusty-colored box of what used to be a trailer but now, vegetation was growing on it. So it looked greener than red.

"They said it's inside there," James whispered.

We dropped our bikes outside the mossed trailer and went in. Eddie was up front, next James, then Ashley, then me who was about to pee in his pants.

"Ashley," I whispered, as we navigated the dim interior. "I've been meaning to tell you something."

"Hurry up slowpokes!" Eddie called ahead, his figure disappearing from view.

The trailer's interior reminded me of something I can't quite put. A big hole in the ceiling lets a column of light pierce through but everything else was dark.

Ashley could feel I was scared, so she held my cold hand and pulled me closer to her. I was instantly calm.

I didn't know how it got there — maybe someone pulled it in — but a long tree trunk snaked through to the deeper parts of the trailer, cutting it in half.

My friends went farther following the tree trunk until we could hear movement. Rustling and knocking the steel walls of the trailer. I felt my bones shiver.

As my eyes adjusted, I also noticed an overgrown vegetation inside. It looked like willow leaves but I thought it was odd knowing the trunk didn't belong to a willow tree.

The place also started smelling funny as we reached the end of the trailer—a peculiar mix of rot and sweetness.

Suddenly it appeared, startling all of us.

"There it is!" James cheered.

It was humongous. The bird itself looked like a willow tree, with its black feathers and branch-looking neck. It was bigger than any of us.

"Is it harmless?" Ashley asked, her grip on my hand tightened. I needed it. Nothing about this creature seemed harmless.

It stood on the trunk like a statue. Eddie and James tried to pet it and surprisingly, it let them.

"Woah, check this out!" Eddie said.

"It's friendly," James chucked, his glasses rested askew on his nose.

Ashley let go of my hand and cautiously approached the animal. Although I wanted to look strong in front of them, the best I could do was hold myself in place. I didn't want to go near it but it came near me.

Its talons were poised to kill, its devilish red eyes set on me, until it was inches before my face. I felt certain death.

"Aww, Franky," Ashley chimed. "It likes you."

No, it didn't like me. I bet it even thinks I was not enough to be its food yet.

"Let's take a picture," Eddie suggested. "Franky, get your camera."

I hesitated but I could thank Eddie, all I wanted to do was to get out of there.

"A vulture has a wingspan of one to three meters but this one's really big." I heard James saying before I headed to the exit.

The trailer felt shorter now. My camera was on my bike's basket and I hastily grabbed it because I sensed the trees outside were whispering. I want to be with my friends again even if I'm with that evil-looking bird. I've always known I could only be brave when I'm with them.

"Hey guys?" I called. "Everything okay back there?" But the funny smell became stronger, now reminiscent of rusting metal.

My eyes didn't take long to adjust and before I could see clearly, I knew something was wrong. They were too silent. They were never silent.

My footfalls stopped as I reached the trailer's end. Unwittingly, I dropped my camera and it made a flash like lightning. In that split second, I saw my friends.

Eddie, James and Ashley, all three sitting on the floor with their heads cracked open. Their brains were spilling like pink froth, and their faces gnashed with thick red lines.

"Did they provoke it?" I asked myself, frozen in place as I gripped for reality.

My breath hastened. I wanted to ask for help but a sense of futility overwhelmed me. My first instinct was to get out of there because I thought — the useless kid that I am — I thought they were beyond help. No, beyond my help. I couldn't do anything even if I wanted to.

Completing the picture, I saw the vulture standing beside them but it wasn't a bird anymore.

It had transformed into an old woman and instead of a beak, her long nose pointed and the wrinkles on her face developed. Its red eyes plunged me in a pool of pure terror.

"It can't be," I muttered. I looked around because the interior of the trailer also began changing.

Under the cover of those willow-looking leaves what reminds me of — was a kitchen, camouflaged to lure people in.

I stepped back, running away, away from them, my friends who are now dead. The trailer reverted to being longer mirroring the tears falling from my eyes.

I heard it squawk, so loud, I thought it was right behind me. Pedaling like a mad man, I turned my head around. I saw it fly from the hole in the trailer and skyrocketed to the clouds.

I wished it was just some dream, even a nightmare that I could wake up from. I pedaled and pedaled until the chain snapped. The vulture dove straight to clutch its talons on my shoulder. Its claws clenched deep into my flesh, lifting me from my bike. I screamed and screamed for help. But I must have slipped into unconsciousness, because beyond that, I couldn't remember anything.