Frostbite

As I walked through the forest, my body grew gradually colder. Drip, drip, drip. The summer rain was pouring in through the gaps in the trees and the booming of thunder popped my ear drums. Mysteriously, as I trekked further into this forest, the unforgiving air became colder and colder. THe answer to why this was happening, I did not know but what I did know was that I was wandering aimlessly with no real goal or destination in mind.

I was now surrounded by air so cold that the tips of my fingers had now lost all of their feeling and the damp rain was seeping through my shoes. There was nothing on me besides my rain soaked shoes, shorts and a thin t-shirt, which made me deeply regret my choice of clothing for that day.

Colour had completely flushed out of my limbs, leaving me looking pale as a sheet of paper. As well as that, the feeling had completely gone from my hands and feet from being so cold in this forest that I wasn't sure I would ever escape from. I really wanted to leave, I really wanted to go back to my campsite but my curiosity was getting the better of me; I had the find the source of this freezing temperature. I just... had to keep going...

After hours and hours of trekking these strange woods, I finally spotted a spec of light in the far distance. Some hope washed over me as all I had seen for the past two hours was pure darkness as the monstrously tall trees were blocking any light from having a chance to enter through small cracks in the leaves. The only thing I must focus in for the time being is this small spot of light; I need to see where it's coming from and what it's doing in this ominous forest.

By following this strange phenomenon, I found myself in a small opening; one lacking any trees with a diameter of about 20 metres. This area was colder than anywhere I had ever been in my life, so cold that I couldn't even talk because my tongue and mouth were numbed by the extremity of a temperature I had fallen upon. The first thing that caught my attention was a small girl standing in the middle of this clearing. Her back was turned to me so the only thing I could see of her was her bleach blonde hair, her light blue dress and exposed hands and feet. Her skin was so pale I could've sworn that she's just doused herself in a bucket of white paint immediately before my arrival.

Seeing as I couldn't speak from the numbness of my mouth, I decided to go up to her and tap her bony, exposed shoulder. I expected to see the face of a typical nine year old shivering in the cold of this forest as this girl had been wearing next to nothing in below zero temperatures. But was I actually saw was horrifying. She turned to face me, and the first thing I noticed was her haunting, white eyes. She lacked any pupils and irises and her face showed no expression but mine showed one of great fear and pain. She simply looked at me and said plainly

"You shouldn't be here"

Before I knew it, my feet were encased in a thick casing of ice. Immediately, I noticed there was a trail of ice coming from this girl and was slowly climbing up my legs which would surely encase me completely. I couldn't even open my mouth to scream for help, not that anyway would hear me either way.

I was going to die. I was going to be consumed by ice and nobody would ever know how I was taken and this girl's cold, dead eyes were going to be the last thing that I ever remember. I looked up at the opening in the sky and realised from the high sun that it was noon. I would've been gone for three hours and my campmates would be getting concerned. They will wander into this forest to find me and suffer the exact same fate.

Or maybe they won't. The girl who I thought was going to be the literal death of me was looking exhausted. The ice that was now covering most of my torso was slowly creeping back down. The girl started to lose her balance and fell onto her stomach, panting and uttering incomprehensible sounds. As water was gathering under where she was lying I could tell that the summer sun was melting her. As the last of the girl melted away, the forest returned to a regular, summer temperature and I finally had feeling back in my limbs and face. As I was heading back to my campsite back the way I came I realised that this was a memory that would haunt me for the rest of my life. Maybe it would be better if I kept it to myself.