Let's Not Meet Again

A Woodland Escape

I'm a male and was around 17 at the time, this story takes place on a winter's night in a small town in southern England.

I was over at a friend's house for a few drinks as we were too young to hit the pubs and the weather too cold to drink in the woods as usual. My friend lived around 2 miles from where I lived, and around half way home there was a shortcut through the woods (where we regularly hung out) which would shave off a precious few minutes on my walk home.

We were having a good time and enjoying a few cans of cider (I think it's a right of passage for English youth) and at around 11pm, I decided to head home as I had work the next morning. I headed out of my friends house and through the alleyway to the main road, it was here that I noticed someone on the other side of the road about half a mile back. I thought nothing of it, it's a quiet town and I had made this walk plenty of times before without issue.

As I started walking, I felt an odd sensation and the hairs on my neck started to stand on end. I turned around to see the person had crossed the road and was now walking on the same side of the road as me, still a way behind but I could see it was a large man with a hooded top on.

Being a relatively switched on person, I decided to cross the road to see if he copied me. No sooner had I done that, sure enough the man followed suit. At this point, I started to nope out and walk faster. I kept checking behind me and he too was walking faster and there was a glint of something in his hand. Now it could well have been anything, but my brain was telling me this guy had a knife.

I continued walking until I was around 100 metres away from the shortcut. Now I had a decision to make, do I take the shortcut through the woods or do I continue another half mile towards the main road where there was likely cars. As I mentioned earlier I spent a lot of time in those woods and felt that I would at least have a chance to lose this guy in there.

Looking back and the guy was around 200 metres behind me now and gaining fast. My fight or flight kicked in and I started sprinting towards the gate and the shortcut.

Now the shortcut was a small unlit dirt road, wide enough for a car to fit down with back gardens on one side, long grass on the other and tree roots littering the path. As I rounded the gate and onto the path, I checked back and the man was fully sprinting behind me. I got about 10 meters down the path and tripped on one of the roots, falling flat on my face (part darkness, part alcohol is to blame I would say).

Knowing I had seconds to make a decision on what to do before he got to the gate. I didn't think I could get up and go quick enough, plus my knee was shot after falling down. I did the first thing that came to my mind and I rolled off of the path and into the tall grass and lay there, trying to be as silent and still as possible.

A moment later I heard the gate rattle and someone walk up the path behind me. Unable to see as I was laying on my front facing forward, I prayed that he did not spot me. The man lingered for a moment around 4 feet away from where I was laying, catching his breath. He was breathing real heavy and I could tell he was straining his eyes to try and see down the path in the dark.

After what felt like eternity he started walking off down the path and I watched him go as far as I could see in the dark. My heart was beating fast and the adrenaline was pumping through my body. I had sobered up very fast and was now acutely aware of every single noise in the woods.

I waited around 10 minutes after I last saw him before getting slowly to my feet. I very slowly made my way towards the road, listening carefully for any noises that were out of place in the woods and keeping a low profile moved back towards the gate. As I reached the gate I heard a loud bang behind me, I spun around and saw a black cat had just jumped onto one of the fences. No sign of the man.

I made my way onto the road and managed to get home without any further incident. Needless to say I was incredibly wary whenever we returned to the woods for a drink. Potential knife wielding murderer, let's not meet.