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Chapter Four

I woke up to the sun in my face and the sound of birds outside. Groaning, I uncurled myself from the bed and sat up. I must've passed out some point in the night from exhaustion. I got up from the bed and walked out of the room, sighing when I saw William passed out on the couch. The door was still locked and a chair was shoved up against it. He probably did that so he could sleep.

I heard soft snoring and looked up at the loft to see Xena up there. She probably slept up there to be closer to William. Her bedroom was near the front of the house and she was probably scared of someone coming after her.

I needed to wait for her to wake up so I could pack my stuff up, so I decided to slip back into Williams room and back for him. They needed sleep and I needed to get my mind off last night.

There was no doubt in my mind that we were definitely being followed yesterday during the hike. How the other two didn't notice though I don't understand. I don't understand the why either. Sick thrill? Someone from school trying to scare us? No, no one from school knew where this cabin was. And Xena was so scared I doubt she organized it as a prank.

I packed up Williams bags for him, just as I began to hear movement in the living room. I peeked out the door to see William sitting up on the couch. He turned and saw me, sighing in what seemed to be relief.

"You sleep okay?" He asked me.

"Yeah. Looks like Xena took my spot though." I noted.

"Yeah...she wanted to stay close to where she'd be safer." He explained. "She was really shaken up."

"Do you wanna wake her up so she can go pack? I still gotta pack my stuff up too."

"Why don't you wake her while I start on breakfast. Then I'll pack."

"Don't bother, already packed for you."

"Thanks. Still gonna make breakfast."

I laughed as he stood and began walking to the kitchen. I walked back to the loft and climbed up, pulling the curtain back and moving to shake Xena awake.

She just grumbled and swatted at my hand in an annoyed manner. I kept shaking her though until her eyes cracked open and she gave me a small glare.

"Morning princess. Time to get up so we can pack and get the fuck out of here."

She just groaned but stood up and climbed down from the loft. Mumbling the entire way under her breath though. I guess even the prospect of getting out of these woods wasn't enough to wake the night owl.

I began to pack my stuff back up, changing into normal clothes at the same time. After my shit was together I went down the loft with it, and headed to the kitchen. William was making pancakes it seemed, humming as he worked.

"You got everything?" He asked.

"Yeah. Now we just need to go."

"Well, come get some pancakes so we won't have to wait on you to eat."

I stuck my tongue out at him and went over to fix some food. Xena came out after a bit, her bags trailing behind her and came to get her own breakfast. We didn't speak much, too tired and drained out from the previous night. Xena was sniffling and I hoped she wasn't getting sick from all the time spent in the cold rain. Finally, we finished breakfast and fixed up a lost few things while William went and got dressed and grabbed his stuff.

We left the cabin, Xena locking it up and William putting the stuff in the back, while I walked to get into the car. As I was about to pull myself in, I noticed a flash drive on the ground. It was just a black flash drive, much like the ones I used for school. Figuring it was just one that had fallen out of my bookbag when we first got here, I leaned down and picked it up and shoved it in my pocket.

I pulled myself into the passenger side and got hooked in. The other two finally joined me, William sitting behind Xena while she got in her spot. For a brief period, I was almost worried the car wouldn't start but my fears were put to ease. Xena backed up and we sped out from the cabin.

"Okay, what do we tell our parents?" Xena asked when we got away from the cabin.

"What do you mean?" William spoke up.

"I mean, what do we tell them? Because I don't know about you, but I don't want to go tell my parents we were terrorized by something in the woods. I don't think they'd be okay with that." Xena retorted, looking back at him in the rearview.

"Okay...that's a good point." William reasoned, before sighing.

"Could tell them it wasn't as fun as we thought?" I offered.

"Nah, we're all too much of the outdoors type." Xena countered.

"The storm knocked out the electric?" William offered this time.

"Then my dad's gonna come out and see that we're lying." Xena replied.

We sat in silence for a bit, each of us trying to decide on something to tell our parents. I grabbed my phone and began to scroll through my emails. If I still had it, I could just... Score.

"Remember that concert that's happening tomorrow night?" I asked, looking at the other two.

"Yeah, we picked camping over it because we weren't too interested." William replied.

"I got three tickets for it. I won them on that radio contest. Could say we decided we wanted to do something fun instead?"

There was a brief pause as they thought over my words. After a few seconds they both shrugged and Xena spoke up.

"Sounds like a good idea to me."

We rode in silence then, all the way back to town. I felt almost relieved at seeing the familiar streets. Xena dropped me and William off, William getting our stuff, before driving off. I helped William get our things inside and came face to face with our dad.

"What are you two doing home early?" He asked from where he was sitting.

"We decided we'd rather go to that concert tomorrow night than camp." I replied.

"Wow, that's different for you little fairy."

I rolled my eyes at the pet name, but had to try not to smile.

"Xena and William talked me into it. Plus, it might be kind of fun." I defended.

"Well, it is your weekend to have fun." He replied.

Me and William nodded before heading upstairs to our rooms. As I closed the door to mine, I noticed the fact a new desktop was sitting on my desk. I smiled lightly and made a mental note to thank my dad later. I unpacked all my stuff, which wasn't as fun as packing it up, before getting stripped. As I took off my jeans, the little black flash drive fell out of my pocket. I looked at it before sitting it on the desk. I decided that I'll look at it later to see what was in it.

Once I was in comfy clothes, I left my room to find busy work. Something about the woods still set me off. Especially that weird shade of blue that followed us everywhere. I shuddered just thinking about it. That was behind us now though.

At least, I hope.