The Sheriff's house is very cold despite the heat of the late summer outside.
"My girlfriend is asleep," Sheriff Terry tells me. "Please be quiet. Are you hungry?"
"No, thank you," I whisper. He guides me down a small hallway and opens a door to a bedroom.
"This is where you'll be staying," He points into the room. It's dark and the curtains are drawn, and it's mostly empty aside from a bed and a nightstand.
All I do is walk in and collapse. The air smells a little musty and the air has a stagnant chill. The blankets and pillows are all cold and I feel my body sinking into it when I slump over onto it. Terry closes the door and before long I'm asleep again for the night.
I wake up with both of my legs slung over the bed, only a moment before I find myself crashing down to the floor.
"It's fine, I just wish you'd have said something," A woman from the other room speaks up. I open the door and peek through to the kitchen. The morning sun is barely shining through the windows, and Terry waves me in with them.
The woman outstretches her hand to me. "My name is Elise," She says. "It's nice to meet you, Lila."
I shake her hand and rub my eye. "You, too," I say.
"There's cereal in the cabinet. Help yourself, little lady," Elise says.
"I'm going to work," Terry says, grabbing his hat and putting on his vest.
"Terry?" I ask.
"Hmm?"
"When will I go home?"
He turns the door handle and leans on the opened door. "I don't know. Soon, I promise. I'll see what I can do."
"Okay," I say. He leaves.
I make myself a bowl of cereal and eat it in silence. Elise is in her bedroom and I can hear her wrestling with some drawers. The cereal was just wheat squares and is now soggy. The milk has turned a light brown from the brown sugar Elise put in for me.
"Try this on, see if it fits," Elise rounds the corner into the dining room, which is just across from the kitchen. She puts down a tank top and brown jeans on the seat next to mine. "When you're done eating, of course."
"Thank you, Miss, um..."
"You can just call me Elise," She says. "And you're welcome."
I look in the mirror. The tank top is a little loose but It does fit. Same for the pants. I bring it up a little ways on my waist and strap the belt around to keep it up. Elise watches me leave the bathroom and she nods like "looks good."
"What should I do now?" I ask. She shrugs.
"I don't know. You can't leave the house, though." She walks over to the front door. "I need to leave for work. I'll be back at 6 and we'll have dinner. Is chicken okay?"
I nod and she leaves. So now I'm alone in this strange house for strange reasons, and frankly, I don't know what to do for 8 hours.
I watch T.V. for a couple hours, then I turn it off cause I got bored. I keep thinking about the hand and the boxes. I keep thinking about how that could've been me. Sometimes I think again that I wish it was me. But I remind myself that I don't. I just don't.
And Ryan and Anna... What's happening with them? Are they okay? Are they alive? There's a sinking feeling in my stomach when I imagine where they must be right now, or how they must be feeling if they even are alive.
I think about when I was lying on the ground in the forest. I really couldn't see anything with those flashlights in my face. Nothing except the barrel of their guns and the silhouettes above me.
I realize I'm white-knuckling the remote and I throw it back onto the coffee table. No matter how much T.V. I watch, how loud I turn the volume up, there's nothing that could keep my mind from racing, from thinking about my friends.
I need to do something.
I race down the hall and into the kitchen and grip one of the knives and just stare at it. I look back at the door, then at the knife again. I know what I can do... I go to Christian St, I find their little hideout, I kill them all. Then, I can take Ryan and Anna back home, we can have our town back, and then I can show everyone my cool powers.
I tap my foot on the tile anxiously, building up the courage to just go do it. Finally, I bolt to the door and swing it open, and then immediately I tuck the knife behind my back.
"Uh, hey?" Aahan, on the other side of the screen door, says to me. His hand is raised as if he was about to ring the door bell.
"Aahan, hey," I say. "What are you doing here?"
"I brought you some clothes. I like your outfit, by the way. It looks good."
"Uh, thanks," I say. It's quiet for a second until he lifts a trash bag up, assumedly full of clothes. "Oh, of course," I open the screen door for him and he comes inside. I set the knife quietly down on a countertop behind me and he tosses the trash bag onto the couch.
"I've been in here before," Aahan tells me. "I was friends with Terry when he was a senior. This used to be his old man's house before he moved to Oregon. Remember that? Whole town came out to say goodbye."
"I was, like, ten. I don't really remember much."
"I remember stuff from when I was ten. Anyway, I also put your soap and stuff in there. Oh, and here's your phone," He hands me my phone. "Mom told me not to stay very long, if that's alright. Seems like you're doing fine anyway."
"Thanks," I say.
"Crazy stuff," Aahan says. "But I'm certain Terry has it under control. He's just like that, you know?"
Aahan slaps my shoulder and walks out with a goodbye. As soon as his car (truthfully, it's my mom's car) leaves the road I turn back to the counter to stare at the knife. Honestly, I'm not feeling nearly as confident as I was three minutes ago.
I take the knife in my hand and I close my eyes. "I want to be whisked away," I say out loud. I don't see anything, and for a moment nothing happens.
"I want to leave, I want to be smoke," I say. Still there is nothing. "Come on, man, I know you're in there. Let me talk to you." Still, and again, there is nothing.
I open my eyes. Everything is normal. Damn.
I step outside and close the door behind myself. Sure, I'm nervous. Hell, I'm shaking. But I have to do something. I can't stop thinking about Anna and Ryan. It's all my fault. Ugh. I feel awful.
Did Terry ever tell me not to leave the house? Ah, I can't remember. But he obviously was thinking it. I can't let them know I'm still alive... they'll finish the job if they ever find out. Aahan told me that Terry could handle things. He has faith in our sheriff. Ugh! Why don't I, too?
I rub the side of the knife with my fingers, pinching it and feeling its smooth cold surface. I mean, I can't just sit around and find out, right? It's my fault, it's all my fault. It was always my idea to push the buttons. I just can't leave them to fate.
God, this is so hard! I haven't moved for ten minutes, I've just been pacing around trying to build the courage to walk down to Christian street and do what I ought. Ugh!
What if I make things worse? What if they catch me again? Could I do that thing... could I...
I feel my heart begin to race. I take deep breaths, acknowledging the fear I feel. But I also feel a responsibility. I owe it to them to just try. I can't... I can't let my fear stop me. I have to do something.
I wander towards the center of town. There are few trees, instead houses, each a set of eyes watching my every move. I catch another sight of one of the boxes and think, what could be in there? A heart? Someone's eyes? Their head?
I tuck the knife in the back of my pants and keep walking. It's hard to act natural even though I've been doing it my whole life. I feel so strange, like I don't belong here anymore. Who else knows? Was it just Terry who was told I'd died? Does everyone here think I'm dead?
The road forks into a Y-shape. In the middle is the town hall, and a little ways down the right is Christian street.
A few steps up the hill of Christian street and I could see the whole thing, beginning to end, right where I stood. I kept glancing over my shoulder to see if someone was following me because it always felt like there was. There hasn't been anyone yet.
Up Christian street there is just one house. We all call it the Jackson house, 'cause that's who lived there before he died. It's abandoned now. No family who bought it after his passing stayed longer than two days because apparently it was haunted. Now, nobody even goes up this street.
The end of this dead end road is a small path which led into the forest. I don't remember such path being so wide... Maybe, I wager, you could fit a big army truck through here now, if you tried.
I approach the forest edge and peer into the trees and see nothing. The large house groans at me in the heavy swaying winds but I try to pay no mind to it. The last thing I need was more reason to be scared. I'm already shaking terribly, I hear voices but I can't tell if it's ahead of me or behind me, and keep catching silhouettes in the corner of my eye, but when I look, it's gone.
I should turn back. I pull the knife from my belt. I really shouldn't go through with this. I take a step into the forest. Those are truck tracks leading into the woods. Trucks definitely went down here. I'm so screwed.
With every subsequent step I take into this forest I feel the pressure of the previous step even more heavily than before, the weight of my decision to continue pressing on. I anxiously grip the knife with unwieldy strength. My palms perspire and wet the wooden handle. I wipe them off on my pants and try to continue on but the tension nearly pulls my heart out of my chest, beating in anticipation of what might come, sending a pulse a hundred times between each wary step. I get closer, I walk further down this road.
Ahead now there's a clearing. I've now walked for so long my feet hurt but I just keep pushing. The clearing opens widely to an encampment, large military green tents and pop-up structures fill this field almost to completion. I close my eyes once more and ask to be whisked away, but once more when my eyes are opened I see nothing has changed.
A voice echoes over the fence they'd hap-hazardly set up around the encampment. Past the military trucks just in front of me I see an opening between a couple of the tents.
I slither through the trucks and peek around the corner of a tent into the camp. There's maybe a hundred men and women pacing around this camp, holding boxes or driving some kind of vehicle. They're everywhere.
Continuing around the perimeter there's an opening into one of the tents. I quickly peek my head around the corner, then snap it back. I take a second to realize what I'd seen, like a polaroid film developing. There was one man and the other end of the tent was closed.
My heart is racing, I'm clutching the knife. I can't believe I'm actually about to do this. I'm not just going to stab him, right? No. I'm going to ask him where my friends are. Yeah. Then I'll go get them. Maybe I'll make him go get them. No... He'll just go for help.
My breathing is erratic and racing so I cover my mouth and try to calm down. I can't. I can't calm down. I just have to do it.
As quietly as I possibly can, which is not quietly at all, I dash into the tent and grapple the man.
"Shut up, don't say anything," I tell him. I press the knife firmly against his back. Immediately, there's a strike against my face and I fall back, clutching my chin. He stands up and looks at me, then kneels down and punches me in the face again. I resist the urge to wail in pain, but my face had cracked or popped with the swing. All I can do is close my eyes and plead, come on, come on, come on...
"You must be really stupid, huh?" The man says. He rears his fist back once more, and then...
And then, it was silent. The world when I opened my eyes was black and white again. I got up quickly and stepped to the side, tapping underneath my nose and bringing my hand back to look. Blood. Damn, it hurt a lot.
I close my eyes and take a deep breath. I want to go back. I can do it.
When my eyes opened I saw him again, crouched down, holding the knife, I had dropped it when I was whisked away. I swiftly kick his face, causing him to fall over and drop the knife.
"What the hell?" He exclaims. I don't talk, my heart is racing, I pick the knife up and I just... I stare at him. I'm not going to stab him, am I?
The man boots my chest and scrambles to the door. "What the hell are you?" He asks, struggling to pull apart the curtains.
I don't say anything. What was I thinking? that I could take on the entire army on my own?
I just turn and run.