I COULDN'T FEEL the wind anymore, just my heart pounding against my chest and the freezing air stinging my lungs with each burning breath.
"Which way are they coming from?"
"Left side!" Jeremey panted.
I whipped my head around as we darted through the field. Two yellow lights crept closer and closer.
"Maybe he hasn't seen the car," I wheezed. I turned my head back around, facing the direction of the pines in the distance. "It's parked in the other direction." I took another deep, painful breath. Daggers stabbed inside my lungs. The soles of my shoes pounded against the ground. "If we can make it to the woods, maybe we can sneak out without him catching us."
"Maybe." Jeremey's sharp, wheezing breath cut through the wind as he sprinted next to me.
The trees were only about four hundred yards away. A quarter mile. It wasn't that far. We could make it. I focused on running as my lungs continued to burn. I lied to them and told them if they could get me to the woods, I'd quit smoking for good.
"Shit, Harper!" Jeremey shouted. "Get down!"
I spun my head around. Two bright lights blinded me, blurring into one seamless flash. I froze in place, a lone silhouette, like a ghost caught in the negative. The light was ice. Joshua was pulling into the driveway.
"Harper!"
Without pausing another second, I dove to the ground, landing on my hands and knees. Pain shot thought my limbs, and my palms stung as sharp pebbles scrapped against the not quite healed scratches. I grimaced and let out a small whimper.
Jeremey turned his head back to face me. His eyes were wide in the moonlight, his pupils more dilated than I'd ever seen them, and I'd seen him pretty fucked up before. "Did he see you?"
"I don't know," I said.
"Stay low and follow me." Jeremey began to crawl along the ground, low enough to keep his body concealed by the tall, dry grass that grew like weeds as the field met the woods in the distance.
I crawled after him, making sure to keep my body down as the light blasted above our heads. My heart pounded in my chest, and my pulse throbbed in my hands. My palms were sticky and wet, but I wasn't sure if it was sweat, blood, or some combination of the two. They stung. I pulled the sleeves of my sweatshirt over them to provide some minimal protection. My lungs screamed at me, but I pushed myself to keep moving.
Only two hundred yards to go.
Dogs barked from the driveway—fifty yards away.
"Shit, shit, shit," Jeremey chanted as he crawled ahead of me.
Joshua's voice echoed in the distance, but it was a low tone. I couldn't make out any words.
More dogs barking.
They sounded closer.
I turned back around to face the house and the driveway. My eyes stretched wide, and I bit down on my tongue so hard I tasted blood. The two dogs were barreling towards us, snarling and barking as their legs pounded through the dirt, kicking up clouds.
"Jeremey, run!" I scrambled to my feet. I didn't care anymore if Joshua could see me. It was too late for that. The dogs were already on us. He knew they were chasing after something. It was only a matter of time before he figured out what.
Jeremey didn't miss a beat. In two steps he was on his feet and running right alongside me. He looked over his shoulder. "Shit! They're going to catch us."
"Keep going! Keep going!"
Only a hundred yards to the woods.
I looked over my shoulder. The dogs were gaining on us. I could see their eyes flashing in the light from the truck. I pushed myself to go faster, and my legs burned. I could hear Jeremey wheezing next to me. I guessed I didn't sound much better. I sucked in air and held it.
Shouting sounded in the distance.
We kept running.
I let out a breath. My head felt light. Everything was spinning. The sound of dogs barking grew louder and louder, and the woods ahead of us drew closer and closer.
If I hadn't have been so out of breath, I would have screamed.
In one last push, I reached the woods. I stretched my hands out and brushed them against the pine needles as though to check and make sure they were actually there and not a mirage. Jeremey came darting in right behind me.
"Harper, don't slow down!" he hissed, shoving me in the back to get me to start going again.
I stumbled a few steps, needles crunching under my feet and then continued running after him. I threw my hands up in front of my face. Sharp branches and needles slashed at the fabric of my sweatshirt. I blinked my eyes. It was so dark. I shut them and followed the sound of sticks snapping and twisting as Jeremey darted through the woods.
My foot slipped on a rock. I opened my eyes in time to catch myself on the trunk of a tree. Roots crawled out of the ground, trying to grab my feet. I stumbled over the uneven terrain. My shoes kicked sand and dirt into the air. The wind turned the dust into tiny bullets. Branches slapped me in the face. I blinked my eyes repeatedly. Thorns and brush sliced at the fabric of my jeans, catching and tugging. The tops of the trees surged and screamed in the wind like monsters.
I didn't look back. I didn't know if the dogs had followed us into the woods or not. Muted barks echoed through the twisted labyrinth of the forest, eventually becoming lost in the pines. I breathed in rapidly, unable to get enough oxygen. My heart slammed against my rib cage.
The hum of the night overtook everything. Owls hooting, sticks breaking in the distance. The trees twisted like they were coming alive. Their limbs reached out to grab me like arms with thousands of tiny needles for fingers. I imagined wolves, but I didn't hear any. The faint slivers of moonlight that made it through to the forest floor turned into glowing eyes, peering out at me through the darkness. Blood pounded through my head, and my vision turned red behind my eyelids.
"Where are we?" I finally gasped, catching up to Jeremey as he slowed down to a walk.
"We should be almost back to the road," he heaved. "We should be almost back now."
"I think we lost them." I glanced around to check, but I saw nothing but endless woods. The forest pressed in around us, suffocating. My breath came shallow like I was swimming, barely holding my head above water. We needed to get out.
Jeremey pointed off into the distance. "Here," he panted. The dark tree line broke. Light seeped in from the opening where the forest met the road. It was dim—faint moonlight—but it was something.
With a final push like swimming to the surface of a lake, we broke out of the woods. I bent over, panting with my hands on my knees. I sucked in thin, painful breaths. I felt like I'd had the wind knocked out of me. I sat down in the ditch by the side of the road. "Fuck, man. I need to stop smoking."
"Yeah, no shit," Jeremey said, pausing for a moment as he panted. He let out one final heavy breath. "Come on, car's back this way." He tapped me twice on the shoulder to get me moving again. I pulled myself to my feet and followed him as he began walking back down the road in the direction we'd come.
After a couple minutes, I spotted the car in the distance. I'd been half expecting the truck to be parked next to it, like Joshua knew we'd parked there, but we were safe. Jeremey's car was as lonely as we'd left it.
Jeremey hit the unlock button on his keys. The car beeped once, and the lights flashed. I winced and looked around, afraid Joshua or the dogs would pop out like a ghoul after hearing the noise, but nothing happened. The night went back to silence.
Jeremey swung the driver's side door open. I yanked at the handle to the passenger side, but it was locked. Jeremey pushed the unlock button one more time, and I heard the lock click. I opened the door and hopped into the passenger seat.
Jeremey put the key into the ignition and turned it. The car rumbled to life. He shifted it into drive, and then began creeping down the road in the direction away from the farm like we were tiptoeing. It wasn't the quickest way home, but neither one of us were about to go back past that farm house again.
Once we'd gone a couple hundred yards at a crawl, Jeremey turned the high beams on and we finally started to cruise.
I rolled down the window, and I lit a fucking cigarette.