I stopped short, and Lee almost barreled into me. I had spent so long convincing myself that it wasn’t real, that it couldn’t have possibly been real. I felt the blood leave my face as all of the memories came rushing back.
Lee broke my reverie. “I’ll be damned; I half imagined it wouldn’t be here. That it never was here.”
I watched as he slid his hand into Jennifer’s, interlocking their fingers. I felt my face flush with anger.
I flicked the flashlight on and shone the beam into the cave. As I inched closer it started to come into focus. The tree stump, just as I’d remembered, except it was surrounded by trinkets. Necklaces, bracelets, keychains, keys, car fobs, cell phones, even a hoodie were all draped around it like offerings at an altar.
“Sarah’s book.” I said, realization dawning on me. It was real. It had all been real.
“What?” Lee asked.
“Sarah was reading a book that summer. Nancy Drew, I think. When I found Jennifer here, she’d left the book. That’s how she chose Sarah. She left the book.” I turned to face him. “Which means you took something from Marcus, didn’t you?”
He rubbed the back of his neck with his free hand.
“Answer me!”
“Yes, alright? Yes. I nicked a keychain from his pocket that night at the beach. I brought it down here. Look, I didn’t think it was real. I thought I was dreaming. I thought he was messing with us, and I was mad, okay? I figured if we came back down here and he saw his keychain it would freak him out.”
“But then he went missing,” I continued. “He went missing and you knew, but you didn’t say anything. You let us all believe he was trying to scare us, and you knew the truth!” I stepped closer, closing the distance between us.
“I didn’t know. I was a kid. It was messed up.”
Fucking Lee. He was responsible for what happened to Marcus, and for what happened to Jennifer. And now he thought he’d just step back in and push me out again?
“What are you gonna do, man?”
I stalked into the cave, he trailed behind me, trying to grab me, to stop me. I looked over my shoulder, then grabbed the tree branch, which looked so much like a hand. “I’m going to play.”
• • •
That night the Forest Man came to me in my dreams. Franklin, Marcus, and Sarah were all with him, but there were others, too. Children I didn’t recognize. They sang to me, taunted me, and offered me things.
“Come play!” they sang, “Come play!”
I shook them off of me. “I can’t play with you, I have to take care of Jennifer.”
The Forest Man stared down at me, millipedes marching in and out of his eye sockets. “If you won’t come and play with me, who will?”
I fingered a white Bic lighter in my pocket. A lighter that Lee had dropped inside the cave all those years ago, and I knew what my answer would be.
Holley Cornetto
About the Author
Holley Cornetto was born and raised in Alabama, but now lives in New Jersey. To indulge her love of books and stories, she became a librarian. She is also a writer, because the only thing better than being surrounded by stories is to create them herself. She can be found lurking on Twitter @HLCornetto
https://twitter.com/HLCornetto
Return To The Woods
G. Allen Wilbanks
Elliot Durant marched forward, raising his feet high to avoid the worst of the uneven terrain. He ducked awkwardly to avoid a thick, low-hanging branch as he weaved between the trees and dense brush. Elliot did not want to be back here but, circumstances being what they were, he had been given no choice. He stumbled, but managed to keep his feet despite the stiff outcroppings of manzanita grabbing and pulling at the orange material of his prison-issue jumpsuit. The guards had agreed to unshackle his legs for this trek, though his hands remained cuffed together and linked to the body chain around his waist, making his balance somewhat precarious.
“This where you killed them?” asked the guard standing behind him. The man wore a black and tan uniform and casually held a shotgun in his right hand, the barrel pointed at the ground.
“I didn’t kill my family,” Elliot responded automatically, though he knew no one believed him. His claims of a monster living in the woods hadn’t convinced anyone that he didn’t murder his wife and two sons. It was too outlandish; too implausible. The story only made him sound insane.
Another man, an El Dorado County assistant district attorney named Dirk Cecil, stepped up and grasped Elliot’s arm to help steady him when he tripped over another manzanita bush. “Watch your step,” he said. The self-important little bureaucrat tried to smile at him, perhaps to appear more companionable, but he was panting for breath and the expression quickly slipped away. The ADA was grossly overweight, and clearly unused to physical exertion more strenuous than standing up from his office chair or signing legal papers. Wearing a white button-up shirt and dress slacks – poor attire for a forced slog through the forest – he did not appear to want to be in these woods any more than did Elliot.
“I didn’t kill them,” Elliot repeated.
Dirk shook his head. “Doesn’t matter anymore, Mr. Durant. The jury will decide whether or not you go to prison. Right now, I just need you to keep your end of our deal. You show us where the bodies are, and I don’t go after the death penalty.”
“I’m not sure I remember exactly where they were. Even if I can find the place again, the creature may have moved the bodies after it let me go.”
“Even if animals have gotten at the bodies, there should still be evidence of where they originally were. That will be enough.”
“No,” Elliot insisted. “Not
