Pitch Perfect SpookFest Day 5 - H is for Hike
Words: 9282
Summary: Beca takes Chloe on a hike she used to do with her Dad. It’s a chance for Beca to feel closer to him, and a chance to introduce Chloe to one of her former favourite pastimes. Beca soon discovers that there is more than just memories hiding in the trees.
Notes: Buckle up boys, this one’s a long one! I’ve really let myself have free reign with the horror in this one, and haven’t held myself back at all. I mentioned previously that I’ve been reading almost exclusively horror this year, and Adam Nevill’s The Ritual was one of my favourites, and the setting of this was definitely a little inspired by that.
@pitch-perfect-spookfest
Read on AO3
-
“Bec?”
“Hmm?”
“You doing okay?”
“Uh huh. A little tired.”
Beca’s hands clenched and unclenched around the straps of her backpack, her shoulders burning under the weight of it.
“We can stop if you need a break?”
“No, I’m good,” Beca said, turning to smile at Chloe. “This is just a bit more physically demanding than I remember it.”
Chloe smiled back and they continued to walk.
“I’m glad you told me to wear these boots for a few weeks at home first,” Chloe said, taking hold of Beca’s hand as she helped her step down a particularly craggy rock. “I think a blister out here would finish me off.”
“Yeah,” Beca said. “I remember Sheila learning that lesson the hard way. I honestly thought her and my Dad were gonna divorce right there and then.”
“How is Sheila?” Chloe asked.
Beca shrugged. “I dunno. Better, I think, now that we’re doing this. She didn’t like him just being stuck on a shelf.” As if on instinct, Beca reached a hand around to press against the front of her pack, pushing against the tightly packed interior, trying to feel for the small, hard, object that was wrapped safely in the centre. It hardly weighed a thing, but was the heaviest item she carried.
“I don’t think you’ve lost him,” Chloe said.
“No, I know,” Beca said, removing her hand. “But it’d be so embarrassing if we got all the way up there and it turns out I left him on a tree-stump near the parking lot.”
Chloe laughed and took hold of Beca’s hand again, this time for no other reason than just to hold it.
“We’d have to just grab him on our way back and tell Sheila we did it.”
It was Beca’s turn to chuckle now. “Damn, lying to a widow about where her husband’s ashes are scattered? Pretty dark.”
“Better than having to do this hike again,” Chloe replied, squeezing Beca’s hand to let her know she was joking. “Are we much further from where you wanted to set up camp?”
“I don’t think so,” Beca said, removing the map from the plastic pouch hung around her neck. She knew where on the map they needed to be, and had a pretty good idea of where they currently were. “Maybe another hour and a half? We should have enough time to get everything set up before dark.”
Chloe nodded and they carried on following the trail.
Beca had done this hike more times than she could count. At one time in her life, she’d have been able to do it blindfolded, her feet knowing where to step without any input from her brain.
Now, however, it had been almost a decade since she’d last been here, and she found herself checking the map more often than she really needed to. The whole place felt totally unchanged and yet completely different at the same time. It was like she was viewing it from another angle. Through a different lens. It felt like something was missing.
It dawned on Beca that something was missing.
For the first time in her life, she was walking this trail without her Dad walking beside her.
She tugged on the straps of her bag again, feeling them dig into her already sore shoulders, and she focused on that pain because if she didn’t she’d start crying.
-
Despite being a little out of practice, Beca managed to set up their tent without much trouble. It was as if her hands knew what to do even if she didn’t quite remember the steps.
“I love watching you be all outdoorsy,” Chloe said, as Beca slid tent poles through eyelets and hammered stakes into the ground.
“Oh yeah?” Beca asked. “Is this turning you on?”
Chloe laughed. “A little.”
“If I’d known that’s all it took, I’d have taken you camping sooner.”
That night they ate a dinner of ramen cooked on their gas stove, and they watched the stars begin to appear above their heads.
Beca lit a small fire to keep them warm, and they huddled together under one blanket, sharing a small cup of spiked hot chocolate.
“Thank you for doing this with me,” Beca said, her head on Chloe’s shoulder.
“Of course,” Chloe replied, her head resting on top of Beca’s. “You don’t have to thank me.”
“I know this isn’t your kind of thing.”
“Maybe not,” Chloe said. “But I’m glad I’m here with you.”
They kissed, finished their hot chocolate, and Chloe crawled into their tent while Beca put out the fire.
Far off in the trees, she heard a branch snap.
A deer, she told herself. Just a deer.
She joined Chloe in the tent and zipped it up after her with a little more urgency than necessary.
Their solar-charged camping lamp was shoved in the corner of the small tent, turned to its dimmest settings.
“Can we keep it on?” Chloe asked, climbing into her sleeping bag. “It’s, like, insanely dark out here.”
“Of course,” Beca said, unable to shake the feeling of unease that, with the lamp on, their tent would shine like a beacon in this pitch black forest.
Beca didn’t realise how tired she was until she was wrapped in her own warm and comfortable sleeping bag.
“Night Chlo’,” she mumbled, suddenly unable to keep her eyes open.
“Night Bec,” Chloe replied. “Love you.”
“Love you too.”
-
By the time Chloe woke up the next morning, Beca was already up and preparing their breakfast of oatmeal and sweet, strong, coffee.
“Morning,” Chloe said, kissing the top of Beca’s head before joining her on the log they had used as a seat the night before.
“Morning,” Beca replied. “Sleep well?”
“Not bad. Better than you, anyway.”
Beca frowned and turned her attention away from the oatmeal so she could look at Chloe. “What do you mean?”
“I mean you were up all night, shuffling around the tent. Were you looking for something? And I’m pretty sure I asked you to keep the light on.”
“I did,” Beca said. “I never touched it.”
“Well then the battery must have died, because I woke up at like 2 am and it was basically pitch black. I could just see your… shape, sitting at the entrance to the tent.”
“Chlo’ the lamp was still on when I woke up. I slept like a log last night, I was exhausted. Unless I’ve suddenly started sleepwalking at the ripe age of 32, I didn’t move a muscle.”
“Huh,” Chloe said, frowning too. “I was sure…” Chloe shook her head, dispelling the memory of the night before and already reframing it in her mind. “I must have dreamt it.”
“You get some weird noises in the forest,” Beca said, returning her attention to their breakfast. “It can play tricks on you.”
“That must be it.”
After they ate and packed up, they were ready to begin their second day of the hike. If all went well, they’d reach their second camp spot by dinner, and their final destination tomorrow afternoon.
This used to be a hike that Beca and her Dad did in two days, but because it was Chloe’s first time, she’d planned a slower pace which meant a couple more nights in the wilderness. Not that Beca minded, she’d always preferred a slower pace to her Dad’s break-neck speed, and it meant more nights spent camping, which she loved. But their time together had always been limited, and she needed to be back at the pre-approved custody drop-off spot by Sunday night.
“You’re quiet today,” Chloe said, her voice breaking the silence that had accompanied them for the last two hours of their hike.
“Sorry,” Beca said. “I’m in my head a little.”
Chloe swapped the stick she’d been using to walk with to her left hand, and took hold of Beca’s with her right. “Don’t be sorry. I just wanted to make sure you’re okay.”
“Yeah,” Beca said. “I’m fine. It’s just… It’s weird doing this without him.”
“I can’t even imagine,” Chloe said.
Beca sucked in a breath and puffed out her cheeks as she blew it out.
She hated this feeling, the one she got right before she was about to cry.
“Bec.”
“I know,” Beca said, clearing her throat. She knew what Chloe was going to say, she’d said it to her what felt like hundreds of times since her dad had passed. She was going to tell her that it was okay to cry. That it was healthy even. That Beca shouldn’t bottle up her emotions. And Beca knew that was true - logically knew that she shouldn’t be holding everything in like a shook-up soda can - but every part of her told her it was wrong.
Beca kept her tears at bay and they lapsed into silence again.
For hours they walked, Beca ahead of Chloe by inches. She couldn’t see her, but she could feel her, a millimetre behind her left shoulder. A shadow in her peripherals.
She could hear Chloe’s footsteps just behind her, in sync with her own, close enough that if Beca stopped, Chloe would bump into her. Her left hand swung back as she walked and occasionally brushed against the textured surface of Chloe’s sweater.
Then Chloe took hold of her right hand.
Beca jumped - almost yelled out - and spun on her heels.
No one there.
Her heart was beating so fast and there was a sound like rushing water in her ears.
“Beca? What is it?”
Beca swallowed, her eyes scanning the trees behind them. She shook her head.
“I thought-” Beca cut herself off, alarmed and ashamed to hear the shake in her voice. “I thought you were behind me. I…” She swallowed again, her mouth dry, her tongue feeling thick. “I just got a fright. I thought you were on my left, not my right.”
Beca clenched her left hand and then shook it out. She had felt something brush against it. Had heard something walking right behind her.
But she didn’t want to scare Chloe - didn’t want to scare herself anymore than she had - so she told herself she’d imagined it. She rubbed the back of her left hand against the sweater she wore under her raincoat, trying to clear away the residual feeling of having touched something unknown.
“Let’s stop for a break,” Chloe said, still eyeing Beca with concern. “We have time, right?”
Not here, Beca thought.
“Yeah,” Beca said, not wanting to turn around and put her back to whatever that was, but also not wanting to stay in this spot for another second. “We can stop, but let’s cover a little more ground first.” She turned and carried on walking the trail, unable to shift the feeling that they were being watched, but refusing to turn and confirm it.
Whatever it was, she knew she didn’t want to see it.
You sound crazy, Beca thought.
Chloe could tell something had deeply rattled Beca, so she didn’t argue and instead jogged to catch up. She decided not to take hold of her hand again, and tried to remain in her line of sight as best as she could.
After what Chloe would call a 30 minute speed-walk, Beca finally slowed and they stopped to take a break.
They took off their packs and Chloe almost cried with relief at the feeling, her aching shoulders and back practically singing now the weight had been removed.
Beca poured them each a coffee from the thermos she’d filled that morning, and they drank it with some cheese and crackers.
Chloe rubbed at the knot in her shoulder as she looked up at the bright white sky that was peeking through the canopy of the trees.
“I’m not walking you too fast, am I?” Beca asked, relieved her voice sounded normal again.
“No,” Chloe replied. “I mean, that last 30 minutes was basically a run, but other than that it’s been fine.”
Beca nodded. “You’ll tell me if it gets too hard?”
“Of course,” Chloe said. Something about Beca had hardened in the last few hours, and Chloe couldn’t work out how or why. It gave her a pit of worry in her stomach, the kind she got when she thought someone might be mad at her. “I’m not, like, slowing you down or anything, am I?”
“No,” Beca said, her eyes widening in surprise. “No, you’re doing great. We’re making good time.”
She sounded sincere, and Chloe felt the tension in her loosen a little. “Good,” Chloe said. She could have left it at that, but Chloe was never one for holding back. She couldn’t swallow her feelings the same way that Beca could. “Sorry,” she said. “I just… I don’t know, I feel like you might be mad at me or something.”
Beca looked even more surprised. “Why would I be mad at you?”
Chloe shrugged. “The atmosphere’s been kinda tense, I dunno.”
“I mean, we’re here to scatter my dad’s ashes, Chlo’, I’m not sure what kind of atmosphere you were expecting.”
Chloe cringed and felt her cheeks begin to burn with embarrassment. “You’re right, I’m sorry. Forget I said anything.”
She turned away and began busying herself with checking her bag.
“I’m not mad at you,” Beca said, her voice softer than it had been a moment ago. “I’m, like, trying to process a lot of feelings right now, and when that happens I go quiet. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t,” Chloe said, turning back around so she could take both of Beca’s hands in hers. “You didn’t do anything wrong, you don’t need to be sorry. I can’t imagine what you’re feeling right now, what kind of memories being back here is bringing up, you are 100% allowed to be in your own head. I just needed to make sure I wasn’t doing anything to make it harder for you.”
Beca nodded. “Thank you,” she said. “And you never make anything harder, Chloe. I wouldn’t have been able to do this without you. Any of it.”
Chloe tugged Beca closer and wrapped her up in a tight hug. “Whatever you’re feeling, or trying to work through, I hope you know that you don’t have to do it in your head. If you want to talk, or even just think out loud, then you can. I can talk it through with you or just be a sounding board. But only if you want to. We can walk in silence, or talk about something completely different. Whatever you need, Bec.”
Chloe felt Beca nod against her, and she held her against her chest until Beca ended the hug.
They packed up, their backs groaning as the weight of the packs settled against their shoulders again, and they carried on walking.
The silence between them remained, and Chloe couldn’t think of any way to break it.
She knew Beca needed it, but she hated it.
Hated it because she was starting to feel on edge.
She couldn’t shake the feeling that they were being watched.
-
Dinner that night was spaghetti in sauce with some kind of mystery meat. Chloe had grimaced as Beca had squeezed it out of the vacuum-sealed packet, but once it had been heated on the stove Chloe’s mouth had watered at just the smell of it.
“It’s not scientifically possible that spaghetti from a bag should taste this good,” Chloe said, trying to scrape up every last bit of sauce.
“I know,” Beca said, her mouth almost smiling.
Beca hadn’t been able to shake the darkness that had been growing in her chest since that morning, and it had only gotten heavier as the day wore on. Each step caused a rock to harden in her chest, and now it was almost nightfall, she felt like she was made of stone.
Chloe cleaned up their plates while Beca lit another small fire, and they were soon huddled up together as night fell quickly.
“Is this the part where you tell me a ghost story?” Chloe asked, desperate for Beca to get out of her head.
Beca let out a laugh that was little more than a puff of air through her nose. “I don’t think I know any.”
The silence fell across them again. Beca stared into the fire, and Chloe felt like she was sitting beside a statue.
Then Beca moved suddenly, startling Chloe. She reached into her pack and pulled out the bottle of whisky she’d used in their hot chocolate the night before.
“Bec?”
“I’ve thought of one,” she said, pouring them each a small measure. She’d brought it with them so they could toast her Dad when his ashes were scattered - something that she realised was approaching closer and closer and that she wasn’t sure she was ready for - she hadn’t intended on them drinking it the rest of the nights. But the whisky had warmed her the night before, had temporarily eased the aches in her back and legs, and had allowed sleep to come more easily. Besides, she figured she might need a drink to tell the story she was about to share.
She took a sip and stored the bottle away again.
“You’ve got a ghost story?”
“Not a ghost story,” Beca said. “But a campfire kind of story.”
“Okay,” Chloe said, pulling the blanket tighter around their shoulders. She wasn’t sure a scary story in the middle of the woods was a good idea, but anything was better than silence at this point.
“Did I ever tell you about the time I got lost in the woods?”
“No,” Chloe said, frowning. “Wait, is this a true story?”
Beca nodded. “I must have told you,” she said. “It’s how I got this.” She pointed to the scar on her cheek.
On instinct, Chloe reached out to touch it. She had asked Beca about it before, had even joked that it must mean they were meant to be together, since the scar formed an almost perfect “C” on her cheek.
“You told me you got it hiking, not that you got lost,” Chloe said, her cold fingers tracing the edge of it.
The light coming from the fire had blinded Beca to the rest of the forest, and the darkness stretched out around them on all sides. Even the stars were hidden by clouds. They were a solo pin-point of light in a vast sea of nothingness. Beca felt like if Chloe let go of her arm, she would float away into space.
Beca took another sip of whisky.
“I was four,” she said. “Out hiking with my Mom and Dad. Before the divorce. The last time we did anything like that as a family. My Dad asked me to grab some sticks for firewood. I was right beside him. My Mom was in the tent, and he turned to ask her something. When he turned back I was gone.” Beca took another drink. “They found me three days later in a Walmart parking lot, the next state over.”
Chloe felt herself go cold. “What the hell?” She asked, her voice little more than a whisper. “What happened?”
“Not a fucking clue,” Beca said. “I don’t remember anything about it.”
“Nothing?”
“I remember looking down for a stick, and then I remember this old couple in the parking lot asking where my parents were.”
“Jesus, Bec,” Chloe said. “Did you just wander off?”
Beca took another drink, her eyes burning from the heat of the fire that she refused to look away from. She couldn’t look away, because then she’d have to look into the darkness. Into the forest. She didn’t want to look.
“I was four, I couldn’t have walked that far on my own, not in three days,” Beca said, a hint of strain in her voice. She was suddenly wondering why she had decided to tell this story. She hadn’t thought about it in years. “I didn’t have any shoes on when they found me. No coat or hat or anything. There’s no way I could have survived on my own.” Beca cleared her throat, and took another drink. “They think someone took me.”
If Chloe had felt herself go cold before, it was nothing to how she felt now. She practically shivered.
“Were you hurt when they found you?” Chloe asked, terrified of the answer Beca was about to give.
“No,” Beca replied. “I was fine. Healthy, even. I should have been malnourished or dehydrated or something. I was perfectly fine, except for this.” Beca touched the scar on her cheek. She cleared her throat. “They asked me what happened for months afterwards, but at the time I didn’t have the words to tell them, and by the time I did, I didn’t remember.”
“Beca, this is insane, I can’t believe I’ve known you for over ten years and I’ve never heard this story. You really don’t remember a thing?”
Beca closed her eyes. “I remember being cold, and I remember…” It came back to her sometimes in her nightmares. The wooden structure. Incongruous to its surroundings, like it had been cut out of a home depot catalogue and pasted into the forest. “It was like a hut.”
A stick snapped in the distance and Chloe jumped, and a nervous laugh followed.
“We moved basically immediately after. Mom said she felt like everyone was watching her. Judging her. She was the bad Mom who let her kid get snatched from under her nose. They divorced not long after that. Mom blamed Dad, Dad blamed himself. I’ve never been back in that forest. It took me years before I’d even agree to go hiking with my Dad again.” Beca went to take another drink. The cup was empty, and the last few drops splashed against her chin. “I didn’t speak for a full year. I… Jesus, I haven’t thought about this in so long, I thought…”
“Thought what?”
“Thought I was over it. Thought it was like a funny, mildly interesting story. The time I got lost in the woods.” She let out a laugh that sounded strange. Panicked. “What the fuck?”
“Bec, it’s okay,” Chloe said, trying not to catch the panic rising in her girlfriend. She knew it was contagious, this kind of fear, and one of them had to be calm. “You’re okay.”
“They checked me over at the hospital,” Beca said, her voice shaking as every horrible memory from that time came flooding back. “You know, just in case. And he hadn’t. I hadn’t been… But, fuck, I was four. I was four and they were checking… fuck.”
It was all rushing back to her faster than she could process it. She wanted to be sick.
This is why she kept things inside. Pushed them down and turned herself to stone.
“Did you speak to anyone after? Like a therapist or someone? Someone to help you process it?”
“Like 10 of them,” Beca said. “But all they did was try and get me to remember. Asked me to draw it if I couldn’t say it. The police tried that too. Said I needed to help them out because what if this guy snatches up another little girl, and she doesn’t get as lucky? But there was nothing in there. Nothing to draw. Just a black space. They never found him. No evidence there was ever anyone with me. This was back in the 90s, but they had basic security cameras in the parking lot, and there’s footage of me just walking into the parking lot alone. No shoes. No strange man pushing me out of a car and speeding off.”
“Man?”
“An assumption,” Beca said. “An assumption everyone else made too.”
In the light of the fire, Chloe could see Beca’s hands were shaking. She took hold of them, and Beca jumped at the contact.
“Baby, I’m so sorry this happened to you,” Chloe said, her thumb brushing over Beca’s knuckles as she squeezed her hand.
“I don’t… I don’t know why I thought about it after all these years,” Beca said, the panic leaving her voice as the heaviness returned. “I don’t know why I told you.”
“I’m glad you did,” Chloe said. “You know how I feel about bottling things up.”
Beca gave a soft grunt of a laugh. “Yeah,” she said.
“You’ve been in your head all day,” Chloe said. “You’re back camping and hiking for the first time in a long time, I’m not surprised that memory came back.”
“I wish it hadn’t,” Beca said, rubbing her free hand against her forehead.
“I know,” Chloe said. “Let’s go to bed. You’ll feel better after some rest.”
Beca didn’t think that was true, but she knew Chloe was only trying to help so she didn’t argue.
A night of rest wasn’t going to undo this thing that had happened to her almost 30 years ago. It wouldn’t break up the rocks that had been settling in her chest all day. It wouldn’t change the fact that her dad was little more than a pile of ash stashed in her bag, instead of the living breathing man that should be here.
She tried to give Chloe something close to a reassuring smile, but her mouth barely moved. It was as if this was turning to stone too. Her face a frozen expression of grief and pain.
“You go on ahead,” Beca said. “I’ll take care of the fire.”
Chloe went into the tent to set up their beds for the night, and Beca was alone in the woods.
Except, she knew she wasn’t alone. That feeling of being watched had never left Beca since it arrived, and she was acutely aware that by standing in the light of the fire, it could see her, but she couldn’t see it. It could be a foot away and she’d have no idea.
Before the fear could take hold and root her to the spot, she began putting out the fire, and then backed into the tent rather than turning around.
“All good?” Chloe asked, already curled up in her sleeping bag.
“Mhm,” Beca replied. “Light staying on?”
“Please,” Chloe said. “You sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah,” Beca said, getting herself ready for bed before climbing into her own sleeping bag. “Weird day.”
“Yeah,” Chloe agreed.
“I’m sorry,” Beca said.
“What for?”
“Being all… You know. Moody. Brooding. Whatever.”
“You don’t need to apologise for that,” Chloe said.
“Still. I’m not myself. Not fun to be around right now.”
“You don’t have to be,” Chloe said. “You’re grieving. Get some rest, Bec. I can tell you’re tired because you’re not even talking in complete sentences.”
Chloe was right. Beca was exhausted and not just from their hike.
“‘Kay,” Beca said. “Night. Love you.”
“Love you too, baby.”
The sound of rustling in their tent woke Chloe up again that night.
It was dark. Darker than anything Chloe had ever experienced.
It was as if the darkness was a physical presence, and not just the absence of light. She could feel it pressing all around her. Smothering her.
Chloe wanted to ask Beca if she was okay - because who else would be rustling around in their tent - but she found she couldn’t. She was scared that if she opened her mouth the darkness would pour in and she’d drown in it.
Then she heard another sound which made her blood run cold.
Beca was crying. Sobbing. Right beside her on the ground.
Which meant there was something else inside their tent.
A fear like Chloe had never felt before gripped her so tightly she was afraid she’d shatter.
She wanted to cry. To tell Beca to be quiet. To do something about this intruder that might wish them harm.
But she couldn’t.
All she could do was squeeze her eyes shut and hold her breath and pray that it would go away. That whoever or whatever it was would leave them alone.
Beca continued to sob beside her, and Chloe realised this was the first time she’d ever really heard her girlfriend cry. She wanted to cry too but she swallowed the urge.
“Please,” Beca whimpered, her breath shuddering between each painful sob. “Please, I want to go home. I want to go home.”
Her voice sounded so much smaller than usual. So much younger. She sounded like the lost little girl in the story Beca had told earlier that night.
Beca’s story came back to Chloe like a bad dream she’d tried to forget.
In her mind, she could see her huddled. Shivering. Looking up at… something. Something her four-year-old brain didn’t understand. Something she couldn’t put into words, but she knew enough to be afraid.
All Chloe wanted to do was reach out and comfort her, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t move because she could still hear this thing in their tent.
Behind her closed eyes, Chloe could see light. A dim glow that had returned to the tent.
She almost opened her eyes.
Almost.
Then she heard another rustle, and she knew they still weren’t alone. It was still there with them.
Chloe could feel it watching them.
It had turned the lamp back on. It wanted Chloe to look but she wouldn’t. She couldn’t.
It was silent save for the soft whimpering still coming from her girlfriend. So silent that she couldn’t hear the sounds of the rest of the forest anymore. No animals scurrying or owls hooting, or the wind rustling through the trees.
She could feel its eyes burning into her and she could feel herself beginning to shake as she realised something else.
She’d heard those noises the night before and had attributed them to Beca.
Now she knew better.
This thing had been in their tent last night too.
Had likely been following them this whole time.
That feeling she’d had of being watched wasn’t just her mind playing tricks on her.
The silence dragged on with the feeling of pressure in their tent growing and growing. Chloe felt like she was waiting for a jump-scare in a movie.
Then she heard the whine of the zipper being pulled, and felt a rush of cold air blow through the entrance to the tent. She heard the zipper again and the soft retreating footsteps of whatever it was.
They were alone again, Chloe could feel it, but she still couldn’t bring herself to open her eyes.
In her head she counted to ten. Twenty. Thirty.
“I want to go home,” Beca cried again. “I want my Daddy.”
It was enough to finally force Chloe’s eyes open, and she felt a brief flood of relief to discover they were in fact alone again.
Beca was curled on her side, knees pulled into her chest, body shaking with each cry for home and for her dad.
From her spot beside her, Chloe could see that the scar on Beca’s cheek was bleeding. The scar was over 20-years-old, long faded and barely visible, but was somehow bleeding like a fresh wound.
Chloe tried for the rest of the night to wake her, but she couldn’t. Beca remained trapped in the nightmare where she was a lost little girl, begging to go home.
All Chloe could do was hold Beca in her arms. She assumed sleep would never come, but at the sound of the birds and the sight of soft light beginning to filter through their tent, she finally did.
-
Chloe was alone when she woke up only a few hours later.
She scrambled up and out of her sleeping bag and was relieved to see Beca sitting just outside the entrance of their tent.
The cold air bit at her exposed arms and legs, but she didn’t return to the tent to get dressed.
Beca was hunched over their camping stove, but was staring off into the trees. Chloe could smell the burning oatmeal in the pan and hurried forward to take it off the heat.
Beca didn’t even react to her presence. Her eyes were slightly puffy from the hours she’d spent crying the night before, and the cut on her cheek was beginning to scab over.
Chloe thought she looked empty. Lost.
“Beca,” she said, taking a seat beside her, the wooden log cold and wet against her bare skin. She took hold of Beca’s arm.
Beca gave a grunt in response, but didn’t look away from the trees.
“Bec, last night…” She trailed off, unable to find the words she needed to explain what had happened. “I don’t think we’re safe here. I think we need to go home.” Even as she said it, the knot of worry tightened in her stomach. They were at least two days' walk away from where they had parked up, which meant two more nights out here in the forest.
Beca still didn’t speak, and Chloe’s panic increased.
“Something came into our tent last night. I don’t know if it was an animal or-” she cut herself off as she remembered that whatever it was had messed with their light. Had zipped and unzipped the entrance to their tent multiple times. “Something was in our tent,” she repeated. “And it was in our tent the night before. And it followed us all day yesterday, and I think you know that. I think you felt it too.”
Beca nodded, slowly.
It wasn’t words, but it was something. It was an acknowledgement.
“So we should go, right? Like pack up and hightail it out of here? I can walk faster,” Chloe said, the speed of her voice quickening as a sense of urgency filled her. “You and your dad used to do this hike in two days, right? Well just walk at that pace and I’ll keep up, or-” Chloe’s words were coming faster. Tripping over each other in a rush to get out of her mouth. “Or we go a different way. Just whatever will get us out of this forest the fastest. We can Uber to the car when we’re back to civilization.”
Beca nodded again, her eyes never leaving the trees. Chloe was too afraid to follow the direction they were focused on.
“Baby, please say something. I’m really fucking freaked out right now.”
Beca swallowed and a tear crept down her cheek, stopping when it reached the raised scab that was still a scar only hours ago.
“I’m sorry,” Beca said. “I don’t… I don’t know what’s happening.”
“I know,” Chloe said. “I don’t either, but I need you right now. I don’t know what I’m doing out here, and I need you to help me get us out of here. I need…” She trailed off. She had almost told Beca she needed her to snap out of it, but that seemed too harsh.
But then she thought, fuck it.
She needed to be harsh.
She needed to be harsh because she couldn’t get them out of this forest alone.
Because she refused to die out here.
“I need you to snap out of this,” Chloe said, her voice sterner than it had been a moment ago. “Something weird is happening out here, and I need you to fight it. You can’t give up, Bec. We need to get out of here.”
Beca cleared her throat and finally tore her eyes away from the trees.
“I know,” she said. “I know, I’m sorry.” She pulled out the map, and tapped on a spot. “That’s where we’re headed,” she said, pointing at the place where she intended to scatter her Dad’s ashes. “From there we’ll cut down here.” She traced her finger down a length of what Chloe assumed to be woodland. “A harder path than the way we came, but shorter. There are multiple places to join the trail, and this should lead us to one of them.”
“Have you done it before?” Chloe asked.
“No,” Beca admitted. “But we could be out of here by tonight if we take it.”
Chloe nodded. The unknown was frightening to her, but the way they came didn’t feel much better. “Then that’s what we’ll do. I trust you.”
Chloe dressed and they packed up their camp in record speed.
The oatmeal had been beyond saving, so they each ate a protein bar as they walked.
The pace Beca set was punishing, but Chloe kept up. Everything hurt from her feet to her shoulders, but she didn’t complain. She would not slow them down.
The thing still followed them.
They both knew it, could both feel it, but they refused to turn and look.
Up ahead, they saw the gradual incline of a hill, and for the first time that day, Beca thought about why they were even here in the first place.
She thought about her dad.
She thought about what she would soon be doing.
These weren’t the circumstances she’d wanted when she’d suggested the idea to Chloe a month ago.
She’d wanted time. Peace. She’d wanted to be able to say a few words. Have a drink. Cry, maybe.
Beca knew now she wouldn’t get that. She knew she was foolish to even still be doing it.
But she also knew she had to. It was her last chance.
Once she got out, she would never set foot in this place again, or anywhere like it.
Because what she knew now was the man that had taken her all those years ago had never been a man.
It was a Thing. An It. Something not human. Something that had followed her to the other side of the country..
After all these years, it had found her.
Or had it always known where she was? Had it just been waiting for the right moment?
Had it been following and watching on every hike she’d taken with her dad?
Beca shuddered as the ground sloped upwards beneath her feet.
It didn’t make any sense, but logic and reason were starting to feel like foreign concepts.
None of it had ever made sense.
How do you snatch a child from right under her parents’ noses? How does she end up in a parking lot miles and miles away from where she started?
Chloe walked beside her, her right hand holding Beca’s left, as their pace slowed as they climbed the hill.
The thing followed on Beca’s right. Its footsteps out of time with her own.
It wanted her to know it was there.
Chloe was beginning to pant beside her.
“We can stop soon,” Beca said, her own breathing just as laboured.
Chloe didn’t want to - she could feel it beside them too - but she knew they needed to.
They crested the top of the hill, and the forest stretched out beneath them.
It seemed to go on forever, and Chloe felt that panic grip her again.
How would they ever get out of this?
“There,” Beca said, pointing in the direction they had to head next, her head down to look at her compass. “Down that way.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yeah,” Beca said, pulling the map out to double check.
“Okay,” Chloe said. She unclipped the strap across her chest and let her pack drop to the floor. The relief was immediate but the pain still lingered.
Beca did the same, though she was a little more careful about lowering her bag to the floor.
This thing that followed kept its distance.
Like it understood this was a moment Beca needed to have before whatever came next.
She reached into her pack and pulled out the urn that contained what was left of her Dad.
She straightened up and took a deep breath.
“This isn’t how I wanted to do this,” she said, speaking to the urn. To her Dad. “I had a whole speech prepared, but I think we have to keep it short. The gist is, you deserve to stay in your favourite place forever. To be with nature, in this forest you loved so much. I… I miss you. I love you.”
Beca opened the urn and tipped out the ashes and they were picked up by the wind.
She had expected to feel lighter, but she didn’t. She didn’t know how she felt, but they didn’t have time to dissect it right now.
“Ready?” Beca asked. She couldn’t bring herself to glance over her shoulder at Chloe, in case it wasn’t Chloe that was looking back at her. She kept her eyes focused on the direction they were heading as she hauled her pack back onto her bag.
“Yeah,” Chloe replied, doing the same. She handed Beca another protein bar. “Let’s get out of here.”
-
Hours and hours passed and they had no idea if they were even close to getting out.
The trail Beca had chosen for them had been significantly more overgrown than expected.
The terrain was rough, uneven, and dangerous. A lot had been completely impassable and had required them to alter their course to go around it.
Beca had tried to maintain their pace but it was proving reckless. One wrong step could result in a twisted ankle or worse, and that could put them in serious danger under normal circumstances.
The sun was getting lower in the sky, and Beca was forced to bring them to a stop.
They would have to endure one more night in this place.
“I’m sorry,” Beca said, her breathing heavy as they finally conceded defeat. “I didn’t realise how bad it would be.”
“It isn’t your fault,” Chloe replied. “We didn’t have a lot of choices.”
They set up their tent even though they knew it offered them no protection from the thing that still stalked them, and they huddled inside it together without any intention of sleeping.
“As soon as it’s light we head out again,” Beca said, checking the map for what felt like the hundredth time. “I think we went too far south, we need to be more west.”
“Eat something,” Chloe said, handing her one of the vacuum sealed packages Beca had brought, and keeping one for herself.
They ate them cold, and in silence, hunger gnawing at their stomachs even after the last of the food had been squeezed into their mouths.
“We’re going to be okay, right?” Chloe asked, shuffling closer and linking her arm through Beca’s.
“Yeah,” Beca said, without conviction. “Of course.”
Darkness was falling fast, and only their dim, flickering, camping lamp provided them with any kind of light.
“I was going to propose,” Beca said, her voice breaking a long silence between them. “Before my dad… Then I thought maybe I’d do it when we got home from this trip.”
There was defeat in Beca’s voice and it made Chloe feel helpless.
“When you ask me when we get home, I’ll say yes,” Chloe said. “I’ll even act surprised.”
“What if I asked you now? Would you say yes now?”
Chloe wanted to cry. “Are you asking now?”
“Yeah,” Beca said. “I think I am.”
“You have to actually ask me,” Chloe said, tears coming quickly now.
Beca laughed and sniffed and cleared her throat. “Chloe Beale, will you marry me?”
“Yes,” Chloe replied, her voice hiccuping as she half laughed and half cried. “But you have to promise me we aren’t going camping for our honeymoon.”
“After this, I’m never going camping again.”
Beca hurried to wipe her eyes before kissing Chloe for what felt like the last time.
Darkness had truly fallen now, and she knew their time was short.
“The ring is in the bottom drawer of my desk. The one with the lock. Key is taped to the back of our photo,” she said.
Her brief moment of joy was now being replaced by the fear that had followed them all day.
It was coming.
She could hear the snapping of sticks in the distance as it made its way over to them.
“You can give it to me yourself when we get home,” Chloe replied. She could feel it too. Could feel the fear radiating out of Beca as the lamp in their tent began to flicker and die.
They were plunged into darkness.
The only thing they could hear was their own ragged breaths.
“Beca. I love you.”
Beca didn’t reply, because she was already gone.
-
The darkness lifted so slowly, Beca thought maybe she was just imagining it. Maybe her eyes were finally adjusting after so long in the pitch black.
But then it got brighter.
She thought it was the sunrise, but she knew that morning was still hours away.
What was that old saying her grandmother had said about a red sky at night?
She reached for Chloe’s hand, but Chloe wasn’t there.
There was no use delaying the inevitable.
Beca unzipped the tent and stepped out into the blood red sky.
The ground was cold beneath her bare feet, the wind bit at her now completely naked body, and her breath fogged in front of her face.
This wasn’t the same forest she’d been in only hours before.
Before her was a clearing free from trees, and in the middle was that wooden structure from her nightmare.
Beca began to sob.
No no no no no no no
God
Please
Her feet moved of their own accord towards the hut, and the door creaked open to welcome her inside.
It was so cold.
The red light filtered through the single window above the door and she could make out the shape of a creature crouched in the shadows.
The door slammed shut.
No no no
It stood. Its presence filled the space.
It was taller than the height of the hut, and it had to hunch over as it stood.
Its body was too long. The back of its head was flat against the ceiling as it looked down at her.
Red eyes and a smiling mouth with too many teeth. Ram-like horns and hooved feet. Thick matted black hair.
Beca began to tremble.
In her mind she begged and pleaded and prayed but not a sound left her mouth.
She was mute with terror, the same way she’d been as a little girl.
The cabin smelled of the cold. Of rotten leaves and neglect. Of animal waste and rotting meat.
Please god oh please please I want to go home please let me go home
This creature looming over her made no sound. It simply stared.
Like it was deciding what to do with her.
Beca knew she was in the presence of something ancient and terrible.
It was older than anyone alive. Older than the country it lived in. Older than the Gods.
She also knew that this creature was dying.
It was the last of its kind.
And Beca was here to fulfil a promise she’d made when she was four years old.
No words had been spoken but Beca had understood that when she’d left this hut as a child, that she would be expected to return. She would be expected to help.
And Beca had wordlessly agreed.
Yes. Anything. I want to go home. I want my Mommy and Daddy.
It had even left its mark so it would be able to find her again.
It’s why Beca had flat out refused to go hiking again as a child, until every part of the experience had been lost from her memories.
She knew now what would be required of her.
Without telling her body to do it, Beca backed up until she hit a wall, and then she slid down it.
Not this not this not this not this
Her mind screamed and tears rolled down her cheeks, mixing with the fresh blood now dripping from her scarred cheek.
No no no no no no no no no
The creature began to fall apart.
Its horns crumbled into dust.
Its eyes melted in their sockets and ran down its snout like tears.
Its fur fell away in clumps.
Its skin and flesh sloughed off its yellowing brittle bones.
It was nothing but a pile of bones and teeth and viscera.
Beca was not comforted by this, and she began to cry harder as she saw movement in that pile.
I don’t want this not this not this please please Jesus fuck please
She remained silent and completely paralyzed as what was left of this monster began crawling towards her.
She couldn’t move an inch. She couldn’t fight. She couldn’t scream. All she could do was watch.
-
Chloe was pacing her apartment, a cut chewed into her lip, a headache pushing against the backs of her eyes.
“Chloe, can you sit down and eat something?” Aubrey asked, her own head pounding as she watched her best friend pace backwards and forwards. “I know you think we’re going to hear something today, but-”
“It’s been three days,” Chloe snapped. “She’s been gone for three days and the last time she was taken she turned up three days later.”
“I know,” Aubrey said, trying to keep her voice calm. Trying to sound rational. “You told me what she told you. Even if that is what’s going on here, pacing a hole in the floor won’t make the phone ring any faster.”
“I can’t sit still,” Chloe said. “If it lets her go…” Chloe trailed off. It had to let her go. The alternative was unthinkable. “When it lets her go, I need to be ready. Who knows where she’ll end up, so I’ll need to be ready to leave at a moment-”
Chloe’s phone ringing and buzzing from the countertop cut her off.
“I can’t,” Chloe said, suddenly frozen in place. “Aubrey, please, I can’t.”
Aubrey nodded and answered.
“Chloe Beale’s phone, Aubrey Posen speaking,” Aubrey said, in her best lawyer voice. “Oh my god are you serious? You found her?!” Aubrey’s eyes were wide as she looked at Chloe. “Wait, she’s where? How did she - you know what, never mind, we’ll get there as soon as we can.”
Chloe felt relief flood through her like someone had opened a valve of it in her brain.
Beca was alive.
“Oh,” Aubrey said, her shoulders dropping. Chloe’s stomach dropped with them. “I’m sorry I think you have the wrong person, Beca isn’t… You’re sure? Like 1000% positive because if I tell her fiance this and you’re wrong I swear I will sue you to… Okay. Shit. Okay. Um, thank you detective. I’ll speak to Chloe now and we’ll… Yeah, we’ll get there as soon as we can.”
“Well?!” Chloe demanded as soon as Aubrey put the phone down.
“Chloe, sit down.”
“I’m not-”
“Sit down.”
Aubrey’s voice left no room for augment. Chloe sat down at the kitchen table. She fiddled with her engagement ring, twisting it around her finger as she waited for Aubrey to speak.
“She’s alive,” Aubrey said. “They found her in a Walmart parking lot and they took her to a nearby hospital. The detective is going to text the address.”
“Is she okay?”
“She’s in labour.”
Chloe blinked. Thought for a second she was having some kind of stroke. Or maybe a hallucination from lack of sleep.
Then her shoulders sank the same way Aubrey’s had. “It’s not her,” Chloe said. “Beca wasn’t pregnant.”
“Chloe-”
“Beca wouldn’t have cheated on me. And even if she did, even if she was somehow miraculously pregnant, she was certainly not pregnant enough to be in labour.”
“She’s asking for you,” Aubrey said. “That’s what the detective said.”
“‘Bree, this is impossible,” Chloe said, her voice breaking.
“So is a lot of the stuff you’ve told me in the past 72 hours,” Aubrey said. “Maybe the detective is wrong. Maybe something else is going on here. But we have to find out, right?”
Chloe nodded. “Let’s go.”
-
They arrived at the hospital the next afternoon, after an overnight flight and long drive in a rental car.
The detective met them at the entrance.
“Ms Beale? Ms Posen? I’m Detective Farrow. Please follow me.”
“How is she?” Chloe asked, her hands shaking as she followed the detective through the winding halls of the hospital.
“Okay, considering,” he said. “Still in labour, though I hear it won’t be much longer. Seems like the baby was waiting for you before making its entrance.”
There’s no baby, Chloe thought.
“When can we see her?” Aubrey asked.
“Not sure, not my circus so to speak. Down to the doctors,” he said. “You should have given the police and mountain rescue folks a heads up about her being pregnant by the way.”
“She wasn’t pregnant.”
“You thought she was just gaining weight or something?”
“Look,” Chloe snapped, pulling out her phone. “Here is a picture I took of her two days before she went missing.”
The detective frowned as he looked at the photo.
“Huh,” he said. “I’ll be damned. Late bloomer, I guess, in the stomach department.”
Chloe was starting to get annoyed with this guy.
“Can you find someone I can talk to about my fiance?” She asked.
He opened his mouth to speak, but there was a series of shouts coming from a room up ahead. He turned, his hand resting on his gun.
A man in scrubs came stumbling out of the room looking horrified. Chloe saw the name Mitchell scrawled on the whiteboard outside the door.
Her feet started moving before her mind could make sense of what was happening, and Aubrey’s hand closed around her arm, pulling her to a stop.
“Everything okay, doc?” The detective asked.
The doctor shook his head, practically tripping over himself to get away from the room.
“Has something happened to Beca?” Chloe asked, her voice shaking. “To the baby?”
“That… That’s no fucking baby,” he said.
The screams and shouts continued coming out of Beca’s room and more doctors and nurses began fleeing.
Chloe pulled her arm free of Aubrey’s grasp and she ran for the door.
She took a deep breath before she pushed it open.
In the days that would follow, a smartly dressed man would arrive and introduce himself as being a part of the FBI.
Beca and Chloe neither checked nor cared if his credentials were real.
He promised he would help, but only if Beca could tell him exactly what happened.
Beca couldn’t, and he would leave seemingly disappointed.
That same night, a nurse would tell Beca, with a straight face, that her baby had died. They could see her mouth twist at the word ‘baby’.
Beca had no reaction, and Chloe was secretly relieved.
Beca would tell Chloe months later that she thought the FBI guy took it. She would tell her that she hoped it wasn’t suffering, but that she also hoped it was dead.
But that was all to come.
Right now, Chloe had to confront the horror she had just walked in on.
Beca was on the bed, staring blankly out of the window to her right, her legs still in stirrups.
The room was empty of medical staff, and Chloe could hear the dripping sound of blood hitting the floor as it ran from in between Beca’s legs.
They hadn’t even covered her up before they fled.
Chloe’s hands were on her mouth as her eyes travelled up Beca’s body.
On Beca’s chest was something small. Hairy. Horned and hoofed. Chloe could make out the red of its eyes as its razor sharp teeth bit and tore at Beca’s breast.
It lapped up the blood that flowed.
Chloe swallowed.
“Beca?”
Beca’s head turned. Her eyes were hazy. Glazed over. Lost.
Somewhere in there, Chloe could see her fiance begging for help.
“Hi Chlo’,” she said, her voice breaking as she spoke. “Have you come to meet my son?”
