The night flexed its vast muscles as the evening drew on, the darkness growing thicker and fuller with every passing minute. The trees didn't help, that could be said for certain, stars barely able to break the dense coverage, pinpricks of light desperately clawing their way in, to little avail. The moon had little luck breaking the canopy either. Crickets screamed their repetitive reverberations, a choir of just two notes ringing out.
Fingers of light sliced through the trees, undulating left-to-right and back again, flashlights being blindly swung to illuminate the pathway that vaguely existed. If you squinted hard enough, what could be assumed to be an impression of a trail of some kind did exist, though it was obviously not walked by Man any time in the last few years.
With the two flashlights came a pair of voices, not that either of them was particularly talkative, but the duo were desperate to fill the earsplitting silence with something. They had abandoned their busted-up 1980s Ford Escort in a ditch not too far from where they now trekked, with the intention of exploring the foliage. Age and curiosities had immediately gotten the better of the driver and passenger. Sarah, flashlight gripped in a white-knuckled fist, trudged a fraction ahead of Jeremy, her rosy cheeks made even pinker by the cool night breeze nipping at her face. They didn't discuss anything in particular, their communications were mainly bursts of reassurance followed by half-hearted joy that they were still in each other's vicinity.
Neither especially wanted to be there, but then again neither wanted to leave.
Three sets of footsteps slogged down the nondescript path, broken up by the occasional stumble from Sarah or Jeremy, three sets of footsteps leading deeper into the leaden woodland, three sets of footsteps.
Wildlife had long scattered like mice from a sinking ship.
Not that Sarah took much notice of her peripheral surroundings, her heartbeat pounding in her ears being all she could hear. Sarah's mind remained fixed on not ploughing into a tree or tumbling 30 feet down into a ditch. She had continued to walk ahead of Jeremy, on a little exploration of her own, assuming Jeremy was on her heel.
...
At some point, the woods got denser, the path narrowing to an eventual end, welcoming Sarah into the belly of the beast. She had paused about 100 yards on from that end of the path, a call from behind breaking her from whatever thoughts she had been lost in.
The young woman whipped around in a split second, night-blind as she directed her torch in the general direction the noise had come. "who's there?" she cried, before blinding herself with her own light, bleary-eyed and just as confused. Even in her hindered state, it was obvious he was there, back at the end of the path. She let out a slightly annoyed huff of "Jeremy", hand flying to her brow, gaze shielded from the glare of the flashlight which continued to scour the foliage.
With a roll of her eyes, she dropped her torch back down to her side "I can't see past your flashlight beam", her words laced with a soft laugh and a sigh of relief to see he was still there. Though she had to squint fairly hard, she didn't take her eyes off him, hoping that, any second, her vision would adjust to the consuming gloom.
"- past your flashlight beam" he mocked.
Another faint chuckle from Sarah, another roll of the eyes, once again raising her torch to see Jeremy's face, his torch flying up directly into her eyes in unison, the young woman dazzled momentarily. His form was distorted by clawing woodland shadows, Sarah unable to tell what was his frame and what was a tree.
Daring to take a step closer, her foot landed perfectly onto a branch which announced her movements with a yelp of a crack.
Another call came.
"who's there?"
What?
A million thoughts abruptly plagued Sarah, overwhelming every sense as she tried to make sense of what had just happened. How could two words be so all-encompassing and disconcerting?
The smile which had lit up her face for the last few moments was instantaneously snuffed out, eyes, glassy with a smear of fearful tears, straining to see through the torchlight. She dropped her arm again, as did he, then she raised it, and as if on cue, he also raised it, blinding her for a third time.
What did he mean 'who's there?'. Jeremy knew it was her, they were the only people in the woods
The only people.
"I can't see" Its voice grew, the words rupturing with far more violence than before.
Both flashlights remained stable, unwavering, each pointed at the other figures face. Forehead slick with sweat, fridge clinging to her face as if for dear life, eyes unblinking as she finally managed to gain some semblance of focus. It didn't take much time or encouragement, perhaps 5 seconds, maybe less, for Sarah to work out that whoever, whatever, stood before she was not Jeremy.
Though she certainly wasn't going to stick around for a single moment longer to find out exactly what 'It' was.
As quickly as she had realised that Jeremy was probably beyond saving, Sarah took off, deeper, further, into the immeasurably wide arms of the woodland.
More than ever before, Sarah wanted to be alone.
A/N:
Please be aware I am not a professional writer and writing horror and suspense is really hard! I know this isn't fantastic and was written in just over an hour but I could not resist writing this after seeing a POV on TikTok by 80babeyy. If people like this I might do more if anyone is interested.
link to inspo: https://www.tiktok.com/@80babeyy/video/7002971075067907334?lang=en
hopefully, this did some justice to the video!
