Modern Monsters

Baye the Dryad

Female Reader x Male Monster

The cabin in the woods retreat was supposed to be a reward, a sweet and simple vacation your family had given you. But the more you actually say 'cabin in the woods' you start to believe in the trope. You had always loved camping as a kid, going out with your folks and straying into the forest, swimming in rivers, and making fairy houses under the roots of trees. You had bragged your entire life about how you were going to buy a cottage in the woods, grow mushrooms, and live out your days as the creepy witch lady that kids feared.

Only thing you didn't account for was actually 'living alone in the woods'. The cabin was a family hunting cabin, something your uncles and cousins used for bonding retreats or secret liaisons with lovers. Your first night had been a cornucopia of discoveries. Oddly placed underwear (which you burned), love letters, hidden troves of things you'd wipe from your memory later under the floorboards. Your grandmother owned it and she told you it was yours for as long as you needed it. You were trying to catalog the family archives for her as well as write your own novel, so she handed over the keys so you could work in peace.

You had cleaned up so you could have an area to work on the family photographs and what-nots, while also having a small space to attempt to write. That took a few days, and each night you were exhausted, so you didn't pay much attention to things like noise, animals, or whatever was living beyond the front door. It was around the start of the second week when you started realizing that wild animals roamed freely outside. You had been sitting on the porch and indulging in an erotic novel you found on the bookcase when several deer came running across the front porch. Not long after you heard rustling and snarling so you darted back into the house and bolted the door.

That night you left the porch light on, hoping that would signal any wild animal or monster in the woods to not mess with you. You snuggled down into bed, laying your head on the pillow and as you closed your eyes there was a tap, tap, tap at your window.

"It's a moth," you whisper to yourself. "It's a dumb little moth."

Another tap, tap, tap.

"The light is on the porch," you grumble. "Dumb little moth." You pull the quilt over your head.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

You shoot up in bed and look out the window, seeing it has suddenly become covered in vines. They blow in the wind, or are they actually just moving? You look around before ducking under the blankets again and tucking them around you tight. You squirm and wriggle, hoping to become as small a ball on the center of the bed as possible so it seems like the only thing there is a pillow.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

"Let me in," a deep sing-song voice echoes. "I want to welcome you to the neighborhood." They tap on the window again. "You aren't like the others who come here. I just want to say hello."

You squeak and squeeze yourself into the corner.

It goes quiet after a while, and you don't fall asleep until late into the night, or perhaps the early morning. When you wake, there is a gentle breeze on your face and the scent of fresh morning air wafting through the cabin. You sit up and rub your eyes, grumbling about the draft. You then see that the window is pressed open, vines having grown in and over the walls and even the floor. You peek outside, noticing the vines growing from somewhere out in the woods. As you get close, the vines blossom with small purple flowers. A sweet scent fills the small cabin and as much as you want to enjoy the aroma, you still feel anxious.

Whatever was at your window last night would most likely come back again, and now, you can't even close your window. You try to pry up the vines, but they won't budge. Whatever is holding them to the walls is better than superglue.