This is for you Chrissy

The Forest

MAX'S POV:

I patiently wait outside the double doors of the hellhole I just left. Chrissy should be out any second now. Maybe she won't show up. I turn on my Walkman and tap my feet rhythmically on the pavement. I'm giving her five minutes before I leave.

Be running up that building— Kate Bush sings before my listening is interrupted.

"Hey Max, you ready to get out of here?" It's Chrissy. I sigh in relief. I was sure she wouldn't come.

"Yeah. Let's go," I respond tersely. We walk in silence away from the school, past the sports courts, and into the forest that 3 short years ago permanently changed everyone's lives.

What's terrifying is how little Chrissy probably knows of it. She doesn't know that a small tear in space and time could put us right in front of a life threatening creature. She doesn't know the secrets the government hid in here. She doesn't know the truth.

Just like the rest of the town.

Suddenly, Chrissy comes to a halt behind me. Her face is white as a sheet, like she's seen a ghost. Her eyes have rolled back in her head, like a character fainting on TV but the cable cuts out and the image freezes. 

I run over to her and clap my hands, trying to snap her out of it, "Chrissy!" I exclaim.

CHRISSY's POV:

Max starts to slow and I pass by her. I make a turn and see a tree dead ahead of me, but it's not a normal tree. This tree has an old grandfather clock inside  of it.

The clock ticks ominously in front of me.

Tick... Tock... Tick... Tock....

The glass starts to crack and spiders spill out of it. So many spiders, all crawling towards me. 

"Max!" I scream, running back from where we were, but Max isn't there. The spiders are still crawling towards me when suddenly everything is gone.

"Hey, Chrissy, what just happened?" I snap out of my trance. Max is staring at me terrified. I lose my balance and stumble into her. "I saw something again. This time it was different though, a grandfather clock was inside that tree!"

"What tree?" 

We walk through the forest to where I saw the clock, but not only was the clock fake, the tree was too. There was just a clearing with a picnic table, nothing out of the ordinary.

"Do you want to sit?" Max asks me. I nod slowly, still in shock. 

When we make our way over to the bench, she sits down next to me.

"Was today the first?" she asks slowly. I gulp, "The first what?"

"Time seeing this shit," Max explains to me like it's the most obvious thing in the world.

"Y-yeah," I answer. 

"Does Jason know?"

"Oh god no. He doesn't know anything," the words spill out of my mouth like vomit, "nothing at all. Not even why I was in the bathroom. Which is good, I like it that way. I don't want him to." Why did I say that. Did I give away too much? Maybe she hadn't picked up on all of it until then.

"Right," Max responds, buried deep in thought.

Max's POV:

I know maybe I sound crazy, but I think something is very wrong here. And yes, there obviously is, and Chrissy needs to get professional help, but I mean upside down wrong. Which can only mean one thing: we are in deep shit.