screaming season

camping

Alice and Abby were close growing up due to their shared love of nature, they took a camping trip to the same woods each october, when Abby died alice had no doubt that the camping trips were what she would miss the most. When Alice announced that she had decided to go camping alone everyone tried to talk her out of it, they said they would be happy to go with her but she told them she wanted to go alone, that was part of the excitement for her. On the night that she was set to leave her mom called her saying that she was worried about her being alone in the woods for that long. "Mom I'm gonna be fine, you worry too much, Abby isn't here to go with me so it's up to me to keep the tradition alive" "i know honey, but the woods are dangerous, you dont know what you could run into out there." "Mom.. Abby would want me to go on this trip alone, she got upset when i asked if i could bring a friend last year, this trip will always just be for me and her, even if she cant come along anymore." Her mom was silent for a moment. "I don't think she would want you to get hurt out there.." Abby knew what her mom was really afraid of, she had already lost Abby, she didn't want to lose her as well. She calmed her mom down and promised she would be safe, she said bye to her and continued to pack for the trip. She made sure to pack Abbys favorite book of campfire stories, maybe she could read them in the tent and pretend Abby was still there with her, even though she hated scary stories she knew how much her sister had loved them and she used to love seeing the smiles on her face as she read the stories aloud to her.

Alice knew the way to the campground like the back of her hand, her sister and her had traveled it so many times that it felt like she was driving home after a long day, she kind of was going home in a way she had never felt more at peqce than when she was under the canopy of trees. She parked the car near the start of the path and got out to get her stuff from the top of the car, as she was takig her stuff down a girl walked out of the woods, she looked like she had camped there overnight. She had this look of fear mixed with relief on her face. "Rough night?" Alice called. The woman jumped and turned to her. "there's something else in there..." The woman said in a creepy tone. Alice walked over to her worried that she had some sort of illness or something but every time she got close to her she backed away. "Are you okay? Do you need help?" Alice asked. The woman ran to her car parked across the road and Alice shrugged it off, someone would help her, if she needed it. Alice walked along the path to the campsite stopping to enjoy the beautiful scenery. When she set up her tent she walked a little farther away from it to watch the sunrise from the top of the trail. This was her favorite part of the trip every year. Alice would bring out a cooler of drinks and they would sit and watch the sun set until it got dark enough to build a fire. Abby was the one who taught Alice how to build a fire. Every time Alice lit up the grill or started a campfire she would remember how difficult it was to start her first fire, and she remembered how comforting Abby was to her when she would mess up. Alice quickly set up a small campfire as the suns light began to go dim. She pulled out a bag of marshmallows and started to make s'mores as she read aloud from the book, she knew Abby couldn't hear her, she knew she would never see her face light up when she pretended she left the book at home only to dig it out of her bag as the fire started burning. Alice got so caught up in the stories she forgot she was alone. When she put the book down and rediscovered that Abby wasn't there she got almost as sad as she did the first time she learned Abby had died. She shook off the sadness and began to put the fire out, deciding it was time to go to sleep.

Alice woke up to screams coming from the woods outside the tent. They sounded almost humanlike, Alice tried to tell herself it was nothing, it was probably just a fox or something, they screamed sometimes and Alice has never actually heard a fox scream before but she had learned that their screams were very similar sounding to a humans, but Alice had never seen a fox in these woods, and she had been coming there for years. The curiosity got better of Alice and she slowly crawled to the tent opening, she moved the zipper back and stuck her head out, it took her eyes a little while to adjust to the darkness but as soon as they did she looked towards the direction the scream had come from. There was a woman in the woods, she was tall and thin and it looked like she wasmt wearing any clothes. "Maybe its the woman from before." She thought. She was about to close the tent door hoping that the woman would get help from someone eventually but then the woman whipped her head around and looked straight at Alice, the woman let out another blood cursling shriek as she began to run towards Alice's tent. Alice zipped the door shut and hoped that that would be enough to keep the woman out, but the woman got close to her tent and started to scratch at the tent. A hole opened up in the tent and Alice heard the woman scream again as she ripped the tent some more. Alice grabbed her flashlight and turned the flashlight toward the woman's face and the woman hissed as she ran away from the light. Alice set her flashlight in front of the tent for light protection and hoped that it was enough to keep the woman (or whatever that thing was,she wasn't even sure it was human) away. In the morning she packed up her things and moved to a different campsite in a different woods, she still liked the woods but she would never step foot near that campsite again.