In Form

Investigation

We were finally on the road. This was my chance to ask my Mom if we could go visit the site.
"Mommy?" I asked. I use 'mommy' to soften her a little when asking a question, especially when it was an iffy when she'd say yes.
"Yep?" She said. She sounded cheery, that was a good sign.
"Um... You know that news thing on TV yesterday?" I asked.
She smiled. "You want to see the crime scene don't you..." she said as if reading my mind.
"Yes..." I said with caution. I squint my eyes as if that's help me see through her.
     She looked at me for a while, then said, "Well..." I was sitting at the edge of my seat. "I kind of want to see it for myself to so... I say we give it a shot." She looked unsure, but was still smiling.
That was faster than I thought it would take. But I was still happy about it.
"Yes!" I said excitedly. "This'll be so much fun, we're gonna be like- detectives!"
She gave me a warm smile. She was the best single mom ever, the best in the world to me. She always understood me, she cared for me always. Sometimes I wondered how she did it.
    "Detectives? I thought it was a closed case?" She laughed.
     I shrugged. "Well, I don't think it was sheep thrives, to me that sounds silly." I shake my head with disagreement.
     She adjusted her hold on the steering wheel to a higher position. "Oh, Why is that?" She smiles.
     "Well," I give it another thought before saying it out loud. "The grass was burned, and you could totally see the sheep's blood on the grass. I don't think if you'd want to steal sheep for your own benefit, you wouldn't want to harm or damage your profit - the sheep."
    She nods in thought. "That's actually a really good point, Amber."
    I sit up straighter. "Thanks, I've thought a lot about it since last night."
    She gives me another kind smile. "My little detective." She laughs at she squeezes my shoulder.
We arrived in Lymin. I was so anxious to see the scene, like a little girl going to buy her first puppy. I always wanted to be a detective when I was younger, but now I'm just thinking of being a stay at home mom. I do have the best teacher.
I could see the chipped red paint of the old barn from a distance. We pulled up the drive and instantly the farmer walked out of his house onto the porch, waiting for our next move. Then my mom got out of the car and began to talk to the farmer. I couldn't hear what they were saying, but I read emotions by their movements.
The farmer wasn't a very joyful spirit at the time. My Mother seemed to be trying to persuade him, and she kept motioning her hands to the car, I guess she was gesturing to me. I kept looking out towards the field, trying to see the scene from inside the car, I exaggerated my excitement just in case he was watching. He kept glancing at me. Then finally he gave up as he put up his hands like she wore him down. He sighed and broke a smile, shook his head and nodded. He agreed.
   He gave us rules as to where to we could and could not go, but led us into the field for supervision anyway. The rest of his sheep were in the other field and I could see them huddled around a shed in the distance.
We walked into the field, I immediately saw the burns. I raced towards them. Then I saw blood. Sheep's blood. It was brown now as it had dried to the remaining bits of grass. There was no way this was the act of sheep thieves. The rusty brown blood was everywhere, especially near the end of the scorch towards the ruined fence. Sheep's wool was scattered about. It was like they were blasted away.
It was still warm, I could feel it from where I stood. It couldn't have been from the heat of the sun because it was cloudy. I knelt down and patted my hand along the charred ground, still warm like sand on the beach on a hot day. I felt the blackened grass, it was also warm, but less noticeable. The grass began to turn green and healthy again slowly. I recoiled my hand.
"The grass is still warm. They must have use a very special, and highly illegal, blow torch." I declared like Nancy Drew.
"Mm hm." My mom said. She seemed distracted.
I turned to investigate further, when out of the corner of my eye I saw her glance at me then pick something up and put it in her coat pocket.
I turned my head and looked at her curiously. "What was that?"
"What..." she said as she turned and looked around to see what I was talking about.
"In your pocket" I said approaching her.
She smiled. "It's an herb I found in the grass..." then looked down to her feet. I looked at her skeptically. She sighed. "Ok..." She luaghed a little. She reached into her pocket and pulled out two little rocks. On closer inspection, one wasn't a rock it was a tooth! And a sharp on at that too. The other one just looked like a tooth but it was rounder and brown. They both had dried blood on them.
"Wow!" I was so excited at the sight of real animal teeth. Maybe this will be a clue. "Why wouldn't you want to show me this? This is cool."
My mother looked pitied that she showed me this prize. "I thought you'd be embarrassed of me if you knew I collected, weird things." She said, sounding ashamed.
     I have her a look. "Embarrassed, of you? No way, I think this is cool, mom." I smile.
There was something odd about the teeth though. They seemed really big. They were as big as a bears canines, they could have been wolf, or cougar teeth. I was trying to think of all the carnivorous possibilities. Although, I wasn't a zoologist.
     I looked up and notice that the field was almost all the way backed up to the forest. Any animal could have gotten these sheep unnoticed if the farmer was in the house. But twenty sheep, that's a lot of meat for one animal or even a pack of animals, like wolves. The only impossible thing that seemed possible at the time was a T-Rex busting through the field with a giant blow torch.
I turn back around to my mom and the farmer, who's name I don't remember. "Hey mom, what about the woods?" I asked.
"What about them?" She said, putting the teeth back in her pockett.
     The farmer was facing the other field, looking at something on his phone.
"Do you think that there might be more evidence in there? The animal couldn't have ate them here the entire time, right? The farmer would have seen them by then." I said. My mother looked worried. "Oh come on what could possibly be in there?" I said. The farmer had not lifted his head at his mention.
Right after I said that I thought of all the thing that could be in there, ready to eat my face off. Lions, tiger's, bears, oh my... is all that went through my head.
"Well, be careful..."she said. "But we can't be out here for long okay." She looked back at the farmer. "Excuse me!" She called over to him.
     He looked up from his phone. "Yeah?"
     "Could we look in the woods for moment?" She asks, pointing towards the trees.
     He looked to where she pointed and furrowed his brows, then looked to his phone for the time. I could see the illumination across his face, which gave the hint to look around at the darkening sky. "Alright. It's getting late though, so only for a minute ladies." He nods.
"Great, thanks!" I said, and started for the forest that slopes up into a hill.
I hopped over the fence in a single bound and stood at the edge of the woods. My mom was trying her best not to ruin her new red coat on the barb wire fencing, not wanting to jump. I wandered into the forest without her, the setting was so beautiful. I got so lost in the woods beauty I forgot why I came in their in the first place.
I stopped to take in the aroma around me. I put my hand on a cotton wood next to me. The forest had a certain glow, and happiness to it, it was great feeling. Most of the leaves were gone from the tree's from the chill of winter.
     I felt a tickle on my hand and arm. I expected to see a bunch of bugs, but when I turned to look, there were cotton wood seeds, little puff balls of them, gently landing on my arm. I slowly lifted my arm, the cotton lifted into the air. As I looked up I noticed the tree that had my hand on, its branches slowly moved, swaying. But there was no wind. And as I looked around all the other trees didn't have cotton on them, and they weren't swaying at all. They looked like they were all still in winter mode. This tree in particular had little green leaf lings on it aswell.
     I moved away and shook the cotton balls off.
In an instant, I could feel a very strong wind coming. As it passed through me, it got stronger and stronger. The wind was at a constant speed not slowing down like normal wind would do. I looked around to notice that the wind was only facing me and not blowing anything else. Confused, I moved to the side and felt just a breeze, but the heavier wind moved over to me.
I looked back through the bushes I just walked through, to see how my mom was getting through this sudden burst of wind. To my surprise she wasn't being pushed by wind at all, not even a small breeze was going through her blond hair. She seemed to be distracted by her coat stuck on the barb wire. The farmer was also distracted by his phone in front of him.
I looked ahead to where the wind was coming from. It was coming through the trees, but I couldn't see through them. I started to move through the trees. The wood got thicker around me and I constantly had to push branches out f the way. Every step I took the stronger the wind got. It got so strong I couldn't take another step, I looked back and I couldn't see my mom or the farmer anymore through the trees.
Suddenly, the wind stopped, and I almost fell forward. I caught myself in a lunging position and stood back up.
    It was dead silent, except for a few birds here and there. I felt like I was being watched, but I also felt like I knew where that watcher was. I stared straight ahead of me, where the wind had been coming from. I knew there was something behind the brush of sticks in front of me.
     My head had a pressure to it, like a headache that had not yet surfaced. I held it lightly as if my hand could comfort it. I quickly heard someone say something, so turned around. "Mom?" She didn't answer. My headache slowly dissipated, but the hairs on my arms and neck stood at the presence of, something.
     I turned back and peered towards the bushes that I had been looking at before, curiously, I felt like I shouldn't be here.
A very low growl came from behind the bush. The kind of growl that came from a lion that was about to pounce, the kind of growl that an animal made for defense, the back of the throat gurgling of a growl, the kind that stopped your heart.
I froze.
My heart beat at an abnormal rate after it's miniature heart attack. I took a shaky step back. The growl became louder in a second, almost barked. I stopped my foot from stepping, but I lost my balance and tried to catch myself again. I wobbled strangely to the ground, back into a full lunge. I stayed on the ground, hoping that whatever was in the bushes didn't come out and eat me. The growling stopped. I could hear my mom calling from a distance, I got up quickly.
I figured the animal behind the bush would be a bit frightened if I yelled, and it would withdraw from me. "Coming mom!" I yelled back, not looking away from where it was.
I watched the now quiet and unmoving spot where I heard the growl. I ran away from the bush looking back franticly, seeing if it was chasing me, but nothing followed.
     I tried to look calm as I approached my mother, wiping my pants off and fixing my hair. She was on the other side of the fence now, but had just ripped her new coat on the barn wire. The farmer had tried to help, but by the way she was looking at him, he had only made it worse. She groaned and murmured to herself about the torn coat.
"Ok... I'm ready to leave. Did you find anything out there?" my mom asked, adjusting her coat. She had a frustrating fight with the fence, and she was ready to leave.
I look back just in case something had decided to follow me. I look back at her, my heart still beating erratically. "No I didn't see anything..." I said with a sigh, trying to calm my nerves.
My mom perked up with a smile suddenly. I straightened at her movements. "Well, I'm glad you had fun! We better get going though. We're almost to Concrete, and it's getting dark. Don't you want to see the new house?" She turned and went to leave, then realized the fence was blocking her way.
It took me a minute to process why she was so happy all of the sudden. And I didn't say I was happy either. "Yes, definitely, let's get going!" I said excitedly, mimicking her excitement.
     The farmer held down the already low wire for us as we stepped over it, no coat was torn this time, and headed back towards our car.
I looked back as we walked away from the forest, I wondered what could have killed all those sheep in such little time, or possibly dragged them off. My worst thought was a giant grizzly. I looked down at my trembling hand, and held it still with another trembling hand. Adrenaline was still going through me, my body ready to flee the next moment I saw or heard the danger. I hurried up next to my moms pace.
Whatever it was, I didn't want to come across it again.