The Lake House

Chapter 13

I woke up to a barely risen sun and birds chirping away in the trees. What a restless night it's been; tossing and turning and mosquito bites everywhere. And sleeping with an empty stomach is not that great. This was definitely the worst night's sleep I've ever had.

I sat up, my body aching everywhere, and my feet covered in blisters from all the walking. My ankle felt better than it did yesterday, though it was swollen. I looked around, Hayley was awake but Jake was still fast asleep.

"Morning sleepy head," she said, "how'd you sleep?"

"Just as well as you did..." I said, judging by the bags under her eyes and the redness in her eyes.

My phone buzzed in my pocket. I had forgotten about it, and as I pulled it out of my pocket I realised that it too, didn't exactly benefit from me falling into the ditch. It was scratched and I could barely read what was written on the broken screen.

RISE AND SHINE. IF YOU WALK 1KM NORTH YOU WILL FIND A TABLE WITH FOOD ON IT. WE DON'T WANT YOU TO STARVE JUST YET, SO TAKE AS MUCH FOOD AFTER YOU'VE EATEN TO CARRY ALONG FOR THE NEXT FEW DAYS. IF YOU ARE OBEDIENT TODAY, YOU MIGHT GET A REWARD.

I froze as I read the message.There was a voice messaged attached to it and I opened it unwillingly.

"HELP ME!! Hayley, Tess, please, HELP ME!!" We heard the sound of Megan's voice piercing through the silence of the forest. I locked eyes with Hayley and we both had tears streaming down our faces. I couldn't believe I had dragged my best friend into this. What are they doing to her? Are they hurting her?

"W-what's going on?" Jake said, awaking from his slumber. He saw the tears on our faces and he knew somethingwas very wrong.

"Megan, our friend. They have her!" I said to him, my voice breaking on the last word.

"Well then we're going to have to find her. Let's start walking back the way we came." Jake said, getting up. "Anyone thought to bring any food though? I'm starving." Jake said rubbing his stomach.

"The text I just received said there is food about a kilometre north of here." I said unsure of whether to believe it.

"A text? From who?" Jake said confused about what's going on.

"The kidnappers. They send me texts every now and then. We're buddies." I said rolling my eyes at him.

"Okay so let me get this straight. People kidnapped youse two, put you in an abandoned cabin, and sends you texts? And you believe they would just give you food for free? What century are youse living in! Do you think next they would send you a cake for your birthday??" Jake said, frustrated.

"Jake, calm down. We're all stressed out here." Hayley said quietly.

Jake took a deep breath. "I'm sorry. I just don't want us going to this food then it's a trap."

"I know," Hayley said, "but if we don't take that risk we might starve out here even before we get to Pete's lake house."

I agreed with Hayley. Though i knew that if I was in a better state of mind I would have never followed instructions from a kidnapper. But right now, we needed to eat something, or die.

"I need to wash my face." Hayley said as we finally agreed to go to where the food was. I did too. After all that crying I needed to wash my face and get into a more brave mood before I could set my mind to finding this food.

Hayley and I walked down to the lake together, while Jake decided to stay up there and figure out how we are going to walk north for a kilometre without getting off of track, as you can easily get lost in a bush as thick as this.

"Hayley, we are going to find Megan and Pete." I said convincing myself more than her, as we walked down to the lake.

"I sure hope so." she said.

We washed our faces and with the fresh water I felt more healthy and ready for the walk. Even though my body was still screaming out for food, I was sure I would make it to the food, if it was even there.

We walked back and Jake smiled at us when we got back. "You two look so much better now." He said sarcastically. Ignoring him we asked what his plan was on getting us to the table of food.

"Here's my bright idea: we follow the sun!" Jake said. Me and Hayley both laughed at his corny sense of humour. Jake pointed towards the sun and said, "Okay, the sun rise in the east," he said, pointing to our right, "so that," he pointed forward, "is north. So we walk in that direction."

We agreed with him and started walking. After about five minutes of walking we heard a loud booming noise.

"Thunder." All three of us said at the same time, with fear over coming us.