Oh No Theyre In The Woods

Southcliff

 Willow didn't believe that Southcliff was normal. People in Southcliff seemed off to him. He had decided to stay in Southcliff for a month. People just didn't seem right. And not a "I've never been here" not right, things just seemed slightly off, a little bit disturbing, honestly. By a week, he could swear every night he saw animals that wandered through the town at night.

Not normal animals, some were too tall, their legs too pointy, they all moved to unnaturally. Others would scuttle over the houses, with metal scraping sounds following. Birds at night never seemed quite like an actual birds. Their mouths opened far too much, feathers too large, too separated. They never sounded like any birds he knew of. Trees always seemed like they were in slightly different places in the mornings, and at night he could hear creaking everywhere outside if he listened enough.

Those freaked him out too. He had asked residents and they all either didn't believe they existed, or they said they were normal animals. Maybe they were normal to them. But none of the Southcliff residents ever complained about their noises so he was sure they just didn't know.

He couldn't just think no one else ever heard or saw those things. Willow's sister had come with him. Lexie was just a few years younger than him. She just thought it was really cool. Some nights Willow would sit next to the window, watching. Every time, Lexie would come out at around 12:30, pick her brother up, and toss him into his bed. He couldn't ever get himself to remember how strong she was before she scooped him up.

Willow had some theories, or Lexie would insist they were conspiracies. The town had to be enchanted. Of course, enchantments were rare then, mostly dwindling away, and definitely not on the scale of entire towns. Maybe the residents were aware of the creatures, but never said a thing.

It was one of those nights, Willow sat in the living room in his pajamas, peering out the window, sketching down creatures as they passed the house slowly. He was pretty decent at it, he was a tattoo artist, but had dreamed of being a biologist when he was younger.

Willow rested his sketch pad down, opting to watch until he saw something he hadn't sketched yet. He watched families of those deer like creatures sit on the dark streets, falling asleep in piles.

One day he hoped to go into the forest, see what exactly went on inside. Many people said the forest was friendly but almost no one in town had actually been in there. Willow asked them, they had always said the same thing,

"The forest will let us go in when it wishes"

If Willow was honest, that had always scared him. He didn't want to think about the forest wishing someone in, that didn't sound right, that sounded scary, honestly.

Willow stared out the window, and just watched the strange creatures. He looked up when he heard his sister's heavy footsteps coming up behind him.

"Hey! Nerdlord! It's almost 1! You can't do your nerdy science stuff if you're super tired!"
Willow huffed, "Well you shouldn't be up so late either!"

"Irrelevant," She said, grabbing her brother and dragging him to his room. "Just sleep! I can't sleep with you nerding out out there!" She blew a raspberry before returning to her room.

Willow chuckled when she left and plugged his phone in. Then, he climbed into his bed, grabbing onto a large stuffed animal he liked to curl up against at night, it made him feel...safe. He never realized how tired he was until he laid down. He fell asleep almost immediately.