Forlot: Forgotten Forest - Book Eight {Completed}

Chapter Three

Hahaha! The expressions on you readers. The "My gosh! It is Cameron's ghost!" or "It is Cameron! He is alive!" phrases were priceless! I was only messing with you. Cameron was nowhere near the bus. Collin was just hallucinating.

"Collin," Paul said firmly. "You brother is not here. I am sorry."

Fear filled up my best friend's eyes. "N-no..." He shed a tear, and it streamed down his cheek. "...he is there! Waving to me! Telling me to come sit with him!"

"He is gone. Permanently. You should accept that."

"You can sit with me, Collin," I volunteered. "I have plenty of room."

He sniffed and rubbed his eyes with his sleeve. He picked up his bags and slowly walked down the aisle.

I scooted close to the window and patted the empty spot. "I saved the best seat for my best friend."

He plopped down next to me and dropped his bags on the floor and in front of him. He slouched and played with this thumbs. I waited for him to speak, but he never did, so I started up a conversation.

"It seems to me that you have not slept in days," I pointed out, noticing the bags under his eyes. "That explains why you are hallucinating."

After a minute of silence from him, Collin replied, not looking at me. "I was not hallucinating. I saw him. He was real."

Collin and I would be mistaken for siblings because of the clothes that we chose to wear that day. I had long, brown hair and wore a blue, short-sleeved shirt and dark blue shorts. My friend had glasses and short, black hair and also wore a blue, short-sleeved shirt and dark blue shorts.

And we did not plan this.

Though, we were wearing different shoes. I had on pink shoes, and Collin had on black shoes.

All of my classmates had special shirts on that were given to us by the school a week before the trip. In bold, yellow letters, it read, "Camp Forgotten." Underneath that were a huge lake and a small cabin. Anyone who was supposed to go to the camp had to wear the shirts today so that the counselors who work at the camp could keep track of us.

"Who is excited for camp?" Paul asked the group.

"We are!" the students except Collin exclaimed.

"I heard that there are wolves in the forest that surround the campgrounds," a boy said. "They love to feast on human flesh. Preferably humans around our age."

"Ooh!" the rest of the boys said. The girls shuddered.

"I heard that children died there!" a girl announced. "The girls of the last class who went to that camp mysteriously died. From drowning to being stabbed to death."

"I do not want to die!" another girl admitted, hugging her legs and whimpering.

"You are not going to die. No one is," Paul spoke up. "All those stories are phony. Myths. They never happened. Wolves do not live in Forgotten Forest, and the girls - and boys - from the year before all returned safe and sound."

The girl who claimed that she did not desire to die let her legs dangle off the seat. "Well...that is a relief."

"I wonder why the forest is called Forgotten Forest," another boy said. "I would have named it something cooler."

Paul steered, and the bus turned to a dirt path. We were now surrounded by nothing but trees. "The leaders of Forlot named it that because of some curse."

"Curse?!" the kids shrieked.

Paul facepalmed. "Me and my big mouth."

"On second thought...I change my mind! I do not want to go!" a girl confessed.

"Let me out! Let. Me. Out!" a boy protested as he stood on the the seat and tugged on the window, trying to open it.

Paul was about to say something, but Collin beat him to it.

"That is enough!" He was mad. "Are you idiots? Do you really believe in that junk? Nothing of it has happened, and it never will!" He crossed his arms over his chest and huffed. "Besides...I know the true story."

My classmates were shocked. Even me. It was super rare that Collin would yell like that, and when he did, it was not pretty. But we should not have been surprised anyway. I mean...he lost his own brother. He was extremely frustrated.

"You know the real story?" a girl questioned.

That girl's name was Sheila Docks, and she was sitting in the seat behind ours. Her closest friend Valerie Love was there also, and they rested their arms and heads on top of our seat. They stared at us with sinister looks.

Collin gave them a sickening glare. "Of course. After all, I am the smartest person in the class."

"I beg to differ," Valerie said. "I am the one who has all A's in each subject."

"And not the one who has a dead brother."

"The joke is on you. I do not have a brother."

Sheila and Valerie are the bullies of our class and love to pick on me and Collin. It is mainly because they have nothing else better to do.

Sheila had glasses and short, brown hair and was wearing a pink, short-sleeved shirt and pink shorts with yellow shoes. Valerie had long, black hair and wore a purple, short-sleeved shirt and purple shorts with green shoes. Neither of them were wearing the Camp Forgotten shirt.

"Why are you two not wearing the shirt?" I asked, pointing to my shirt.

"We have a reputation," Sheila explained. "Those disgusting shirts are not good enough."

"Then why bother to come?"

"To have fun, Ari," Valerie answered. Then she whispered, "To torture you and your friend."

"You girls have no class," Collin spoke the truth. "Just like the wizard who lives in Forgotten Forest and kills anyone who enters his forest."