They Are Not Human

Chapter 9

The slow crackle of a fire, and the smell of something delicious cooking, pulls me from the deep sleep that I was in.  My stomach audibly grumbles at the very thought of food. I sit up and begin to sluggishly analyze my surroundings.

There was nothing glorious about where I was by any means. It looked like a mini camp site that was set in some sort of divot or valley in the land scape.  Trees surrounded the clearing and made the location inconspicuous. There was a small cave just a few feet from where I was lying, and it looked to be littered with someone's belongings. Surely there was no way I could have survived that snowy night alone in the woods.

Alarm bells should have been going off in my head, but they just weren't.  All I could hope for is to be dead.  Maybe this is what the afterlife is supposed to look like? Or maybe I was stuck in some sort of purgatory?

"Ruth! She's awake." a loud voice yells from behind me, causing me to nearly jump out of my skin.

Immediately I snap my head in the direction the voice was coming from and see a boy, not much younger than myself, excitedly smiling at me. His short light brown hair was kept in a neat buzz cut.  This hair cut did little to age his soft boyish face.   His short stature, and his big brown naive eyes also made him seem very young.  The big smile he held on his face, made little dimples appear on each of his cheeks.  There was no way he was older than 15 years old. 

The woman who I presumed was Ruth came walking from the opposite end of the campsite and joins Mr. Dimples. She was definitely older than the boy and gave me grandma vibes. Her hair was long, gray and wavy. She was thin and looked to be very frail. Her younger days obviously behind her. 

So these were my captures huh?

Ruth kneels down by my side and touches my face gently with her frail hand.  Reflectively I want to shy away from her touch, but instead I just allow it to happen.  

Let's just get it over with.

"Are you okay sweetie?" She asks her voice sounding just as frail and old as she was.

"Am I dead?" was the only coherent thing I could think to ask.  Please just let me be dead.

Before the woman responds, Dimples pipes in" No! But you were in pretty rough shape when we found you". His tone was a little too enthusiastic for my grumpy mood this evening.

Ruth gives him a warm smile and looks down at me. "What he's trying to say is we are blessed that you are still here with us".

Her kind words make me smile, but they do little to lessen my anxiety. How much could I trust them?

They did save my life I guess, but there was no telling how long that hospitality would last. Maybe they would just kill me and get it over with.

"Ruth!" Someone off in the distance calls. 

She slowly gets up, and every joint in her body makes a loud cracking sound as she stands and puts weight on it. Before she leaves us, she looks at the boy who is sitting a little too close to me for comfort and asks in a buttery sweet voice. "Do you mind sitting with our new guest dear? It sounds like I have work to be tending to elsewhere, but I assure you I won't be gone long."

The boy gives her a little too eager of a nod, indicating that she was dismissed. With that Ruth then begins to walk, in quickest way she could manage, over in the direction where the voice was coming from. Once the boy was sure the old woman was gone, and out of earshot, he turns to me, and introduces himself.

"Hi, I'm Arlo by the way" he says "Do you have a name?"

I wanted to laugh out loud by how ridiculous that question was. Of course I had a name!