❝And I don't want the world to see me 'Cause I don't think that they'd understand When everything's made to be broken I just want you to know who I am.❞ { 2 0 1 4 © josie nicholson short story. all rights reserved. } edited by the great @iprobablyateit! myself and my readers can never thank you enough.

Every half century in a small little town hidden in the woods, a beast comes out from the forest to claim his bride on the night of an eclipse. The people of call this phenomenon "the taking". This beast is said to be very dangerous. It roams door to door searching for the woman whose being calls to his animal instincts. He will kill, mutilate and destroy everything in his path until he finds his bride. In the past, the townsmen have tried to hunt the creature and kill him before they can steal one of their marriageable daughters, but the beast does not hunt alone. He has followers among the shadows to make sure his goal is accomplished. Once he finds his bride, he carries her back to the forest where she is never seen or heard from again. Celeste believes this so-called "legend" is just some scary fairytale her grandmother made up to scare her. But was she ever wrong when a pair of moonlit eyes stared straight at her through her bedroom window and entered her room. Next thing she knew, she was being carried out the house and into the woods by a half-naked man who called her his. Who would have thought? Grandma wasn't crazy after all. Young Adult novel. Paranormal/Comedy-Romance @2014

Going through my pictures, I went to the one that I had just taken, and the phone slowly slipped out of my grasp. What had escaped my notice before is that the couch I had taken the picture on was against a window, which showed the backyard of the house. But in this picture, it wasn't an empty backyard. No, behind my smiling face was another one, outside the window. It was his face. Covered with a black ski mask, watching me. *** All 19-year-old Layna wanted to do was forget about the guy that broke her heart, and move on with her new boyfriend Brian. But instead, she unwittingly attracted the attention of a stalker. Someone who had been watching her every move for a month, plotting and planning for the perfect moment when he could take her. What Layna never would have expected was that when he finally kidnaps her, she would have to undergo "The Test". The Test that the girls before her had gone through. The one they failed, and payed heavily for. Will she pass The Test or will she die like the others?