Page 9 of The Girl in the Mist
“He walked along the edge of the lake at sunrise the next morning, running his hatchet through the water as he went. They say the water still glows red as the sun comes up because of the blood of all his victims. He’s still out there. He still lives among the trees in that shed. And sometimes, hewalks.”
A cloaked figure with a face like a weathered skull bursts out of the darkness from behind Anthony, leaping into the glow of the flames with a loud roar. The silence of the campers shatters into terrified screams. It takes only a second for them to catch onto the joke and for the screams to turn into laughter, but not before two tumble off their benches and one stands and takes off running.
“Everything’s fine!” Holden, another of the counselors chosen for the summer’s special session, calls after the girl running toward the director’s office. “It was just ajoke.”
Two of the other campers chase after her, eventually catching her and wrapping their arms around her to bring her back. She looks shaken and tears have already sprung into her eyes and slipped down her cheeks.
“That wasn’t funny,” she sayssullenly.
“Yes, it was,” Grant says as he peels off the skull mask he was wearing and shakes out his shock of bright red hair. The girl pouts and he gives her a look. “Oh, come on, Helen. It was a prank. It’s all in good fun.” He walks up to her and wraps his arm around her shoulders, giving her a playful squeeze. “That’s what camp’s allabout.”
“You know, I heard the guy was an escapee from the mental ward of the prison, not some kid who ran off into the woods,” one of the campers dares tosay.
“My brother told me he killed everybody in camp,” another chimes in. “There weren’t anysurvivors.”
“That’s not true. There are ten people still in the mental hospital right now who saw everything and couldn’t handle it,” anothersays.
“No, they did catch the guy. Years ago. He confessed,” another says.
This causes an uproar and Grant laughs, playfully shaking Helen’s shouldersagain.
“See? All in goodfun.”
Helen looks like the corners of her lips might just start to twitch up into a smile when another scream splits the air. The sound seems to reverberate off the raindrops that have just started to fall. Every face turns in the direction of the scream. Silence hangs over them. They don’t move. Don’t react. Counselors meet eyes with counselors. Campers wait, wanting to laugh, feeling like they mightcry.
“That sounds like it came from the cabins,” Grantsays.
“Stay here,” Anthony tells the campers, holding out his hand as if it can keep them in place even without the words. “Grant, Emily, stay withthem.”
Anthony takes off in the direction of the cabins with Holden close at his heels.
“Are all the campers accounted for?” Holden asks. “I thought I saweverybody.”
“I counted,” Anthony says. “They’re allthere.”
Another scream makes them run faster. Their hearts pound in their chests as they try to cross the empty space without losing any more time. The rain is turning from mist into drops and Anthony wills it to not get any harder. He knows rain means clouds rolling over the moon and stars and dropping in their eyes. Without the light and with the sting and blur of the water, they can’t see. And if they can’t see, they can’t run.
They get close to the cabins and see a faint light glowing in one of the structures in the distance.
“There,” Holdenpoints.
“It’s a counselor cabin,” Anthony says.
“Oh, god,” Holden whispers. “Miranda. She had a headache. She skipped the campfire so she could go laydown.”
He pushes his feet harder into the softening earth, terror like ice in his veins. Anthony now trails behind him for the last few yards they have to run to get to the cabin where Holden’s girlfriend was assigned for the week. His was on the opposite side, surrounded by the boys. Some nights he and Miranda met by moonlight just like Brad and Mary Ellen.
Tonight she stayed behind when Holden went to the campfire. She’s supposed to be there. The director wants all the counselors at the fires every night. But camp is not a good place to soothe a headache, and the worst place just may be beside a raging fire while a gory ghost story is told. Holden assured her no one would mind if she stayed in to lie down. Now her scream echoes through the woods. He wonders how far it traveled, if someone, somewhere can still hear it.
Holden gets to the top of the steps first, barely landing on the creaking wooden slats of the porch before grabbing for the metal handle on the screen door. He wrenches the door open and takes hold of the one on the main wooden door. It doesn’t move. He tries to force it, but the door is locked from the inside.
“Miranda!” he shouts, pounding on the door. “Miranda, it’s me, open thedoor.”
Anthony tries the handle even though he just saw Holden do it. It’s compulsion, needing that confirmation of doing something independently rather than always trusting someone else’s results. The door still doesn’t move and Holden pounds again, adding harsh kicks to the bottom of thedoor.
“I’m going to look around back,” Anthony says.
He jumps down from the side of the porch and moves around to the back of the cabin, shining the flashlight he always keeps in his pocket on the ground in front of him to guide his feet in the gloom. He can taste raindrops. He can smell blood.