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No.
She starts racing again, and with all my strength, I push past the sticks and vines, feeling them dig into my palms as I break free.
I stumble out of the pile, and with one glance over my shoulder—showing she’s way too close—I start sprinting again, my limbs aching, my skin bleeding, my throat burning as I pant, completely depleted of all energy.
Sticks break behind me, and I know she’s gaining on me. My soul twists in agony as I know she’ll be on me any second.
I let out a scream as I feel the deathly coolness of her body. The woods open up, and I inhale a large gasp as her body knocks into mine, shoving me forward. I slide against the ground, my shirt stained with dirt.
And then I stop, and I let out a cry that hurts every rib in my chest. My forehead drops to the dirt, and it grows wet with my tears, turning to mud as pain and horror rock through me. Lifting my forehead, I wipe the dirt from my eyes as I slowly glance over my shoulder, expecting to see the woman once again standing behind me.
Yet, she’s not. She’s nowhere to be seen.
I turn back around, my eyes widening when I see exactly where I am.
I’m at the bridge.
My hands push against the ground, and I scramble back, realizing my arms were hanging over the edge. Only a few more feet and I would’ve tumbled over.
I roll onto my back, the backpack heavy beneath me. The weight pulls me down, pure exhaustion seeping into my limbs. I just want to fall asleep here, fall wherever the earth takes me.
But I refuse. I refuse to slip into the darkness.
Rolling over, I push to my feet. I brush the dirt off every inch of me, ignoring the pull from the other side of the bridge. The whispers are loud, the need to go over there strong, but I ignore it.
Walking through the night, I realize I’m farther away from my house than I initially was. It’ll take a long time, and honestly, I’m too fucking terrified to be out here.
I speed up until I’m at a slow jog, much more familiar to where I am as I make my way to the closest place.
Ten minutes later, I slow my jog to an exhausted drag as I step up to the abandoned house. It’s creepy at night, but I know it’s just the outside, and the inside is just a weird, bro hangout spot.
I walk up the steps and head to the door, pressing my shoulder against the wood and giving it a little shove so it swings open.
It smells like stale marijuana smoke as I shut the door behind me. I bypass the couch, making my way toward the stairs. It’s dark, but some of the boards are flimsy enough that the night sky filters in through the ceiling. I hold on to the railing as the stairs creak and I make my way upstairs. It’s cold in here, but it feels better than it did outside.
Once I get to the loft area, I let the exhaustion take over, my back slouching when I let out a depleted sigh. The straps of my backpack slip from my shoulders as I make my way to the mattress. I fall forward, my knees crashing against the bed, and I flop down, boneless. I pull the backpack forward, unzipping the pocket, taking out the thick book of Castle Pointe, along with my cell phone, kicking the rest of the things over the side of the mattress and listening as it thumps against the floor.
Turning on the flashlight on my phone, it lights up the front of the book, the cover a picture of the sign outside of town, with Lake Superior and tall, lush, green trees behind it. It doesn’t look ominous or even slightly scary, but I guess, as we all know, looks can be quite deceiving.
Castle Pointe wasn’t always as it seems. The town used to be filled with laughter, bright blue skies, and kids playing on the shore of Lake Superior. As we slipped into the nineteen hundreds, and the Sibley and Kipling bloodlines moved into Castle Pointe, it seemed that everything changed.
The waters grew harsh, and the sun no longer shined, even on the nicest of days. Yet, taking a short drive south of Castle Pointe, and the sun instantly warmed your skin. Castle Pointe seemed to be under some sort of curse that no one knew how to break, but we all know where it originated from.
Even the death of Sibley Alastair and Beryl Kipling didn’t remove the disease that covered Castle Pointe. We’d all hoped that by burning them, all would go back to what it once was. But it didn’t. If anything, the air grew heavier, the fog thick and everlasting.
Was it the blood that had been spilt on the land? Perhaps it was the fact that we may have severed the bloodlines, but we haven’t eliminated them altogether. Both the Kipling and Alastair bloodlines continue to live on, though the townsfolk do not believe of ending the lives of the innocent.
As months turn into years, and Sibley and Beryl become a distant memory, the scars they have left on Castle Pointe are embedded so deeply within the town, they will never fade.
I shake my head as I set the book down on the ground, listening as it lands with a thud. Physically, I’m absolutely depleted, but my mind is running a mile a minute. I feel wired, like my body is on a constant tingle against electricity. It’s nonstop with the things happening here, and I haven’t had a moment of reprieve. Yet here I am, and I need to figure out what’s going on.
I sit up against the mattress, then stand, pacing the small loft attic, the orange moon shining through the small window. Walking over to it, I press my fingers against the aged, rotted wood of the windowsill, staring at the moon.
What is the significance?
Everything around me means something, yet I can’t figure it out. I’ve been watching the pale gray moon shine down on Castle Pointe since I was a child. Yet, since we’ve burnt the school down, it’s as if some of the flames rose to the moon and colored it red. The sparks, its reddish hue, it spilt its heat onto the moon and stained it forever. Or so it seems.
Why? How?
