by Aaron Niz
“They’re going to try for the pay phone first,” Tyler tells me.
I don’t mention that Diggler already seems to have failed at reaching that very same destination.
Instead I nod, deciding to forgive Tyler for the words we had with one another earlier in the day. It feels like a lifetime ago.
The remaining seven of us stand out on the deck together, shivering in mostly silence as our four brothers fade into the woods.
It’s a terrifying feeling I have, a feeling that something has gone irretrievably wrong. Worse than simply an accident which cost a brother his life, it feels as though we’re all in danger now.
You’re just being paranoid, I tell myself.
“What if someone out there’s watching us, trying to split us up and make us weaker?” I say to nobody in particular.
“Don’t be such a fucking pussy,” Hetridge replies.
“I didn’t hear you volunteering to go with them if you’re so tough,” I say.
“Actually, he did,” Stutty says from near my right shoulder. “He wanted to go but I asked him to stay.”
I’m too annoyed to give credit where it’s due. “Good for him.” Hetridge just smirks at me. The illumination from the outside deck lights makes him seem pale and even more sinister than he usually looks.
After awhile, we all drift back inside to the safety of the kitchen.
Beers are cracked and quickly consumed, mostly for those of us whose nerves have become too frayed. And that seems to include all of us.
I drink my beer fast, wishing that the buzz of alcohol might take away the panicky feeling I have in my stomach.
Nobody’s talking much, instead we seem to be counting down the seconds until help arrives.
All night long, people try their cell phones, sending texts and attempting to access email. We hope that at least one of us might get through at some point, but it seems there really is no service. We theorize how far one might have to get from the cabin before a cell phone would begin working again, but nobody seems anxious to test any of these theories at night in the woods.
“Can you believe how helpless we are without cell service?” I ask Vinnie as he tries his phone yet again.
He looks up at me. “We’re the lost generation. Without a fucking GPS, Google, texting—we curl up and die.”
I laugh. “It’s true.”
“Literally.” He shakes his head. “I can’t believe he’s dead.”
“Shhh…” I look over at Stutty. He’s taken Eli’s death really hard, sitting on the couch, drinking and staring into the distance. His jaw is slack and his eyes are far away.
“He’s lost it,” Vinnie whispers. “Not that he ever had it completely to begin with.”
“You think there’s really someone out in the woods?”
“Don’t you?”
“Maybe it’s just a coincidence. Maybe Eli fell and hit his head out there and we jumped to conclusions. Maybe Diggler just got lost.”
“Don’t you just feel it in your gut that something’s wrong?”
“I don’t know.” I’m wishing I’d never started talking to Vinnie. He’s usually a funny guy but this situation seems to have changed him into a doomsday preacher.
“Look around, Gabe.”
I do. Stutty’s still staring off into space, Randall and Reyes are whispering in the kitchen, Neil is looking out the back window. Hetridge and Tyler are arguing about how long it should take the group to make it to the pay phone and subsequently for help to arrive.
“I’m looking,” I tell him. “What should I be seeing?” Vinnie leans closer to me. “Look at everyone’s faces. Look at their eyes. They know we’re in danger. It’s not just sadness about Eli. It’s a sixth sense we have, no different than a herd of elk getting nervous when some wolves are nearby.”
“Do wolves hunt elk?”
“It doesn’t matter, dude. I’m trying to explain that everyone here is scared shitless.”
“I know that, Vinnie. I’m not an idiot.”
“Well stop trying to convince yourself that everything’s okay, because it’s not.
Something happened to Eli and Diggler. And now something’s happened to the other guys too.”
“You don’t think they’re going to make it?”
“I think if they did we’d know about it by now. The cops would be here.”
“Christ.” I feel like the wind’s been knocked out of me. I feel like I’m trapped in a small boat that’s in the middle of the ocean in a huge storm, and we’re taking in water.
My legs are like jelly and suddenly my breathing becomes shallow. I can’t get enough air.
“Gabe—“ he says.
“Just shut up for a minute.” I walk across the room, through the kitchen and out to the back deck to get some air.
The chill air hits my face as I stand on the deck. I feel exposed and frightened but somehow it’s also calming me down. I’m out here and I don’t see or hear anything.
Nobody’s trying to kill me. I shouldn’t have listened to Vinnie.
But the longer I stand outside and listen to the wind through the trees and the muted voices from inside the house, the more I start to feel as though I’m being watched.
The sensation is eerie and makes my skin crawl. I look around, finally grabbing a small flashlight that’s sitting on the railing and turning it on, skimming the woods below.
Branches, stumps, leaves, the beam of light glances past tree after tree after tree around the perimeter of the cabin. My breathing comes in gasps now. Any moment I’m sure that I’m going to see someone or something in the woods. Standing. Watching.
Waiting. A lifetime of horror movies floods my memory banks. I picture a gruesome killer with a hockey mask, which then morphs to a maniac with a bag over his head and a chainsaw in one hand. Michael Meyers. Leather Face.
My hand is shaking.
Yet after another minute of scanning the woods, I haven’t found any boogiemen.
As I turn to go back inside, I hear a scream. I can’t say I’ve ever heard a sound quite like it before. Sure, maybe in one of those childhood horror movies.
The scream is incredibly high-pitched and its distance from our cabin is impossible to tell. It could be a man or woman, although something tells me it’s a man.
The noise is a primal howl, carrying all of the misery of a wounded animal, a dying infant.
Immediately, the brothers run outside.
“What the hell was that?” Tyler asks. His face looks gray. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him scared before.
“I don’t know.”
We stand there on the deck, all seven of us that are left. It’s quiet. The silence is making it even worse.
But whatever the noise was, whoever was screaming, it isn’t repeated again.
After a few more minutes, Hetridge looks at me. “Did you make that noise?”
“Why would I scream like that? It sounded like it was a mile away.” He shakes his head and looks at the others. “Who the fuck screamed?” he demands.
“Dude, calm down,” Stutty says. “Nobody here made that noise.” Hetridge is pacing, his face a mask of rage. “If someone’s out there hurting brothers, I’ll be damned if I’m going to let them do something to me or anyone else in this house. Motherfuckers.”
Strangely, I find his words comforting. Someone who isn’t afraid, but rather, angry. It ignites my inner rage too. I find myself nodding as Hetridge paces.
“Why are we just sitting here when someone’s out there, maybe hurt? Maybe needing us to come get them? We’re supposed to be brothers,” I say.
Some of the others murmur agreement.
“I will stab someone,” Tyler growls. “I swear to god. Let them test me. I’ll carve a motherfucker up.”
Vinnie holds out his hands. “Wait a second. How do we know that scream was a brother in trouble? Maybe it’s one of these crazy dudes out there trying to set a trap.” That quiets us down a little bit.
Even without having seen any direct evidence of a “crazy dude”, let alone multiple crazy dudes, I can easily imagine a group of dirty hillbillies hiding just out of sight, watching us and laying their devious plans. Instead of Freddie Krueger, I now picture the kinds of people seen in films like Deliverance or The Hills Have Eyes. People who’ve grown up in broken down shacks and living in decrepit, abandoned houses with broken windows and rats scuttling behind the walls. These maniacs drink moonshine and eat whatever they can kill or steal.
Maybe it’s some disturbed, inbred family who’ve decided it’s time to hunt the out-of-towners for sport.
My rage subsides all too quickly and turns back to self-doubt and then fear. I hate Vinnie a little bit for making that happen.
“It’s not a trap,” I offer, but my words have no belief behind them.
“But what if it is?” he insists.
“We need to do something. We can’t just sit around and twiddle our thumbs, dude. If there is someone out there—or two or three of them—waiting to pick us off—“
“I think we stay in the cabin, ready to defend ourselves,” Vinnie says, “but we stay inside. Wait until morning, whenever the sun comes up, so we can see what’s out there. And then we make a move.”
“Sit here all night waiting?”
Stutty puts his head in his hands. “Guys, please.” Hetridge strides across the deck toward Vinnie. He pokes a finger into Vinnie’s chest. “You want to sit here, shitting our pants like a bunch of bitches while our brothers are out in the woods, waiting for us to come and get them? How would you feel if you were out there, bleeding to death like a stuck pig—“
“Please, don’t—“ Stutty cries.
Hetridge listens, surprisingly, and stops in mid-sentence. Tyler puts a hand on his shoulder and he shakes him off, walks back inside the cabin.
The rest of us look at one another.
“We need to figure out what to do. I’ll take charge and make some decisions,” Randall tells us.
Tyler snorts and folds his arms. “Why would you be in charge?”
“Because I have half a brain and I haven’t been drinking for the last fifteen straight hours.”
“You’ve just been smoking weed the last fifteen hours.”
“I think better stoned anyway.”
“I wish Diggler was still here,” Stutty says. “He’s a marine, he could have helped us figure out how to deal with this. He could have—“
“But he’s not,” Randall replies. He lights a cigarette and inhales. Everything with Randall is theatrical. “He’s not here, dude.” The wind picks up and blows harder, tousling my hair. I shiver. I’ve been outside too long without a coat. “We should go back inside and talk. Maybe we should have a vote on putting someone in charge.”
“Why does anyone have to be in charge?” Tyler says.
“We’re a fraternity. We’ve always had a president because you need someone to take charge and lead. And right now, that’s what we need. Otherwise we’re going to just run around like a bunch of chickens with their heads cut off.”
“Literally,” Vinnie says.
“Knock it off,” Tyler tells him.
We all go back inside, where Hetridge is drinking another beer and eyeing us darkly. “Let me guess. We decided to sit tight and play with ourselves until the cops come rescue us.”
I look at him. “We’re going to elect a temporary trip president.”
“Oh, that’s a great idea,” he scoffs. “Just what we need. Fucking elections when brothers are being murdered in the woods.”
“We don’t know that anyone’s being murdered.”
“There’s a fucking dead body downstairs, you idiot.” Stutty stares at him. “That’s not some dead body. That’s Eli, you asshole.”
“My point is that we need to do something. Right now. Not jerk each other off and start writing secret ballots and shit.”
“Well let’s take a vote on it,” I say. “Everyone in favor of electing a temporary president to help us out of this mess, raise your hand.” I look around. Neil raises his hand.
Then Tyler raises his hand, and so does Randall. Pretty soon everyone but Hetridge has raised a hand.
“So who feels like they can help us through this?” I ask.
“You seem to be taking charge pretty well,” Reyes grins. Reyes and I don’t really like one another, so I’m surprised to see him giving me support right now.
“I don’t want to be in charge. I just want to get organized.” Vinnie runs a hand through his curly hair. “Maybe that’s what we need.”
“No. I’ve never held office before and I don’t intend to.”
“This isn’t holding office,” Tyler says. “We’re just putting you in charge of helping us organize and plan the next couple of hours.”
“Wait, so I’m going to be temporary president now?”
“Why not?” Stutty laughs. “I mean, this can’t get any worse. I say give it a shot, Gabe.”
I sigh. This wasn’t what I’d intended. I’m not really the type of guy who wants to be in a leadership role, which was why I’d never run for Pledge Master or President or Treasurer. I’m more of a behind the scenes guy. But now somehow I’ve stepped into it, and the brothers are expecting me to help think our way out of this. It’s a lot of pressure.
“Okay.” I look at each brother in turn. “Okay, if you all agree that you want me to try, then I will. I’ll be temporary president for a night.” The brothers all begin clapping, half as a joke, but I can tell that another part of them means it. This is a horrible situation and what feels right is to try and regain some order and control. Now we feel like we’re doing something instead of sitting on our hands.
“So, Mister President, what’s your plan?” Hetridge asks. For the first time, I notice a slight slur of his words. He’s been drinking pretty consistently for some time and I think he might be getting hammered.
Everyone’s watching me, waiting for my decision. Seeing the hope and need that they have, that they’ve suddenly invested in this notion that I’ll have some answers, is almost as frightening as watching Eli die in front of me. Because I’m not sure I can do this. In fact, I’m fairly certain that I can’t do it. But I forge ahead regardless. “Okay.
Well, I agree with Vinnie. We need to hole up inside the cabin for the rest of the night.” Hetridge takes a long swig of beer. “Fucking pussy!”
“We’re not going to twiddle our thumbs. We’re going to really arm ourselves, set up patrols, make sure that nobody can just come in the cabin and start killing people.”
“And what about Diggler, Walden, Eugene, all the others?”
“We don’t have a clue where they are, dude. It’s pitch black out there and if we just go running around in the woods, it’s going to make us more vulnerable. You have to be able to see that.”
He turns and goes into the kitchen without bothering to reply. Reyes follows him.
Neil smiles. “Don’t worry, he’s just sexually frustrated.”
“That’s funny,” Tyler replies. “I thought sexual frustration was your area of expertise.”
“I got laid last night.”
“Who gives a fuck?” Randall says. “Let’s keep on track here. Jesus fucking Christ.”
“We need to really look around the cabin for ANY weapons,” I tell them.
“Gather the stuff up and bring it to a central location. And then we’ll set up shifts for people to watch the house and make sure nobody comes in without us knowing about it.” Nobody quite listens to me the way I’d hoped they would. Brothers split off and start looking around the cabin for weapons, but they’re listless and lacking direction.
Maybe Hetridge was right. Maybe we needed to run outside as a group and announce ourselves to whoever is out there in the forest. But if there are people, enemies of some sort, the last thing we want is to be running around blind in the woods. What if they have infrared binoculars, guns?
Well, why haven’t the attacked the cabin
yet? I ask myself. No answer is forthcoming.
Neil and I are combing through our room for anything that could be used as a weapon. He throws me a can of spray deodorant.
I hold the deodorant up and read it. “Axe Body Spray. How is this a weapon?” He winks. “Flammable. Make a bomb or some shit out of it.”
“Sounds like something Tyler would be good at.”
“Spray a bunch of it on a rag, stuff it in a bottle and light it on fire. Make a Molotov cocktail.”
“Okay. We’ll make sure to have a bunch of makeshift bombs ready to go.” Suddenly Neil’s expression becomes more serious. “Isn’t it weird? Just down that hallway, Eli’s dead. He’s been sitting there for hours.”
“I know. I’ve been trying not to think about it.”
“Do you think the others are dead?”
“No.”
“Then how come nobody’s come back? How come the cops—“
“Maybe they are dead, Neil. I don’t really want to think about it.” He gets quiet as he continues to rummage through the bags lying on the floor.
Suddenly his face goes pale. “Jeeeesus,” he whispers.
“What’s wrong?”
He slowly pulls out a large hunting knife from one of the duffel bags. “Look at this Crocodile Dundee knife.”
“Whose bag is that?”
“I don’t know.” He pulls a bunch of clothes out of the bag. “I can’t tell.”
“Why the fuck would someone carry a big knife like that on trip?” Neil stares at me. “Maybe because he was planning on killing Eli.”
“Who?”
“Whoever’s bag this is.”
“Come on, we better get everyone together.” I go upstairs to the living room and call the brothers together. I’m holding the large hunting knife in my right hand and it feels heavy and malevolent in my grasp.
One by one, they straggle into the room.
“What’s going on?” Vinnie asks. Then he sees the knife. “What the hell is that?”
“A knife we found in one of the bags downstairs.” Reyes raises his hand. “That’s mine.” He has a small smile playing on his lips.
