by Eden Beck
I don’t know what kind of man Romulus is. All I know of him is this brief encounter, and what little I’ve been told about his sons.
That’s not enough, but it has to be. For now. For my mother, if nothing else.
I just hope she’s right.
I really do.
I have to take a trip to the outhouse in the middle of the night. My own stubbornness wouldn’t let me leave the loft until after my mother finally goes to bed. Then it’s laziness that leaves me drifting in and out of sleep, nothing but the dark silhouettes of trees and stars above my head, until my bladder won’t let me wait any longer.
Even then, it’s a task getting my creaking joints out of bed and out of the loft. I wrap a blanket around my shoulders and make a mad dash to the outhouse, where I wash the sweat and fear of the day from my body, watching as the soapy water swirls slowly down the drain in the floor.
Now, outside in the dark, damp air, I find I don’t want to go back inside.
It can get claustrophobic inside the tiny cabin, and tonight the night sky is so bright and clear that I don’t even need a flashlight. Here outside, there’s no glass boundary between me and the sky. Me and the forest.
Despite my own worries earlier, and despite Romulus’ warning, I feel no fear in the forest tonight.
Only freedom.
Not that it has anything to do with how much I despise being told what to do … especially by entitled men like Romulus.
If he didn’t want us wandering around his property—because it is his, not just an old friend’s—then he shouldn’t have rented us the cabin in the first place. I’m tired of people pretending to help when all they really want is to feel better about themselves.
The chill air awakens a nervous energy inside me. All around, the sounds of the forest make it feel alive. But try as I might to listen, I hear no made-up wolves. Just like I suspected earlier, it was just another figment of my imagination. Just another excuse to hole up inside and hide.
But I’m on the other side of the country now. This far out, on the edge of the Canadian wilds, it might as well be the other side of the world.
So, with that in mind, I set out into the forest away from the cabin.
I quickly find a narrow path almost completely overgrown with grass. I can still see the edges of it though, so I start to wander off in the direction it leads. At least this way I’ll be able to find my way back before I’m missed. No sense getting lost out here. There’s no telling how long it would take to find me, if I’m even found at all.
Just the thought of it makes that thrill race through me again, and if anything, my pace quickens.
It isn’t long before I start to wonder if the slightly worn path I follow is even a path at all. It winds through the trees in a meandering pattern, often doubling back until I think it’s going to loop back around on itself, only to turn sharply back up the hill. Always, slowly, heading up the mountain. During the day, it’s more like a large hill … but here, in the shadow of night … it’s more like an endless, yawning slope leading ever upward.
In some places the trees and underbrush grow so thick that I can barely make out my own hand in front of my face. At those times all I can do is reach my hands out to either side, feeling for the edges of trees and tips of bushes to guide me in what I hope is the right direction.
Though what direction that is … I don’t know.
All I know is if there’s a path, it has to lead somewhere. And I’m determined to find out where that is.
It’s as if a spirit has possessed me.
I didn’t set out to follow this path, but it soon feels like I did. Soon, there’s nothing but me, the soft-packed earth, and the breath of wind through the trees.
And then just as quickly, the trees thin and I find myself standing in front of an old, forgotten barn. A long-forgotten scent of horses sticks in the air, faint enough to be nothing more than a memory. The air here is still, so still it doesn’t even rustle the browning leaves of the vines winding their way up the side of the old red-painted slats of wood.
This must have been a part of the original homestead.
Part of me knows I’m bordering on trespass now, but that’s the part of me that’s easily shoved aside in favor of a blossoming curiosity. One does not simply find an abandoned building on their land without exploring it.
Still, I walk around the barn looking for signs of life, and finding none, test the latch on the front doors. It’s unlocked, but it wouldn’t matter if it was because the rusted latch breaks in my hand at the slightest touch.
Red rust crumbles in my hands, followed by the scent of iron. I wipe my hands across the front of my thighs, and checking once more over my shoulder, push on the groaning double doors.
They open at the expense of a silence-shattering screech. By the time I’ve finished wincing from the sound I’m surprised they too haven’t crumbled into dust. If there was anything sleeping in the forest nearby, it’s certainly awake now.
The scent of damp hay and leather and rust overwhelms my nostrils. Skylights set into the roof of the barn let in just enough of the waxing moonlight to let me make out the shapes within. Stalls, as empty and forgotten as the rest of the building, line either side. A loft above is heaped with hay packed down and disintegrating.
But what interests me the most is the object draped with a cloth tarp sitting in the middle of the barn. As soon as the dust settles, that single flourish reveals exactly what my thumping heart expected underneath.
It’s an old classic car.
The shell of the car is blue, but it’s so rusted-out that it looks more like a speckled robin’s egg. The windshield has a spiraling crack on the passenger’s side, but other than chipped paint and an old nest shoved up under one of the seats, it’s actually in pretty good condition.
But there’s only one real way to find out.
I give the handle a careful tug, expecting it to give way like the latch to the barn outside, but the door pops open without a sound. I open the door wide enough to slip through and sit down in the front seat, sending a heaping dust cloud into the air.
After a few solid coughs to clear the grime from my lungs, I’m a little disappointed not to find a key forgotten in the ignition. My fingers poke and prod in the dark, searching in the glove box and under the seats to see if I can find anything of use.
Nothing.
That disappointment settles deeper this time, and I flop dejectedly back in my seat.
What’s the use of a car that doesn’t start?
It would have been the perfect ending to my little adventure. Not that I expected to drive it out of here or anything. I just thought …
I shake my head. I don’t know what I thought, maybe that fixing up this car would become some kind of secret side project I worked on. Like some sort of teen character from a movie. Even if the car started … what would I do with it then? Steal it? Drive it around town until the original owners finally recognized it? And all that’s if it didn’t turn out to need parts, which I have neither the money nor the skill to replace.
All this is what I tell myself to try and soften the unexpected blow of being unable to start the car. But it was unnecessary.
When I finally lift my head back up, ready to stare resignedly out the dingy windshield towards the barn door cracked open to the forest, that feeling of disappointment is replaced by something much stronger.
Absolute heart-stopping terror.
All this time, I thought that I was alone.
But I’m not.
9
Sabrina
One moment he’s standing in the doorway, nothing but a shadow. The next, in a movement far too fast to fully comprehend, the car creaks under his weight as he leaps onto the hood of the car.
I gape up at him through the glass. There on the hood of the car, with one hand touching the metal exterior and the other on the top of his knee, is Kaleb Gray. He looks like he’s ready to pounce through the glass at me. He also loo
ks like he’s breathing heavily enough to have just finished running a marathon.
I scramble out of the car and to my feet. I take a couple steps back from him and stare in disbelief.
“What are you doing here?” I snap. He scared me so much that between my shock and all the dust I swallowed, my words sound more like a gasp.
“I could ask you the same thing,” he says as he hops down from the hood of the car. “Little late for you to be roaming the woods alone, isn’t it?” He walks closer to me and even though I think I should probably back away from him further, I find myself frozen to the spot.
He stands so close to me that I can feel his breath against my face. It’s warm and he smells woodsy, like patchouli and sage.
“What are you, my keeper or something?” I say as I try to sound cool and unaffected by his presence. In reality, I feel as if every inch of my body has been set alight.
He takes a step even closer so that now our noses are almost touching.
“I could be,” he whispers, and all that pent up energy inside me explodes up my spine.
I find myself unable to take my eyes away from his as if the gray pools in his pupils are swallowing all of my common sense. I could stay like this forever.
And from the still way he stands, one hand nearly brushing my own, his own eyes locked with mine—so could he.
If only fate didn’t seem so determined to intervene.
“What in the actual hell do you think you’re doing out here?” Rory’s voice hollers as he strides into the barn along with Marlowe. “Do you have a death wish or something?”
They carry with them a rush of cold air from the forest, cold enough to dissipate the heat that’s been growing steadily between Kaleb and myself. And just enough to start bringing me back to my senses.
“Is that a threat?” I ask as I turn around to look at him, despite still not wanting to take my eyes off Kaleb.
“Not exactly a threat,” he says sternly. “A friendly bit of warning.”
I huff and purse my lips, not buying his bullshit. “That friendly warning sounds an awful lot like what your father said to me earlier, and it didn’t sound that friendly coming from him either.”
“Romulus came to see you?” Marlowe asks from his position next to Rory. I can tell from the tone of his voice that he’s surprised.
“I don’t care how friendly it sounds or not,” Rory continues, disregarding Marlowe entirely. “You can’t just wander around other people’s property at night, touching their things.”
I glance over at the car, rusting with age. It doesn’t look like it’s been touched in a decade … maybe longer.
“Sorry,” I say, no hint of an apology in my voice, “but I didn’t think anyone would care. And this is kind of my property. I mean, we’re renting it but …”
“No, this is our property.” As he says it, Rory’s face grows red. “And you’d do well to remember that.”
It’s late, and my temper is short.
I settle into a more dismissive posture. “So how am I supposed to know what’s your land then? I didn’t see any signs.”
“That’s because all the land is ours,” Marlowe says, his voice far more measured than Rory’s as he steps forward. “Everything from that closest ridge of mountains to the bridge down by the river, that’s ours.”
He nods through the gap in the barn door towards the snow-tipped mountains in the distance.
“Right,” I say, trying to hide the fact that I’m just a teeny bit impressed. “So what am I supposed to do then, if you own all the land? Do you plan on just showing up every time I step off the driveway up to the cabin? What about the grass around the school, is that yours too?”
I know I’m being a little ridiculous, but so are they.
Rory doesn’t like my defiance. For a moment, his jaw works wordlessly.
Then, after a pause, he barks out, “Just don’t be an idiot. Show some respect. This isn’t your land, this is ours.”
“Your father’s, you mean,” I mutter.
“And what’s his is ours,” Rory growls back. For a second, he looks wild. He looks more like a creature of the forest than a man, but then just as quickly, his face hardens and he’s nothing more than an overgrown boy. “You shouldn’t be wandering around here,” he says, finally. He glances over at his brothers, then grabs Kaleb by the arm.
“Let’s go.”
Kaleb hesitates as though he’s getting ready to argue with his brother, but apparently thinks better of it and goes along with him at the last second. Neither one of them says anything else to me before leaving the barn. I stand here, not quite sure what to make of any of it.
“Don’t worry about Rory,” Marlowe says. Unlike the other two, he hasn’t made any sign of moving. “He’s just protective, that’s all.”
“Protective of what?”
“Mostly of his family. Can’t be too careful these days, you know?”
I have no idea what he’s talking about, but I nod in agreement because it seems like the least awkward thing to do at the moment. I’ve already made a fool of myself. I’m the one trespassing after all.
I need to stop making a habit of picking fights. Enough chaos already follows me.
“So Romulus, you guys, you really own all this land?” I ask, when it becomes obvious Marlowe isn’t leaving any time soon.
“Yeah.”
“And the cabin?”
“Yep.”
I thought as much. I had a hunch he owned it, even before he came to visit this afternoon. Back then, though, he was just the nameless ‘father’ of the Gray boys. Now he has a face, it doesn’t make him any less mysterious.
“And what about the mansion at the top of the hill?” I figure I might as well try to get as many questions answered as I can while we’re here.
“Have you been up?” Marlowe asks. His voice seems a bit more tense than it was before.
“No, I just—”
“Good,” he interrupts. “Best to stay away from there.”
Just as I get ready to ask him why I should stay away from the top of the hill, he interrupts me yet again.
“Come on, I’ll walk you back to your cabin.”
“That’s nice of you to offer, but I’m okay getting back on my own.”
Marlowe stands at the door waiting for me, and I have a feeling he isn’t going to take no for an answer. So rather than get into another unnecessary altercation, I decide to just let him walk me home. It’s the least I can do.
And it has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that I’m not as certain about the way home as I’d like to be.
We get back to the cabin with only a little gentle prodding in the right direction on Marlowe’s part, only to find the light on inside.
Shit. My mom is probably freaking out. Certainly doesn’t help that I didn’t bring my cell phone with me. Again.
Marlowe stands at the bottom of the steps as I hurry up to the door. It’s kind of odd how he’s just standing there, watching.
“Uh, goodnight,” I say, again just because it seems like the socially correct thing to do.
“Goodnight, Sabrina,” he says.
He doesn’t move, just keeps watching until I close the door. The next time I glance outside, he’s gone.
It should leave me unsettled, as the rest of this place often does, but instead … for once … I feel safe.
10
Sabrina
My first class when I arrive at school in the morning is Ancient Greek Civilizations.
Normally, I’d be excited for this sort of break from math and science … but my misadventure has left sleep in my eyes and an ache in my shoulders that just won’t go away.
Fortunately, my mother didn’t spend too much time grilling me last night about where I went. I told her that I just sat outside for a while looking at the stars and the exceptionally bright moon, omitting the parts where I wandered off on an unmarked path and basically broke into Romulus’ barn. I also leave out the pa
rt where I spent a good part of the night with the three incredibly attractive, if equally aggravating, heirs to the land we now live on.
The fact that she accepts my story without question leaves me feeling guilty. I really do need to start being careful of how easy the lies come these days. It’s starting to become a habit.
The classroom walls are littered with posters that show random historical and mythological figures. If I look closely, I can also spot the corners of colorful cartoons poking out from behind. They must take some of the more … gory … depictions down for some of the younger students who share this room on alternating days.
I scan the room just enough to find an empty seat and hurry over to it without realizing—until too late—who I’ll be sitting next to.
Not that I should be so choosy, not on my second day.
“Rory?” I say as I sit down, dropping my bookbag under my desk and trying not to look as intimidated by him as I feel. Intimidation is only one of the emotions running through me though, the other one isn’t something that I’m ready to put a name to yet.
Last night left me with a mixed bag of emotions. Despite what Marlowe insisted, I get the feeling that Rory doesn’t like me much. It shouldn’t bother me, but his tone last night … it was accusatorial. It’s like he was blaming me for doing something, and I still don’t know what.
“Hello Sabrina,” he says in a tone that seems much too formal, considering he was nearly yelling at me like a disobedient child only hours earlier.
He doesn’t make eye contact, doesn’t even look at me. But at least he doesn’t move away. He does me that courtesy, at least.
Since I don’t really have anything to say to him, I focus on taking such meticulous notes that I don’t actually hear anything the teacher is saying. I don’t realize this, of course, until the sound of my own name slowly pushes through the haze of my thoughts.
Even then, it takes a few swift kicks under the chair by Rory to make me snap my head up and gawk up at the teacher like the idiot I am.
