What Waits in the Woods

by Kieran Scott

  Jeremy shook his head in annoyance, but he stepped on the nearest plank. It creaked under his weight and he suddenly turned around, flinching as he looked back at the trail. His hands grasped the rope holds. Callie felt a surge of fear.

  “Did you guys hear that?” he gasped.

  “What?” Callie’s gaze darted to the trees, which tapered to wild underbrush and flowers near the edge of the water. Dozens of tiny white butterflies flitted around the tangled growth and a few bees zigzagged nearby, but otherwise the world was still.

  Jeremy’s alarmed brown eyes scanned the woods. Nothing moved. The air was so stagnant that nary a leaf twitched.

  “I thought I heard a laugh,” he said.

  Callie whacked him hard on the shoulder. “Jeremy! Stop trying to freak me out.”

  “I’m not!” He looked at Callie and his face softened. Callie knew he could tell that her insides were now twisted into a million knots. “Sorry. I’m sure it was nothing.”

  “I hope so,” Penelope muttered, hugging herself.

  “Can we just get across the bridge already?” Lissa snapped, hands on her hips.

  Jeremy nodded. “Sorry. Yeah. Let’s go.”

  He edged tentatively forward and the bridge dipped and swayed. Callie’s heart pounded inside her throat as she watched him. Each step let out another ominous crack, so loud that Callie was actually surprised when the bridge didn’t collapse. Jeremy curled his fingers around the two rope holds tightly, bending forward from the weight of the huge pack on his back.

  “Are you guys coming?” he called without looking back at them.

  “Maybe we’ll just wait to see if you make it across,” Lissa joked.

  “Lissa,” Penelope said, nudging her friend. Callie was glad Penelope had spoken up—she was too anxious to talk right now.

  “It’ll be steadier if you’re all on it with me,” Jeremy shot back. “The combined weight will minimize the motion.”

  Callie looked at Pen and Lissa. When it came to matters of physics, Jeremy was the person to trust. He’d taken senior AP physics as a sophomore and had won more state science fairs than anyone in the history of their town.

  “Okay, geek. We’re coming,” Lissa called out. Then she looked at Penelope and Callie. “You guys go. I’ll bring up the rear.”

  Penelope went first, stepping lightly and with a sureness that awed Callie. She tried to mimic Pen’s grace when she grabbed the two ropes and placed her foot down on the boards, but the bridge bucked and swayed and she realized that grace was not an option. She was just going to have to hold her breath and get through it.

  Pressing her lips tightly together, Callie followed behind Penelope. After a minute she realized that if she matched her footfalls to Pen’s, the bouncing wasn’t as much of a problem because the boards weren’t coming up to meet her feet in Penelope’s wake. With each step, she felt a bit surer and she held her head high, actually taking in the beauty of the water as it gurgled downhill and around a bend up ahead.

  Then the bridge gave a particularly stomach-dropping lurch and she found herself staring down at her yellow laces, trying to blur out the water rushing beneath them. A big, ugly dragonfly flitted up from the water and stared her right in the face. Callie had to bite down on her lip to keep from yelping. The dragonfly glared beadily at her, turned sideways, then darted away.

  “Not bad, rookie,” Lissa said from behind her. “Keep it up and I may just forgive you for bringing that book with you.”

  Callie managed a laugh. She was just about to toss back a retort when Jeremy let out a shout.

  No, Callie thought in horror.

  The boards under Callie’s feet lifted and threw her sideways. The world swooped before her as she clung to the ropes, seeing nothing but trees and jagged rocks and foaming water. There was a loud splash and then Penelope screamed.

  Callie didn’t realize she’d closed her eyes until they wrenched open and the sunlight blinded her.

  “Go!” Lissa shouted behind her. “Go!”

  “What?” Callie gasped, clinging to the rope holds for dear life.

  “They fell in! Pen and Jeremy are in the water!” Lissa shoved her from behind. “Go!”

  Panic rose up in Callie’s throat as she pulled herself shakily to her feet and started to run, catching glimpses of Jeremy’s wet hair, of Penelope’s outstretched hand in the water down below.

  Are they going to drown? Please don’t let them drown.

  Callie and Lissa reached the last plank in seconds and Lissa threw her bag on the ground, then skidded down the steep slope bordering the river. Callie saw that Jeremy was being dragged downstream, Penelope right behind him.

  “Try to grab on to something!” Callie shouted, her voice hoarse with fear.

  “Like what?” Penelope cried back, getting water in her mouth. She reached for Jeremy, but his fingers were just out of her grasp.

  Thinking fast, Callie grabbed a long fallen branch off the ground and tossed it to Lissa.

  “It’s too deep to stand!” Jeremy shouted, bobbing up and down in the foamy water. Callie’s throat closed. She could see from here how his eyes were wide with fear. Behind him, Penelope’s soaked face was a mask of terror.

  “Swim toward me!” Lissa directed, her voice loud but firm. In front of her was a wide, slick, rocky area flattened by the current. She inched carefully toward the water with Callie’s branch, her feet slipping and sliding over the algae-covered stones. Callie looked on, grateful that Lissa seemed to know what she was doing.

  Penelope turned and started to swim upstream awkwardly, her pack still on her back. Jeremy tried to do the same, but the much heavier backpack weighed him down and he was unable to straighten his arms thanks to the bag’s straps.

  Callie’s head spun. Jeremy was going to drown. He was going to drown all because she couldn’t handle one day with the heavy pack.

  “No! Not against the current!” Lissa cried as Callie picked her way down the incline. “Perpendicular! Swim toward the bank.”

  The dry dirt and rocks collapsed beneath Callie’s feet and she slid on her heels toward the riverbank, catching herself on a branch before she went sprawling. She nicked her chin on the sharp edge of a rock but barely felt the pain. This was no time for whining. She shoved herself up and ran to Lissa’s side. Penelope had clawed her way out of the current and was now on hands and knees in the shallow water, her hair matted over her face as she sputtered and coughed. Jeremy was still slowly cutting across the water.

  “Here! Grab this!” Lissa crouched and held out the torn tree limb to Jeremy.

  He reached for the end of the branch. His fingertips just barely grazed it before he was pulled farther away. Lissa jumped up and Callie ran with her down the bank, getting ahead of Jeremy.

  “Try again!” Callie shouted, her voice cracking.

  Lissa held out the branch, but it wasn’t long enough. Jeremy was being swirled away, into the center of the water, which was wider here than at any other point Callie could see. If he got away from them, if he went around the bend, there would be no more shallow spots from which to help him. Up ahead, it was nothing but steep drop-offs from the trees to the water. What if there were bigger rapids up ahead? What if there was a waterfall?

  Callie’s pulse pounded in her ears. She felt like she was about to burst into tears, but she gritted her teeth, refusing to crumble. She was not about to let her boyfriend die because she was a weakling. She shed her backpack, whirled on Lissa, and grabbed the branch from her friend’s hands.

  “I’ve got this.”

  Lissa looked surprised but also somehow impressed. Callie took a deep breath and waded into the frigid water, the intense cold shocking her for a second. The water swirled through the eyelets in her boots and drowned her socks and toes. It doesn’t matter. Keep going, she told herself. Her feet felt like blocks of ice but she ignored the discomfort, reaching out the branch until she could feel the strain in her shoulder muscles. Her eyes locked on to Jeremy’s
. He looked so scared, which was such an unfamiliar sight. But she knew she had to stay calm, even though every fiber of her being trembled with terror.

  “Grab it!” she shouted.

  Jeremy made one big lurch forward and his fingers closed around the branch. The sudden addition of his weight nearly knocked Callie over, but she held her balance and then leaned back, dragging him toward her, toward shallow water. Slowly, she began to step back, pulling Jeremy with her until his feet finally found the bed of the river. Callie fell over from the lack of resistance and her lungs seemed to freeze as the cold water rushed over her torso and head. She shoved herself up again, gasping for air, her hair clinging to her neck and face.

  “Callie! Are you all right?” Jeremy sputtered.

  “Fine. I’m fine,” she lied. She was cold, she was soaked, she was scared, and she was quickly coming down from her adrenaline rush. But Jeremy was alive. That was all that mattered.

  He staggered over and threw his soaked arms around her. They clung to each other, shivering.

  “Are you okay?” Callie asked, placing her hands on his wet cheeks.

  He nodded. “Thanks to you.”

  Then he kissed her, and for that one moment, the world—the rushing, terrifying water behind them, Penelope and Lissa standing nearby—fell away. All Callie felt was the warmth of Jeremy’s embrace. It was the sweetest kiss they’d ever shared. Everything was going to be okay.

  Then Lissa clapped her hands and whistled sarcastically. “That was so awesome, Science Boy!” she crowed. “Can you do it again?”

  Callie’s fingers curled into fists and she felt an almost frightening fury rise up in her. Really? Lissa was seriously going to pick on Jeremy right now? He’d almost just died.

  Jeremy clenched his teeth, but he didn’t respond to Lissa’s taunts. He only locked his arm around Callie as they trudged to dry land and collapsed on the rocky shoreline. A dripping wet and wan-looking Penelope loped over, dropping her waterlogged backpack on the ground. Jeremy extricated himself from the big pack, then pulled the front of his T-shirt away from his body, making a sucking sound, and wrung out the hem over the rocks.

  “What even happened?” Penelope asked, shivering and glancing up at Jeremy. “One second we were fine and the next second we were going over.”

  “I’m so sorry, Pen,” Jeremy said, water dripping from his nose, his chin, his earlobes. “I saw something in the woods and lost my balance.” He looked toward the far bank. “I saw someone.”

  Callie swallowed hard.

  “Not this again,” Lissa groaned, throwing up her hands.

  “No! I’m serious! It was like this big flash of white. Like someone in a white T-shirt,” he said, shoving his hair back from his face. He looked different with his bangs off his forehead—older somehow. “I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you last night, Cal,” he added. “Maybe you did see someone. Maybe someone is—”

  Just then, a shrill shriek split the air. Everyone froze.

  “What was that?” Penelope gasped.

  There was a rustle in the trees. Callie’s heart hit her throat. Suddenly a huge white bird took flight, its long neck stretched, its wingspan at least five feet wide. It swooped over the stream and up above the trees behind them, disappearing from sight.

  Callie and Jeremy looked at each other. “Oh,” Jeremy said, sounding sheepish.

  “Great.” Lissa laughed. “So you drowned our cell phones for a crane.”

  “What?” Callie blurted, turning around.

  “Oh my God!” Penelope cried, her eyes widening. “You were carrying the supply bag!”

  Lissa reached into the side pocket of the bag and pinched her cell phone between her thumb and forefinger. Water sluiced off its face as she drew it out. Callie dove for her own phone. There were bubbles under the protective covering. Her fingers trembled as she held down the power button. Nothing happened. She tried it again. Her jaw clenched at the blank screen.

  “It’s dead!” Callie cried, desperation welling inside of her.

  That phone was her only connection to the real world. Her salvation in case of emergency. And now it was about as useful as a rock.

  “Mine’s dead, too.” Lissa sighed, tapping the blank face of her own useless phone.

  Penelope started to pull more things out of the pack. Lissa’s sweatshirt, soaked. Her washcloth, soaked. The sleeves of crackers, an open bag of marshmallows, hot dog buns, trail mix, potato chips, all soaked. All ruined. The only food that had survived was some random pieces of fruit, the few hot dogs and mustard packets that were in the insulated bag, and a tube of peanut butter.

  Callie’s whole body shook, and not just from the cold. Dread was beginning to take over, like a horrible, slimy eel curling up around her rib cage. No phones, and dwindling food. What were they going to do?

  Jeremy hung his head in his hands. “You guys, I’m so sorry.”

  Penelope was silent, her face ashen. But Lissa was all business.

  “We still have the cereal and dried fruit in your bag, right?” she asked, promptly taking Jeremy’s bag off her own shoulders.

  “I have gum and M&M’s in there,” Jeremy said weakly.

  “And I have a Snickers!” Callie announced, clinging to that one fact as if a chocolate bar could save her life.

  “Oh, and a bag of Goldfish,” Jeremy said, snapping his fingers.

  “Goldfish?” Lissa said snidely. “What’re we, four?”

  Jeremy shoved himself up. “Hey! It’s food!”

  “Food we wouldn’t need if you weren’t so incompetent!” Lissa shouted back.

  “You guys, don’t fight!” Callie blurted, hugging herself to try to stop the shaking.

  She realized Penelope hadn’t said a word. Callie glanced at her friend to see her still pulling out item after waterlogged item in a growing frenzy. Then she fell back on her heels with the trashed map and compass in her hand. The glass front of the compass was smashed.

  “That was my grandfather’s!” Lissa lamented.

  Penelope handed it to her and turned to her own bag, pulling everything out and laying it on the ground. Once all her sopping clothes, her plastic bracelet-weaving kit, and her toiletry bag were strewn over the rocks—not to mention their one roll of toilet paper, which now looked like a swollen diaper—she got up and raced down to the water’s edge, her back to the others. Callie watched her, wondering if she was about to cry or scream. The iPod and headphones that had been in her pocket were probably toast, too.

  “Pen?” Callie asked, her teeth chattering. “Are you okay?”

  Penelope held a staying hand behind her. She headed first downriver, peering out at the water every few feet, then walked back up, checking the rocks and the dirt and the underbrush, looking, probably, for any food that might have come out of her bag while she was under.

  “Nice job, genius,” Lissa said to Jeremy. “Now we’re down to half our food and we have no compass and no phones. All because you got spooked by a little bird.”

  “You don’t have to keep blaming him, Lissa. It was an accident,” Callie pointed out. Even though the tiniest part of her kind of blamed Jeremy, too. He couldn’t have just kept walking and then looked back when he was safe on the other side of the bridge? But the act of standing up for Jeremy actually warmed her a bit, and if she was going to be choosing sides here, she’d be choosing her boyfriend’s. If he had her back, she was going to have his. “And, to be fair, I wouldn’t say it was a small bird.”

  “Thank you, Cal,” Jeremy replied.

  He wrapped his arms around her and, even though he was just as wet and cold as she was, Callie finally stopped shivering. Lissa groaned.

  “You guys do know where you’re going without the compass, right?” Callie asked, pressing her back against Jeremy’s chest. “We can still follow the trail markers?”

  “Hopefully,” Lissa replied acerbically, giving Jeremy a look of death.

  “Come on. You’re just saying that to make him feel worse
,” Callie said.

  “Oh, am I?” Lissa snapped. “Thanks, Callie. Nice to know you think I’m so evil.”

  Callie blinked, stung and uncertain. Maybe talking back to Lissa twice was one time too many, and she didn’t want to get on Lissa’s bad side. “That’s not what I meant. I just … we can follow the trail markers, right?”

  “In theory,” Lissa said. “But it’s not always a perfect system. Sometimes people come up here and mess with them. Take them down or destroy them. I’m not saying we’re gonna get lost, but there’s a reason we always bring the compass. It’s our only plan B.”

  She looked down at the destroyed heirloom in disgust and shoved it into her shorts pocket. Callie pushed herself to her feet, her water-heavy clothes clinging to her skin. The last thing she wanted to do was anger Lissa even more, but she felt like she had to say what she was thinking.

  “Maybe we should just go back the way we came,” she suggested tentatively. She saw Penelope walking slowly toward them from where she’d been searching. She looked despondent. “Just to be safe. We can hike this trail another time.”

  Silently, Callie decided that whenever the girls rescheduled the hike, she’d conveniently come down with a nasty case of the flu. Or mono. Or a coma.

  “I think my phone still works,” Penelope offered weakly, pulling the big waterproof case out of her pocket and holding it up.

  Jeremy scrambled to his feet and Callie’s lungs expanded with hope.

  “Yes! Omigod! Yes!” she cried. “Let’s call home and tell our parents to meet us back where they dropped us off!”

  “And you guys mocked me and my case,” Penelope chided, taking the phone out and turning it on. She looked pleased with herself, but also distracted. “This case is gonna save us.”

  “Nope. No way.” Lissa snatched the phone out of Penelope’s hand. “We are not wussing out just because your boyfriend is a klutz,” she added, whirling on Callie.