“Well, good thing there’s not much in the car for them to go through,” Chris shrugged. “It shouldn’t take us too long to get through.”
“Ugh, but we’ll probably get stuck behind some massive RV where they spend forever looking through every nook and cranny.” As soon as she said it, she knew it was disrespectful toward the girl that had vanished. If Jess disappeared, she would want a thorough search done to try and find her, so it was unfair to complain about it when someone might be in very real danger. Chris hadn’t taken much notice though, so she dropped the idea.
After their meal, they began the journey back. In a few different fields near the park that had been so tranquil and calm in the morning, the police had trampled the ground and destroyed some of the crops as they wandered through looking for evidence. A lot of the corn was left broken in half and bowed over, as if the officers had found it too hard to simply walk straight down each row. The farmers were certainly going to be livid. It was easy to already picture news segments with an angry old man in a dirty baseball cap giving a soundbite that would be played over and over.
At the entrance gate, they were only the fourth vehicle in the line. It moved along fairly quickly with officers having people pop their trunks and then checking the interiors with a few quick looks.
As they pulled up, Chris tried to look as relaxed as possible, but not so loose that he looked drugged or suspicious. He always felt the same nervousness at the Canadian border, despite having nothing illegal or questionable on them. The officer asked him to pop the trunk, they rooted around inside for a moment, then waved them on through the gate.
They took the main road around to their camp loop. Officers were everywhere scanning the area and watching cars pass by. They couldn’t imagine being a first-time visitor and driving into camp only to find it looking like a crime scene. It probably looked even worse if you were a foreign visitor getting your first few impressions of America.
Pulling into their site, Chris swore loudly. Jess followed his gaze and added her own curse words. Mark’s rusty red truck was still parked next door.
“Just ignore him,” Chris said.
They climbed out and went about their business as if nothing had been awkward and unsettling about their morning encounter. At first, it seemed like they’d be left unbothered, but as soon as they relaxed, they heard, “Hey.”
Chris subtly motion for Jess to stay where she was down near the fire pit. He walked up to meet Mark at the side of the road. They spoke quietly for a bit, then Chris headed back to Jess.
“Steph still hasn’t come back. He wants help looking for her. I’ll go help him look, you can just hang out here.”
Jess grabbed his arm and squeezed tightly. “Don’t go with him. Please. The police can help him. He needs to report her missing.”
“He said he told the police this morning and they pretty much blew him off and said if they see anything they’ll let him know. He probably left them with a bad taste in their mouths. I mean, who knows how he reacted. I guess they pretty much tore up his tent and truck after he talked to them, but that’s about all they did. I’ll just commit to a couple hours. You can get some reading done while I’m gone.”
Jess gave a small tug on his shirt as Chris turned away. He spun back to face her. She put her face in close to his. “What if he did the same thing to Steph as whatever happened to the missing girl? I mean, how do you know you aren’t going to walk off into the woods with his crazy ass and then get knifed in the back?”
Chris patted her hand. “He seems really worried and pissed. I think he really needs help.”
Jess turned up the intensity on her attempt to get through to him. “Do you know why so many people get their asses murdered? Because the killer always seems like a nice guy! If the killer acted like what they were then no one would ever go anywhere with them.” Her voice was a low hiss as she pulled his arm in closer. “Seriously, do not go with him,” she said with a growl.
Chris glanced back at Mark, then looked his wife straight in the eyes. “Okay.”
Jess sighed and let go. Chris had a red spot where her fingers had been in a death grip on him. It surprised him how serious she had been. He went back to meet Mark and she heard him politely say that he didn’t want to leave Jess alone and that he’d have to get the police to help him.
“So then have your wife come with us,” Mark shouted gesturing angrily toward her as she watched out of the periphery of her vision.
Chris shook his head and declined one more time. Mark leaned in, inches away from Chris. “You’re both a couple of hoity-toity pieces of shit, you know that?”
Chris didn’t react and Mark fumed off toward his site again. They could hear him slam the door on his truck and with a furious squeal he backed out of the space and sped off around the loop. When he was out of sight on the other side, they heard his brakes shriek as he stopped for something, probably a person walking from the bathrooms, then even louder and angrier than before, they heard his truck rumble away.
“What a fucking nut,” Jess noted. “I can’t believe you nearly went with him.”
“Now I’m worried about Steph though,” he added. “I think we actually should say something to the police.”
Chris walked to the park’s security office and soon someone met them at their site. Neither of them had a cell phone signal and it meant hoofing it for help. The security officer had given Chris a ride back so he didn’t have to walk. He was an older gentleman with white hair and deep lines in his face. The officer had handcuffs and a Taser and little else on him. They explained what had happened ever since the weird couple had set up their site and Mark’s behavior through the whole situation. The man wrote everything down and called it in. No one had heard Mark report anything from the park side of things, but they would check in with local police.
The park security had been helping the officers with their search, and the lines of communication were supposed to be open between the two forces.
“See, he was lying!” Jess tapped her husband on the arm. “I told you he was a psycho.”
Chris shrugged and the officer said to call if Mark returned. They had people looking for his truck now and would be taking Mark in for questioning as soon as possible.
“They only said they were supposed to be communicating, but you get one or two little missed messages that don’t seem important and that’s how stuff falls through the cracks,” Chris said, shaking his head. He sincerely hoped he believed himself.
Jess and Chris sat at the campfire breathing in the scent of smoke and trying to eat lunch, but spending more time watching the flames, each thinking their own terrible thoughts. Chris assumed that Steph had probably run off and maybe found somewhere to hang out for the night, like at a party or something. Jess had automatically decided that Mark had probably taken her somewhere secluded and cut her into little pieces that he would then feed to wild animals while covered in blood and laughing like a psycho murderer. They each ruminated in silence wondering what to do, if anything.
“Let’s go swimming,” Chris finally suggested as the macaroni salad warmed on his plate in the sun.
Jess looked down at her own uneaten food and dumped it onto the fire. She didn’t like to save leftovers that had gotten warm, and she absolutely refused to put the food back in containers with cold food that had been sitting in the ice. “Yeah, that sounds good,” she said. Sunlight, sand, and water would probably help to take her out of the slump she had fallen into.
Chris suggested that they change into their swimwear before walking to the beach so that neither one of them would have to walk into the changing rooms alone. It didn’t seem likely that something would happen to either one of them, but he knew Jess was prone to overthinking and working herself up over some things. This seemed like exactly the sort of thing she’d latch onto and drive herself into paranoia, which would then be followed by a panic attack.
Soon they were off. With beach bags on their shoulders and Chris
carrying the sand umbrella, they crossed the little park roads and grass areas until they were at the water.
A couple of policemen were walking around scanning the ground for anything suspicious. Jess mused that they couldn’t be having much luck because the whole area had already been overrun first thing in the morning when the lifeguards opened the beach and several hundred swimmers had flocked to the shore. Even now, they hadn’t closed the beach and sunbathers were spread out on towels all over the place. The water was filled with shivering adults and kids screaming and splashing. It seemed like the least effective time and place to do any sort of investigating.
“Any evidence is going to be stomped to hell in the sand,” Jess said annoyed at the waste of time the search looked like.
“Yeah, but it’s still worth looking,” Chris said with a shrug, “just in case there does happen to be one little clue. But yeah, I doubt there’s much either.”
He pointed out a spot that was being vacated by a family. It wasn’t as close as Jess preferred, but there wasn’t anything else more optimal. Not this late in the day and not when the weather was at its hottest. The waves of heat pouring off every surface gave the impression that the lake could be a mirage. Jess took off her sandals, but after a few steps in the searing sand, she threw them down and slid them back on. The beach was scorching and uncomfortable, but she didn’t love it any less. Instead, she only walked faster to settle into a spot. The long swim in the icy water made her feel alive and bright again. Even Chris seemed to be delighted with the sun and the carefree attitude of everyone around them. As soon as she started to feel like the top of her head was burning, she suggested they get back out.
A woman lying prone on the sand next to Jess’s spot was talking to another bored mom watching her kids in the water. “I heard on their radio that all the cops are on their way out. Supposedly didn’t find anything and don’t think this area is worth searching. I think she probably got dragged off to Rochester. Sold for drugs or prostitution or something.”
Jess grimaced and picked up her stuff. She had no idea how to react to such a grim, but likely scenario. They weren’t so far from the city that a girl couldn’t be smuggled off somewhere into a large, anonymous population. The woman didn’t seem to care what her neighbor thought as she readjusted her sunglasses and put her headphone ear buds back in.
The rest of the day was blissfully uneventful. Mark didn’t resurface and the police weren’t snooping around. Everyone seemed to be relaxed. Music drifted from multiple sites and children ran giggling through the darkness of the camping loop with glowsticks and flashlights while the smell of delicious campfire dinners permeated the air. Fires crackled everywhere and Christmas lights spiraled around tent poles and picnic areas like fairy lights.
“I still wonder what happened to Steph,” Jess surmised. “I wonder if they found her. Or Mark.”
Chris put his arm around her. “I’m sure she’s fine. Hopefully she just bummed a ride off a friend to get away from that asshole.”
The sunlight had baked their skin a golden brown and they were both dead tired as they hit the hay. Jess snuggled into the blankets. Chris curled around her and they fell into a deep sleep.
In the middle of the night, Jess awoke. Rolling over, she put her hand out to wrap it around her husband when her hand met the empty futon mattress.
“Chris?” she asked in a tired stupor.
At first, the sleepiness left her slowly, drifting away as if on a breeze. Suddenly, she sat bolt upright and frantically looked around the tent. “Chris?” she said more urgently.
No response. Slipping on a sweatshirt that she’d tucked away in a corner, she fumbled her way out of the tent into the dark. There was no light at their site. Leaning back in, she grabbed a small flashlight they’d stashed in the overhanging pocket. Clicking it on, she illuminated a small circle of light.
It was like a creepy horror movie as she shined the light around. At any moment, the beam could illuminate a nightmare. Instead, the picnic bench sat vacantly by the fire pit. The cooler was tucked under the table. The car was parked on the small gravel space on the lot. After that it was nothing but forest.
“Chris?” she said again, still somewhat quiet. She willed herself to assume that he’d simply gone to the bathroom.
There was only the faintest hint of a radio playing nearby. Someone was an extreme night owl. Otherwise, the whole area was devoid of human sounds. The animals were joined in a nocturnal chorus mostly comprised of owls and crickets.
She could feel a small panic rising in her chest. Her blood was beginning to chill at the thought of something happening to Chris. The road surface clawed at her bare feet as she jogged along toward the bathroom. She knocked on the men’s room door and called for Chris again. Nothing.
The horror continued to rise and her heart was beginning to beat out of control. She called for Chris louder. She was running now, heading back for their loop, mentally configuring the place they’d left the car keys. Her purse? His pocket? The tent? She wondered if she should phone the park police or 9-1-1 first.
Rounding the bend back toward the site, she saw a flashlight shining off into the woods. Her bare feet slapped heavily against the ground. It felt like sandpaper against her sensitive skin, but she couldn’t stop the terror.
She raced past her site hoping to enlist the stranger for help. Maybe they’d seen something. Maybe they had heard something.
The flashlight was shining into the back of an empty campsite. The person stood on the road just barely out of reach of the only streetlight. It illuminated the intersection between this specific loop and the road that connected the other loops. It was the last site in the row.
“Hello?” Jess asked as she sprinted toward the stranger.
The figure turned to her and took a step into the light.
“Chris? What are you doing here?”
“I thought I saw something.”
Jess caught up and turned to look into the site. “I don’t see anything.”
“When I was coming back from the bathrooms. I thought I saw two people. They were running right toward me and then they weren’t under the light anymore. I came to see if they needed help and by the time I got down here, it was just the bushes rustling.”
“Should we call the park police?”
“Yeah. That seemed really shady.”
Chris pulled out his cell, but still no signal. They were about to walk down to the security office, when they saw a park vehicle pass by. The maintenance man radioed for help as they waited in the chilly dark. A few moments later, several green park vehicles pulled up. The officers got out and after everything Chris had seen was recounted, they looked around. Finding nothing, they told Chris and Jess to go back to their tent.
The curiosity was still overwhelming and they couldn’t bring themselves to try and go back to bed yet. Instead, they sat around the campfire. About an hour later, headlights passed by as the vehicles drove off and the darkness was complete again.
“I guess they didn’t find anything,” Chris shrugged. “I still saw something though.”
They gazed into the smoldering embers. The flames had died down, but the logs still gave off an intense heat. Jess leaned in close. Her front was so toasty warm and her back was so cold. After her initial panic at finding Chris missing, it had taken a long while to swallow the fear back down. Even after knowing he was safe, what he saw nearly convinced her force them to pack up that night and leave. She said as much to Chris.
“We don’t need to leave. Nothing is going to happen. We have each other,” he said rubbing her back hard enough to generate a warm friction. “Besides, we have the rest of this week all to ourselves now,” he added. The humor fell flat and they both sullenly watched the flames considering how they’d come to the situation.
As the night continued to count down to dawn, they climbed back into the tent to try and get some rest. Snuggling in side by side, Jess nuzzled in tight to his neck. He stroked her hai
r and together they fell asleep wrapped around each other.
Chapter 3
In the morning, it was like the horrors of the previous night had vanished into the daylight. There was a smattering of clouds in the sky, but the sun shone bright. The golden glow of the early hour was revitalizing and Jess felt worlds better than she expected she would.
Some scrambled eggs and juice revived them even further. Jess was eager to get back into her energetic state of mind. She wanted a walk in the woods. To experience nature without care or concern. The tweeting birds told her it was the right thing to do and with hiking boots that fit like a glove, she practically dragged Chris off toward the semi-tamed wilderness.
The walk down the lakeshore was radiant in the honey light. The day was starting off lazy and hot. Cicadas buzzed their sweet songs of summer. Squirrels scuttled along the boardwalk. A short detour through the sand made a mess of their shoes and they spent time dumping them out and laughing as the lake caressed the shore in rhythmic motions.
At last they stood at the trail entrance. A decrepit sign nearby asked hikers to avoid raccoons which were known to sometimes attack people and then listed all of the wildflowers and birds that could potentially be spotted along the trail. In big bold yellow letters it declared this to be the Lancer Trail. A map detailed the dominant walk and encouraged people to stay on it to see some of the notable landmarks. It was suggested not to leave the trail or there was the risk of getting lost or disturbing wildlife.
Without a glance at the sign, the couple entered hand in hand under the canopy of emerald. It was like a storybook scene the way the branches interlaced overtop of them and welcomed them like a tunnel to another land. Jess was certain the forest was significantly more welcoming than the day when Mark and Steph had followed them in, although she hadn’t found anything that could ruin her day the same way that they did. Immediately she felt a pang of guilt for thinking like that.
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