From frozen apples to the theft of a police squad car, Mariah thought, slowly getting out. But then thought better of it. It can't be theft if the man behind the wheel is dead too, can it? One such as he can't be said to own anything anymore, not where his brains were ... Anymore than she could be said to have a thing.
But she had watched from the culvert, impervious to the rain and wind, and even fear, as the woman that the officer stopped by the side of the road did her deed, and followed in the car as the murderer fled up the rain-drenched hill, towards the mansion at the top.
Her beacon, hadn't she been Mariah's beacon? The north star to all this craziness? The single thing she'd woken up to see in the forest? Well? Wasn't she dead? And wasn't that woman her guiding light? The frozen apples, and then the guiding light? They had slipped easily past someone in the woods, then a couple by a broken down car, the man angrily gesticulating, even waving a gun, then even past another car with a bleeding woman inside and an infant in the back seat, weeping like an open wound, and then by another man, who seemed to see them, but who hadn't been able to catch up? Then to watch the light break and bleed and evil pour out, and directionless pour in.
Mariah got in. She continued to follow the woman. Who looked back, dumbfounded at first, until she saw the phantom behind the wheel with the long, uncombed hair, and not the poor, brainless cop. Then she picked up her pace, and darted off the road, back into the trees, towards a darkened cabin-like structure lurking back there in the gloom. But just when Mariah was turning off herself, ready to plunge into the forest, there she appeared again at the top of the hill, near the mansion.
And now here she stood, still directionless, with the beacon most likely inside, and death in the car, and mysteriousness down on the road below. As she stood indecisive, blinking in the rain, a man lurched past (he who had been in the forest?!) with a gun. Seeing her, he suddenly stopped and hid his weapon. He seemed to want to turn, then seemed to think better of it. His feet stuttered in the wet gravel.
I guess, thought Mariah, I really must look a fright. I mean, being buried for who knows how long. And again the image of the frozen apples surfaced in her head.
"Jesus!" the man said, taking a firm step back. And his gun was out again. But it only wagged in the wet air, impotent. He quickly turned and went staggering back on towards the mansion.
Now all this time, Mariah had become aware of some sort of crawling sensation at the back of her neck, as though there were worms. She turned, and through the trees glimpsed that darker darkness, the cabin, or whatever it was, at the bottom of the hill. She felt watched, and felt angered by being watched, angry at being caught out, her dress in rags, her hair in such a state, and her poor grave beneath the ground with its perfect soil pillow how many miles away? By these strangers, these criminal strangers.
And if this road in the middle of nowhere in the middle of a storm wasn't a perfect highway now, she didn't know what. Because here came to her death-dulled ears the sound of yet another blurting, blatting, struggling car engine. And headlights splashed over her front.
View Portfolio
Visit Notebook
Send Gift Points
Awards
Badges
Send Email
Community Newsfeed
General Discussion
Sponsored Items
Book of Trinkets
Static Items
Books
Groups
Interactive Stories
Audio
Campfire Creatives
Community Notes
Crossword Puzzles
Documents
Folders
Images
In & Outs
Madlibs
Photo Albums
Polls
Product Reviews
Quizzes
Survey Forms
Web Pages
Word Searches
More by this author
