Lost in the Backwoods

"It seems the Bermuda Triangle has moved to the backwoods," Andrew muttered to himself. He glanced over at his phone, where the navigation app was still confidently tracing out a path deeper and deeper into the woods. He checked the time and his heart jumped. An hour ago he was supposed to be five minutes away from his destination. An hour ago? he thought. "OK, something is definitely wrong," he announced aloud to himself, pulling over on the dirt road that cut a rough, untraveled path through a dense standing of ancient trees.

Grabbing his phone, he pinched and swiped around, trying to make sense of his current location in relation to the intended destination. His head was spinning. He was wildly off track. His engine grumbled violently, shaking on worn struts. He glanced at the fuel gauge. "Crap," he sighed. As if on cue, the car trembled and coughed, then went silent.

He rolled his eyes and ground his teeth a moment. Arching his back he pulled his wallet out and thumbed through the cards inside until he found his AAA membership card. He dialed the number, but only after his phone failed to produce a ringing sound did he notice the lack of service in the area. He cursed under his breath and let out a long, frustrated sigh.

Packing up his cell phone and keys, he got out of the car and slammed the door shut, locking it just in case. It was still plenty light out, but he could tell sunset was just around the corner. He checked the map on the phone again, and he normally would have been disheartened at the lack of civilization it showed around him, but he wasn't even sure he could trust it at this point.

He glanced around the area. His tongue was dry. He remembered the way his father always had extra water bottles in the car and it made him feel stupid for not having any extra water on hand. The forest was thick with green vegetation. He hoped he might find a spring nearby.

Feeling confident that he hadn't passed any manmade structures for an eternity, he decided he might fare better trekking deeper into the woods. The road had begun to angle downward, hopefully indicating a possible river nearby. Where there was water, there might be a settlement. It was his only hope.

Andrew set off down the road, feeling each step land a tiny bit lower than the last as the rough dirt road continued pitching down. He took a deep breath of fresh air as he walked, gathering it in slowly through his nostrils and letting his lungs soak it in. The air was fresh and cool. He heard birds chirping in the trees and pine needles rustling gently in a soft breeze that blew high above him. Where he walked the air was nearly still but alive with the scents of nature.

He realized he hadn't been for a walk in a forest since he was young, and he found himself wondering what he was doing with his life. Out among the pine trees he felt grounded and sure. Why hadn't he been coming to the mountains more often? He fell into a confident, rhythmic pace, trundling down the mountain with a sure foot and a smile. Rocks rolled under his foot and dust kicked up as he went. It was peaceful and beautiful. He was alive, just as alive as the trees and bushes and grass all around him. He decided that as soon as he got home he would start blocking out time to go out and spend time outside with the trees and birds and grass.

Andrew took another deep breath of dense, cool air. He could see a clear gradient spreading across the sky as the eastern regions darkened and the flames of sunset radiated out from the west. A long, urgent gust of wind tugged at the treetops, pushing a column of air through the trees. Branches shuddered and trembled and Andrew shivered, holding his arms with cool hands. The moving air brought new scents, and one of them burned the back of his nose. It was musky and pungent, like freshly drenched gym clothes mixed with dusty old books from the library. He pictured a bookworm leaving the gym and going straight to the library to check out books that hadn't seen the light of day in a hundred years.

He stared off into the powerful gust of wind, squinting at the forest, wondering what might be looking back out at him. He could only see a few trees deep before the sun's rays were too scattered to be useful. Beyond that point the forest was a dense cloud of shadows.

As a boy Andrew had gone camping with his family many times. He knew what deer smelled like. He had smelled a bear from less than a hundred yards away. He knew the scent of javelina and mountain lions and even death itself. But this smell was different. It kept hitting him like a nagging salesman knocking at the door every few minutes. He wanted to know what could possibly be the source of the smell, but something in his gut told him it was something large, and he didn't want to have anything to do with large animals during the twilight hours.

He picked up his pace, keeping his eyes and ears on high alert. A deep worry was rising up inside him. If he didn't find civilization by nightfall he was going to be in trouble. He tried to remember some of the makeshift shelter skills he'd learned from his parents, but he didn't even have a pocket knife on him. No, if the sun set and he was still in the woods, he didn't know what he'd do.

Andrew pulled out his phone and checked the signal strength. Nothing, but the back of the phone was hot to the touch and he'd lost a huge chunk of battery life since the last time he'd checked. The little battery symbol had turned red and it said it had 4% remaining. "Crud," he mumbled, holding the power button to shut down the device. He considered going back to the car. He could try to charge the phone from the car battery, sleep there, and climb the hill in the morning trying to get a signal.

Soon, every step he took made him feel more and more stupid. He should have stayed with the car. He stopped and stared down the road. He hadn't even noticed how dark it had become. He was straining just to make out details in the trees a dozen yards from where he stood. He sighed and turned around, then froze.

Something had moved in the trees. He heard the shuffling of branches and he was sure he'd caught the blurry shape of something big disappearing into the shadows. He stared where he thought he saw the movement. The sound might have been from the breeze, but the movement... that had to be something, right? His heart was pounding relentlessly and he felt the weight of terror on his lungs. Tentatively, he took a step, then another. A snapping stick rang out like a gunshot in his strained ears and he froze again. A hollow, icy feeling filled his chest.

"Hello?" he called out. He remembered that most animals were afraid of humans, so if he made extra noise he should be able to scare it away, whatever it was. "I'm just passing through," he called out loudly, gratuitously kicking rocks and dragging his feet through the harsh gravel. "I don't want any trouble from you."

He felt ridiculous, and he'd never felt so stupid in his life. If he'd just stayed in the car he wouldn't be in this situation. He whistled a noisy tune, kicked rocks into the trees, and hoped that he hadn't somehow found himself separating a mother bear from her cubs.

There was another rush of movement from the pines and just as he turned his head to the side he caught the tail end of a glimpse of something smearing through the extreme edge of his peripheral vision, directly behind him. He whirled around breathlessly, adrenaline-saturated blood coursing noisily through his veins. He caught some branches swaying on either side of the road, and a small cloud of dust hovering in the air along with the powerful stench he'd detected earlier, but a hundred times stronger. The road was gently lit by the dying light of sunset. He took a few steps toward the lingering dust and gawked at a single print left in a patch of dirt among the rocks. There, clear as his own palm, was the print of a very large, bare human foot.

His heart jumped and he took off running back up the road, tripping and stumbling in the fading light. He couldn't bring himself to keep humming or talking, and he wasn't even sure if noise would drive off any creature capable of leaving such a footprint. The dusty, musky odor had permeated his lungs now, overwhelming his nostrils until even the fresh scent of the pines was gone. His shoe hooked hard on a stubborn rock and he splayed out, catching himself by digging his palms into the rocks, which went better for the rocks than his hands. His feet scraped desperately behind him, lifting his torso by pure momentum as he continued propelling himself up the gentle slope of the road. His whole body twitched to the beating of his heart. His chest was tight and empty except for the sharp ice that had crystalized in his frosty lungs.

Andrew wasn't even sure what else he may or may not have heard as he noisily clambered up the hill. It seemed to him that the whole forest was alive with cracking twigs, snapping trees, howling winds, and growling monsters. The sharp musky stench clung to the back of his dry throat, stinging and scratching at his esophagus.

At long last he arrived panting at his car. He yanked at the door handle before remembering it was locked. He yanked the keys from his pocket and promptly dropped them. It was almost completely dark, and in the deep shadow of his car he pawed desperately at the dirt and rocks trying to find the keys. He heard movement and froze, listening carefully before resuming his search. His fingertips found the keys and he fumbled them again as he stood. Finally he had the keys firmly in hand and stabbed the key drunkenly at the hole, his entire body trembling as the whole forest began to breathe and swell with activity around him. The wind howled more earnestly, owls hooted, and branches rubbed together menacingly.

Finally the key sank into the lock and he turned it, throwing the door open and shutting himself inside in a flash. He locked the door again and tried to take in a deep breath, staring out through the windows with wide eyes while he gasped for air. Sweat was pouring relentlessly down his brow. He wiped his forehead on the back of his forearm and choked on air, coughing while he stared out the windows. The dome light inside the car shut off and he was suddenly able to see everything around him.

Trees stood firm all around, their long branches swaying gently in the wind. The faint light of the stars in the sky bathed everything in an eerie celestial blue that stained his retinas and made his blood run cold. Deep in the shadows, close by one of the thick tree trunks, he caught a glint of light off two beady eyes staring at him. They blinked, and then they were gone.

A powerful shiver crawled swiftly through his flesh. He checked the locks on the door again, reclined the driver's seat back, and curled into the fetal position, trembling and cold. He could swear he heard breathing outside the car. He allowed himself a quick peek up at the driver's side window just in time to see a splotch of steam fade away. The creaky suspension croaked as the car was slowly, powerfully tilted to one side. Andrew wasn't breathing. He had turned to stone, a weak heartbeat clinging tightly to a tiny bit of warmth in his freezing core. The pressure against the side of the car released and it rocked violently from side to side on the old, rusty metal struts.

A moment passed. The breathing was gone, slowly replaced by Andrew's own breath as he gradually resuscitated himself. Every muscle in his body was tight or trembling or both. His jaw was clenched tight enough to shatter diamond. He waited.

He kept waiting.

After a long time he finally stole another peek at the window. A large, dirty hand print was left on the glass. He squeezed his eyes shut, wishing he hadn't looked. Sleep was impossible now. He just curled up on his side, shaking, waiting for the night to end.