Chapter One
Don’t go out
in the woods today
You’re sure
of a big surprise If you go out in the woods today,
You'd better not go alone.
It's lovely out in the woods today,
But safer to stay at home
It was close to Halloween and it was the last class of the
week then it was half term meaning we had one week off, everyone was having a
discussion on the topic.
‘Is sixteen too old to go trick or
treating?’
I could hear
some girls at the back of the classroom “I’m going as a naughty school girl or
a nurse” why is it that girls like them think Halloween is an excuse to dress
as slutty as possible? I turned to my best friend we rolled our eyes at each
other.
“So are you going trick or treating?” she asked, to be
honest I would love to- it’s the only time of the year a load of strangers give
you buckets of sweets and you don’t have to feel guilty eating them all.
Although this time of year it is absolutely freezing, and because I live in a
village that is full of country lanes I’m always the one forced to walk in
front carrying the biggest torch I could find so that we don’t step in puddles
or muck that has fallen off the back of the tractors.
“Do I really have to?” I moaned at Ellie. She’s like the
sister I never had, we met at nursery , we went through primary school and
through high school and now we are at sixth form doing our A level’s, all of my
best memories are made up around her . We are the two people who would always
be sitting with each other in class at lunch and anywhere else you saw us.
“Oh please Amy. Next year we’ll look too old and they will
refuse to give us any sweets and we both know how many sweets we get?” she
taunted wiggling her eyebrows- I must admit I do have a soft spot for
chocolate. We had done this for the past
twelve years, it’s almost a tradition. Our parents walked with us until we were
fourteen then they trusted us to go on our own.
“Okay fancy dress shop after school?” I gave in.
“Yeah that’s the spirit” we got off into town which was
about seven miles from our village; the instant we stepped into the shop the
woman recognised us. She was about sixty and quite…fat with grey hair and her
glasses were balanced on the tip of her nose as she altered costumes at the
sewing machine.
“Oh hello girls has it been a year already?” we laughed
recalling the last time we came in here was in May when we had fancy dress for
the last day of year eleven.
“Nope it’s been six months since we left year eleven, we’re
here for Halloween."
“What are you planning on dressing up as this year then? I
have made a few costumes since then why don’t you come and look” the shop was
huge like a warehouse that had rows and rows of clothes railings bursting with
every outfit you could think of.
“Oh I have just the thing for you Amy” she ruffled through
the railings then pulled out a red riding hood outfit covered in a plastic
cover. The good thing about her is that she makes realistic outfits not slutty
versions. This outfit had a full length red hooded cloak that was blood red
with a red three quarter length skirt and a white blouse that had a red button
stitched to the neckline. It looked like the actual outfit little red riding
hood would’ve worn. I remembered two years ago when me, Ellie and Lizzy came in
here for Halloween we were the best of friends.
Who is Lizzy? I hear you ask, she was diagnosed with a brain
tumour eight months before Christmas she made it through to the new year by three
hours, she died on 1st January 3.12am.
Elizabeth Cole July 1st 1995-1st January 2011.
***It was New Year’s Eve and we were going to spend the
night at the hospital with Elizabeth she’d told her Mum and Dad to stay at home
because we were going to have a sleepover, I walked to Ellies to help her with
her bags and as it was a nice day I decided to walk through the forest. The
ground was hard and coated in a white shimmer of frost the sun shone down
through the tree’s making it glisten, in my head I wished so hard that the
chemotherapy helped shrink Lizzy’s tumour. She didn’t deserve this. She was
such a nice, caring, thoughtful girl and she’s never done harm to anyone. I was
happily strolling along when I felt another presence, like someone was watching
me. I decided to shrug it off because it was broad daylight and the only scary
thing you’ll find in this forest is Mrs Grimshaw and her dog. I felt it again
and this time I looked around wearily I definitely saw something move between
the trees naturally I walked quicker keeping my eyes on the space I’d seen
movement.
I looked forward to see where I was going and soon regretted
it, I was faced with…well I don’t know what it was but it was big, I swear if I
needed the toilet I would’ve peed myself right there. It was like something out
of a horror film- A huge wolf blocked my path but unlike a normal hound its
eyes were blazing red like the gates of hell. I had never been so scared in my
life, no matter how much I wanted to run for the hills my feet were rooted to
the ground with fear. Momentarily I stopped breathing without realising, my
mouth dried up a lump lodged in my throat making me feel sick.
It just stared at me like I was I was its next meal, head
bowed it closed its eyes after staying like that for a few seconds it was soon silently
disappearing back into the forest without a trace. I ran straight for the exit when I reached
Ellie’s house I was still shaken up but managed to keep it hidden, not wanting
to worry Ellie with something else, I kept my experience to myself.
Once I’d picked her up we walked back to my house avoiding
the forest we sat up in my room watching TV and playing on my laptop waiting
for my Mum to get home so she could drop us off at the hospital. Ellie popped
to the toilet and I used the time to Google what I saw earlier
‘Huge wolf with
red eyes like saucers’
I typed into the
search box. I know it was a bit vague but something might come up. The first result that appeared was from
Wikipedia.
‘Black Shuck - Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia’ as soon as I clicked on it and the page
loaded my mouth dropped open, I was about to read it when I heard the bathroom
door open and Ellie came skipping back into my room. I bookmarked the page and
closed the internet. Mum finally came home and she took us to the hospital.
We watched
the New Year’s fireworks out the window on her ward she sat in a wheelchair
because she was too weak to stand. At 3am while we were sleeping a loud beeping
from the machine woke us.
“Lizzy” I
ran over to her bed and tried to wake her with no avail, Ellie hit the red
emergency button above the bed. Within seconds a crowd of doctors rushed in and
we got hurried out of the room by a nurse. Ellie called her Lizzy’s mum and dad
while I tried to peep through the window on the door. A few minutes later most
of the doctors left the room apart from one or two.
“What’s
going on? Is she okay? Why are they leaving?” Ellie questioned.
The doctor that had been looking after her
came over to us and…well gave us the bad news. For the rest of the school
holidays me and Ellie spent every day together, we wrote a short speech to say
at her funeral. When I was on my own I went on Elizabeth’s facebook and stared
at her profile her last status was on New Year ’s Eve a few hours before we saw
her…
‘Urgh feel like crap but I can’t wait to
see the fireworks and the sleepover tonight with my best friends Amy and Ellie J’
‘You were such a nice girl I’m going to
miss you so much RIP x’
‘We didn’t really speak but whenever I saw
you around school you were always smiling, rest in peace with the angels’
“Amy
love-“ I slammed the door on my way out.
It was raining outside but I didn’t care, jumping over the broken garden fence
I found myself running through the forest for no reason. I didn’t know how far
I ran but I finally came to a halt when my chest and throat was burning.
“You
bastard!” I threw my head back and screamed at the sky. Who was I shouting at?
I didn’t know. God I guess, if there was anyone up there taking control of the
world they weren’t doing a very good job of it “What a load of sh*t! This. Is.
A. Load. Of. Bullsh*t!” I punched the air angrily.
A battered
abandoned fence post about the size of a baseball bat laid on the floor covered
in leaves, I was so angry I didn’t think twice about picking it up. The ancient
defenceless oak tree was in the wrong place at the wrong time. I raised the
post above my head and struck the tree while cursing and crying
“Why!”
smack. The thudding sound of the post colliding with the tree filled the air.
“Fu*king
world!” slam. The force of the beating echoed through my bones in my arm.
“It isn’t
fair!” whack, whack, whack. I repeatedly attacked the tree in a state of pure
anger until my arms ached.
“Urgh” I
swung the post round and released it sending it sprawling through the air
before hitting another tree. I collapsed at roots landing on my ass, I brought
my knees up to my chest leaning my elbows on them while my hands supported my
head.
After my
outburst had finished I took a deep breath of composure and wiped away my tears
with my sleeve. I stood up and tuned to the tree I had spent a good fifteen
minutes assaulting and opened my arms to embrace it in a hug, it was so big my
arms only came in contact with a quarter of the trunk “Sorry tree”.
I returned
home and acted like nothing happened back up in my room I returned to my laptop
and clicked on the link I had saved about the wolf. I read and read until I
came to this sentence ‘in some cases it has supposedly happened before close
relatives to the observer die or become ill.’ My hand clamped over my mouth
with shock. Was that a sign? Was me seeing this animal linked to her death? I mean I saw it…the wolf just before we went
to the hospital and within hours Lizzy was dead.***
Our village is mainly forests and fields and we’re five
miles from any town so I guess you could say we’re in the middle of nowhere we
don’t have a shop, pub and the nearest school is eight miles. Well we have a
post box, phone box and one bus every hour goes through the village so we can
go to town if we want. But other than that me and Ellie have grown up pretty
isolated if we made friends at school we would always end up falling out
because we couldn’t just walk out the door and play with them, but with Ellie
she was less than a two minute walk down the road.
Halloween was finally here and it was pitch black at half five me and Ellie were all dressed up and ready to go to get loaded with sweets. We stood together holding hands as my mum took a photo to add to the collection “Be careful you two. Are your phones turned on? Do you have spare batteries for your torches?” she shouted as me and Ellie left the drive way “Yes, Yes and Yes mum” I screamed back. We looked at each other with excitement which is quite sad if I think about it I mean we’re sixteen other people our age are probably at house parties getting wasted and taking drugs and we are getting excited over trick or treating. “Where should we start I think we should walk right to the end of the village and work our way back”
“Okay that’s what we’ll do then” in one hand I was carrying
a straw basket that had my mobile phone in and a bag of pumpkin seeds just in
case anyone takes the ‘trick’ option and in the other hand I had my torch, my
hood kept falling down so I clipped it to my hair. I try to make the most of
these moments because in a couple of years I just know me and Ellie will be
split up because we both want to go to university.
We had done most of the village (which is only about twenty
houses) and all of them complied, it was just over half a mile back to my
house, the moon was out and the sky was full of stars fog covered the field and the country lanes, it was so
cold our breaths made clouds in the air
“Isn’t there a shortcut I’m so cold” Ellie complained I
could hear her shivering, I ran through a mental map of the village in my head“…we could half the distance back if we go through the forest”
“There aren’t any lakes or very deep puddles are there?”
“Nope not that I can remember. You live in the same village as me surely you’ve been through there before” I joked
“Well yeah but you know…I don’t tend to play in the woods haven’t you heard the story of little red riding hood” she said mocking my outfit.
“haha you’re so funny. Do you want to take the shortcut or not?” I replied sarcastically.
“As long as you promise not to leave me.”
“Don’t be stupid I would never do that. Come on then” we turned off into the woods and stayed close to each other. The only light we had was our torches and the shining of the moon above we were surrounded by tall trees that blocked our view of the sky.
“Aren’t you scared?” she whispered.
“Would it help if I was? And why are you whispering?”
“No you’re right…not being scared is better and whispering comes naturally” suddenly there was a snap echo through the forest we both let out a loud squeak and turned around to see there was nothing there. Chills shot up my spine plaguing my body with goose bumps.
“Now’s the time to speed walk?” she asked frantically.
“Yes” we turned back around and walked as fast as we could but then we heard stomping like someone was wearing huge boots and marching in the forest, now we were really freaked out.
“Run!” I screamed “Just keep running I’m right behind you” I kept my torch pointing forwards and my basket in the other hand. The ground was muddy meaning we had to be extra careful not to fall over. My feet pounded the ground one in front of the other over and over again; one unlucky step and my foot chose a patch of slippery mud. I felt my foot lose friction with the surface of the forest floor, my feet disappeared from under me. I tumbled down dropping my basket and using my hands to break my fall to no avail. Landing on my side and within that moment Ellie had disappeared out of sight, leaving me on my own.
I couldn’t see her at all; I was left alone on the floor by
myself in silence and scared out of my wits. I looked around to see if I could
recognise where I was and that’s when I saw something behind the trees. I knew
what it was as soon as I saw the glowing red eyes it was the wolf I saw hours
before Elizabeth died even though it was the second time I had seen it I was
just as scared as the first. My heart felt like it was going to beat out of my
chest its size was close to a horse and its fur was thick, black and shiny,
hiding between two trees it was about twenty metres away from me. Fight or
flight mode kicked in and I chose the safest option. Still keeping my eyes on the beast my hands
scrambled on the muddy floor beside me when my hand came in contact with my
torch I grabbed it took one last look then struggled to my feet leaving my
basket of sweets and phone scattered on the floor and I ran for my life.
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