Whoever unlocked the door was inside before I could jump out of bed.
My entire body was exhausted. It took me longer than it should have to get to my bedroom door and try to seal it, knowing it didn’t have a lock.
Whoever had come in got to my bedroom door right when I got there. They were trying to turn the handle with my hand on it.
I held tight and kept them from getting it open. Then they gave up rather quickly and the handle went soft.
“Your key fell out of your pocket in the house,” Hannah’s voice came through the thick wood of the door.
I opened the door immediately.
My heart dropped when I saw Hannah standing there, my house key held out in front of her. Her eyes were wet and puffy, her arm shook as she held out the key.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“I shouldn’t be out here,” Hannah explained, barely able to get the words out. “I have to go.”
She dropped the key onto the ground and turned away.
“Hey, hey,” I tried to reason with Hannah.
I was relieved when she stopped a few steps away, but didn’t turn around to me.
“Every second I’m here I’m digging my grave, but I couldn’t leave you without your key,” Hannah muttered.
“It can’t be just that,” I shot back.
She finally turned around and we held there for a few seconds. I think the longer she was there the deeper my grave was dug.
She walked up to me. In my head I felt like she was going to kiss me.
Instead, she just stopped right in front of me, and reached her hand onto the back of my neck. She held it there for a moment with her palm impossibly cold on a warm, summer night.
Then she dug her nails into the back of my neck and searing pain spread all across my body.
She ripped her nails back and forth for a few seconds and then slipped away while I tried to collect myself and work through the pain.
I went over to my mirror, got the hand mirror and checked the back of my neck.
Hannah had ripped off the number that had been carved into the back of my neck.
—
Each day after I would wander around the edge of the farm field by the briars, peering in, trying to see if I could see any signs of life.
I never saw Hannah or any of the briar boys. Then one day I heard some distant rap music on the other side of the briars and instantly knew the source.
I talked to Lunch Money fishing down by the river. He said the Dr. Berry guy hit him with a board or something and fucked up his arm, but that was it. He was fine.
Lunch Money went home. I lingered by the briars, hoping to see Hannah.
I didn’t.
Then the hottest day of the year hit and I was swimming in the river. I came out bathed in the warmth of the blistering day and saw her standing up at the top of the riverside, at the edge of the briars, wearing her white nightgown, and looking down at me.
She just stood there for a while. I tried to think of something to say, but couldn’t.
She came down to the river and pushed me out into the water.
We swam in the river the rest of the day. We barely said anything.
She started to act like she was going to leave whenever I tried to start a conversation. She was perpetually looking over at the top of the riverside where the edge of the briars were.
We swam until dusk. Then she retreated back into the briars.
This may sound anticlimactic. It was not. I think it was from living in the briars and almost never talking. Hannah let off an energy that was unreal. We spent hours together. Never said anything and it all felt magical.
I could see all of the scars all over her body as we swam in the river. They were beautiful and painful, just like the life I had left behind before I moved to the farm.
I thought this appearance was going to be the start of something.,
Then days went by and I didn’t see her again.
-
I woke up a few nights later with someone walking into my bedroom in the middle of the night.
I shot up in a haze - initially excited. Thinking it was Hannah, coming back to see me again.
No, it was two of the briar boys, shirtless, sweaty, and all scratched up, standing next to my bed.
They rushed me before I could have another thought and pulled me out of bed. One of them threw a sack over my head and I was suddenly blind.
I don’t know where they took me. My best guess is near the river because I think I could hear water running. I think they were trying to send the message that they might throw me in there with the sack on my head, so I would drown.
Their voices were frightening - low and growling with that odd uneven cadence that Hannah had like they hadn’t actually learned to ever speak. Everything came out rapid fire and with a crude vocabulary.
Endless threats. I needed to stay out of the briars. I needed to leave the town, and SOON. Most importantly, I had to STAY AWAY FROM HANNAH.
I was hesitant. They didn’t like that. They moved me closer to the river.
“FINE!” I agreed. I would leave her alone. My life wasn’t worth it.
And I’m a good liar.
They let me go.
I started to devise a plan, but then Lunch Money showed up the next night. Distraught.
He explained his dad found out about how the people in the briars hurting him and that he rounded up a bunch of townspeople who were going to burn down the briars, and the church in the briars.
I readied myself to run out to the briars and defend the place.
It was too late. I could already see them burning.
Lunch Money informed me of something heroic. He had already beaten his family and the mob to the briars and warned everyone inside what was going to happen.
Did he see Hannah?!?!!? Had he warned her?!?!?!
Lunch Money wasn’t sure. He didn’t see her. He could only hope she got out.
He did say that he thought they were all going to stay in the briars. Go down with the fire. Go down with Dr. Berry.
I looked back out across the farm and the entire patch of briars was aflame.
There was nothing I could do.
—
I found a few sets of footprints running out of the briars and through the fields of the farm the next day.
I also found a small bunch of flowers - the purple ones which grew in the grass above the river - placed neatly next to the front door of my Grandma’s house.
I’m going to stop there. The burning of the church in that small, little town in Idaho ended up making news. The outcome of who might have lived in that church is a major controversy.
It’s unconfirmed if Dr. Berry made it out alive or not.
I’ll leave it at that.
I was okay. My mom ended up okay, but I told her I wanted to finish out high school at the farm in Idaho.
My grandma is okay. I found out one of the few things she can still do is shoot a shotgun and she’s pretty good at firing warning shots over the top of the briars whenever she hears noise out there.
She also can still make those same damn pork chops for dinner every night.
She cooks for three.