I’ve lived my entire life in a small town by a mountain. The town is so small I doubt you’ll be able to find it. Most of the people my age gained some sort of freedom by learning how to drive early and borrowing the family car. I would get my ass beat if my father knew I touched his car, so unless a friend gave me a ride, I got stuck inside this small town with nothing to do. I spent an entire summer saving up enough money for a bike that handled the trails. Then, most of my time was spent riding around to be anywhere but at home.
While riding down through the mountains, I rode over some junk on the trail I didn’t notice. I got tossed over my handlebars, my front wheel bending in the accident. I cursed up a storm knowing I had a few hours’ walk back home with a sore ankle. I grabbed my bike to start back down the trail. I knew I wouldn’t get home before dark. That made me nervous. All small towns came with tall tales and ours was no different. There have always been rumors of the Faceless Cat that roamed the woods looking for innocent children out after bedtime. A lot of people over the years claimed to see a large cat that stood on its back legs but was missing its face. They also heard some pretty weird noises out in the woods at night, but it’s the woods. Animals made noise all the time.
I walked down the path, miserable wondering if my father would be home and how much trouble I might be in if I missed dinner. I saw someone through the trees by the lake and considered asking for some help. Talking to strangers wasn’t a big deal where I lived, cause hell, everyone knew everyone. I made my way over to the riverbed trying to remember the man’s name.
He didn’t even look up from his task. He wore an old torn straw hat with a faded shirt. His jeans so torn he really should have just bought a new pair. I knew him by sight but had never spoken to him before. Everyone called him old man Nathaniel. He lived in a shack all year long. He didn’t look that old though. Just middle-aged, fifty at most. In the summer he shaved his beard due to the heat and that made him look younger. I heard he was a bit off his rocker. I almost regretted walking over to him.
He finally looked up, his blue eyes looking at my bike and then at my scuffed-up knees.
“What are you doing?” I asked him being too embarrassed to admit I trashed my bike.
I expected him to shout or shoo me away. Instead, he waved me to come closer. I got nervous unsure of if I should. I looked around for an escape route in case he turned dangerous. I got closer to look over his shoulder. A lot of people around here panned for gold and dug up other expensive minerals. I never heard how much money they made from it. He had a few screens that went over a green bowl. He kept adding water to the bowl, spinning it then refilling it in a way that confused me. With all the washing, wouldn’t he let some gold drift away with the water? I watched him for a while until he had only a small amount of dirt left on the bottom of the bowl.
“See the flakes?” He asked in a very low and somewhat raspy voice.
He didn’t speak very often. He didn’t have any family and no one dared go near his cabin. I squinted through the small amount of dirt left trying to see the same thing he did. He pulled out an eye dropper to skillfully suck up the few flakes left in the edges of the bowl. He put them inside a small jar he pulled from his pocket. He then reached over to pick up a spare bowl to offer it to me.
“Do you want to try for a bit?” he offered.
I looked between him and my busted-up bike. I did want to try finding enough gold to pay for a replacement. The idea was enough encouragement to stay with the local crazy mountain man for a few hours. Oddly enough, Nathaniel acted very quiet and calm. He agreed to give me a ride back into town so I wouldn’t be home after dark. So, I stayed with him as we panned for gold. He turned out to be a very good teacher. With a few words, he got me to understand how to pan and even went into how to spot some signs of gold along a riverbed.
By the time we packed up, I found a very small number of flakes in my vial. I moved the sparkling grains around doubting they even equaled the weight of a few grains of sand. There went the hope of a new bike.
“It’s not much.” I admitted and held out the vial for him to take.
“It adds up quickly. Over a few days, you’ll notice that. You keep what you found today. Whenever you have time, come by again. You can use my bowls until you can afford to buy your own, or get bored and quit.”
I considered the offer. It wasn’t as if I had anything else to do. This might as well be my summer job considering there wasn’t anything else in his town. I pocketed my few hours of work. Nathaniel pulled out a bigger container with some smaller nuggets inside with smaller flakes. To me, it didn’t look like much at all.
“This amount is worth around a hundred and forty on a good day.” He said letting me get a good look.
I nearly tripped over my feet. That much? And he was just carrying it around? I simply could not believe that little gold was worth as much as he said. He made a motion for me to hold out my hand to feel the weight of the gold inside the container. If I had a few good days, I might be able to find this much over the summer. Hell, maybe more.
“I’ll get you home. Am I packing you lunch for tomorrow?” He asked walking towards the trail.
I quickly collected my bike and nodded. So, what if I hung around the weirdest guy in town? He taught me a pretty easy job and offered to feed me. God, in a bigger town I would have been a prime target for all sort of untrustworthy characters.
That was the first time we met. He made good on his promise of driving me back home. I put my bike in the shed unsure of how I would get to the river bed without it. I didn’t dare tell my father where I spent my day. He wouldn’t approve, or demand I got back out there and stay out until I brought a good amount of spending cash back with me. The next day I needed to walk back to the trails. Nathaniel met me at the entrance of the pathway. A mountain bike by his side. One a bit worn but better than my own.
“You can use this one for now.” He said pushing the bike in my direction.
My body wanted to run. A man I didn’t know offered me a bike. He noticed my expression and understood the reason behind it.
“I understand how this looks. You can take the bike and never see me again. I am an older guy hanging around a teenager. What are you, thirteen?” He said guessing at my age.
“Fifteen!” I said offended.
“You need to eat more then. It’s up to you to do what you’re comfortable with.”
Without another word, he started down the trail with his bag of tools ready for the day. I debated if I should follow. Despite the age difference, I felt like I could trust him. I wouldn’t suggest others go down the same road I did. I followed behind, bike at my side determined to find enough gold to repay him for the gift.
That second meeting could have turned out poorly. But for the next three years, the crazy mountain man acted more like a father than my biological one did. We spent every day together in the summer. With his advice, he made me open a bank account that my parents couldn’t access. Any gold I found got turned into cash to be placed into a savings account. When I was only seventeen, I moved out of my parent’s place. I wouldn’t have been able to get away from that house without the hidden stash of cash I put away for two years.
Nathaniel even caved in and let me call him Nathan. I’ve been over to his cabin a few times. I’d kept begging him to move into town. It wasn’t as if he couldn’t afford it. I worried for him over the winter. We got nasty snow storms and one of these days he would freeze to death in the cabin. He never budged about moving. I even tried threatening him with our local legends. The only time I’ve heard him laugh was when I said The Faceless Cat was going to eat him one day.
We started to make it a habit of weighing what we found at his place. I’d gone in a few times to exchange my gold, but we found it easier for Nathan to exchange both of our finds at the same time. I had my eyes on college and got busy when I turned eighteen. He was out gold panning more than I was after my birthday of that year.
I didn’t have any friends besides him. I didn’t have a clue how anyone found out we spent time together. It wasn’t as if anyone kept track of what the local weirdo did. But someone noticed his main source of income. I’d finished sending out college applications and to celebrate I went to the lake to hang out with Nathan. I wondered just how many summer days I had left spending time with him. After nearly three years, I barely knew anything about Nathan. But I could tell he was proud I took steps to get my life in order.
That day we got back to his cabin one day unaware someone else was waiting for us inside. Nathan noticed before I did but didn’t act fast enough. His hand flew to where he kept his shotgun by the door finding the spot empty. I felt a splitting pain in my head the moment after I walked inside the cabin, then nothing for a few hours.
When I woke up, I found myself on the floor with my hands tied behind my back. The entire cabin was torn apart by a pair who didn’t find what they were looking for. The orange light outside told me I was either knocked out for a few hours or all night. I lifted my head just enough to see Nathan tied to a chair, his head slumped and dried blood caked in his grey hair. I thought he was dead. My chest hurt at the thought.
One of the people who attacked us noticed I woke up. A rough hand came down to grab a hold of my hair I needed to cut.
“Where the fuck is the cash?!” He screamed, his breath an awful burst of smell.
“How the fuck should I know?” I growled back.
A bit of a wrong answer. He smashed my face into the hardwood floor. I heard my nose crunch which sounded louder than my cry of pain. He let go of my hair to go back to ripping the place apart.
I knew the bastard from school. He and his brother were expelled for a few reasons. We think the firecrackers in the toilets were the last straw. Daryl and Carl. Everyone called them the local fuckups. There wasn’t anything else to call them.
Nathan stirred, his head weakly lifting to see me.
“Liam, are you alright…?” He asked, his voice barely a whisper.
He looked so damn old to me at that moment. I needed to get loose so I could get him some medical attention. The brothers came back, a large knife in hand. They forced my friend’s head back to expose his throat. The blade pressed against the soft flesh, slightly digging into the skin.
“Where is it?! Where is the cash?!” Daryl spat, his hand shaking.
It was clear these two were going through some sort of withdrawal. Because they didn’t have any money to buy their drug of choice, they came here for an easy target. Nathan was a man who did nothing but pan for gold and lived in a shack in the middle of nowhere. If they killed him, I was the only one left to miss him. I never asked Nathan what he did with the extra money. It wasn’t as if he spent much on living costs.
“In the bank. I’ll show you where we keep the gold before we cash it. We have some here you can take.” Nathan said sounding oddly calm considering the situation.
The brothers looked at each other not trusting Nathan had a bank account. That was news to me too. They carefully untied him but kept the knife at his back. He went over to a floorboard by his bed. He knew that a few other people might get the idea of going through his cabin while he was gone so he hid his findings fairly well. He finally pulled out the small glass jars he kept his flakes and small nuggets inside. He put the stash in front of him waiting for the brothers to take it and leave.
“There isn’t anything here!” The one shouted.
He kicked the jars, shattering them and scattering a few hundred dollars worth of dust and nuggets along the floor. When I first started planning, I had the same thought. These two just refused enough cash to buy an overdose. I flinched as Daryl reached down to manhandle Nathan back to his feet. I rolled on my back and then sat up trying to get over to them. I needed to do something,
The knife pointed dangerously at my friend’s throat with a shaking hand. I charged forwards using my shoulder to tackle Daryl to the ground. I then turned to headbutt Carl, which again wasn’t a good idea. He barely felt the pain and turned on me. In a few seconds, I was back on the ground a mad junkie raining down punches to my face.
The attack only lasted a few seconds. Nathan reached down to lift the man off his feet. With strength I didn’t know he had, he lifted Carl off the ground to toss him clear across the cabin. His expression never changed. Not even when the knife sank deep into his throat.
I screamed watching his body fall to the ground. Daryl stood stunned by what he had just done. Nathan stayed still where he fell, blood pooling on the wooden floor. I scrambled over to him, tugging at my bonds trying to get my hands free. I knew enough not to remove anything stabbed into someone. But I needed to do something or else my friend was going to die in front of my eyes.
“The sun set…” Nathan said through a mouthful of blood.
Tears came to my eyes. This man took care of me when no one else did. I risked ending up the same as Daryl and Carl but avoided that outcome because of a kind older man. I never knew what hatred felt like until that moment. I wanted to tear Daryl apart. I’d use my teeth if I had to.
A hand landed on my shoulder making me look back at Nathan. For some reason, he smiled. A rare expression for him.
“A cat comes out to play at night.”
He sat up as he spoke. His voice sounded stronger. He’d never sounded so young before. I wasn’t able to stop him from yanking the knife out of his neck. Blood sprayed outwards and yet; Nathan didn’t seem to mind in the slightest. He stood up, Daryl and Carl were shocked by the change. I wasn’t able to ask what was going on.
The front door burst inwards, narrowly missing me before crashing against the other side of the cabin. A sleek black shape rushed inside. The thing was so long it needed to curl part of its body to fit inside. Carl darted away, backing up into a corner whimpering in fear. The face of the monster was directed towards him. Or the lack of a face.
The thing had a body like a cat but just much longer. The face completely flat with a pair of ears on top of its head. In a flash of movement, it crawled along the ceiling until I was directly above Carl. Then the entire thing came down. The body twisted around him in a fury, blood and gore sprouted from between the vortex of fur.
His brother attempted to run. He only got two steps. The monster changed into a different shape. It was much like how the locals described it. A massive cat that walked on two legs without a face instead of the long creature it looked like seconds before. A set of powerful claws came down on his shoulders, squishing them into a crushing vice. The void of a face came down over the top of Daryl’s entire head. His skull disappeared into the darkness. When the flat face pulled away, a stump of a neck remained.
My mouth dropped open at the sight. When the Faceless Cat turned, its head towards me I thought my heart stopped. I’ve never been so scared in my entire life. A thousand ideas of how this thing was going to kill me next came to mind. I did the only thing I could. I fainted right away.
I woke up again, my face throbbing with pain. I felt dizzy but forced myself to sit up. Nathan sat beside the bed, a broken lamp on giving enough light to see inside the cabin. I looked around trying to find any signs of the attack. The cabin was still torn apart but I didn’t see any blood.
“What…” I croaked out unsure if I was safe.
“I really hoped you didn’t find out about him.” Nathan admitted, his tone even.
I didn’t get a chance to ask what he meant. A shadow came from under the bed. I screamed, moving away from the creature. It looked smaller than before, but it was still the thing that killed the brothers. The monster circled on the blankets a few times, then started to knead the blankets the way cats did.
“What… is that thing?” I choked out.
Nathan looked between us, unsure of how to explain what made itself comfortable on his bed. The creature noticed the attention and shifted yet again. This time it looked fairly human aside from the pitch-dark skin, no face and claws. To my horror, it brought the flat face near Nathan’s. I thought it was going to eat him the same way it did Daryl. Instead, it just tried to nudge the flat face against my friends. He brought a hand up to block the contact as if this was all normal.
“He’s always lived here. I’m not sure if humans have ever come across something like him before. He can change shapes but like the person one or the cat one the most.” Nathan started.
I nodded unable to do much else. I could buy a monster living deep in the woods avoiding human eyes but why was the same monster acting so friendly with Nathan? He knew what question was coming no matter how much he wanted to ignore it.
“He got lonely after so many years. As well as myself. We weren’t picky about our partners. As long as he’s alive, I can’t die. But he can only come out at night.” He explained.
Nathan looked better, the knife wound long since healed. He also appeared younger because of whatever connection he had with the monster. I realized then I never spent any time with him after the sunset until then.
I took a deep breath, ignoring the pain in my face long enough to ask a very important question.
“Nathan… are you sleeping with the monster that just ate two people.” I asked deadpan, trying to keep my voice steady.
“I thought I already made that clear.” He said matching my tone.
I needed a minute. Nearly dying that night wasn’t the most distressing thing I went through. Nathan let me pace for a while to let the idea sink in.
“I’ve put aside money for you to go to school.” Nathan said making me nearly trip over my feet.
“You what?” I sputtered.
That answered what he did with his cash. Did he just keep it in the bank until he found someone like me to help? He lived a simple life and apparently couldn’t die. Wouldn’t he have better things to spend it on? I still was shocked by the idea of it. We were friends but I never would have assumed he thought so much of me.
“You’re being wasted in this town. We’ll talk about that later. Sit down so I can get a look at your face.”
I silently listened to him. I was nervous sitting next to the monster but he minded his own business. Nathan spent some time cleaning the blood off my face and told me we needed to go to the hospital to get my nose looked at. He’s always been good at dealing with my minor scrapes. I didn’t stand up just yet. I suddenly felt like I didn’t want to move. If I left for school, I would be leaving the only person who cared about me behind.
“How about I stay here? I mean-”
Nathan’s answer was a swift smack upside my head. I made an offended noise, but it did knock some sense into me. I knew leaving this crappy small town was for the best. We left for the hospital and he reported to the local small police force. He said Daryl and Carl raided his place, beat us up, and left into the woods. They made a small effort to find them. When their bodies never showed up, no one appeared to care.
I did end up leaving that town. I swore to pay Nathan back for him funding my schooling. He just said I should pay it forward to the next person. I do go back home to see him when I’m able. It’s nice to talk with a friend.
I haven’t come across the Faceless creature again. I’m glad about that. Nathan is a kind person, but I don’t approve of his choice of a partner. I fully believed that monster kidnapped naughty children like how the rumors suggested. Along with some hikers and campers. I’ve looked into reports and the area has an increased number of missing people compared to other towns. I don’t know how to feel about that. He saved me from a dead-end life, and yet supports something that lurks in the dark. We’ve never talked about it. I felt far too frightened of the creature to ever bring it up.
I don’t know how many other creatures are out there. I’ve honestly gotten my fill of the outdoors. For now, I’m aiming for a city job. I think we humans should stay out of the forest at night. There aren’t just animals out there. I don’t think a lot of people are going to be lucky enough to get on the good side of the ones who live in the dark.