It all started with bitter rejection. Utter humiliation. That evening, I made the unfortunate decision to go see Mindy. My best buddy Cliff tried to talk me out of it, but I was madly in love with the girl. She was way out of my league, of course. Cliff attempted to tell me so. Most crushes are.
I should have trusted Cliff. After all, he was the one with the girlfriend. At least, he told me so. I had never met her.
But I didn’t even have an imaginary girlfriend to show for. So I turned a deaf ear and set off to see Mindy. This was pre Facebook or Instagram, you see. No such thing as sending out an invite. You actually had to go see your crush to get properly rejected.
Now why did I choose to go to her house, and not just ask her out at school? That’s an interesting question, because Mindy lived in a farmhouse outside town, a mile or so into the woods.
As darkness was setting in, I actually began to regret my decision. Then the Jones property finally appeared into view. A great slab of land surrounded by trees, with a stately manor in the middle. Not much farming going on here: I knew Mindy’s dad was loaded, and had fixed the place up to be a quiet home in he woods.
Leaving my bicycle and starting for the house, I murmured: “Hey Mindy, wanna to go see a movie?” My heart drummed in my throat as I stepped onto the porch and reached for the doorbell.
Just a small wait, then Mindy greeted me herself. She looked suprised to see me. To make matters worse, one of her cheerleader friends stood beside her. Fuck. I should have turned away right there and then.
“Steve? Can I help you?” the subject of my obsession queried.
“Hi Mindy”, I began. My voice shook, and the next words came out like glue. “Wanna go see a movie sometime?”
Her friend snickered, Mindy’s face clouded.
“Oh”, Mindy said, elbowing her stupid friend. “I mean… You’re a decent guy, Steve, but I’m not interested. See you around, okay?”
“Yeah, sure, I…” She had already slammed the door into my face. I could overhear Mindy’s friend burst into laughter, and Mindy’s irritated but amused response.
I just stood there on the porch for a while, heart in shambles. Then I returned to my bycicle with sagging shoulders, convinced I would never find love.
But that was not how the evening ended.
Cursed tears stung my eyes as I made my way home. My weak front light barely lit the pitch dark forest road. But the small light did find the figure that suddenly entered the road.
Braking hastily I almost dropped from my saddle, eyeing the stranger.
It was a pretty girl, even more pretty than Mindy in fact. Raven black hair fell on her shoulders and dark eyes found mine. I briskly wiped the tears from my eyes.
“Don’t cry for her. She’s a bitch.”
“Who…” I started at her words. “Who are you? You live around here?”
“I do. I’m their foster kid. Of the Jones’s, I mean”, the girl said. “Been with them for a while now. I’m Isabelle.” She held up a bottle that looked an awful lot like bourbon. “You look like you need a drink.”
My eyes grew big. “Where did you get that?”
“Ripped it from my asshole foster dad. Want a sip or not?”
I hesitated, but was well aware that a beautiful girl just asked me out drinking. Mindy had been a mistake. This actually happened.
So I nodded. “Sure.”
We sat down behind the trees. Just shy of 16, this was the first time I got really hammered. We talked for hours. About movies, music and bullshit. Isabelle didn’t open up about herself alot. Since I had never seen her around, I figured she went to a different high school than Mindy.
When I finally got up to leave, my companion surprised me by planting a kiss on my mouth. Her lips were cold as ice, but obviously I didn’t give a shit about that.
“You wanna come back to my house?” she asked. “I know a shortcut.” She gestured at the dark trees, with a daring look in her eyes I could barely resist.
But Mindy was still in the back of my mind. Wouldn’t want to run into her again. “Not tonight”, I said, regret seeping through in my voice. “I should really go. My parents are probably wondering where I am.”
She looked disapointed, but then her face cleared. “Fine. See you later, village boy”, Isabelle smiled, kissing me again. Longer, this time. I offered to take her home, but she shook her head. “I know a shortcut, remember?”
Fuck mindy, I thought on the way home. Now I know how it feels to be in love. My lips still tingled. I realized this had been the first time I kissed a girl. No, I reconsidered proudly. She had kissed me.
The next couple of weeks were one of the best of my life. I went to see Isabelle alot, always in that same spot between the trees. We made out, and did a lot of other stuff as well. Stuff I only dreamt of doing with a girl a few weeks ago.
Cliff clearly noticed something, but he was also busy with his girlfriend. We didn’t see much of each other, other than at school. I don’t know why I didn’t open up about Isabelle. Perhaps because it felt a bit strange, telling him I was meeting some girl in the forest. Thinking back now, that was kind of weird.
Isabelle invited me back to her place everytime. I never gave in, uneager to run into Mindy. I wonder if she ever spotted me with her foster sister. She obviously didn’t care.
And then Mindy died.
A crosswalk and a drunk driver. That was all it took to end her life in an instant.
The school was shocked. The town was shocked. Mindy had been extremely popular. I went to the memorial, just like everybody else in school. I never saw people as broken as the Jones’s. Mindy had been their only daughter. Their real daughter, I mean.
Isabelle sat with them, staring at Mindy’s coffin with empty eyes. She held the hand of Mr. Jones as he cried, never so much as throwing me a look. That was surprising. I thought she hated her foster dad.
But when I went to see her afterwards, my girlfriend had disappared. I had half the mind to offer the Jones’s my condolances and ask them where Isabelle was. Something held me back. It felt selfish.
Around that same time, Cliff went missing. He had told his parents he was gonna do homework at my place, though we had never made such plans. I figured he snuck off with his girlfriend somewhere. But a couple of days in, he still hadn’t returned home. The police got involved, and found his car at the edge of town. Cliff wasn’t in it. Neither was his girlfriend, for that matter.
Of course I was concerned about my friend, and helped the police as best as I could. But I have to admit: my heart was somewhere else. Isabelle had stopped texting me. That was weird, because she had been sending me messages almost every day.
I rode to the spot in the woods a couple of times, but she was nowhere to be seen. It ate away at me, and I started to get worried. I realized how little I knew about her. I didn’t even know the school she went to. So one day, I decided to go see her at the Jones place.
As I parked my bycicle and stepped onto the lawn, I noticed a change around the farm. I couldn’t shake this oppressing feeling. Like something bad had happened.
Last time I had been here, I had asked Mindy out, I realized as I stood on the porch. And now she was dead. Hard to imagine. It also hit me I hadn’t thought about Mindy’s death since the memorial. Isabelle was in the front of my mind.
I rang the doorbell, silently praying Isabelle would answer the door. No such luck. Mr. Jones appeared. He looked terrible, with greyish hanging skin and dark circles under his hollow eyes. I guess that’s what losing a child does to you.
The whole thing suddenly felt very awkward. “Mr. Jones, I…” I stuttered. “I’m so sorry about your daughter. I always liked Mindy a lot.” I dropped a moment of silence, but he just stared at me, like he hadn’t even heard.
“Is Isabelle home?” That question finally got his attention. His eyed fixed on me like a cat.
“Isabelle”, he mumbled. “Isabelle. How do you know…” Then his eyes flashed to a point behind me. “Hey! You!” He pushed me aside, running down the lawn, heading for the forest. “That’s not what you promised! You said I would get my daughter back! That’s NOT my daughter!”
I stared with open mouth as Mr. Jones disappeared between the trees. I wondered if I should follow him. He clearly wasn’t in his right mind. Then I turned and gazed down the hallway. Something felt wrong. And Isabelle could be inside, in trouble.
I hesitated for a second, touching my phone in my pocket. Maybe I should call the cops first. But I didn’t. I stepped into the house.
It was dark inside, as if every curtain was closed. A musty, nauseating smell entered my nostrils. From the hallway, I saw dishes piled up on the kitchen counter. There clearly hadn’t been any cleaning for a while.
I heard some shuffling upstairs, and queried. “Isabelle?” Nothing. “Mrs. Jones?” I added. No reply followed.
I headed upstairs, step by step, starting to get really nervous. Standing on the landing, heart drumming in my throat, I could make out that shuffling once more. It came from behind a door in the back.
“Isabelle? Mr. Jones?” I repeated. The sounds from the backroom turned up when I spoke their names, but no reply followed.
I took another step, and froze. The door opened. Inch by inch. Fingers curled around the corner. The person that appeared wasn’t Isabelle or Mrs. Jones.
It was Mindy.
But she didn’t look anything like the Mindy I had known. I screamed, and stumbled backwards. I missed the first step and dropped down the stairs. I landed on my back, but ignored the pain. Scrambling upwards I made for the front door down the lawn, heading for my bycicle.
I didn’t look back once as I sped down that dark forest road. Then a movement in the trees caught my eye.
It was Isabelle, disapearing in the woods. She was naked. I jumped off my bycicle and ran for her. What the fuck was going on?
“Isabelle”, I yelled. “Wait!” But entering the forest, my girlfriend was nowhere to be seen. Then I spotted her, a couple of yards ahead. Thinking back, I don’t know how I could. It was pitch dark in the forest.
I kept on yelling her name, but she didn’t respond. What the fuck happened in that house?
Walking aimlessly, I noticed a shimmering light between the trees. Fire. I headed for the light and suddenly found myself on the edge of a clearing. Straight ahead, a tall slab of stone stood upwards. Behind it, something burned. I couldn’t see what it was, but it had the vague smell of roasted meat. A figure shuffled around the fire.
And there were sounds. Wails. Crying. Someone screaming for help. A familiar voice.
“You found the shortcut”, someone spoke behind me. Two strong hands locked my arms.
I screamed, somehow managing to shake free from the steel grip. I ran blindly for the opposite side of the forest. I trashed through thickets for a while, thwarting tree trunks. Then the woods stopped, and I was back on the road. I looked wildly around me, no clue which way town was. A rustling in the trees behind me forced me to pick a side. Fortunately, it was the right one.
My parents couldn’t make any sense of the incoherent story I uttered between panicking sobs. My dad simply called the police.
When the cops investigated the Jones farm, they didn’t catch any sign of Mindy. What they did encounter was Mr. Jones, dangling from a rope. Mrs. Jones was found a couple of yards into the woods. What was left of the poor woman, anyway. Her body had been burned to crisps, beneath a tall slab of stone. Remembering the smell of roasted meat, I retched when I heard.
“What about Cliff”, I found myself asking, when I was questioned by the police. “Any sign of him?”
The detective shook her head. “Why do you ask?”
“No reason”, I murmured.
And Isabelle? As I was questioned, I kept asking them about the Jones foster daughter. They were looking into it, they kept replying. When they took me in for another round of questioning, I tried once more.
“There’s no record of an Isabelle ever living there”, the woman answered brusquely. “Mindy was their only daughter.”
“But…” I muttered. “That’s… That’s impossible. I knew her. We…” But it wasn’t that suprising. Since the police asked, I had tried to find her number and texts on my phone. They were nowhere to be found. Vanished.
The detectives eventually cleared me. It was established pretty quickly that Mr. Jones killed his wife. To what motive, they never discovered. There hadn’t been a suicide note. Something to do with the trauma of Mindy’s death, perhaps. The horrific incident was labeled a ‘domestic dispute’. And that was that.
My first girlfriend was never seen again, and neither was Cliff.
Other girls came, and I’m in a steady relationship for years now. We all have to grow up sometime, right? Which brings me to last weekend, when my girlfriend and I decided to stay the weekend at my folks. They actually moved, their new house being a lot closer to the forest where I used to meet Isabelle. The guest room is located on the ground floor, adjoined by the garden.
The sound of a text message woke me up late at night. Groggy, I reached for my phone and stared at my screen. My heart skipped a beat.
“Hey village boy. Wanna meet?” In the same instant, I thought I heard a soft tap on the bedroom window.
I lurched upwards, my heart drumming, and stared at the window. Had there been a movement? Could have just been my imagination. My girlfriend was still fast asleep as I crept across the bedroom and opened the balcony door. Nothing. No one to be seen. But there was something on the outside tiles.
An empty bottle of bourbon.
Gulping, I gazed at the dark tree line at the end of the yard. I couldn’t spot anyone. A sick joke? But who knew?
As I stepped back inside, a soft giggling turned my stomach into ice. I would always remember that voice. But it was different now. Twisted. When I saw a pale arm reach for me from the corner of my eye, I slammed the door and dove between my blankets.
I didn’t get much sleep that night. The incident had sparked a lot of memories. That blind trashing through the forest. The smell of roasted meat. And above all, my best friend screaming for help.