I walked carefully on the muddy ground, trying not to trip. Corn stalks surrounded me.
Man, am I tired of corn stalks. I’m going to just call this off if this goes on for longer.
There were occasional holes in the ground in which James will hide in. Easy for him to get into, but for a 17 year old girl, it’s pretty difficult.
“James!” I screamed. My voice cracked.
Nothing. Leave it to that little twerp to make this 10x harder. My boots were getting muddier by the second, and I could’ve sworn the temperature dropped 10 degrees since I came out here. I stepped on a slick rock and almost tripped.
“James!” I screamed again, with a similar response from the last time. I was getting annoyed, and despite the wet ground, started jogging. “James!” Stupid kid.
I came to a halt. Blood was spread over a rock. Oh, crap. It was a little amount of blood, so I wasn’t too worried. A trail of it lead to the east side of the field, and I followed it.
This might prevent him from asking me to play out here for some time. Maybe there was an upside to this. I continued to follow the trail, which lead all the way to the end of the field, to a thin group of trees that cast a faint shade. The blood trail, which was getting heavier by the foot, stopped around some bushes.
A figure was hunched over panting. Blood was spread all around the figure. That was not James. Way too large.
I started to back away, trying to be as quiet as possible. Sorry James, there is no way I’m going near that. But as my hopes of getting away we’re becoming reinforced by the thoughts this thing can’t hear me, it turned around.
I was expecting a man, or a person at the very least, not this. A deer head was cleanly attached to a humanoid body, it’s unseeing eyes turned in my direction. My muffled screams were finally let loose, and I turned and ran as fast as I could, towards the direction I thought my house was in. It stood up, and started gaining speed. After taking a couples of turns, I threw myself into one of the lager holes and tried to muffle my heavy breathing.
Oh, what the fuck was that thing? No human, unless it’s a mask, but it was so realistic.
Suddenly, the earth above my head shook, and the deer-thing ran right over me, to the end of the opening of corn, and stopped. If it turned around it would see me, but if I moved, it would hear me.
It started moving again, taking a right turn. I let out a long breath. Good, now I’m going to get the hell outta here.
As I was jogging through the field, I thought about it more. It was probably another teenager playing a prank, or something. That would make sense.
I turned a corner, and stopped short. The deer thing was standing in the middle of an opening. I could feel the tears had welled up in my eyes. I could practically see the roof of my house. The deer’s hands came out of the pockets of its black coat, and with it came some sort of pocket knife. Not a joke, no way. What happened to my brother, and what will happen to me? The thing started walking towards me. I closed my eyes tight, tears running down my face. It was a few inches away from my face, and I could feel it’s hot breath on me.
…
Jules looked out her window and saw her son, James, walking up on the porch with a scraped knee.
“James, what happened? And where’s your sister?”
“I scraped my knee,” he said, and then scrunched up his face, confused, “I thought April already came home.”
Jules sighed. The sun was starting to set. “Okay, grab a flashlight. We’re going to have to find her before nighttime.”