Sirena
The forest is quiet again. Too quiet.
Every sound feels suspended — the whisper of leaves, the soft drip of dew from the branches above.
My breath comes in short, uneven bursts, creating fog in the air in front of me.
My heart hasn’t slowed; it is still thrumming like the drums back at the festival, wild and unsteady, echoing inside my chest.
I press my hand against a tree trunk to steady myself. The bark is cold and rough under my palm, grounding me in a way I desperately need. My legs feel weak, trembling not from fear, but from something deeper. Something that burns low and hot in my stomach.
He let me go.
He could have caught me.
I felt it — that moment where the air changed, where his presence was so close it felt like a shadow pressed against my skin. I thought he’d take hold of me, drag me into him — but he didn’t. He let me run.
I could feel him behind me, the ghost of his hand on my skin, his breath on my throat.
Need pulses through my body, wetness gathering between my legs, and I know I’ve awakened something deep inside me.
An intense need to be wanted the way this man wants me.
The way he will stop at nothing to claim me.
A shiver ripples through me. I close my eyes, trying to breathe him out of my lungs, but he’s still there — that scent of smoke and pine, the ghost of his voice in my ear.
“Run, Little Doe.”
The way he said it wasn’t cruel. It was a promise.
I should be terrified. Instead, I’m trembling for all the wrong reasons.
I can still feel the heat of him on my skin.
My body responds instinctively to everything about him, his scent, his touch, the sound of his voice.
I’m paralyzed with fear, but feral with want and a deep need for this man I can’t quite explain.
I can feel the heat pooling between my thighs; my nipples pressed into hard peaks beneath my tank top.
Who is he? This man who has somehow made me feel more desired than I’ve ever felt in my life.
I don’t know how long I stand there in the dark, listening for any sound of him. The woods feel even more alive now— every sound a tease, every shadow a question. I think I see him once, between the trees, the faintest flicker of white — a mask? Moonlight? My imagination?
It doesn’t matter. The pull is still there, thrumming like a live wire under my skin.
I walk in the direction I thought I saw him, but when I finally stumble back to the edge of the clearing, far away from where I originally entered the forest, I see that the festival is completely over, and the man I was searching for is not here.
Carly’s nowhere to be seen — most likely long gone with whoever caught her eye this evening.
In fact, there’s almost no one left in the field.
I should feel relief that I’ve made it out of the forest, but I don’t. I feel… empty. It’s as if something inside me woke up in those woods and now refuses to sleep again, and I can’t satiate its need on my own.
I think back to all those stories I’ve read over the last few years, and how many times I’ve secretly wished for a man to want me enough to do something like this, to chase me, to claim me.
A man who would possess me in every sense of the word.
My center tightens with need as I feel heat creeping up my neck.
I shouldn’t want this, but I’ve never wanted something so bad in my life.
There’s a desire in my core that hopes what I am experiencing lives up to all those stories I’ve read.
How fucked up is that? I actually want to be chased and claimed by a masked man? I must be delusional, but as I feel myself getting more wet, I can’t deny what my body is telling me. I want this. I want this bad.
I find my camera hanging limp around my neck. The lens is smudged, dusted with ash and dirt. I lift it anyway, snap a photo of the festivals close around me. The shutter clicks — sharp, metallic, final. The sound feels too loud in the quiet.
When I lower the camera, my pulse spikes. I can feel it, someone’s watching me, that same heavy awareness that had followed me through the trees. Slowly, I turn toward the dark.
Nothing. Just the smoke curling upward, the faint shimmer of moonlight on the leaves.
But I know he’s there.
He’s still hunting.
Still waiting.
And the worst part — the part I can’t say aloud, even to myself — is that I want him to.