Chapter 2 Ava
TWO
AVA
Ihave no idea what my mom was trying to tell me, but even that fleeting contact from someone outside the cabin takes the edge off my frayed nerves. For a moment, the panic inside me wanes.
Until my brain realizes it’s just me again and the fear slithers back in, like the smoke of a house fire slipping beneath a doorframe. It coils in my chest and squeezes. Maybe I need a cup of tea, or hell, something stronger to take the edge off.
My hands shake as I reach up, rummaging blindly through the cabinet above the fridge.
It’s the one place we sometimes stash alcohol, if anything’s ever left behind.
Clinks and rattles tumble down from above my head as my fingers knock into dusty platters, ceramic dishes, and mismatched mugs.
I wince at every sound, like I might disturb something.
Finally, my hand wraps around a tall, slender glass neck. I pull it down and squint at the faded and dusty label.
“Tennessee whiskey, my old friend. You’ll do nicely.”
I might as well make a hot toddy. If I’m going to fall apart and potentially lose my mind to this isolation, I may as well do it warm.
Living on campus with roommates has made me accustomed to always having someone around. No matter where you go on campus, the library, the gym, it’s hard to find a place of solitude. So having it here feels wrong.
I place the bottle on the counter beside the stove, then pull down the honey and a half-used jar of cloves.
The red tea kettle sits on the back burner, covered in its own film of dust, waiting for someone to need its services.
I fill it from the jug on the counter and set it to boil.
While my hands are busy, my mind wanders back to the sound at the front door—that heavy, distinctive pounding.
It sounded like someone wanted in. A person, on two legs, with a fist demanding to be let in out of the cold.
I try to rationalize that it might have been an animal. They could have been driven by instinct toward the cabin’s warmth. But even in a desperate state, they should have been put off by the noise inside. I should have seen the track marks in the snow. Maybe I somehow missed them.
A thunderous crash outside breaks the fragile stillness, and every light blinks out. The cabin plunges into near darkness, sending my anxiety through the roof. The kettle takes that moment to sing its ear-splitting whistle. I nearly jump out of my fucking skin and reach to pull it off the burner.
My hands shake as I make my drink and try to calm my stunted breaths. I whip my head toward a new sound, one coming from inside the house. The fire in the living room still burns, low but crackling, casting flickering shadows across the wallboards.
It becomes my guide. I grab my phone, my steaming and fragrant hot toddy, and shuffle toward the safety of the only light left.
The cabin seems to groan with every step I take, like the two-hundred-year-old wooden planks are finally ready to call it a day.
I don’t blame them.
Darkness reaches out from every corner, and I fight the urge to look behind me.
Ignorance is bliss in a time like this. Before settling into the worn loveseat, I pop a few more logs onto the fire and pull the scratchy Afghan from the blanket basket.
It smells like dust and the musk from being folded up for too long, but I don’t care.
I’m not going back to the bedroom to grab my quilt.
Not in the dark. Certainly, not alone. I might be grown, but there’s something about the unknown in the dark that doesn’t sit right with my logical mind.
I take a slow sip of the toddy, enjoying the spicy notes of the cloves with the smokiness of the sweetened whiskey. The warmth washes through me, extinguishing the chill that has little to do with the cabin’s climbing temperature.
Whatever fun evening I imagined with my family is long gone.
I think back to Mom’s call. The static made her message something even the smartest decoder couldn’t decipher.
Was she trying to tell me they weren’t coming tonight?
It’s starting to seem that way. The idea of being alone until tomorrow fills me with dread.
I stare into the fire, watching the flames twist and leap like a coven of witches dancing under the stars.
It’s mesmerizing, and the hushed crackles become strangely comforting.
It blocks out everything else in my mind, like I’ve been hypnotized.
There’s no more howling wind pounding against the walls.
No animals scratching at the door. Just the rhythmic rustlings of wood and the heat against my cheeks.
Slowly, sleep pulls me under.
The front door is wide open when I wake.
Snow billows in, sweeping across the hardwood floor.
It’s already piled inches deep on the threshold, soft and glittering under the moonlight.
The fire’s gone out. The cabin is frigid, and my breath comes out in pale clouds.
It’s my fingertips and nose that garner my attention, stinging from the exposure.
The blanket slips from my lap as I lurch to my feet. I wrap it around my shoulders and rush toward the door to shut it and seal it off. But just as I reach it, I see them.
Boot prints. Imprinted in the layer of snow lining the floor, large and deep. They lead away from the front door, down the porch steps, and straight into the forest.
Not toward the cabin, but from inside.
My blood runs cold.
I slam the door shut with a jarring crack and lock it with shaking hands. I even push the small stool we keep by the door under the knob for good measure.
I lean against the solid frame, gasping. My breath rasps in my ears. I try to still the trembling, but my limbs won’t listen.
Fire or protection? Which is more important?
My thoughts scatter like debris from an explosion.
But the darkness swallows everything now.
The fire’s out, the lights are dead, and I didn’t have the sense to grab my phone from the chair.
I can’t see my hand in front of my face, but I wave it anyway.
The movement at least gets the blood flowing to my limbs, but that’s it.
I could be face-to-face with an intruder and not know it.
Stumbling forward, I try to orient myself by memory. The fireplace is at the back of the room, in the corner to the right. I beeline for it, but pain screams up my leg as my shin collides with something hard.
“Fuck!” I cry out, hitting my knees.
I can’t kneel here and moan about the injury; if someone’s in here with me, I’ll be a sitting duck. I have to crawl now. My hands fumble across the floor, meeting the old bearskin rug as I search for the rough brick of the hearth beyond it.
Instead, my palm lands on something smooth and cold that slightly curves on the edge.
Not the leg of a chair.
Not the hardwood on the other side of the carpet.
I freeze, every nerve in my body screaming. I pull my hand back like I’ve been burned, heart hammering so hard in my chest it steals the breath from my lungs. Then I hear it.
Breathing, that doesn’t belong to me, because I can’t currently catch mine.
This is slow and steady. Hovering over me. Way too close.
I shove backward, crab-crawling as fast as I can, heartbeat pounding like a drum in my ears.
“Who’s there?” I whisper, voice shaking. “Who’s in here?”
No reply.
Only shallow breathing.
Then—
Pound. Thump. Pound. Thump.
The sound jolts me awake.
My heart races as I sit bolt upright in the loveseat, the fire now just glowing embers, but still enough light to see.
A dream, shit, more like a nightmare.
But the incessant pounding continues against the front door.
I grab the iron poker from beside the hearth, hands clammy, and fingers trembling. I raise it over my shoulder like a baseball bat, creeping toward the door one shaky step at a time.
The locks click, one… two… stealing my protection with a metallic rattle.
And then the door pushes open.
I stagger back, weapon raised, ready to swing at whoever comes through.
A man ducks inside, hands raised instinctively.
“Jesus, Ava!” he shouts, just in time to avoid the poker aimed at his head.
I drop it with a loud clang, the tip denting the floorboard where it lands. My hands fly to my face as shame crashes over me.
“Oh my god, Scott. I’m so sorry—I didn’t—”
He crosses the room quickly, gently prying my hands away. His touch is warm. Real.
“Ava, are you okay?” Scott Donahue—my dad’s oldest friend—asks, and stares at me, eyes wide with concern. “What’s going on? Where is everyone?”
My lips part, but no words come.
Where is everyone?
I don’t know.
And suddenly, the empty cabin feels like a guillotine waiting to fall.