Chapter 4
Chapter Four
Cassie
It’s hard to feel tiny when you’re five foot ten, but standing at the edge of a cornfield does the trick. A solid wall of cornstalks stretches several feet over my head, making me feel like a child, as I try to get my nerves under control.
It took a few days of planning and harvesting my courage to get to this point, but now that I’m here, I’m quickly losing faith in my plan.
Before I left the house, it sounded foolproof. Now, it just seems like a haphazard plot to a cheap horror movie.
Is this how I die? Being too curious for my own good?
I collected a myriad of supplies from the farm that I might need for this excursion, all based on survival shows I’ve watched over the years and a quick internet search.
Drawing as little attention to myself as possible, I filled an old backpack and chucked it into the backseat of my car, prepared for the first opportunity I got to wander out on my own.
I was patient—possibly for the first time in my life—because if anyone knew what I was up to, they would have tried to stop me. Not that there was anything they could do, aside from barricading me in my room, but I knew they’d be upset that I was searching for the Watcher.
Getting kicked out of the house and having to find somewhere else to stay in less than a week is not on my to-do list, so keeping my mission a secret was crucial.
Do not engage with the Watcher.
Madelyn’s voice replays like a ghostly warning in my head, but I ignore it. The Watcher isn’t real, and there’s no reason to be afraid. There has to be a rational explanation for the things happening in Cold Springs, and I’m determined to piece the puzzle together.
This is just an old, abandoned cornfield, and once I can prove it, everyone will be better off.
That thought drives my confidence and keeps me going.
I’m doing this to help.
I’m going to help.
I can feel it from the pit of my stomach to the tips of my toes: this is what I’m supposed to be doing.
My mind briefly flicks to the scream we heard on the porch a few days ago, like it’s making a last ditch effort to talk itself out of this situation.
I still have no explanation for the noise, but I haven’t heard anything else like it since arriving in Cold Springs.
No other screams, no unusual animal noises.
Maybe Aunt Bonnie was right after all.
Maybe it was just a rogue crow that flew too close to the house and spooked us.
Shaking my head, I stop wasting time and sling my backpack off my shoulder to do a final assessment of my supplies.
A pocket-knife and my neon pink taser are both tucked into my back pockets just in case—I didn’t work up the courage to borrow or steal a weapon from Uncle Wayne.
Hopefully, one of the two will do the job in a worst-case scenario.
Inside my bag, I’ve stuffed a blanket, even though the hoodie I’m wearing shields me from most of the icy air, a flashlight, a compass, and a hefty bottle of water.
I’ve even packed snacks, although I don’t plan on being out here for longer than a couple of hours.
It’s easy to get disoriented in a forest of stalks, and I’d rather take my chances with the Watcher than risk starving to death.
My cell phone is useless this far from the city—no bars even if I needed to call someone—so I tuck it into my bag and take out the compass.
It doesn’t help that after years of abandonment, the stalks have begun to venture away from their perfect rows and are growing sporadically like weeds, but I’m confident I’ll be able to find my way out.
If I get lost, I’ll just head northwest, which the compass says is directly behind me.
If I walk in any direction for long enough, I should be able to find my way out eventually.
At least, that’s my theory.
There might be a more efficient way of finding my way back, but I’m working with what I have: a little bit of survival knowledge and a whole lot of determination.
I giggle as I think back to middle school geography when we first learned about compasses, and I rolled my eyes at Mr. Winston’s lecture. If only he could see me now. Maybe he’d be proud.
Or maybe he’d tell me to abandon this insanity and go back to the farmhouse like a good little girl. I doubt he’d encourage the idea of instigating a potential demon.
I shrug off the thought and zip the bag closed again, slinging the strap over my shoulder. I’m in too deep to go back now—I have to finish what I’ve started.
After all, I have a point to prove, people to help.
It’s just after two o’clock and the sun has started to make its slow dance down the sky toward the horizon.
Madelyn is hanging out with her boyfriend, and I told Aunt Bonnie and Uncle Wayne I was going to explore the town for a little while.
I have several hours to poke around before I raise suspicion, and even more before it starts getting dark.
That should be plenty of time to cover a sizable portion of the field.
Or at least some of it.
I have no idea how deep and wide the rows of cornstalks are.
“I sure do have a lot of opinions for someone who’s never been in a fucking cornfield,” I mumble to myself.
It’s true, but I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t try to reason my way through every situation. I’m hard-wired for logic, which is a blessing and a curse.
Sometimes, logic isn’t enough, and you just have to grab the bull by its horns and jump into a situation feet-first. That’s what I plan to do now.
With a deep breath and a final look at my car like it’s the last time I’ll ever see it, I take a confident step toward the chaos of green. I march my way through the thick grass along the perimeter of the field and inch my way into the stalks.
It only takes a few seconds for the spacious outside to disappear completely.
My heartrate spikes as a tendril of claustrophobia slips its way around me, and I take long, slow breaths to abate the feeling.
I think back to living in a big city, how close together everyone was all the time.
The subway rides where everyone was shoulder-to-shoulder.
The giant buildings that blocked out most of the sky.
“This isn’t much different,” I whisper to myself. “The stalks are just like skyscrapers. You’re fine.”
Even though it’s clearly not the same thing, thinking about home relaxes me enough to keep plowing my way into the corn.
I focus on my footsteps, listening to the soft rustle of leaves as they brush against my arms and the crunch of soil under my tennis shoes.
I count each step I take until my pulse returns to a normal rate.
Unlike the farm, where crickets and cicadas buzz up a storm day and night, the air trapped between the cornstalks is eerily quiet.
Like I have earbuds in and the song I’m listening to has suddenly stopped to buffer.
Like I’ve shut myself in the car after a long day at work and I’m sitting in the undisturbed space until I have to drive home.
Every sound has been sucked out of the air, aside from my breathing and the rustling of leaves. When I pause and hold my breath, I can’t hear anything past the faint pounding of blood in my ears.
Just like a scary movie.
I crack a smile at the thought.
Despite the quiet, it’s also incredibly peaceful—way too calm to be a horror film, where a jump scare is waiting around every corner. It might have been over-kill to bring the knife and taser after all, since it seems like I’m the only thing with a pulse in this field.
“Don’t get ahead of yourself, Cass,” I mutter under my breath. The sound of my voice breaks up the silent monotony around me. It’s soothing to hear something familiar. Besides, there’s no one here to judge me for talking to myself, so I keep right on doing it.
After a few minutes of walking, the scattered stalks straighten into tight parallel lines with a thin pathway of dirt stretching between each row.
It’s much easier to navigate without dealing with random weeds and brush growth, and it looks exactly what I imagined a cornfield would look like.
Countless, endless rows of eight-feet tall cornstalks race into the distance, no end in sight.
This field is so much bigger than I initially anticipated.
It’s such a shame the farmers stopped harvesting it—there’s so much food. Cold Springs could sell it to nearby cities and make a killing.
Maybe then, they could afford some cell towers.
Even in an old country town, there’s always room for something new.
I keep walking, following the dirt pathway for a few minutes before hanging a left and squeezing through several rows to another aisle. I take a right, then another left. It doesn’t take long to start feeling hopelessly lost.
Everything is identical, no matter which direction I look, and when I start to feel the tease of anxiety brewing again, I look up at the smear of sky overhead. The faintest wisps of white break up the otherwise flawless patch of blue, and I take several deep breaths to calm my nerves.
When I was plotting this excursion, I considered all my potential outcomes, even the highly unlikely ones.
However, claustrophobia never crossed my mind; I’ve never felt this confined before.
It’s proving to be another wrench in my less-than-perfect plan, but after a long minute of rest, the tension in my chest finally subsides again.
“For fuck’s sake,” I grumble as I keep walking.
I’m not sure how much longer I can go on before I need to turn back. The last thing I need is to have a full-blown panic attack in the middle of nowhere because I can’t convince my brain I’m not trapped and going to die.
Who knew you could feel completely caged in an open space? Not me before today.
I press on, desperate for any sign of something unusual. So far, this entire trip has been a letdown. I haven’t heard or seen anything out of the ordinary, and the farther I walk, the more I’m convinced of what I already knew: this is a regular cornfield and the Watcher isn’t here.
I still haven’t seen anything to suggest he’s even real.
Glancing up, I notice the sun has sunk lower in the sky, and I have no idea how long I’ve been walking. While it only feels like a half hour, the drastic difference in the orb’s position says otherwise.
Curious, I shrug my bag off my shoulder and rummage through the contents until I find my phone to check the time.
My eyes widen when I see two hours have passed.
“What the—” I stare at the phone screen in disbelief. “Two hours?”
I know I’ve been walking for a while, but the jump in time doesn’t seem feasible. Surely I would have gotten tired by now or had to take a break. I’m not even thirsty yet.
My mind reels, attempting to trace back my steps, but I can’t remember how many turns I made along the way. I can’t even guess how many rows of corn I’ve seen. Hundreds? Thousands?
Everything since stepping into the field is a chaotic blend of browns and green. No beginning and no end; just a blur.
If I’ve already been walking in one direction for two hours, now is the time to turn around and head back. Four hours is a good chunk of time to be gone without a trace, and if I take much longer, my aunt and uncle might start to worry.
Will they come looking for me?
Will they send a search party?
Surely, they’ll start to panic if they see my car sitting abandoned outside the cursed field of corn.
I swallow hard and toss the phone back into my bag, reaching for the compass again. As uneventful as this trek was, I can at least confirm the field doesn’t seem to be haunted. Whatever made the farmers go missing can’t be in here, or I would’ve found it by now.
Or it would’ve found me.
I hold the compass flat on my palm, waiting a moment for the needle to spin into place.
Once it shows northwest, I’ll start the long walk to my car and hightail it back to the farmhouse before anyone has a chance to worry.
I might even work up the courage to tell them about my adventure, but I’d like more evidence to disprove the Watcher conspiracy first.
One trip into a field doesn’t prove anything either way.
He could still be out there, somewhere.
I wait, my eyes glued to the compass in my hand, but the needle never stops spinning. It continues moving steadily, around and around, like a sped-up second hand on a clock.
My stomach pitches toward the ground, and I give the compass a little shake. There’s no telling how old the thing is. I found it in an old desk drawer at the farmhouse, but it seemed to be working earlier.
I even checked it against my phone’s GPS before packing it. Maybe being jostled around in my pocket threw it off.
I jiggle it again, temporarily disturbing the easy movement of the needle, but after a few seconds, it’s back on track, spinning out of control.
A shaky breath passes my lips, and my heartrate kicks up as panic ensues. I’m lost in a prison of plants with no sense of direction to find my way out.
Up until now, I’ve managed to keep my cool and work myself down from panicking, but it’s official now.
I’m so screwed.