13. Friday, October 13, 2023 #3
Geoff steps free of the trees and Beverley is right there beside him. “Look who I found,” he says. Alice’s mother has the blanket draped over her shoulders and she’s holding on to Geoff’s arm for support, but otherwise she looks fine.
“Mom.” Alice rushes forward to give her a hug. I didn’t manifest my mother’s disappearance, she thinks, flooded with a relief that makes her buoyant. I am not an evil daughter—today.
Her mother lets Alice hug her, hold her even, for a few seconds. “Are you okay?” Alice asks.
Her mother pulls free from the embrace and gives Alice a pat on the arm. “I’m fine, dear. A little bit chilled, but otherwise I feel great.”
“Let’s get her inside, warm her up with a bit of bourbon,” Geoff says, putting an arm around Beverley’s shoulders and leading her toward the house.
“Nana, what happened?” Polly asks as they move in a group across the lawn.
“I’m not sure, dear,” she answers, sounding less like her confident self and more like a confused, but surprisingly cheerful, old woman. “It’s all a bit of a blur.”
“You were gone for almost two hours,” Quinn says. “We were calling for you and we tried to find you using my drone, but it broke.”
“That’s very sweet of you,” Beverley says, turning to give Quinn a smile, seemingly unaffected by the panic that everyone felt at her disappearance.
“The path is just one big loop,” Geoff explains. “I found Beverley on the lowest part of it, down the hill. I told her she must have just been going in circles but wasn’t able to tell in the dark.”
“Thank God you came for me,” Beverley says, reaching up to pat his hand on her shoulder.
Alice has never heard such warmth for her husband in her mother’s voice. Alice feels a tug on her jacket and turns back. Polly has stopped walking and is giving her a look that stops Alice dead.
Polly points toward Beverley’s cabin. “What the fuck?” Her daughter whispers so low that only the two of them can hear it.
Alice follows Polly’s sightline to her mother’s cabin, taking in the front door, which is closed, then moving to the window beside it. In it sits her mother’s black cat, Soot, his ears pressed against his head, teeth bared.
Polly
“Mom,” she says, pointing at the black cat in her nana’s cabin window. “I saw that cat with my own eyes out here on the lawn. And Quinn and I have been out here all night, so how the hell did he find his way out of the woods and let himself inside without us seeing?”
Her mom looks stunned, staring at the cat. “He must have come around another way.”
“And opened the front door, then closed it behind him?” Polly is incredulous.
“Well, no, of course not. Cats can’t open and close doors.” Alice shakes her head. “I don’t know, Polly. Let’s go inside and get your nana’s version of things.” Alice turns to go, but Polly reaches out and grabs her coat again.
“Nana was wearing a yellow sweater when she went into the woods.”
“What was she wearing when she came out?” Alice asks, looking toward the house, but her mother has already slipped inside with Geoff.
“A blue one.”
“Maybe it was a neighbor’s black cat on the lawn,” her mother offers. “And maybe Nana was wearing two sweaters and took the yellow one off in the woods.”
“Mom!” She is practically yelling. “Something is not right about tonight. When I came outside Nana said, ‘Soot got out.’ Don’t you think she’d realize if it wasn’t her cat? And why on earth would she wear two cardigans?” The pitch of her voice is rising, but she doesn’t care.
Her mom sighs deeply and puts a hand to her forehead, the thing she does when she’s stressed. “I don’t know, Polly, but instead of standing here playing Nancy Drew, I’m going to go inside and talk to Nana.”
“Who’s Nancy Drew?” Polly asks.
Her mom snorts, gently pulling free of Polly’s grasp. “Google it.”
Going over to her nana’s cabin, Polly checks the door. It’s shut tight. She checks the window where the cat is now meowing at her; it’s also shut tight. Walking around the cabin, she looks for any way that a cat could get in and out undetected but doesn’t find anything.
She decides to go inside and question her nana herself but as she’s making her way to the back door, she hears someone call her name from the trees at the side of the house. Her stomach does that weird roller-coaster thing. She hesitates, but only briefly.
“Hey,” she says casually. It’s been almost a week since she’s seen Gray, and it was torturous, but she doesn’t want him to know that.
He steps into the light from the house and the thick heat of attraction runs fast though her veins.
He’s wearing his usual: black hooded sweatshirt and black jeans.
But over that is a thin black North Face jacket.
He’s wearing a black baseball hat backwards that makes him look boyish and bad at the same time.
“It’s Friday the thirteenth,” he says with a wide grin.
“You’ve got that right,” Polly says with a frown. “My nana just got lost in the woods for two hours because she was chasing a cat that’s now sitting safely in her cabin.”
Gray tilts his head and narrows his eyes with confusion. “What?”
Polly shakes her head, not even sure how she’d explain it. “Nothing. It’s just been a weird night.”
“So, does that mean you don’t want to go on that adventure I promised?”
His question erases all concern for her nana and the strange events of the night. “No! I want to go on an adventure,” she says with too much enthusiasm. “I mean, I love adventures,” she adds, toning it down.
“Great. Let’s do it, then.”
She pulls her phone from her back pocket and texts her mom: I’m going over to Natalie’s for a while.
Gray reaches into his coat pocket and pulls his hand out in a closed fist. He holds it out to Polly and opens his fingers to reveal what looks like gray, withered plant roots. “Shrooms?”
Polly sends one more text to her mom: Don’t wait up, I’ll probably sleep over.
She takes what Gray’s offering and shoves it in her mouth, washing it down with the water that he holds out to her, trying hard to resist gagging on the horrible taste and texture of the plant.
He takes her hand in his. “Ready?”
“Where are we going?”
“Why, the woods, of course,” he answers, pulling her into the trees.