She
wondered what it was.
She wondered
where she was.
Had she died
again?
Or was she about to die
again?
She knew
all about death.
She
faced it before, and she fell deep into its hole.
Was she
here again?
She
passed out and went into a light of her own.
CHAP
TER TWO
When she
woke again, Cheryl Dunning blinked and though her head was still thick and her
eyesight still cloudy, she was able to process that the darkness she now saw
had nothing to do with death or being unconscious, but everything to do with
the fact that it was night.
She was
outside and she was alive, but where was she?
How did she get here?
She tried to make sense of it, tried to
remember what events led her to this, but she couldn’t remember anything.
Her mind
was blank.
She
needed to leave, get home.
But
where was home?
She
tried to raise her head, but the effort was excruciating and she realized that
she couldn’t.
She put her left hand
beneath her breast and tried to push herself up, but she cried out in pain and
slumped back onto the ground.
She
wasn’t able to move.
At least not
now.
Instinct kicked in.
That part of her that could still reason
realized that she might have broken a bone or, worse, several bones.
She needed to be careful.
It felt as if someone had pummeled her.
As she
lay there, it came to her that she was on a moist forest floor.
She could smell damp timber, the rot of
whatever lay beneath her, and she was aware that it was raining.
Water tapped against the side of her
cheek and soaked her clothes.
It
wasn’t a heavy rain, but it was steady, and she was alert enough to know that
her situation was dire.
She was
alone and exposed to the elements in some unknown woods.
Her thoughts turned to the wild animals
she knew were around her.
Circling
her.
Smelling her.
Wanting to tear her apart and eat
her.
The fear she felt at that
moment made her want to get up and run, but her body wasn’t having it.
Something was wrong with her head.
It wouldn’t stop throbbing.
She felt as if it had been kicked.
And so
she lay there, a prisoner to whatever had happened to her.
She listened to the night and
occasionally heard rustling sounds in the woods.
What would prey on her tonight?
Something would.
She felt utterly without hope and knew
that she’d be dead before she had the chance to help herself.
She
closed her eyes.
She tried to
remember her life, but there was no life to remember.
It was as if someone had erased it from
her mind and left in its place a pain she had never before experienced.
It consumed her before and it did so
again.
She
wavered on the precipice of that pain, and then she gave herself over to it and
slipped into unconsciousness.
CHAPT
ER THREE
Morning
came and with it, the end of the rain.
Cheryl
Dunning opened her eyes, and this time she could see clearly.
There was no fog, no haze, just
clarity.
Her body still ached, but
the pain wasn’t excruciating.
For a
moment, the idea that she’d made it through the night alive gave her back the
hope she lost the night before.
With one
side of her face planted on the wet ground, she looked around and saw that she
was in a wooded area.
A
forest.
Above her was a canopy of sunlit
trees, from the fiery blaze of maples being seduced by autumn’s crisp touch to
the evergreens that would challenge the pending winter, stare it down and see
it through to spring.
It was late
September in Maine, pine needles were the carpet on which she lay, and she was
chilled to her core.
She also
was thirsty.
Her mouth was caked
with the coppery taste of dried blood and she wished she was near a water
source, if only so she could rinse out her mouth.
How had
she gotten here?
She closed her eyes,
thought back hard, and the pieces of a puzzle that was lost to her yesterday
started to form.
Her last
memory was spending time with her friend Patty at their favorite local bar, The
Grind, doing shots to celebrate Patty’s thirtieth birthday, which she called a
landmark event because she said she never thought she’d make it to
twenty-seven.
Not with her
luck.
Cheryl
rarely drank, but Patty coaxed her into joining her because it was her
birthday.
Not wanting to spoil her
friend’s fun, Cheryl went
along with the celebration because Patty was a
lifelong friend and after all she had been through in this town―and all
she had done for Cheryl many years ago, when she died the first time―she
deserved a fun night out.
Together,
they did several shots of
tequila even though Cheryl knew she’d pay
for it the next day.
But not
like this.
This didn’t make
sense.
Why was she here?
Who brought her here?
She
needed to get up.
Needed to get out
of here.
She remained on her
stomach and carefully lifted one of her legs behind her.
It was fine.
She moved her other leg, and though it
hurt like hell, it was clear that nothing was broken.
She went to lift up her right hand and
it was at that moment that she saw the cell phone strapped to it with a rubber
band.
Confused,
she stared at it.
Then it
buzzed to life.
Startled,
she lifted her head off the forest floor and some of the pine needles that were
stuck to her face tumbled off.
With
an effort, she sat up, swiped away the rest of the needles with her free hand,
and the cell phone buzzed again.
She tore
it off and tossed it away.
She
looked around the forest and could see steam rising up in those areas where the
sun made its way through the trees to warm the cool, wet ground.
She felt as if she was being watched.
She listened and heard leaves falling
from the maple and birch trees.
A
light breeze touched her back.
And the
phone buzzed again, vibrating just ahead of her on the ground.
It seemed to tremble, not unlike she was
now.
And
Cheryl Dunning of Bangor, Maine, who for ten years had worked as an underpaid
secretary in the English Department at the University of Maine and who had
never made it out of college for reasons only few knew because of the deep
shame that had crippled her for years, knew she was in worse trouble than she
ever imagined.
CHAP
TER FOUR
It was
curiosity that pulled her in.
Moving
through the pain, she reached out a hand to grab the phone and when she did,
she saw the cuts and bruises on her forearm, which made her pull back as her
stomach sank with worry.
What did
the rest of her look like?
She was
still in her bar clothes.
A tight
white T-shirt that showed off her curves, tight blue jeans she picked up for
seven dollars at the bargain bin at The Gap, and boots that Patty said were
made “for getting any man you want.
And you need a man, Cheryl.
God, do you ever.
It’s been,
like, forever since you dated someone.
At the very least, those boots with those heels should get you in the
back seat of someone’s car.
And
praise Jesus for that.”
As if
that’s what Cheryl was seeking.
She
hadn’t been with anyone since that night and Patty knew why.
She knew Cheryl was emotionally scarred,
but Patty had suffered her own troubles and knew that life nevertheless had to
move forward.
“There
are two things you can do, Cheryl,” Patty once said.
“You can live in your past and die by
it.
Or you can let your past inform
your present so you can have some semblance of a future.
That’s therapist talk, but it’s
true.
Your past won’t go away, but
you can do your best to learn from it and move forward.”
Over the
years, other lectures came, which Cheryl tolerated because she knew her friend
was just worried about her.
But
after what happened to Cheryl during her junior year in college, which is the
reason she never finished college, she wasn’t sure if she’d ever be with a man
again.
Not after what she went
through.
She
wondered about the boots and their heels.
If she had to run, how would she manage to do so with these on her
feet?
The idea of it worried her
almost as much as that phone, the surface of which now gleamed because it had
captured a piece of the sun and was tossing it back toward the sky.
She went
for it and grabbed it.
She turned
it over in her hands and nearly screamed when it vibrated again, which
confirmed her belief that somewhere in these woods, someone was watching
her.
Toying with her.
She didn’t understand why, but someone
was nearby and given her current condition, it was clear that they either
planned to hurt her more than they already had, or they were going to kill her.
Why?
She had
no idea why.
Maybe there wasn’t a
“why.”
Maybe it just was,
particularly if she was dealing with madness, which she’d dealt with before.
She
wished she could remember more of what happened last night.
Did someone slip something into one of
their shots when they weren’t looking?
And if someone did, who did it?
It had been only her and Patty last night, hadn’t it?
She didn’t remember speaking to anyone
but the bartender, and even that was brief.
The Grind had a packed house.
He was busy.
Whenever she or Patty engaged him, it
was just to order another round.
She was
thinking of Patty and wondering where she was when the phone vibrated again in
her hand.
It was an iPhone, dented
on its side, scratched on its surface, but one of the newer models.
She had one herself, an older version,
so at least she was familiar with how to use it.
She
pressed the button below the screen and saw that while there were no voice
messages, there were eight text messages.
She clicked on the icon and read the first.
“You have no ability to make a
call.
You have no ability to send a
text.
Maps have been disabled.
Tracking has been disabled.
Browser access has been disabled.
Are we clear?
This phone has been hacked and it serves
as my line of contact to you.
Here’s your first directive.
Select the iPhotos icon and look through the photos.”
She went through the other seven
messages and they all said the same thing, though the last one was more
urgent.
“Select the iPhotos icon,
Cheryl.
Do it now.
Don’t anger me.”
Whoever
it was knew her name.
How did they
know her name?
Did she know this
person?
The
phone buzzed again and another text appeared on the screen.
She opened it.
“I really don’t want to kill you,
Cheryl.
At least not now.
So, open the fucking icon.”
Nervously,
she clicked out of the text window and selected iPhotos.
What she saw when the application opened
was a series of events.
The photos
began at The Grind.
The quality was
grainy, as if no flash was used, which made sense because people would have
noticed a flash, including her and Patty.