That Night in the Woods
Authors note: This is in fact my first fanfiction, and I would muchly appreciate it if there were no flaming. I will however gladly take criticism. Thanks for the read!
Rose gazed around slowly, trying all she may to think of how far she had ran. Clad only in her white gossamer night dress, underwear, and her pink bunny slippers, she had run from her home. She had taken nothing else, due to her wanting to leave quickly.
Rose and her mother had fought, more so than they ever had before. Rose wanted a pet, simply to keep her company in the deep woods they lived in. She really didn't care what the pet was, she was just lonely. But her mother would not listen. She did not understand Rose's loneliness.
After one particularly bad fight, Rose ran out the front door, fleeing from her mothers cries to come back. And now she was lost, with night closing in and no hope of returning home on her own.
Picking herself up from her spot on the ground where she fell, silently thanking the large root that had woken her from her fit of panic, she righted herself. She carefully brushed the dirt off of herself shakily, wondering what she was to do now. She stood in that spot for several minutes, thinking.
Finally, she realized that all she could do was go onward, in hopes of finding civilization. She was scared, and had no idea which direction she had come from. She had never gone this far into the dark woods surrounding her house. As far as Rose could tell, there was no way home in sight.
But something didn't seem right about these woods to her, maybe the way the trees shifted with little wind, or the way the shadows didn't quite match up with the forest. Rose felt certain that she wasn't alone, but she couldn't see anything except trees for miles.
Sighing heavily, she consoled herself.
"Come on Rose, what choice do you have? I know you're scared, but you're lost in the woods, no where near home. You have to go on. It's that or die here."
So she walked on, trying desperately to ignore the crawling feeling that raised the hairs on the back of her neck, and the fact that no animal noises could be heard.
Rose continued on this way for almost an hour, all the while supernatural occurrences gaining in frequency and intensity. Every ten minutes or so, she would see a figure in the distance, and couldn't tell if it was a tree or not. Eventually, the sun did go down, leaving her to the moons sparse light.
Suddenly, she bumped into a tree that was shrouded in shadow, causing a large snowy owl to screech at her and fly away, making Rose scream loudly in turn.
She ran in her adrenaline pumped state, only to slam into another tree, or what she thought was a tree. Looking up slowly, Rose saw only blackness. She had thrown her hands up when she stumbled into the shape, and now what she felt was soft cotton.
Now realizing she had slammed full contact into what seemed like a very tall human, she ran screaming again, not wanting to ask what someone was doing in the deep woods this time of night.
After several minutes of running and a considerable amount of panicked screaming, she slowed.
"Why did I have to leave home?!" She sobbed, voice hoarse and lungs tired.
"I should have just dropped the whole thing and went to bed! I didn't even think to bring a coat let alone food or water! I'm such an idiot..."
Finished mentally berating herself, she once more checked her surroundings. At first she saw nothing, but upon closer inspection she spotted the tall figure in the distance, still too far away to have any discernible features.
Now angry with herself, and determined to keep going, Rose couldn't be bothered with fear of the man.
Bravely, she called out to the man.
"Hey! Mister tall dark and creepy! Do you know where the hell we are? I could really use the help!" She yelled.
Upon receiving no answer, she began to walk closer. She continued calling out to him while walking, and felt her slipper catch on a small branch. She bent down to release it, and upon standing up, realized the man was gone, though she looked down for barely a few seconds.
"He couldn't have gone far, right? I'll just keep walking and maybe I'll find him again." She reassured herself, confused.
Spinning around to go back in her original direction, she found herself looking at the tall creature. Rose decided to try the polite route this time around, hoping he would help her out. She began to look up at him, formulating an apology for calling him creepy.
"Hey, sorry I call-" But she was shortly shocked into stopping. The first thing she noticed about him was that he was much taller than she had assumed. The second was that he was impossibly pale. The last thing she noticed was his distinct lack of a face or hair. Only the blank, white memory of a facial structure.
At this point, Rose lost it. Screaming the loudest she had in her life, even with her sore throat, she darted, terrified in the opposite direction.
They continued like this for nearly twenty minutes. The creature popping up at seemingly random points, causing Rose to scatter away from him. Rose eventually found herself running towards her front door. She threw herself inside, a primal scream for her mother ripping its way out of her.
Her mother appeared quickly, rushing out of the family room to swoop in and pull her daughter into a tight hug.
"Where were you?! I was ready to call the cops! What happened to you!?" She half yelled half sobbed in relief.
Out of breath and shaking, Rose told her mother everything that had happened to her that night. She spoke about why she ran, about the owl, and the creature that plagued her forest trip. She realized that her mother probably thought she had hallucinated out of fear, but at least the confused parent listened. And that was enough for her.
That night, after an entire box of tissues and a bowl of hot soup, both women went to bed a different person. The guardian now realizing her child's loneliness, and eventually slept soundly. Rose, however, stayed awake for several more hours, watching the window and wondering what that thing in the forest was.
At 4:27 am, Rose began to drift off. The last thing she saw, was a blank, pale face leaning from above. The last thing heard in the house that night, however, was one pained scream, with the preteen never to be seen again.
Fin