Sue grimaced as she pondered the freshly erupting blister under her new, painfully stiff trail boots. A fire flickered lazily outside of their canvas pop tent, and the spicy smell of cowboy beans simmering in a pot scented the night air. Carrie, sweet Carrie, the girl she had known since primary had insisted on this hiking trip as a commemoration to both the dawning of summer and their own graduation. This would be the last carefree summer before soldiering up and marching off to face the world, before the miles came between their friendship to dull the memories of summers spent frolicking in the lake, of water-guns and My Little Pony parades.
And so Carrie had been adamant about coming here, of spending the first weekend of freedom here in nature, to spend the first days of a new life here in the lush greenery, the cold sparkling lake twinkling in on the horizon. Of course, it was easy for Carrie, Sue mused. For perfect, beautiful Carrie the world was her oyster. Her excellent grades and numerous club memberships and extracurricular activities had earned her a spot in a most prestigious school, her acceptance letter had been a given. And so it was perhaps fitting that all of Carrie's good qualities that Sue had long secretly grudged against her friend would be the catalyst for their separation.
For Sue there had been no acceptance letter, instead of heading out to shake the scholastic world up as Carrie would no doubt do, Sue would be enrolling in the local community college and grub for grades much as she had done all through school. While Carrie held infinite possibilities in her palms, Sue had not much more to look forward to other than an associates degree from said community college and a bland office job somewhere, after which she would no doubt return home to an equally bland husband.
Sue was Carrie's polar opposite. While Carrie was lithe, sun-kissed and well, beautiful with her strawberry blonde hair that curled so becoming at the ends and her eager green eyes, Sue was plain, to say the least. Her ash brown hair, while thick, was nothing to write home about, and her light brown eyes were far from limpid pools. While Carrie sported a winning dimple in her left cheek when she smiled, which was almost always, Sue's pale cheeks were smooth and her lips seemed to be turned slightly down, giving her a pensive expression most of the time. To describe Sue as a drab moth content to aspire to porch lights and street lamps to Carries's soaring butterfly flitting through wide blue skies would be more than apt. And somehow these girls who were so different, had remained friends throughout it all.
Sue's already naturally pensive expression grew even more so as she contemplated their very different prospective future, brooding over lost day, missed opportunities and the like until Carrie's bell like laugh sounded out from the crackling fire. She grasped at memories of summers past, wishing she could turn the clock back until Carrie popped her head into the tent, her wonderfully crooked smile drawing Sue from her reveries, distracting her from her aching calves and blistered feet.
"Let's walk to the lake, Sue."
As much as Sue's feet ached, she rose and followed her friend out into the warm velvet of the night. Stars that had been tucked away in their secret places when they made camp now hung heavily from the wide midnight sky, the moon a lazy crescent. Eyes feasting on the beauty of the night here at Camp Crystal, Sue drifted after Carrie, all earlier sorrows forgotten here in the arms of nature.
He could hear the girls giggling from his vantage point, even see flashes of moonlight glance off their young limbs as they made their way down to the lake. He watched them for a bit longer before stealthily coming out from behind the massive oak tree to slowly pursue them. His face was so hot under the stiff fabric, his skin greasy and stinging slightly from perspiration but he was now glad he had worn it. Jason had not expected to come across anyone just yet, after all summer was a season still forming within mother nature at this point; people usually were not tempted to trespass into the old campsite and it's surrounding areas until the sweltering heat had manifested enough to seduce them into venturing out to the lake.
So despite the sweat stinging his eye like acid, Jason was glad he had donned his pillowcase. For these girls stirred his curiosity. The taller one with hair spilling over her shoulders like beams of moonlight had been chattering non stop to the smaller, quieter girl, pointing out the various constellations above them.
"Do you see them, Sue? Gemini, the twins. They represent Castor and Pollux, you know."
"Castor and who?"
"Pollux. They were twins in Greek mythology. See the two really bright stars there? They are named after the twins themselves, and they are the brightest in the constellation."
Jason paused for a brief moment to squint up at the sky himself, and they they were, twinkling like the brightest diamonds against the blackest velvet. The girls voice chirped on, describing the exploits of the Greek twins to her quiet friend. He found himself listening to her bell like voice, her tale stirring up memories of long ago stories his mother had read to him every night for as long as he could remember.
For a moment, the story teller was all he could see, and bright as the moon in the heavens above him.
"You see, unlike Pollux, Castor was mortal. When Castor died, Pollux begged his father Zeus to give Castor immortality and he did, by uniting them together in the heavens. And there they are." Carrie tucked a long strand of that moon-spun hair behind her left ear and smiled.
"That's actually kind of depressing, Carrie." Sue answered, flexing her toes outward, the scent of the lake beginning to tickle her nose.
"Do you really think that Sue? I mean, I thought it was a good story. In the end they remained together, after all." Carrie's pretty mouth turned down in a slight frown.
"Well, sure, they stayed together, but what life is that, being immortalized as two really bright stars? Why didn't Zeus just bring Castor back?"
Carrie had no reply to that immediately, and they trudged on down the path thoughtfully. The night's beauty pulled at them, leading them closer the lake, and for a time there was no need for words.
When they stood at the shore, Carrie finally spoke again.
"Maybe Zeus understood something we don't."
He could see them standing at the shore of the lake, his lake. The one that had claimed him, as well as made him, in a sense. Something like a mother. His heart twinged at the thought of Mother, and he gripped the machete tighter. The pretty one was kicking her boots off, shimmying out of her jean cut offs and wading into the sparkling water, calling to the dark one to join her. Her earlier moment of pensiveness seemed all but forgotten as she slapped at the still waters with the flat of her hand, her voice tinkling as she threatened to pull the other girl in if she didn't hurry up.
The blood lust swelled within him then, hot and consuming. The moonlight glinting off of the girl's slick, wet flesh called to him even as she was calling to her friend. She was perhaps the most stunning thing he had seen here in these woods, in those waters, and he resolved to see that pretty face contort and feel that soft body writhe as he thrust his blade deep into the heat of her.
The other girl was entering the water now as well, and she too was now shimmering in the refracting light of the lake. It was if she had been transformed from a somewhat average teenage girl into a lady of the lake for a moment, and the sight of her also tugged at Jason's heart. The girls laughed and splashed, and Jason watched and waited.
The darker one was fascinating to him in her own right, perhaps not as flashy as the star girl, but her dark hair waving down her back looked rich and soft in the moonlight. Her slender neck sang out to him, and he imagined wrapping his arms around her in an almost tender embrace, slowly sliding his hand up to her swan like neck and then closing his fingers around it in a death grip. For a brief moment he could feel her weight pressed back against him, feel her struggles grow more intense before becoming more spastic and fluttering and then ceasing altogether.
He could feel her life ebbing through her in that moment, and knew she was the one. The star girl was far too bright, she was like the moon itself and out of reach, but this dark one seemed more like a firefly that could be brought down with a swiftly placed set of hands and carried back to his shack. There he could look at her in the soft moonlight, feel her softness, hear her screams...
Oh they always screamed.
Feel her pulse pounding in her veins, feel his hands slowing closing on her. Yes, she would be the one.
The star girl in her midnight blue bikini top was the first to exit the lake, her pale hair a river running down her small back. She whipped the hair over her shoulder and began to wring the cool lake water from it, leaving a wet trail behind her as she strode over to her cast of shorts and hiking boots. He watched as she eased them op and over her hips before the hiss of the zipper echoed in his ears. The dark one seemed refreshed by her night dip, those pouty lips were actually curved upwards. She shook her head like a wet dog, flinging water out about her.
Sue was reaching for her own shorts when he stepped out.
His blade glimmered in the darkness much as the stars above, and before Sue could even gasp out a word of warning, he was upon Carrie, grasping a heavy handful of her wet locks and drawing her back against him, against that blade.
Carrie's eyes widened and her lips parted but nothing save a burble of blood issued from them as the tip of the blade appeared from her midsection. Sue watched in horror as her friend's legs gave beneath her, much as her own threatened to do now, watched as he gave the blade a brutal thrust and a twist before wrenching it free. He let go of her hair, and she slumped to the ground, limbs and torso twitching erratically.
And then Sue screamed.
Now in that cold moonlight he came for her, Carrie's blood glistening wetly upon him, and smeared upon the blade of the blade he bore. Sue tore her gaze from her fallen friend who was beginning to still, and began to run, her bare feet crying out in protest as she tore over twigs and rocks in a desperate bid to distance herself from this man.
However, it was not meant to be. While the fear coursing through her veins was a powerful motivator, he quickly overtook her and wrestled her to the ground. She cried out as her head struck a small rock, and his weight forced her down onto sharp sticks littering the unforgiving ground.
Sue struggled blindly, small panicked shrieks tearing from her throat as the mountain of a man grasped at her, his hands vice like. One rough hand settled around her throat, and she felt herself being hauled up from the earth, the other crushing her upper arm. She found herself face to face with her assailant, saw that cruel eye fixed upon her. She grasped at that powerful arm, desperately trying to give herself enough leverage to draw another breath. Her legs kicked helplessly, as she struggled despite his grip becoming tighter around her throat.
Just as blackness began to take her, that cruel hand released her throat, and she found herself flung to the hard ground knocking what little wind remained out of her. As she lay gasping for breath, he simply stood over her, that eye regarding her curiously. Sue made a weak attempt to scramble away from this juggernaut, but he brought his heavy foot down on her small arm, effectively pinning her to the ground like an especially exotic specimen of butterfly.
Sue wept.
The dark one writhed and struggle beneath his boot, gasping and mewling incoherancies. Here, away from the wet embrace of the lake, she had become just another girl, the allure dissipated. No longer a slick, wet princess of the forest, she was merely a dirty, desperate creature pinned under his foot. She no longer seemed especially worthy of his attentions, but yet here she lay at his feet.
The dark one whimpered, and he made up his mind.
He bent to take her up again, to wrap his hands around her neck once more, this time his fingers clamping down decisively. This girl would never be like the one who had fallen asleep under the oak tree so long ago, the one that got away. The one he'd let get away. This girl was nothing more than a poor substitute, and he'd been a fool to entertain the thought that she could be anything more. That girl was far away now, and he wasn't sure there would ever be another one that could compare to her.
That realization fueled the rage within him, took him over again. He dropped the girl to the ground, disenchanted with her and disgusted with himself. Jason drove the machete through her and into the earth with a fierceness borne of total and utter rejection. Not her, never her. His fists clenched, his mind shrieked. He yanked the blade free, the handle red and sticky in his massive hand as the blood lust screamed for more.
He would deal with the bodies later, the night was still young. For now, the desire to tear, crush and rend was too overwhelming. The girl twitched a bit, and then became still, her eyes taking on a glaze he was very familiar with. He left her then, to continue his night terrors before ultimately retiring to his shack later to think of that ghost of a girl who only returned in his feverish dreams.
As Sue's life played in front of her as it fluxed out from her veins, for a brief moment Sue was the moth again , but instead of fluttering towards the safety of porch-lights her destination was the nexus of the stars themselves. Perhaps she would see Carrie there, and they could form their own constellation in the summer sky one day.