"Chelsea, I do not understand why you are packing this much!" Lane, my best friend, whines. I sigh, rolling my eyes.
"Lane, you wanted to go camping in the middle of a huge forest, on Halloween weekend. Who knows what will happen! I, personally, would like to be over prepared in case we get lost, or if we happen to find murderers on a killing spree." I say, exasperated. I sit back, looking at everything I have laid out with my checklist in my hand.
Lane and I have been friends for almost ten years. He is only half a year older than me, but I swear I am the more mature one, though, only slightly. Our friendship has always been weird. The eccentric gay kid, Lane, and the weird, geeky, survival enthusiast, me. People have wondered how our relationship works, yet we can give them no answer. It just does. We understand each other more than we understand ourselves.
We met when I dropped out of public school. My parents decided that I would be better suited for a homeschool life, and it worked in my favor. I got to take all the weird classes, like survival, fencing and swordsmanship, along with a few styles of karate, along with classes that I truly enjoyed. Those included classes involving the medieval period, up to the modern era of the 20th Century, with language classes of sign language and Latin. Weird, right? That's homeschool for you though.
Back to the topic at hand, Lane thought that this Halloween weekend would be a great time to choose a random forest and go camping. Me? I agreed to go along because I was not going to let him get murdered alone. Great friendship, right? We are currently sitting in the living room of Lane's apartment, with all my stuff scattered around. I have no idea what will happen, but I know to be prepared. One bag has our main source of food and water, four things of that shin raymun (Lane and I's favorite), along with fire starters and lighters/matches, but we will each have our own backpacks that carry necessary stuff.
Mine includes all that is laying about. I am a bit of a stickler when it comes to first aide, especially when going to a place where my allergies act up. My first aide kit always includes my inhaler with three extra boxes of Combivent, and the rest is all in a professional medical mountain survival kit. That includes things for burns, breaks, bandaging, bleeding, medication (with extra cold medicine and two bottles of acetaminophen), and wound care stuff. Hey, I am a stickler for the saying "What can go wrong, will go wrong", and it has gone wrong before. I also include a box of tampons, because those are amazing, and you never know when you might need one.
My bag also includes things like three boxes of batteries, for not only our flashlights, but our portable phone chargers. Yes, those are needed. Lane made sure we packed them, along with his USB stereo. Insert eyeroll here. I know I overpack, but better to be safe than sorry. As I go through everything, I am fitting it inside my duffel bag. All I need to do is add my clothes, and then we are set!
"Everything is done, all that is left to do is go through clothes, shower and change, and then we can head out!" I say cheerfully, standing up. Lane gives me a huge smile and claps his hands together.
"Good! Now, run upstairs and shower!" I roll my eyes at his excitement but do as he says. When I am done with the shower, I come out with a towel wrapped around my and another rolled up on my head, trapping my brown hair up. My outfit was already laying on his bed and I look over it. Black skin tight jeans, two thigh holsters, one for my handgun and the other for my bowie knife, black crop top, and a dark blue and green flannel shirt. I shrug and get dressed, then braid my hair back. I open the bedroom door to see Lane dressed in blue jeans and a similar flannel top. He catches a look at me and whistles. My cheeks heat up in slight embarrassment at the action, but I roll my eyes.
"Alright, clothes. Weather is supposed to be in the mid 70's during the day, typical for south Texas, and at night it can drop to the 40's. I have a shorts outfit, and a night shorts outfit, and the others are for colder weather," Lane starts. I nod my head in agreement.
"Same. I also have a scary stories book, and my manga." I say, motioning to the two books on his nightstand. This time, it was Lanes turn to roll his eyes.
"I don't understand how you like that stuff." I sigh, knowing he is talking about the manga. "I mean, come on. You are reading a picture book of a little kid making a deal with a demon, and then they go killing people! How could you like that?"
"Because it is so good! I have read all the books that are out over and over! Blame Corinne for getting me started on it!" He just doesn't understand. Not to mention, most of the characters in that story are drool worthy.
"Chelsea, I seriously think that you are the most weirdest person I have ever met. You are such a contradictory person. You have tattoos, you know your weapons and how to use things like swords and guns with deadly accuracy, I have seen you take down the freaking Cuban mob, and you are only five feet one!" I shrug, looking down at my feet.
"I didn't mean to take down the mob…" I mumble. I take a dee breath and look up at Lane, anger in my brown eyes. "They just tried to take little girls and I couldn't let them!"
Lane rolls his eyes. "Yeah, and you got kidnapped. Then proceeded to beat them almost to their death, waiting for the police, all while having been shot three times!" Remember when I said, that things that cam go wrong, will go wrong? This was that time where that saying ran true.
"Yeah, yeah. I was young then."
"Chelsea, this was last year! And you aren't even twenty yet, not for another two months!" I shrug in response. "By the way, you got that new tattoo a few weeks ago right? Can I see it?"
I nod my head, unbuttoning the flannel, pulling the crop top up slightly on my left side. I have always had this strange birthmark on my side, right below my ribs. Its shaped like a circle with an upside-down star inside. Like I said, strange. Well, I had the biggest desire to get a black raven sitting on top of said birthmark. So, I went and got the black raven tattooed on my side, its talons looking like it is carrying said birthmark. Super cool. Lane bends down and looks at it, sucking in a deep breath.
"Chelsea, I think this is the most detailed and beautiful tattoo that you have, even more so than the rose!" I smile and put my shirt down, butting up the bottom of the flannel. I have five tattoos. The raven on my left, a quote from Alice In Wonderland on my right ribs, right under my breast, a rose on my left shoulder blade, a white heart on my right wrist, matching with Lane, and a sign language "I love you" on my left ankle.
I turn and grab my clothes from the bed, along with my books from the nightstand and walk into the living room. Lane follows behind me and as I am putting my stuff in my bag, I give him a big smile. "I really love it. I don't know why a raven, but it was really calling to me. So, I went with it."
Lane nods, finishing up packing his own bag. Once we are done, I latch my hatchet to the bag, and grab my 9mm hand-gun and check the clip. Full. I clip it back into place and put it in my right holster, safety on. I grab two boxes of bullets and put them in a side pocket in the bag, then put my bowie knife on the holders on the left. Once I am all loaded up, mid-shin black combat boots laced up, backpack on, I give Lane a nod and then we are out the door.
We have been driving for about three hours, before we arrive at the national forest. Sam Houston to be exact. Lane wants to go and camp up by the cemetery for the weekend. I wont disagree, cause it actually sounds pretty cool. We check in and drop the car off at a parking space. We load our bags onto our backs, and I carry the tent with the sleeping bags attached, while Lane carries the other bag of food and fire stuff. It's a bit past five in the evening according to my watch, meaning the sun will be going down in about an hour. I give Lane a big grin and start the trek up the path. We have to go up the hill and some ways off to find a good place away from the trail, but close enough to the cemetery.
It's about ten till six before we find the perfect spot, and I set up camp. Lane works on building a small firepit and getting the fire going before it is dark. I get the tent up and the sleeping bags inside before joining Lane by the fire. I take out my phone and take a picture of the two of us before plugging it into the portable charger. I take a look at the fire and smile with pride. I taught Lane how to build a fire that we can use to cook on, and he built it perfectly. You use a rock method, with some rocks piled in the middle that help heat up. You can put a pan on it, which is exactly what we did. We boiled our noodles and ate those, all while talking about the hiking we will do tomorrow.
"Dude! Wanna explore the cemetery tonight?" Lane asks, grinning slyly. I shrug, smiling back. "Come on, Chels. It will be cool! I tried to look up pictures, but there wasn't any online. I wonder why that is?"
"Lane, It is rude to take pictures of a cemetery unless you know someone in it, or at least that's what momma said. Oh! Speaking of mom, I am gonna text her right quick that we made it."
I grab my phone and send a quick text to mom, letting her know we were safe and that I love her and the boys. I also sent that picture I took of me and Lane to her. I got a quick reply back, along with a picture of her and my two brothers making a silly face. I giggle, showing Lane the picture and he rolls his eyes with a smile. We finish eating and we put our things away in the tent. We make sure the fire is still going strong before making our way to the cemetery by flashlight.
Now, I am not one for superstition or scary stuff, but this cemetery gives me the creeps. Granted it is a dark night will a crescent moon, and the fact that this graveyard is old, really old. It has a creep factor. Lane and I are hanging onto each other, looking around with the flashlight. As we turn to walk back to camp, we hear a distant, disembodied deep voice roll through the wind.
"Found her…"
At this, Lane and I take one look at each other, brown eyes meet hazel, and we hurry our butts back to our camp. We take a seat around the fire, catching our breaths, staring at one another. Once our breaths are caught, we loose them again in laughter. We soon call it a night and crawl into our sleeping backs, tent tightly closed, without changing clothes. Our phones plugged in, with my alarm set for eight a.m.. We were out within five minutes.