Fiction Sample
Fiction Sample
"The Hunted"
Arthur's breath was quick and ragged as he sprinted through the trees, kicking up a shower of red leaves with each step. Crisp air nipped his nose and the sweet aromatic smell of poplar clung to it. His lungs burned after running all night. He had numerous scrapes and bruises from stumbling around in the dark before his eyes finally adjusted to the moonlight. It was morning now. The sun rose slowly over the mountains casting a warm glow over the eerie scene.
Arthur dragged himself over to one of the wider trees. Putting his hand out to catch his fall, he collapsed at its roots, panting and trembling. His legs ached. His muscles strained with each gasp of air. But he couldn't stop. Alongside the chirping and singing of freshly awakened birds, was the sound of footsteps. They weren't panicked or rushed; they were deliberately paced. Unlike Arthur, they knew the terrain; they knew where they were going and how they would get there. He couldn’t let them find him.
Arthur shot a glance over his shoulder. The two men dressed in oak brush camouflage were roughly twenty meters away. One of them shouted something and, worried they might've seen him, Arthur took off again. He was worn out from the earlier hours of running, stopping, resting, and running again, but he didn’t want to know what would happen if they caught up. There was no undergrowth or vegetation to hide in. No dips and hollows to duck behind. No way to escape except to run. And so he ran, deeper into the stretch of wilderness, farther beneath the yellow leaved canopy. The fragrant poplars and warm autumn colors created the illusion of safety yet poor Arthur was everything but safe.
9/13/2021
"Laughter is a Memory"
I strode through the tall, arching trees, listening to the soft hum of insects and trilling song of starlings. My hands brushed the old bark, tracing the imperfect creases of their age. I was like them; seasoned and fading. The memories I once held of this place were as withered as the scarlet leaves that decorated the forest floor. When I was youthful and free, I shared this place with a close friend. We would spend hours strolling beneath the leafy awning and climbing the twisted boughs, dancing through the foliage and laughing the entire time. She laughed a laugh that echoed off the hills, but that’s the only thing I can remember of her, the only thing that is left. I’ve forgotten her face.
My joints ached and creaked like the spiraling branches did when a breeze swept in. My hair blew in my face in the same way the golden leaves shook, raining soft showers of dew onto my head. The wind brought a chill to my bones; in the past it would bring cheer and excitement. My companion would try to catch leaves that drifted in the wind. Now the same fiery leaves floated aimlessly across the ground but no one cried out with joy as they chased after them.
The smell of recent rain still lightened the air. Warblers greeted the dawn alongside chirping sparrows and tweeting finches. Even a few cardinals fluttered gracefully among the branches. I followed the path I knew by heart to a crooked aspen tree, set apart from the others by it’s white bark. I wouldn’t describe it as gnarled or warped like some might, but the trunk rose up and curved like a rib bone. It’s branches weaved together like knots and from them hung two ropes which strung up a wooden plank. With a sigh, I lowered myself into the old swing. It swayed beneath me in an almost comforting way. I sat there for a while. I felt like I was waiting for something. Maybe I hoped the memories of my closest friend would come flooding back to me just by being here. Maybe I wished the ghost of a person who’s name and face I could no longer remember would welcome me. Maybe a small part of me thought this was where I wanted to spend my final days. When I was a kid I promised myself that I’d spend the rest of my life in this forest, with this friend, but that didn’t happen. I no longer knew the person who I saw so frequently in my dreams. My aging mind had erased her identity. I wanted to know her again. I knew every tree in this forest, every creek and stream, every boulder, every cliff. I wanted to know her like I knew this place.
But she was long gone and soon I would be too.
9/14/2021
"Nearly Dark"
“I hope she doesn’t get lost,” Beth said, her voice full of worry.
Two teenagers walked through the woods, searching for a little terrier named Oakley. The sun hung low in the sky, far lower than it had been hours earlier when she first disappeared into the forest. The minutes had dragged on with no sign of her, not even a bark, but Beth wasn’t ready to give up searching just yet.
Eric, her closest friend at the time, gave her a comforting smile. “Don’t worry. She’ll come back.” He hoped his voice was confident enough to ease her anxiety since he too was worried for the dog’s safety. It was nearly sundown. Long shadows creeped through the spindly branches. It would be dark soon and he didn’t want to run around a forest at night. The deeper they went the less confident Eric felt about their chances of catching Oakley. He was beginning to lose hope when he caught a glimpse of white fur through the thicket. The terrier was standing stiff at the bottom of a small hill, head tilted.
“Oak, you lunatic!” Beth ran over, scolding her dog. Eric sighed with relief but paused when he noticed that something still had Oakley’s attention. It sounded like there were voices. He held out his hand to get Beth’s attention and put his finger to his lips. She caught on quickly. Scooping up Oakley so that the dog wouldn’t escape again, the two slowly crested the hill.
Three figures were standing together beside a truck, heads leaned close in conversation. The first individual had a hat on with their back turned to Eric and Beth, so they couldn’t see the person’s face. The man next to the first had his hand on their shoulder in an almost comforting way. It took a moment but something about him struck Eric as familiar, like he knew the second man. He leaned in, studying him more closely. Then the man turned his head and recognition dawned on him. “Is that… Sheriff Floyd?”
The familiar face of the local lawman was illuminated by the dying light of the late afternoon. Sheriff Lewis Floyd was well known and well liked throughout the town. He often gave speeches about safety at the schools so Eric had seen him a few times. He wore a green jacket, similar to the one he wore on patrol, but no uniform or badge and from the layout of the scene, it didn’t seem like he was doing police work.
The third man stood on the driver’s side. A shovel was propped up against the door. He held a cigarette between his finger tips, watching as Sheriff Floyd and the first person went around to the back of the truck and struggled to pull something from it, which fell to the ground. One of them cursed before heaving it off the forest floor and carrying it away from the truck. It didn’t take long to figure out what it was.
“My god… Is that a body?” Beth whispered in disbelief.
Before Eric could process what was happening, Oakley started to squirm. Beth quickly tried to hush her whines but she jumped from the girl’s arms, alerting the strangers to their presence.
“Hey!”
The man by the truck, now looking in their direction, dropped his cigarette and started towards them.
“Run!” Beth shrieked, jumping to her feet. Eric quickly scrambled up and followed with Oakley at his heels. They took off down the slope, trying not to stumble as they went. Beth was a track star so, with some light still peeking through the trees, she had little trouble sprinting through the trees. Eric ran after her, shooting a glance over his shoulder towards the sound of heavy footsteps, but just as he turned back he felt something tug his foot. He fell to the ground, landing awkwardly on his arm and letting out a yelp. A branch had snagged his foot. He kicked it off but when he rolled over, his heart nearly stopped. The man was standing above him.
“Don’t move,” he growled. His breath smelled of cigarette smoke. The blade of a knife glinted in his hand.
Eric’s heart was pounding in his chest.
The man shook his head. “We can’t have you knowing our secret,” he said, shifting his grip on the knife. “You might try to badmouth our good sheriff’s reputation and that wouldn’t be good for any--”
There was a thud and then the man crumpled to the ground. Beth was holding a log behind him. “Quick, get up!” She reached out her hand to pull Eric to his feet. They ran, lungs burning, until the trees eventually opened up and before them lay a blue lake tinted with an orange glow: they had originally planned to hang out at said lake, but then Oakley ran off. They continued down the shore to Beth’s blue pickup parked by the dirt road that led back to town. They leaped in, the dog hopping into Eric’s lap, and Beth started the engine.
“Eric, he saw your face.” Beth’s voice was quivery and toned with terror. Still shaken from the encounter, he could only nod. “We’re in danger-- you’re in danger. Do you realize that? If they actually killed someone, what’s stopping them from doing it again?”
Eric had no idea how he was supposed to feel, having just seen the local sheriff with literal blood on his hands. Confused? Shocked? Terrified? Here was a man he’d known and trusted for much of his life moving a body. A real life, actual corpse. Most people would tell the cops. That’s what Eric wanted to do. That was his instinct. But was that an option if the potential murderer was a cop?
“W-we have to go to the police, right? We have to tell someone.”
“What?” Beth looked at him as if he had lost his head. “Eric, don’t you get it? We can’t. Whatever this is, Sheriff Floyd is in on it. We don’t have any evidence. If that really was a dead guy, they’ll find a new place for a grave and any search will be pointless.”
“They’re trying to cover up a murder!”
“No one’s going to believe us! It’s our word against a police officer’s! They’ll try to kill anyone who knows! It’s a small town.” It wouldn’t be hard for them to track someone down. With the police force on their side, a witness to their crime could wind up missing with no case to look into.
Beth turned to him. “We can’t tell a soul.”
10/1/2021