Kevin O'Brien - One Last Scream

They continued on, and Karen could hear the woman clicking her tongue against her teeth. “Stupid girl…at this hour…Just wait, we’ll hear it on the news tomorrow that she’s missing or dead.”

Karen trudged on through the gloomy woods. She kept the flashlight directed on the path in front of her. She guessed it would be at least another five minutes before she should start looking for the trail markers Amelia had told her about.

She didn’t hear anyone else in the forest, just leaves and bushes rustling in the night wind. Karen felt dread in the pit of her stomach. She tried to brace herself for what she might find. Having volunteered at the rest home for the last few months, she’d seen her share of dead bodies, and had cleaned up blood after several messy accidents. She told herself that she could get through this. She simply had to be dispassionate about it. And, if she found Koehler’s corpse, she would turn around, go back to her car, and call George. The two of them would figure out what to do from there.

She started shining the light on the bushes and trees that hovered over both sides of the crude, snakelike path. She didn’t see any trail markers, just a few squirrels and raccoons. Their eyes looked iridescent in the flashlight’s glow as they gazed at her, and then scurried away. Karen checked her wristwatch. Only 6:20, but it felt like midnight. If she didn’t find one of Amelia’s markers by 6:35, she’d quit and turn back.

She almost tripped on a tangle of tree roots across her path. And then she heard something that made her stop. Twigs snapped underfoot. “Is anyone there?” Karen called. The noise was unmistakably someone-or something -prowling through the bushes. They didn’t stop, and they didn’t answer her, either. “Hello?” Karen called nervously.

She directed the flashlight in the general area where the noise was coming from. But she didn’t see anyone. The sound was fading. The trees and bushes seemed to move as the beam of light swept across them. Then Karen saw it-only a few feet away. A piece of white fabric with a blue stripe was tied to the low-hanging branch of a small, bare brittle-looking tree. She made her way through the brush to get a closer look. She remembered the fabric pattern from yesterday. Koehler had said it was his lucky shirt.

Standing very still, she listened for a moment. Whatever she’d heard earlier, it was gone now. Karen shined the light in the trees, searching for the second piece of Koehler’s lucky shirt. She found it through the thick overgrowth, about thirty feet away. She seemed headed in the right direction, but there was no real path. It was nearly impossible to navigate her way in the dark. At one point, she walked right into a branch, and just missed scratching her eye. Touching her cheek, she glanced at her fingertip and saw blood. “Good one, Karen,” she muttered, pressing on.

Part of her wanted to turn back. Amelia had been right about everything so far. Karen knew she was close to finding Koehler’s corpse. Did she really need to see it? Once she set eyes on it, she’d have to call the police. And then how would she be any help to Amelia?

Still, she forged ahead, following one trail marker after another. She’d counted seventeen of them, and guessed by now she was about a quarter of a mile off the trail she’d started on. Karen found another rough trail, and then came upon a clearing, a little bald spot in the woods, no more than ten or twelve square feet. With her flashlight, she scanned the tree branches for the next marking, but there wasn’t one. She had no idea which direction to go from there.

Something darted across the ground in front of her. Karen gasped and tried to catch a look at it with her flashlight. But the thing scampered by so quickly all she saw was a shadow before it was gone. “Relax,” she said to herself. “Probably just a rabbit.”

She still had the flashlight directed on the forest floor when she noticed something else amid the leaves, twigs, and dirt. One part of the ground was darker, as if stained. The leaves were a different color. Karen took a step closer. Something smelled horrible-like death. She knew that putrid odor from the nursing home. It filled the room when a patient had died.

With the light shining on that dark patch, she could see some of the leaves were the burgundy color of dried blood. Part of the ground was covered with a slimy substance that had attracted bugs. Was this where Amelia had left Koehler’s corpse? No doubt, some person or thing had been there for a while. It had started to decay before being moved. Karen wondered if a bear, or maybe even a cougar, had dragged off the carcass.

The fetid smell was too much for her, and she backed away. Shaking, she felt sick to her stomach.

Karen took a few deep breaths, then scanned the forest floor with the flashlight’s beam. She was looking for a mound of dirt that might indicate a grave, or maybe even a piece of clothing. But there was nothing.

Still, she knew Amelia must have killed Koehler on this spot. It was where the lucky-shirt markers ended.

She heard something-a rustling sound, and twigs snapping again. She made a wide arc around the slimy patch of ground and directed the flashlight into the woods on the other side. The sound seemed to be coming from that direction. Karen could see only the first row of illuminated bushes and trees. Beyond that, it was just blackness. She thought she saw a bush move. Or was it just the shadows playing a trick on her. “Who’s there?” she called.

The rustling noise abruptly stopped. Karen realized no forest creature would freeze up like that. This was a person.

She was paralyzed for a moment, waiting for the next sound.

All at once, there was a shuffling noise, footsteps.

Karen turned and ran, but suddenly the ground seemed to slip out from under her. She fell backward into that oily patch of leaves and dirt. She let out a sharp cry. The flashlight had rolled out of her hands, and she desperately scurried along the ground to retrieve it. Then she struggled to her feet. Leaves stuck to her clothes. As she frantically brushed them away, she felt that slimy, jelly-like substance that had come from Russ Koehler’s decaying corpse.

Karen could hear the footsteps coming closer. She spotted the last marker, tied to the bough of a bush by the crude pathway. She ran toward it, and anxiously searched for the next marker. All the while, she could hear that rustling behind her, pursuing her. The trail suddenly disappeared, and so did the markers. Panic stricken, Karen waved the flashlight around, hoping to find a piece of Koehler’s shirt on a nearby tree or shrub. Without them, she couldn’t hope to find her way back to the main trail.

Had she taken a wrong turn? She noticed a short path amid the foliage, and hurried along until her flashlight illuminated something on the ground in front of her. Karen froze. “Oh, God, no,” she murmured. For a moment she couldn’t breathe.

At least a dozen strips of Koehler’s shirt littered the pathway.

All this time, someone had been behind her, removing Amelia’s markers. That someone didn’t want her finding her way back to the main trail.

She heard the footsteps again, coming closer. Karen blindly ran through the brush, zigzagging around trees and shrubs, staggering over rocks on the ground. She didn’t know where she was headed. She could have been totally turned around and forging even deeper into the woods. Branches lashed at her face, arms, and legs. At every turn, she expected a hand to grab out at her. She prayed for some sign ahead, a light through the trees, some signal that she was near the edge of the forest. She didn’t want to die in these woods, as Koehler so obviously had.

All the while, she heard the footsteps thumping behind her, the bushes rustling.