Chapter 20
Amaris walked as quickly and quietly through the forest as she could. What was she thinking. Mr. Lyle Bruce was here teacher. Before yesterday their conversations consisted of home work and the study of the moon. She never even knew that he did not live in the village or that he was from the mountain. She had blindly followed him because he had showed up at the right time on the road after she avoided the men in the forest. Could he be part of it?
No. Gran had said that she knew him and that they had been working together. Unfortunately she could not ask Gran any questions since she has now disappeared.
As Amaris walked she knew that she needed to pull herself together. She needed a safe place to think and a place to be able to make a plan. She had to find out if Gran was alive and if she was, get her back safe. That was really what mattered right now.
Amaris walked through the night. She traversed the forest and as she worked her way down the mountain she found the stream that she knew if she followed would bring her right back to where she was this morning behind the school.
Making her way through the rocky terrain, and through the dense under brush in the dark without a flash light was dangerous, but gradually her eyes began to get used to the dark and she could see better. She moved faster and more nimbly and soon made her way to the part of the forest behind the school. She came across one of the hiking trails that led to the ropes course used by the high school. It followed along the river bank for a while and so she walked on. Shortly before the trail took a turn to head toward the back of the school Amaris spotted something down by the bank of the river. It looked like a person, but since it was so dark she could not be sure that far away. Amaris went down the bank to investigate. As she reached the waters edge her stomach lurched. The clouds had cleared and revealed in the moon light the body of one of the men who had fallen in the river when she cut the rope to the bridge. He was swollen and bloated. Something had clearly been feeding on him making it a grotesque scene. She quickly turned her head away and vomited In the nearby bushes. She knew this man was dead because of her. Her stomach lurched again at the thought that she had taken someone’s life. Amaris could not stand one more moment on the bank and wrapping her arms around her body made her way up the bank back to the trail falling and stumbling the whole way blinded by the tears that were now coming fast and heavy. She did not remember how she got that far, but had followed the trail back to the end of the forest where the fence opening was. Amaris leaned her body against the fence post and sank to the ground wracked with sobs.
Coming back to town and seeing where it all had happened had made it all too real. She had spent so much time running over the last 24 hours that none of what happened had time to sink in.
Amaris stayed in that spot wracked with sobs and hers arms wrapped around herself in an attempt to hold herself together. She did not remember falling asleep, but she woke to the warm feel of the sun one her face. As she became more conscious she realized that her hair and clothes were soaked with dew and she was cold and shivering. Amaris stretched out her stiff arms and legs, and stood. She looked around at where she was, confused for a moment as to how she got here. Memory came back all to quickly and before it could reduce her to a whimpering pile on the ground she decided to get moving and push it all down to deal with later.
At first she had no idea where to go. For all the time she had spent walking through the forest last night she had clearly defined what she wanted to do but how to do it.
She walked to the parking lot of the school, having taken the long way around the baseball field not having the heart to go back over it again and see where Heather and Mrs. Bass had died. She thought of how she and Heather had been kidding around in the locker room just before they went out to the field. She needed a friend like Heather right now. And then she thought of it. Anna. She did not live that far. Amaris could stay at her house. No one would think of looking for her there.
Amaris walked out of the parking lot and across the main road. She entered the park across the street and cut through. At the back of the park she climbed over the locked metal gate and into the field. Amaris walked the side of the field and cut back into the woods. After a few minutes walk in the woods, she came out in the back yard of a house. It was nothing fancy. Just a simple white clapboard house with black shutters. Amaris had been to this house many times. She had even played in the house, and in this backyard with Anna and her Dad. Finding an old milk crate next to the garage, Amaris placed it on the ground under one of the windows in the back of the house and knocked quietly on the window. After getting no response, she knocked again. Still nothing. Amaris decided to go around the front and just Knock on the door. She knew it was early, but Anna’s parents wouldn’t mind.
Amaris walked up the front steps and stepped up on the porch. As she lifted her hand to knock on the door, the breeze blew the door ajar. It was open.