Page 48

NICK: Oh, come on. What’s not to like? It’s just a nice walk out in the woods.

Mel giggles nervously. Vanessa shoots Nick an irritated glance.

VANESSA: Maybe we should—

MIRANDA: Shh. Listen.

A scream splits the air. The teens flinch at the sound, and Mel cuts off her own scream with a hand clamped over her mouth. They whip their flashlights up into the trees, illuminating a crow perched on a branch.

ANTHONY: Is that...?

TRINA: It was just a bird?

NICK: Oh, man. There’s more of them. Look.

He points his flashlight farther in among the trees. Birds’ eyes flash. Dozens of crows fill the branches, eerily silent.

SARA: The birds come after the dark. That’s what it said in Becca’s notebook.

ANTHONY: Are they dangerous?

SARA: I have no idea.

TRINA: Oh God. Oh God, what is that?

Her flashlight points among the trees. Not at the branches this time, but at the ground, where a figure staggers. Its hair hangs bedraggled around its face. Its gait is uneven, knock-kneed, as if some vital thing has been broken in its legs, twisted. Its clothes are torn and muddy. It grasps at the nearest tree to pull itself forward with one hand; the other is missing. Its arm ends in a ragged black stump that sheds black, oily smoke, which seems to eat at the remaining flesh.

If it weren’t for the brightly patterned leggings she wears, visible even under the muck, it would be nearly impossible to recognize Vanessa Han.

The camera whips around, focusing on the other Vanessa Han standing on the road as she clucks her tongue, a gentle tsk-ing sound.

VANESSA: Oh dear. How did you get all the way out here?

Nick looks at the Vanessa on the road, and then at the girl dragging herself toward them through the trees, her mouth opening and closing like a gasping fish. Her glasses sit crookedly on her face. Nick takes a step back from the Vanessa on the road, eyes wide in uncomprehending horror.

NICK: Vanessa? What—what’s going on?

She cocks her head in a movement reminiscent of a bird getting a better look at the grub it’s about to eat.

VANESSA: Shouldn’t have let go, Nicky.

TRINA: Oh my God.

JEREMY: We have to help her.

He steps toward the edge of the road. Anthony catches him, holds him back.

JEREMY: We can’t just leave her out there.

ANTHONY: The rules—

JEREMY: Fuck the rules!

VANESSA: Yes. Fuck the rules. Go help her, Jeremy. I’ll come with you.

She smiles. Nick is shaking his head, a moan in the back of his throat. He whirls toward the Vanessa struggling toward them. She is perhaps fifteen feet away now, but she falls to her knees, her remaining hand braced against the ground.

NICK: Vanessa! Come on. Get up. Keep moving. Vanessa, come on.