Page 13 of Into the Dark, We Go

"What do you mean?"

June leaned forward, interested, and grabbed our headrests. Clearly, this was a story she hadn’t heard before.

"Shit went down at night when we were on patrol. We were moving through the desert, and then suddenly everything just... stopped."

"What do you meaneverything stopped?" his sister interrupted.

"Froze up. Dead silence. No nothing. But it was different from the usual nighttime quiet, you know? And the weirdest thing, I saw something on the horizon." He took on an expression of far-off wonderment. "It was like a bright light, but it was off, you know? I’d never seen anything like it before."

"Like a UFO?" I offered.

He shrugged and continued, "I was watching it, and then it just vanished. Like it never even was there. And then, everything went back to normal."

June asked, "And what do you think it was?"

"No idea," Mitchell replied honestly. "But it was really fucking strange. Pardon the language."

I waved it off.No big deal.

"Did anyone else see it besides you?" June asked from the backseat.

"No, it all ended before I thought to call any of the guys."

I smiled slightly, and Mitchell noticed, seeming a bit embarrassed.

"What?"

"Nothing, really. Sorry."

"Speak!" he laughed. "Tell me honestly, what’s my diagnosis?"

"It’s nothing! It’s normal for a person to try to find a supernatural explanation for things."

"Really?"

"Yes. We’re wired to make sense of the inexplicable. It’s just a way of reassuring ourselves that the world still makes sense, even if the explanations we come up with are far-fetched. So, don’t beat yourself up over doubting the rational world. It’s in our nature."

"Thanks, Doc. For a second there, I thought you were gonna tell me I’d lost my mind or something."

"No, not at all," I grinned. "One session would be too little for a diagnosis."

Our fun was interrupted by June nervously fidgeting with the wooden beads on her wrist. I’d thought they were bracelets, but they turned out to be a rosary wrapped tight as an angry serpent around her hand. "Enough flirting. We didn’t come here for that."

Mitchell and I exchanged a glance, slightly embarrassed, even though there was nothing overtly flirty in our conversation, at least not to my knowledge. A hush fell between us, not because we were obediently following a teenager’s command butbecause June had skillfully brought back the tense atmosphere that our chatter was dispelling. Soon, she asked to stop for coffee, and when we got our drinks, she sat without a word in the front seat next to me, throwing over her shoulder, "Mitch, sit in the back. I’m getting a little queasy."

Her brother didn’t argue with her, but when I caught his reflection in the rearview mirror, he playfully made a face as if to say, "I see you, little sister."

I smiled politely in response. June gave me a stern, "Don’t you dare" glance, her expression clearly conveying, "My brother is off-limits".

I didn’t mind. I wasn’t interested.

September, 2017

He saidI couldn’t come with them.

When I arrived at Lucas’s dorm, he was frantically stuffing items into his hiking backpack. It seemed like he had completely forgotten about our plans but wouldn’t admit it, and my presence only irritated him further. This camping trip came out of nowhere, and when I started asking questions, he became defensive quickly.

"It’s a guys’ trip. We just wanna hang out."