Two moons hung over the horizon in a white fog on a Charcoal black sky.

I had just woken up at the rest stop in an empty part of town, not knowing exactly where I was. In the back of my mind, I saw a girl with black hair, reaching out for help as the bus drove through the flooded dirt road, to reach the turn at the rest stop. It had occurred to me that I didn’t have my backpack on hand, and all I had on me was my wallet with my ID in my shoulder bag, with a few zines to sell while looking for a ride out of town and back to Chattanooga. I purchased a few snacks to tide me over while waiting for the next bus to arrive. But as it turned out, that would be the last bus for many months. I set at a table outside, waiting for the rain to stop.

I needed to find a map of some sort in the lobby, in the off chance that I needed to refer to that if I needed to walk back home, in case no ride was available. Once I retrieved it, I began my trip along the ledge of the road. The cars would pass by, and the wind would gust right over me. The rain however stopped. It was dark, and I had to carry around the flash light that was on my smartphone I was carrying. On my phone, I would receive odd text messages from someone who seemed to know me really well, but I had only known from a few trips. She would sit on the back of the bus when we would go to school together. I was one of the few that would sit come sit by her side, with her black hair over her eyes, pretending as if not to notice me. I would ask the others what her deal was, and said that ever sense her little brother died, she had not spoken a word. Only sat silently in the back of the bus. We only knew each other on the bus, and had largely different class periods. But one day, she asked me: “Do you have a little brother?”

“Not anymore” I said. This was not entirely true, however it would have been to much to go into why my siblings no longer lived with me. “I heard you miss your brother.”

“Lets not mention him again.”

I wasn’t sure why she was contacting me now, except that perhaps she might have been asking me where I was, so her family could offer me a ride back to Chattanooga. Eventually I saw a car slow down, with its headlights on. When the door opened, I saw her family. “Are you lost? You can come stay with us for the evening.” I had no other choice, and I wasn’t about to freeze to death in the wind, with the rain on the horizon.

“Yes please, and thank you.” I said.

“Tonight, we’ll be having hamburgers and hot dogs. Do you have a favorite topping?” the mother asked. What I had noticed was that the black haired girl was not in the car.

“I’m a hot sauce girl.” I said.

The mother had made my bed for me, and I thanked her for her generosity. “It had been rather lonely here sense our daughter has been gone. It be a shame if you could stay here longer, and keep me company.” I wasn’t entirely sure how to take the comment.

After the lights went out for the evening, I heard the wind outside the window howl. Soon I tried to sleep. However I was woken up grown beside my face. I jolted up, and found that nobody was there. Then suddenly I saw the silhouette of a long haired girl in a white dress peeking through the door.

“Is that you? Was there something you needed?” I asked.

But there was silence.

What I would find out was that this town had had a murderer that was on the loose, that took her daughter. However a part of me wondered if that was only part of the story. The murderer was eventually tried, and given lethal injection last month. But some say his spirit still wanders around town, searching for victims for his ax.

When I woke up, I thought the lady would offer me a ride home. However she was no longer in the house. Instead I would here constant creaking in the hallways. Until eventually, I saw the silhouette again flicking just outside of my vision outside the kitchen window. I got my bags packed, when she supplied me with a new backpack and notebook paper, and $50 dollars in my pocket. I would have thought that she would at least give me a farewell. I parted ways with the house, and then began walking back into downtown Chattanooga. Instead it was night time, as if the morning had not passed.

Shuffling behind a dumpster, I found the silhouette of the girl. However she was not the woman that took me in, but rather a black haired girl, with hair over her face. She carried a shovel, and was covered in blood.

“I remember when I found my brother here.” she said.

“Where have you been, you weren’t in–” I began to say.

“Don’t act like anything hasn’t changed between us.”

She began lurching toward me with her shovel.

On the run, I found I had to hide at the next town over. I wasn’t sure when the girl was going to find me. In the library, I found a historical newspaper rack. On it detailed the exact circumstances of the previous murders. There had been considerable doubt about the guilt of him, and some had speculated that the real murderer may actually still be on the loose. I couldn’t help but wonder if it was this girl I met that committed the murders. The house had in fact been abandoned by the family, and they were about to tear the house down. Then I remembered something important.

A detail I did not pay attention to before: she said that her daughter was dead, and yet here was she was standing upright, lurching at me with her the shovel she was carrying.

Now I find myself trapped in this library, with nowhere else to go. Currently I’m looking for some doorway exit that I can break out of. I had stayed so long that I forgot the library closed.

I found a door, and broke it down with an ax.

Then booked a stay in the hotel.

I heard a grown and a scream in the bathroom, I struggle to make myself check to see what it is. Somehow I had left the lights on, but I thought I had turned those off.

I forgot to get my ax I purchased.

Opening the door, I saw her face in the mirror.

“Wait, how did you get here!?”