(C) Heather Farthing 2023, all rights reserved.

Chapter four

I wake sluggishly, trying to snuggle deeply into the warm bed, like the winter mornings before school, when I didn’t want to step into the cold and was hungry. The ghosts of my dreams feel like poison in my veins, making me feel uneasy and a little sick.

I shiver when I crawl out of bed, still hungry, a light pain behind my eyes that indicates poor sleep. Despite the adequate temperature and sealed walls, I still feel chilled and exposed.

How does the old song go?

Little girl, little girl, don’t lie to me

Tell me where did you sleep last night?

In the pines, in the pines,

Where the sun don’t never shine….

Tell me where did you sleep last night?

That song sounds like I feel, dark and crawly and not quite right. Some dinner will do me good, but the light is fading outside and I don’t want to have to walk back in the dark.

I spend way too long at the window, remembering days sent to school hungry, before I make my decision.

You know we’ve got a new car payment! We all have to make sacrifices, Mya!

Sighing, I unlock the door and step out, locking it carefully behind me again. The air outside is breezy and starting to get chilly as the seasons change. Crickets and frogs are chirping, making a cacophony of life that makes me feel exposed to the night.

The blackness of my dreams make me feel colder and more shivery than the approaching autumn really should. I find myself scanning the darkness for eyes, eyes like headlights.

I trudge my way to the diner, thinking I might get a breakfast to warm up so I won’t have to do this again, maybe some snacks. I’d rather not be out in the dark around here.

Something howls, sending shivers up my spine. I pick up speed, heart hammering in my chest. Wild animals don’t drag people off anymore, right?

Something moves in the leaves to my right. It could be a squirrel, or an acorn fallen off a tree, but it sends my heart into a thunderous hammer, scanning the shadows between the trees for movement or eyes.

Feeling a bit silly, I shrug it off and keep walking to the diner, holding my arms around me for warmth.

Humanity drove off the reaching hands of nature with the birth of civilization, so even out here in the middle of nowhere, I’m not going to be carried off by wolves.

Right?

I fix my eyes on the lights of the diner and the main motel and keep walking. Again, something rustles the grass, not wind but footsteps. Howls echo in the distance, past the cabins into the forests. I quicken my pace, heart hammering in my chest.

Lights from the cities drove away wolves long ago. I’m safe. I’m fine.

In the fading twilight, as I look over my shoulder, I see something move. It’s bigger than a squirrel, with eyes that reflect green in the dark.

Smack!

Stunned, I look up at the slab of meat I’ve walked into. It’s the bemused-looking cashier, the cute one from the store.

“Oh, it’s you!” he says, trying to be friendly. “You…okay?”

“Thought I saw something, is all,” I murmur, scanning the trees.

“You didn’t hear someone calling your name did you?” he grins in a mock-spooky tone. “That’s how the wood anglers get’cha!”

“Wood anglers?” I ask, raising an eyebrow.

“Local folklore,” he smiles, motioning to the diner. “They say that people hear voices calling their name from the forests, and they feel compelled to answer.”

“What happens then?” I ask skeptically.

“No one knows for sure,” he replies theatrically. “No one ever sees them again!”

“If no one sees them again, how do they know they answered the voices?” I pry dryly.

“Don’t rightly know,” he laughs, stepping onto the curb. “Just local superstition.”

He holds the door open for me like a proper Southern gentleman and lets me inside, speaking quickly.

“I’m getting dinner for myself and some take-out for my dad,” he explains. “You look like you took a fright. Care to join me for dinner, and I’ll…um…walk you back to your cabin?”

Irma raises an eyebrow as she checks out a customer at the counter.

“Um…sure,” I answer, not sure if I’m grateful for the escort or worried about being alone in the dark with a strange man.

A man who, by the feel of it, is made of solid muscle.

He ushers me into a booth and slides in to the other side, handing me a menu tucked behind the napkin dispenser. I scan it lightly, finding mostly the usual cheap, greasy diner fair. My stomach churns a bit at the thought of a patty melt.

“Where you headin’ to?” Archer asks, catching me like a deer in headlights.

“Moving for work,” I answer with a practiced smile.

“Maryland.”

I always answer Maryland, and then never go there.

“You still got quite a drive. Headin’ out in the mornin’?”

“If my car’s fixed by then,” I sigh, putting my finger on some steak and eggs.

“Earl does good work,” Archer smiles. “He’ll get you on the road as soon as he can.”

“Evenin’, Archie,” Irma asks, appearing almost as if from nowhere. “Usual?”

“Yeah,” Archer answers. “I’ll take mine dine-in and send Dad’s to-go.”

“Sweet tea?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And you, love?” Irma asks, turning to me.

“Steak and eggs. Fried. Well done. Diet Coke.”

“Short and to the point,” Irma smiles. “I like this one.”

She winks at Archer as she walks away with her notepad.

“You bring a lot of girls here?” I ask, flushing.

He flushes a bit, too, replying, “Don’t get many visitors.”

“You are sort of far out in the middle of nowhere,” I point out.

“It’s good for farmland,” he smiles.

“Farmland? Up here?”

“Depends on the crops, but yeah. We carved terraces into the mountains for apples. Plants do…really well in Angler’s Ridge.”

“You live on a farm nearby?” I ask, putting a straw into the soda Irma brings.

“We got a personal homestead,” Archer explains. “Some garden plots, a few chickens, and a breeding pair of milk goats.”

I wrinkle my nose at the thought of stinking goats and pungent goat milk, which makes Archer laugh, then he suddenly looks thoughtful and smacks the table.

“You know about the curfew, right?”

“Yeah, um…Irma told me,” I reply, pasting the wrapper from the straw to the outside of the glass using condensation to make it stick.

“The best thing to do is to lock all the doors, cover all the windows, and climb into bed,” Archer continues. “Nightlife is dead around here anyway, but don’t answer any knocking; they shouldn’t be out anyway.”

“People around here just go around knocking on doors?” I ask, raising an eyebrow, the dufflebag burning at the back of my brain like a solar eclipse viewed with the naked eye.

“Merry pranksters,” Archer smiles. “Can’t trust tricksters.”

“Get a lot of bored teenagers up here, huh?” I ask as Irma slides food in front of us.

“Take-out’ll be at the counter, Archie,” she tells him. “Slipped in a chocolate pie for Nora.”

“Great! She’ll love that!” he beams before turning back to me. “Ain’t much to do otherwise, ‘cept huntin’ durin’ the season.”

I look down at my steak, feeling a little pale. I can’t imagine what kind of person enjoys looking at an animal while it dies when there are grocery stores to get the meat from.

“That’s a bit judgey for someone eatin’ Irma’s famous venison steak and quail eggs,” he smiles cheerfully, taking a spoonful of grits with a shrimp tucked inside.
Immediately, I turn green and push away the plate, already making a mental note to keep an eye out for signs of parasites.

“Boy, don’t you go lyin’ about my cookin!” Irma shouts from the counter, prompting Archer to laugh so hard he puts his head against his arms on the table. “Don’t let him spook you, hon, it’s just beef. Darn fool.” She glares sharply at Archer, still shaking with laughter, hidden inside his lean arms.

“It is just beef and chicken eggs,” he smiles, looking up at me. “But you should have seen your face.”

I scowl at him, pulling my steak and eggs back toward me and prodding a thick yellow yolk with my fork until it bursts, running across the plate and dousing the steak.

“She got’cha in the cabins?” he asks in a more friendly, almost apologetic tone.

“Yeah,” I admit quietly, thinking of that long walk back in the dark. Maybe I should have just gone hungry.

“They used to be part of the Getaway, back in the seventies,” Archer tells me.

“Oh?” I ask, feigning interest.

“Irma bought ‘em after the Getaway closed down.”
“What was the Getaway like?”

I prefer to think of sunny summer afternoons spent sunning on a floating dock, the smell of grilling meat in the air. There’s no fighting, no arguing, no guilt trips, and full bellies.

“I don’t really know,” Archer admits sheepishly. “It was closed long before I came along. Supposedly, real deep, there’s still the visitor’s center with pamphlets and educational stuff still on display, and the wildlife center still full of vet stuff. Some say still prepped for surgery.”

A shiver runs down my spine. Not really the description I was after.

“Don’t like the spooky stuff, huh?” he grins as he puts another grits-covered shrimp into his mouth.

“What is a ‘grit,’ anyway?” I wonder, eyebrows knitted, looking into his bowl.

“Cornmeal porridge,” Archer beams proudly. “Mom used to make it from scratch when she could.”

I retch discreetly, thinking about the bumpy texture across my tongue, like eating chunky butter and a block of cheese. “My mom never made it.”

“Pop tart kind of girl?”

“No,” I answer, frowning, not sure how to tell him my mom would rather us go without than eat “poor people food.”

When dinner winds to a close, Irma comes by to clear our plates.

“What’s the damage, Irma?” Archer asks.

“No, no, I can…” I interject, not wanting to look like a leech.

“Don’t worry about it,” he smiles, passing Irma his card as she hands him the check. “You’ve had a rough day.”

My mouth gapes like a fish, before closing on its own. I don’t like taking handouts, especially under current conditions, but he seems well-meaning and genuine. If a good-looking young man is willing to pay for a lady’s dinner, who am I to argue?

“Imma walk her back to her cabin, Irma, and pick up the to-go on the way back,” he tells her as he pays.

I follow him out past the register and back out into the cool, darkening air. He takes a deep breath in the fresh mountain air, apparently just enjoying the night.

“So, which cabin?” he asks, gesturing ahead.

I point the way and start walking, acutely aware of him, his hardworking man-smell, the ripple of his muscle under his clothes.

I’m always nervous about strange men. Men are bigger and stronger, and any woman in America should feel safe walking naked, drunk, and brain damaged through the lowest-income neighborhoods, but we’re not so maybe don’t.

Way out here, they’d never find me. Plenty of lakes, plenty of wildlife.

Without realizing it, or even really having done so before, I start whistling to break the tension.

“No,” Archer declares, whirling on me fast enough and looming large enough that I actually back away a little with a squeak of fright. “No whistling after dark, especially outside.”

I just stare at him, all wide-eyed an a little shaken as his intense face softens.

“Local…” he starts.

“Superstition,” I finish. “Local superstition.”

“Yeah,” he sighs. “Things…are drawn to it. Things you don’t want to tangle with.”

“Things?” I ask. “Like…bears or wolves?”

I’m by no means an expert, but I’ve never heard anything like that before.

“No,” he huffs, looking frustrated. “Things like…”

Before he can finish what he’s about to say, a piercing wail fills the night air, a simian shriek of pain and rage that has me clinging to Archer’s side and trembling.

“Was that a wolf?!” I blurt, wringing his shirt in my hands.

“No, that’s not a wolf,” Archer replies kindly. “Probably just John, or one of his wives.”

“John?” I ask, letting go of the cashier and still shaking, wondering how to can be so calm about a polygamist making such a terrible racket that can only mean police sirens and news vans.

“Big Bad John,” he continues. “Our local sasquatch…silverback, or alpha male, or whatever.”

“Bigfoot?” I repeat, feeling very stupid and wondering if he’s just trying to diffuse the situation.

“Oh, yeah, biggest male for at least four counties,” Archer shrugs. “Been the alpha for about…forty years now.”

“You believe in bigfoot,” I state dryly.

Yeah, sure, let’s screw with the city girl.

“Of course,” Archer laughs. “Had to chase Big John out of my granddad’s apple orchards a few times. He’s nearly nine feet tall, but people annoy him. Bang a pan with a wooden spoon or such, he’ll go away on his own. Bring out a rifle, he’ll charge. He knows what they are.”

“Bigfoot,” I state again.

“Yeah,” Archer agrees. “You know, big, hairy, primate, native to North America? Patterson-Gimlin film?”

“…Bigfoot.”

“You know, on the rare occasion we get people coming through, they’re usually sqatchin’,” he growls. “That sorta makes you the anomaly here.”

“Bigfoot the only urban legend around here?” I ask.

“Nah, there’s the Lake Emmit Siren,” he elaborates. “A lake monster in the heart of the Getaway, lays her eggs on land like a turtle from time to time. Some of the older buildings are, without a doubt, haunted. An’ then there’s the wood anglers…”

“Wood anglers,” I laugh. “That’s a new one.

By this point we’re close to my door, standing on my porch.

“Yeah, short version is, wood anglers are why we don’t just hang out in the woods.”

“Wood anglers,” I ask, raising an eyebrow. “And not wifi and air conditioning?”

“Nope, definitely the wood anglers,” Archer grins. “They come out of the woods to steal children and take their faces.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah, we got a kind of peace with ‘em,” he shrugs. “We stay out of the woods ‘cept during huntin’ season, they only take those stupid enough to wander off. So, remember the curfew. Take a Benadryl or something, and veg out in front of the television. I’ll wait out here ‘til I hear your door lock, then be on my way.”

We say our farewells, and then I slip inside and lock the door. By the time I check out the window, Archer is already heading back up to the diner, so I close the blinds and start getting ready for bed.

Mountain people are weird.