The Thicket

“Girl! If you don’t bring yo ass!” I whisper shout through clenched teeth at my cousin Brittany. By marriage. She is my favorite uncle’s wife’s child from a previous relationship. I still remember the first time we met. I was four. My uncle had told me I was meeting some people who were very important to him, so I should be nice. And try to become friends, because they are gonna be family now. Then he walked me into the den, and this wild haired blond girl ran up and hugged me. Before I could even see her face. She says “I hope we can be best friends!” And I said “You smell funny.” My uncle grabbed my arm and kneeled to my eye level and whisper shouted to me “I asked you to be nice” through clenched teeth, the same way I’m speaking now. I wasn’t trying to be mean. I was just making an observation. Luckily, she and her mom thought it was funny. I later found out it was nit shampoo or spray or lotion. Something like that. It smelled like black licorice and tea tree oil. I never smelled anything like that in my life!

That was my first time meeting a white person in real life. And we became fast friends after our less than ideal introduction. We’re the same age, both born in July, she’s two weeks older. We grew up having joint birthday celebrations, going to the same schools, same camps, same gymnastic programs, karate, swim classes, we did everything together. We still do pretty much everything together. Now we’re twenty year olds, attending college and sharing an apartment. She was my person, and I was hers. But right now, I don’t know.

“What!?” Brittany shouted, indignantly.

“SHUT UP! And come on!” I whisper. Why is she lollygagging and being this loud out here!?

“Oh Tremain! There’s no one out here but us. You don’t need to whisper.” She says.

“You don’t know that. You don’t even know where ‘out here’ is!” I say softly.

“I told you, I walk through here all the time when I come from the campus. You worry too much!” She chides. I roll my eyes at that.

“You walk through here in the DAYTIME!” I assert. She rolls her eyes.

We trek through the grass we’ve been marching through for over a half an hour. I’m so irritated I could slap her.

“I can’t believe you got me out here walking, at night, through a damn forest. I should’ve left you!” I bristle.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I’ve said sorry a thousand times. You can hate me when we get back home, but right now, let’s just get through this together.”

I stop dead in my tracks. “Was you worried about together when you was mouthing off to our ride!?” I ask with all the attitude in my body, hand on hip, neck roll, and finger to boot.

“Tre! I’m sorry alright! I wasn’t thinking! I was stupid and bullheaded and you can kick my ass for it later, but for now, please lay off me. Please?” She pleads.

I don’t answer. Because I don’t know if I can. I’ll try to let it ride. But it really depends on how this plays out.

Brittany has always had a problem with her mouth. Now, me, I don’t really have much of a filter. Never have. If I think it, I say it. It’s something I’m working on. But, when I say things, it’s never with the intent to harm and mostly, people think I’m joking. Brittany on the other hand, does have a filter and she chooses what she says. She’s just oblivious and kinda rude. She doesn’t ever think of the impact of what she says. And she either gets away with it, or she has me there to defend her. I’ve been in so many fights because she decided to say something outta pocket to somebody, knowing damn well she couldn’t pop a grape in a food fight. My mama always told me “Don’t let your mouth write a check that your ass can’t cash.” I don’t think Brittany ever had that conversation with her mama. And I’m not sure my uncle ever told her either. I have. Plenty. But she don’t listen.

“Oh, look! A barn owl!” Brittany says, pointing up at a tree.

“Can you please, for the love of all things holy, lower your voice?” I ask, exasperatedly. She sucks her lips into her mouth and nods.

“How do you know what a barn owl even is?” I ask.

“Well, I think most owls we see are barn owls. They’re the most common.” She answers.

“Hmm…learn something new.”

“I wanna get a picture of it! You stay here and I’ll—“

“GIRL THIS AIN'T SCOOBY DOO! We ain’t splitting up! What’s wrong with you!?” I say, much louder than I intend to.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to yell. But you not about to leave me in no woods alone. The black girl always dies first, and what I’m NOT about to do, is disgrace my ancestors by going out like that!”

She laughs, then asks “You have service now?” I check my phone.

“Nope. Not a single bar.”

“Me either. What’s your battery percent?”

“16%, its in power save.”

“I have 32%. Power save is on, but this flashlight is draining it fast.”

We’ve been using her phone’s flashlight since the woods got thicker and we lost the moon light. I’m saving my battery in case I get service because I have Verizon. She has Sprint. So if I don’t have service, she definitely don’t have service.

“You sure you know your way through here?” I ask, skeptical. This wooded area doesn’t seem this big or this dense when I drive past it.

“Yes, I do. So just come along, stick with me, we’ll be out of here in no time.”

The barn owl sits perched on the same branch, watching us. He looks amused. I’m not. He suddenly snaps his head in the direction we came from, and flies off. Then I hear what sounds like rustling leaves, and twigs snapping. It sounds like a far off echo of the sounds that have been surrounding me for the past twenty minutes. Like footsteps, in the distance.

“Shh.” I snap quickly. “You hear that?” I ask.

“Do I hear what?”

“Listen!”

We both listen. We don’t hear anything.

“I don’t hear anything.” She responds.

“I thought I heard footsteps.”

“Well, we are wa—“

“Not our footsteps, smart ass.” I interrupt her. “Footsteps behind us.”

“I don’t hear anything. I haven’t heard anything but us since we entered the thicket.”

“Mmmmm…I swear I heard footsteps.”

“Okay. Let's just keep our ears open as we walk. If you hear it again, let me know.”

I give her a thumbs up. We walk and she talks. I don’t know what she’s saying because right now, I’m just in my head about the footsteps. I mean, I’d say I’m at an appropriate level of alert for being lost in a forest, but I’m not like, skittish. I swear I heard footsteps. And, why did the owl look in the direction I heard the footsteps coming from, and then fly off? Maybe I’m tripping. But don’t they say animals be knowing? I just—

I hear a branch break behind us. I grab Brittany by the arm and bring my finger to my lips, then I cup my ear with my hand. She freezes. There’s another snap of a branch. I squeeze her arm and shake her by it. I mouth “I TOLD YOU!!”

She takes my hand from her arm as she nods. She starts walking again. I follow.

“It’s probably just somebody else trying to get home. It's not that uncommon to walk this way to our apartment.” She whispers.

“At damn near three o’clock in the morning?” I ask incredulously.

“Maybe they’re coming from the party too.” She says with a shrug.

I’m very doubtful of that. When we left the party, it was winding down. That was almost an hour ago. “Lets pick up the pace.” I say.

We continue walking, and I continue to hear the sounds of someone behind us. I got a bad feeling. There's nothing I can do besides keeping up this brisk walk. Oddly enough, it sounds like whoever is behind us is keeping pace with us. I grab Brittany’s wrist, cup my ear and slow. She nods that she still hears the footsteps. We come to a stop. The footsteps behind us also stop. We start again. The echo follows. I set a quicker pace. She catches up. After a few steps, the sound of the footsteps syncs to ours.

“You don’t find that weird?”

“What?” She asks.

“That they’re stopping when we stop and keeping pace with us?”

“Why is it weird?”

“They’re clearly trying to mask their steps.” I whisper to her.

I look up at her. Her brows are knit in thought.

She nods and says “I’m gonna go check it out” as she turns from me. I grab her by the arm and halt her.

“What the fuck is wrong with you? Why would you wanna go TO a potentially dangerous situation? Go check it out and do what? Are you crazy?” I ask, seriously dumbfounded.

“Well I was gon—“

“Come your ass on! You ain’t finna check nothing out! Check us out this forest!” I whisper as I drag her forward. I can't even believe this. Why? What is she thinking!

We walk, briskly, in silence. There’s tension in the air. I think she's tense because I snapped at her. I’m tense because somebody is following us. Every time I glance at her, she looks away, but when I peek, I see her face looks like she's in deep thought, like she's confused about something. After a while Brittany asks me if I have service.

“Still no. Shouldn’t it be back by now? Ain’t we getting closer to home?”

“We are, but we have splotchy service at the apartment anyway. This whole area needs new towers.”

“Facts.” I agree.

We’re making good progress and the tension wanes. Brittany has started up chatting again. About her Chemistry professor being a douche. I’m listening until I notice that the distant footsteps don’t sound so distant anymore. And that they’re no longer in time to ours. They sound like they’re approaching much faster. I pat Brittany’s arm and continue to walk.

“Listen. The footsteps are faster. And closer. Right?” I whisper as quietly as I can.

She listens and nods.

“We need to get out of here. Whoever that is, they’re trying to catch up to us. There is no pleasant reason for anyone to be running up on two girls walking in the woods this late. We need to move.”

She nods.

“How much farther?” I ask.

“Not much.” She whispers.

We pick up the pace, nearly running. It’s hard to be sure of where to step, since our light source is bobbing around in Brittany’s hand. I can't hear the footsteps now. But that could be from our heavy breathing, the sound of our own feet tramping through the leaves, or my heart pounding in my ears. I’m just hoping we’re actually putting distance between us and whoever is behind us. I just hope we—

My thoughts are disrupted by a cry as the light disappears. I look beside me, Brittany is gone. I stop. I look behind me. Brittany is on the ground, clasping her ankle. She fell. She actually tripped and hurt her ankle while being chased by a bad guy. I can not believe this.

I run back to help her. I grab her upper arms and pull her to her feet.

“Can you walk?” I ask.

“I think so.” She whimpers, fighting back tears. She tries to take a step, and crumples. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” She cries.

“Shh! It’s fine. Uuuhh… uuuhh… uummm…” I stammer, trying to figure out what to do as I pull her from the forest floor. “Just lean on me, and move as fast as you can.”

I can hear the footsteps. Closer than they have been all night. Approaching us, fast. We’re hobbling at what feels like a snail's pace. My heart is racing. My vision is blurring. The anxiety is getting the best of me. I’m shaking and trying not to cry. It feels like this stalker is breathing down my neck.

“Come on, come on, come on!” I chide to myself. I have to ignore the cramp in my sides, the spasms in my legs, the shaking throughout my entire system. My adrenaline is crashing. I don’t know how much—

She falls. Again. She SERIOUSLY FELL AGAIN. I can't even right now. I whip around to see what she could’ve possibly tripped over. We are SIDE BY SIDE. What got her that didn’t get me? I try to locate her in the darkness, and I see a huge, lumbering man approaching us like a freight train. He swatting through the branches of the trees. He’s got some kind of light around his neck and with its glow, I can see a crazed look in his eyes. I run, scanning and groping the flora, trying to find something, ANYTHING that could help us.

“Please! Don’t leave me!” Brittany calls, reaching out to me, dragging herself along.

I don’t understand why she won't just get up.

She’s crawling and crying. I’m scouring and searching. I glance back. The crazy man is rocketing towards her, looking pleased at finding her nearly prostrate and defenseless. I run back towards her. The man is a few feet away. As he reaches out to grab her, I use all the strength in my body, along with the large stick I just found and swing it like a baseball bat at his head. It connects with a loud “THWACK.” The man crumples to the ground in a heap. I lift the stick over my head, and taking full advantage of the assist gravity provides, give a few more wacks to the guy's skull, just to be sure we’re safe. I use my phone to drop a pin on the location to better inform police of where to find him once we’re home.

I scoop her up and help her place her arm over my shoulders. We continue on, taking our time since the situation is neutralized. It takes us about 6 minutes to finally break through the trees and back into civilization. We almost died this close to home.

We get into our apartment. I put my phone onto the charger. It’s on 2%, so it won't be any good for calling the cops right now. I help Brittany get into a hot bath. I drink a glass of ice water and allow my nerves to settle. Once my hands stop shaking, I make the call.

The cops come, take statements, apprehend the psycho, and leave.

I shower. I get Brittany into bed, and once I get the fire stick set up, I plop down next to her.

“So that was interesting.” She says with a facetious tone.

I give her all the side eye I can muster. “You know you would’ve died like three times tonight if i wasn’t there, right?” I ask.

She giggles, and says “I don’t understand how the black people always die first, because clearly…”

“CLEARLY!!” I shout and throw my hands in the air.

We laugh and start our nightly binge watch of “Lost.” Could anything be more fitting?