Amelia, Don't Break My Heart

The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window.

It was a beacon.

It was an invitation.

It was a trick.

***

We were at the lake house. A tradition for two weeks every summer while we took a much-needed break from grad school. The property was wooded and isolated with a private lake that catered perfectly to my naturally reclusive tendencies. It belonged to Amelia’s parents who were exceedingly rich but liked to indulge in a rustic fantasy every once in a while. They were vacationing in France, so we had the place to ourselves. Just the two of us. It was always just the two of us.

The first night we lit a ceremonial fire in the backyard chiminea to mark the occasion. It was July and the nights were warm and thick with humidity. We lounged in luxury chairs imported from Europe and complained about the heat.

“How’s the Professor?” Amelia asked, casually. It was cruel of her to bring it up and she knew it. She took a sip of wine to conceal a smile. This was one of her favourite pastimes. Pressing on nerves.

She was an expert at exposing mine. And she knew exactly how much pressure to apply to make me hurt.

I gave her a disapproving look but didn’t reprimand her. “I wouldn’t know,” I said, mirroring her casual demeanour.

“He still stalking you, or has that stopped?”

She knew it was hard for me to talk about. She knew it brought up painful memories of my past. Still, she pushed.

I sighed. “Can we not?”

To anyone else, Amelia’s interest in my problems might look like a caring gesture. But I knew her better than that. This was not Amelia being nice. She was not worried about my well-being. Amelia loved pulling strings. And I was her favourite puppet.

She pursed her lips. She was displeased that I wasn’t playing along. “Is he still calling you all the time?”

“Not so much anymore,” I said, hoping that would be enough to sate her and we could move on. It was not quite a lie. The professor called me once a day. I picked up, told him to go to hell, then hung up on him.

“You should get a restraining order.”

I made a noncommittal noise.

“At least tell me you’ve blocked his number.”

I had not. “Of course,” I said.

She glared at me. “Give me your phone.”

I bristled at the demand, finally feeling a swell of anger.

She cocked an eyebrow, extending her arm. “Give. Me. The. Phone.”

I hated this side of her.

“No,” I said.

There was a flash of surprise behind her eyes, but she quickly recovered. She wasn’t used to receiving pushback from me. She sat back in her chair and crossed one long leg over the other. Her face settled into the cool stone expression she wore when she was planning the best way to rip my throat out, put me back in my place. I braced for the attack as she moved in for the kill, but something stopped her mid-sentence. A sound.

At first, it was a few barking screams of a fox. Followed by the distant yips of a coyote. Then the screech of an owl.

And then, the woods came alive.

It was unlike anything I had ever heard. It was as if every animal that called the woods home was shrieking at once. Every four-legged, feathered, nocturnal, and diurnal creature. Prey and predator alike. Somehow, they were all making noise at the same time, and the effect was bone-chilling. A deafening symphony of feral howls, screeches and snarls, all layered one on top of the other to create a truly horrific wall of sound.

I bolted upright, nearly pitching forward. Amelia stood up beside me.

Every cell in my body was vibrating with the same message.

Run.

It was so loud it was painful.

I covered my ears. Fear and dread grabbed hold of my heart like a fist. Something primal welled up inside of me. I wanted to cry, or scream, or—

Silence.

The noise died away as abruptly as it had come.

Only the sound of the wind rustling the leaves remained.

My head was spinning.

I looked at Amelia. “What was that?” My voice sounded small, shaky.

I expected to see my fear reflected on her face, but she didn’t look scared at all. She looked curious. Almost hungry.

“I’m going to check it out,” she said with no preamble. No explanation.

Surely, I had misheard her. “What? No! Why?” I was tripping over my words, tongue thick with fear. “Let’s just go inside.”

Amelia ignored me and turned on her phone’s flashlight. “I’m going,” she said, shrugging on her expensive cardigan.

“Amelia, please. Don’t.” I begged, grabbing her sleeve.

She pulled away from me. “If you want to stay here you can. But I’m going,” she snapped.

“Amelia.” I tried one more time.

But it was no use. Boldly, she took a few steps into the night before looking back at me over her shoulder. “You know, some people like to take action instead of hoping their problems go away.”

I let her go. My mouth was full of acid. I said nothing as the darkness swallowed her body. Even as the light from her phone winked out, I remained silent.

I stood by the fire with my arms wrapped around my waist, my insides thrumming with electricity. The warm summer air was cool compared to the heat of my flushed face.

My resolve did not last long.

Twenty minutes passed and Amelia did not return.

An icy thread of panic spread through my body. I shivered and rubbed my arms. I began pacing, muttering to myself, and running scenarios in my head. When that didn’t work, I counted back from one hundred. Anything to stave off the mounting hysteria. I stared into the night. I couldn’t see anything past the ring of soft light from the fire.

What would I do if she didn’t come back?

I was driving myself crazy with worry when finally, she returned.

One moment I was staring into the endless expanse of black and then, there she was, stepping from the darkness and back into the safe cocoon of the firelight. She looked unharmed but dazed. Her legs moved awkwardly like they were having trouble responding to her brain.

I stepped in her direction. “Amelia?”

She looked right through me, unresponsive.

“Amelia?” I tried again. What happened? I was vibrating with anticipation.

What happened?

What happened?

What happened?

She sat down in her chair. I noticed her phone was missing.

“Are you okay?” I asked, hovering nervously.

She looked me up and down and slowly her eyes revealed a glint of recognition like she was seeing me for the first time. She smiled. There was something not right about it like it pained her. “Of course,” she said. Her voice was rough.

I was unconvinced. “Are you sure?”

She smiled wider. Her bottom lip quivered. “Yes.” She nodded. “Yes, thank you. I am fine.”

Then with lightning-fast reflexes, she lurched from her chair and hugged me with so much force we nearly fell over. She was squeezing too hard. My arms were pinned to my sides. She squeezed even tighter. Her fingernails dug into my back. Hard enough to puncture the skin.

***

It rained for two days after. I didn’t mind really. It gave me plenty of time to work on the grant proposal I was drafting and to try and forget about the strangeness of that night. I spent most hours of the day curled up by the window with a blanket and my laptop, alternating between typing and staring out the window.

We quickly fell into a pattern. By day I would take my laptop and work by the lake or in the study if it was raining. At night Amelia would emerge from her room, where she spent most of her time, and we would drink wine until our eyes were heavy with sleep. We never spoke about that first night. We hardly spoke at all. As the days wore on Amelia became more and more withdrawn.

I tried not to read too much into it. It wasn’t uncommon for her to be moody and quiet. But I found it hard not to link her strange behaviour with her time in the woods.

***

The first animal showed up on Thursday, the fifth day of our vacation. A bird. It was on the welcome mat and I nearly stepped on it when I came back from my run. I gasped and stumbled backwards. It was small. Brown. Likely some kind of sparrow. I paused the music in my earbuds and leaned in closer to get a better look. It looked dead, but its tiny body was completely intact. It reminded me of my childhood cat, Mango. A grey tabby cat who would leave birds and small rodents at our back door.

The sound of hinges creaking caught my attention. I jumped. Amelia was on the porch swing, staring at me intently. She sat with one leg nestled underneath her and used the extended leg to rock the swing back and forth.

I felt suddenly exposed. Embarrassed about my reaction to the bird. “I think it’s dead,” I said, unsure of what else to say.

Amelia’s face fell, eyes hardening. She looked insulted.

Without so much as a word, she stood up stiffly and walked away.

***

Next, it was the rabbit.

My spirits were high because it was sunny, and my run had been good. I entered the kitchen through the side door, looking forward to some cool water. Amelia was perched at the kitchen island gingerly picking through a bowl of fruit. There was a box next to her. She looked up from it when she heard me.

“Hey,” she said. It was the first time she had addressed me directly in days.

I grabbed a water bottle from the fridge. “Hey.”

I went to take a sip of my water and stopped.

There was a half-dead rabbit in the box next to her.

She noticed me staring, a barely perceptible smile curled on her lips.

“Oh my God,” I said. “Oh my God, what happened?”

Amelia shrugged. “I found it.” She reached into the box and stroked it gently.

It was a muted shade of brown and had a little white tail. There was no visible injury, but it was clearly incapacitated. It was breathing through its mouth and making an awful wheezing sound. The whites of its eyes were visible, and it was shaking.

“We need to take it to the vet,” I said.

Amelia stiffened beside me. She gathered the box in her arms and held it away from me. “No vet,” she said, flatly.

“It needs medical attention.”

She shook her head. “He wants to stay here. With me.”

I didn’t know what to say to that. “It’s dying,” I said finally. “We should at least call animal control or something…” I patted my pockets, sighing when I realized I had left my phone upstairs.

I spied the portable phone resting in its cradle. As if reading my mind, Amelia moved into action. With impressive speed, she picked up the phone and hurled it at the wall. It shattered into pieces with a loud crack.

I stared at her incredulously. The look on her face was wild. Her pupils were dilated, and she was panting like she had been running a long distance.

This was not an Amelia I recognized. She had never been physically violent before, so blatantly unhinged. If she lashed out it was with words not aggressive displays of anger.

I didn’t move. I didn’t breathe.

“He wants to stay with me,” she said at last. “He stays with me.”

The wheezing tormented me for the next several hours. I tried to distract myself with work, but it was useless. It was heartbreaking to listen to. Impossible to ignore.

I had to make a decision. The moment I heard Amelia leave the kitchen, I grabbed the box and the keys and ran to the car.

I left the rabbit outside the vet’s office in town and called in a tip anonymously from the car. After I placed the call, I checked my inbox. There were eleven missed calls and three voicemails from the Professor, a consequence of the spotty cell service at the lake house.

“I think we should leave,” I said when I came back. Amelia was standing at the window staring blankly into the yard. I couldn’t read her expression.

She remained silent, continuing to look out the window. She didn’t mention the rabbit.

“Things just feel off,” I went on, gesturing vaguely with my hands. You feel off.

I thought about threatening to leave without her but deep down I knew I wouldn’t.

“I want to stay,” she said with finality.

And I was ready for that to be the end of it.

But the next morning when I passed Amelia’s SUV in the driveway, I nearly dropped my phone on the pavement.

Someone had let all the air out of the tires.

***

I started sleeping with the door to my room locked. I didn’t know why exactly. I just felt safer when I did. Periodically I would wake from a dead sleep certain that I had forgotten to lock it. Seized with panic, I would not be able to fall asleep until made sure the lock was secure.

A few nights after the rabbit incident I awoke gasping and soaked in sweat from a nightmare. It was well after midnight.

In the dream, I was standing by the floor-length window in the living room downstairs. There was a giant flock of birds soaring and dancing in the sky. They were flying low, sometimes swooping down into the yard before gliding back up again. I watched their graceful motion, how they moved as one. It was peaceful. I felt like I was floating.

Without warning, one of the birds hit the window. There was a dull thud, a sickening crunch of bone, then its lifeless body fell to the ground.

I stared on in horror as another bird followed the first. It flew at the window full speed and dropped immediately after colliding with the window. A third bird followed. Then another and another and another. Ten, twenty, fifty. Hundreds of birds all hurtling themselves against the glass in unison.

I screamed for them to stop but no sound came out. It was like watching a tsunami swell and then crash on the shoreline. A wave of death.

They kept coming, willingly careening to their deaths. And all I could do was watch.

I was badly shaken. The effects of the nightmare still lingered. I rolled over on my side only to be met with another scare. My body jolted from the bed compulsively.

Amelia. She was here. Sleeping in my bed. One arm was outstretched as if her open palm was reaching across the expanse of the mattress to where my body had been. There was a speck of blood on her left cheek.

I clasped a shaking hand over my mouth.

In her other palm, clutched in a loose fist, was a dead bird.

I hovered over the bed and leaned as close as I dared. No. I was wrong. The bird was still alive. I could see the rustle of a black wing, the twitch of its delicate head, the pulsing fear behind its eyes.

I could feel that same fear in my own chest.

My legs gave out and I fell to the floor. Why was she doing this? How was she getting them? I was quivering all over and holding back tears. All I wanted to do was curl into a ball on the floor and rock back and forth.

But I couldn’t stay here. I just needed some space. Some time to think.

Without another thought, I forced myself up off the floor and made the trip down the stairs to the kitchen. It was dark and quiet. Only the hum of the refrigerator cut through the silence. I was still breathing hard. My knuckles were white from clutching the countertop. I swiped furiously at a few escaped tears. What was happening?

The kitchen light clicked on. Amelia was in the doorway, squinting at me. The bird fluttered in her hand.

I whimpered.

“What are you doing?”

I blinked against the light, trying to remain calm. “Nothing.”

Something flashed behind her eyes. There was something off about them. Inhuman. I got the sense that she was reading my thoughts. Her fingers flexed around the bird’s body. It became agitated and released an anxious chirrup.

My fear was mounting again, becoming insufferable. I moved to leave the kitchen, but Amelia was still blocking the exit. She didn’t move out of my way. Taking a deep breath, I mustered all my courage and shimmied past her as best I could. My upper arm brushed hers and I nearly died. Her skin was cold. Damp. The repulsion I felt towards her was instinctual. I stifled the urge to cringe away from her. I didn’t want her to know what I was only just coming to terms with myself. I was afraid of her.

***

I locked myself in my room for the entirety of the next day, devising the best plan of action. My phone was missing. It had not been on the nightstand when I returned to my room last night and without it, I felt like a cornered animal. I would not let myself sleep, terrified that I would wake up and Amelia would be next to me.

I needn’t have worried. She was preoccupied with a new animal. A possum. I had caught a glimpse of it when I risked a trip to the bathroom.

I hid at the top of the stairs and listened to her fuss over her new obsession relentlessly. Even from the safety of the second floor, I could hear its ragged breathing. She never tired, either cooing over it or humming quietly while stroking its fur. All the while the terrified animal struggled to cling to life. It was haunting. Mocking. Sadistic. Only I didn’t know if she was toying with the possum or with me.

I had never been in the basement before. There was never any reason to go down there. But now I was desperate. It was my last chance at salvation. If I was lucky, I would find an air compressor for the tires or maybe a shotgun. Amelia had gone to bed, or at least I hoped she had. It was 2 am and I was eager to make my escape.

The smell hit me before my eyes even adjusted to the shadows of the dank basement. I gagged and covered my nose with my arm, wavering on the first step. Groping the walls, I searched for a light switch but couldn’t find one. Dread filled my entire body, rooting me to the spot. The air was warm, and heavy with my own apprehension. I moaned. My imagination was swimming with a nightmare cast of images. The air compressor faded to the recesses of my memory.

What the hell was going on here? The twisted desire to know was the only thing that pulled me forward now. With each step, my heart sunk a little lower. I reached the bottom and had to steel myself. The stench was so strong my eyes began to water. I crept deeper into the basement.

There was a faint buzzing sound. A hum.

Something soft and wet squelched under my bare foot. I lost my balance and knocked down a few rusted cans from the shelf beside me. My breath was coming in short bursts. Bile rose in my throat.

Somewhere in the chaos, I found the string for a lightbulb. After a moment’s hesitation, I pulled. Light flooded the room.

I felt like someone had punched me in the stomach.

It was a massacre.

Rats. Thirty or more. All of them—dead.

Their mutilated bodies were everywhere. Severed body parts. Viscera. Blood. Stuck to the walls and coating the floor.

And the flies. There were so many flies. Dense in the middle of the room where the carnage was worst.

Something fell from the ceiling and landed on my shoulder. A pink piece of intestine.

I doubled over, vomiting violently.

I needed to get out of here now. I would walk all the way to town in the middle of the night if I had to. Anything to get away from this place. From her.

Fleeing the graphic scene of the basement, I took the stairs two at a time, stopping abruptly at the top. I screamed and nearly fell backwards. It was too much. My nerves were shot. I was unravelling. I wanted to go home.

The lifeless body of the possum was blocking the top of the steps. Its throat had been sliced open. Blood pooled on the hardwood floor in a dark red puddle. It stared at me with dead eyes.

Wildly, I searched for Amelia. I was sobbing now, certain that the possum’s fate was soon to be my own.

Tripping over the fresh corpse, I forced myself to make a run for the front door. I threw it open, still in my bare feet.

She was standing in the driveway, waiting for me. Her eyes came alive when she saw me. They were flashing with undisguised hunger.

"Noooo," I whined. No no no. I pulled at my hair, choking back another scream.

I had to leave.

Now.

I turned on my heel. There was only one other option. I fled out the back door and into the woods. Running and running and running.

By the time I reached the cabin, I had slowed to a limp. I could barely see it in the weak light of the moon. It was small. In need of repairs. A lone candle burned in the window and I moved towards it like an insect. I was numb with exhaustion and the warm glow of the flame looked so inviting I nearly started crying again. My arms and face were stinging with cuts, feet aching and raw.

I dragged the heavy door open with shaking arms. It was dark. The candle was the only source of light. I squinted. There was a shape on the floor. As my eyes adjusted, I realized it was human. A woman. Gagged and bound. Wearing only underwear.

I gasped.

“Amelia?”

She opened her eyes.

I was skeptical. Confused.

She groaned and even though the sound was crude it settled something inside of me.

It was her.

I didn’t know how, but it was her. The real Amelia.

I forgot my fear.

She cried when I knelt before her and slipped the dirty rag out of her mouth. “I’m sorry,” she sobbed.

I stroked her filthy hair and hugged her to me. Her body was warm against mine. Familiar.

I didn’t understand. If this was Amelia…

My blood froze. I felt a presence behind me. The back of my neck prickled. I turned.

And at that moment, the woods came alive.