Crib

The cabin in the woods has been abandoned for years, but tonight, a candle burns in the window.

In the absence of heavy footfalls and decidedly urban voices, nature has grown bold, in these woods. Circling this cabin. Where once shovels and pike fences had ruled this clearing, now plants curl posts; birds build nests; bugs burrow deep. But tonight no trace of the birds is to be found; the bugs find their underground haven and stay there; the very plants appear to wither and retract, desperate to be passed, unnoticed.

A swathe of vine reaching tender coils around the rusting throat of the cabin’s leaning gate isn’t so lucky as that, wretched out of place with a wail so silent it echoes. The woman bursting through it, though: she is too blind with midnight mania to hear anything but the tendriled ground catching beneath her feet. No moon stands watch over her gutted breaths as she runs; no kind star overhead marks the clearest path. No, the air is hostile, tonight—the air, and the pursuer cleaving it.

Here is the thing about running in the dark: one is bound to trip and fall.

Here is the thing about the cabin buried in the woods: it is her last chance.

Here is the thing about the candle in the window: who’s to say it burns for her?

The cabin door gives way like it’s meant to, like it’s destiny, like the night is over and in relief it has no choice but to yield. She does not have enough left in her to control how she falls; the threshold is welcoming, the floor warm and grateful.

Oh, its gentle cushioning says, honest and wooden and soft. Oh, it has been so long since we have had someone to hold.

She is not, she thinks, collected enough to understand why her hands are so raw. Yes, that must be it; she must be overtired, she must be overthinking, she must be overwhelmed by the constant never-ceasing throbbing eating up the soles of her feet. And why, she thinks, one two three take a deep breath, why aren’t her lungs cooperating? Why are the corners of this room so dim? Why are her knees bare, why are her bones rent, why is her skin against the floor sticking like the layers have gone?

There was a bag, she remembers. There was a bag, and she had it, and then she did not. The bag was… important. The bag had her things. The bag had… the bag had safety. Connection. Help.

“Help…”

The bag is gone.

“Help.”

She is more sure of herself, now. Her tongue is slick with saliva and tang and fear.

“Help.”

And then as her voice climbs out of its pit in her stomach she remembers the loud, and the hurt, and she remembers why as she ran she tried so hard not to breathe.

Quiet quiet quiet quiet… hush.

The floor has yet to push her upright. She struggles to her elbows; she grabs whatever surface is in front of her and she pulls. Her leg kicks out. The cabin door kicks closed.

The candlelight is absolute.

She opens her eyes and she is born again in a room of sturdy little stick figures lining the walls. She blinks and they revert: furniture. Woodsy and intentional; curated and loved; rotting.

Between the floorboards there are slivers of white. Beneath the cupboards there are cobwebs that grin. Beneath the table she is white-knuckling there is a horde of dust wanderers. Beneath the mobile hanging in the corner there is a crib.

The cabin had inhaled with the current she’d carried in; now, it holds its breath, eyes wide open.

Eyes wide… the windows.

Puckered are they, but functional as ever, and for her, more dangerous than any ghost going boo! in the night—mostly because, well. Something far more than a spectre slinks behind those trees.

Unless she had managed to…

And in her indulgence of relief, however brief, however lonely, the cabin sways. The cabin sags. And the cabin exhales.

She does the same, emptying her lungs into the space between her trembling hands. They’ve locked in place around the edge of the table, but now she extracts them, one finger at a time, unlatching with creaks the cabin would envy if only it could hear the depth to which she’s crumbling.

Help, she thinks but does not say, for she has learned and she has remembered. This is, to the static of her teeth, something to celebrate. She takes a step.

Stringent in the corner, the crib watches. Another step. She moves her hands for good, now, leaving behind two perfect prints on the table, whorled with the wood grain.

The candle flickers.

Another step. The unfurled wilds of the cabin floors greet her with open arms and shadowed ruts; the candle sees her hesitancy, sees her falter. It dims.

She steps on a creaky floorboard—the regulars to this place, back when this place had regulars, always knew to avoid it, but she is not a regular. The dip is just enough to tap her forward and in desperation she lunges for the closest savior. She lunges for the crib.

And Oh, says the crib, shivering and settling as worn old bones so often do. Oh, it has been so long since I have had someone to hold.

And the candle, its guttural want a stumbling success, flares brighter.

See, the woman does not feel the crib take her hands. She has not been able to feel anything but the numb of them for quite some time now. It would be generous, to say this was all by design, but it would be disingenuous to say it was not.

The woman does not see the wind draw near in the gape of the cabin windows. She is too busy attempting in vain to stay upright and cognizant to register the shadow that walks with it. When her elbows lock she is bleary; when the door whispers open and the wind hisses in, eager and cunning in its poison haste to fill the room, she is buckling. Drooping out the way the candle should be, and yet—

Every kiss of the wind’s bluster strengthens the candle. For every inch the woman sinks it grows taller—for every second longer her breaths take, color seeps into its flame.

The candle is strong—the candle is tall—the candle is taller—the candle is taller still—the candle is burning—the candle is building—the candle is reaching—the candle is

The shadow in the wind enters the cabin and wastes no time. One, strike open the door. Carve a scar in the skin of the woods outside. This place will never forget. Two, pinch the candle flame. Extinguish it with gasping anguish. It does not burn. This place will never be the same.

Out is the candle and out is the wind. Present still is the shadow from the woods, standing quiet in an airless room. Of its own accord, it seems, the door shuts. Languid. Coarse. The shadow does not flinch. Steady are its roots, but it would not need them if they were to steal away. No. It would not need them at all.

Lying prone against the crib is the woman, still; she is little more than effigy, now, hollow sculpture of whatever flesh she once bore. Covering her body is the crib—standing unmoved is the crib—hungry is the crib.

But the shadow is ravenous, and the shadow has eyes only for the bones the crib has left behind.