No Service (5 page)

“Let’s go swimming,” Chris finally suggested as the macaroni salad warmed on his plate in the sun.

Jess looked down at her own uneaten food and dumped it onto the fire. She didn’t like to save leftovers that had gotten warm, and she absolutely refused to put the food back in containers with cold food that had been sitting in the ice. “Yeah, that sounds good,” she said. Sunlight, sand, and water would probably help to take her out of the slump she had fallen into.

Chris suggested that they change into their swimwear before walking to the beach so that neither one of them would have to walk into the changing rooms alone. It didn’t seem likely that something would happen to either one of them, but he knew Jess was prone to overthinking and working herself up over some things. This seemed like exactly the sort of thing she’d latch onto and drive herself into paranoia, which would then be followed by a panic attack.

Soon they were off. With beach bags on their shoulders and Chris carrying the sand umbrella, they crossed the little park roads and grass areas until they were at the water.

A couple of policemen were walking around scanning the ground for anything suspicious. Jess mused that they couldn’t be having much luck because the whole area had already been overrun first thing in the morning when the lifeguards opened the beach and several hundred swimmers had flocked to the shore. Even now, they hadn’t closed the beach and sunbathers were spread out on towels all over the place. The water was filled with shivering adults and kids screaming and splashing. It seemed like the least effective time and place to do any sort of investigating.

“Any evidence is going to be stomped to hell in the sand,” Jess said annoyed at the waste of time the search looked like.

“Yeah, but it’s still worth looking,” Chris said with a shrug, “just in case there does happen to be one little clue. But yeah, I doubt there’s much either.”

He pointed out a spot that was being vacated by a family. It wasn’t as close as Jess preferred, but there wasn’t anything else more optimal. Not this late in the day and not when the weather was at its hottest. The waves of heat pouring off every surface gave the impression that the lake could be a mirage. Jess took off her sandals, but after a few steps in the searing sand, she threw them down and slid them back on. The beach was scorching and uncomfortable, but she didn’t love it any less. Instead, she only walked faster to settle into a spot. The long swim in the icy water made her feel alive and bright again. Even Chris seemed to be delighted with the sun and the carefree attitude of everyone around them. As soon as she started to feel like the top of her head was burning, she suggested they get back out.

A woman lying prone on the sand next to Jess’s spot was talking to another bored mom watching her kids in the water. “I heard on their radio that all the cops are on their way out. Supposedly didn’t find anything and don’t think this area is worth searching. I think she probably got dragged off to Rochester. Sold for drugs or prostitution or something.”

Jess grimaced and picked up her stuff. She had no idea how to react to such a grim, but likely scenario. They weren’t so far from the city that a girl couldn’t be smuggled off somewhere into a large, anonymous population. The woman didn’t seem to care what her neighbor thought as she readjusted her sunglasses and put her headphone ear buds back in.

The rest of the day was blissfully uneventful. Mark didn’t resurface and the police weren’t snooping around. Everyone seemed to be relaxed. Music drifted from multiple sites and children ran giggling through the darkness of the camping loop with glowsticks and flashlights while the smell of delicious campfire dinners permeated the air. Fires crackled everywhere and Christmas lights spiraled around tent poles and picnic areas like fairy lights.

“I still wonder what happened to Steph,” Jess surmised. “I wonder if they found her. Or Mark.”

Chris put his arm around her. “I’m sure she’s fine. Hopefully she just bummed a ride off a friend to get away from that asshole.”

The sunlight had baked their skin a golden brown and they were both dead tired as they hit the hay. Jess snuggled into the blankets. Chris curled around her and they fell into a deep sleep.

In the middle of the night, Jess awoke. Rolling over, she put her hand out to wrap it around her husband when her hand met the empty futon mattress.

“Chris?” she asked in a tired stupor.

At first, the sleepiness left her slowly, drifting away as if on a breeze. Suddenly, she sat bolt upright and frantically looked around the tent. “Chris?” she said more urgently.

No response. Slipping on a sweatshirt that she’d tucked away in a corner, she fumbled her way out of the tent into the dark. There was no light at their site. Leaning back in, she grabbed a small flashlight they’d stashed in the overhanging pocket. Clicking it on, she illuminated a small circle of light.

It was like a creepy horror movie as she shined the light around. At any moment, the beam could illuminate a nightmare. Instead, the picnic bench sat vacantly by the fire pit. The cooler was tucked under the table. The car was parked on the small gravel space on the lot. After that it was nothing but forest.

“Chris?” she said again, still somewhat quiet. She willed herself to assume that he’d simply gone to the bathroom.

There was only the faintest hint of a radio playing nearby. Someone was an extreme night owl. Otherwise, the whole area was devoid of human sounds. The animals were joined in a nocturnal chorus mostly comprised of owls and crickets.

She could feel a small panic rising in her chest. Her blood was beginning to chill at the thought of something happening to Chris. The road surface clawed at her bare feet as she jogged along toward the bathroom. She knocked on the men’s room door and called for Chris again. Nothing.

The horror continued to rise and her heart was beginning to beat out of control. She called for Chris louder. She was running now, heading back for their loop, mentally configuring the place they’d left the car keys. Her purse? His pocket? The tent? She wondered if she should phone the park police or 9-1-1 first.

Rounding the bend back toward the site, she saw a flashlight shining off into the woods. Her bare feet slapped heavily against the ground. It felt like sandpaper against her sensitive skin, but she couldn’t stop the terror.

She raced past her site hoping to enlist the stranger for help. Maybe they’d seen something. Maybe they had heard something.

The flashlight was shining into the back of an empty campsite. The person stood on the road just barely out of reach of the only streetlight. It illuminated the intersection between this specific loop and the road that connected the other loops. It was the last site in the row.

“Hello?” Jess asked as she sprinted toward the stranger.

The figure turned to her and took a step into the light.

“Chris? What are you doing here?”

“I thought I saw something.”

Jess caught up and turned to look into the site. “I don’t see anything.”

“When I was coming back from the bathrooms. I thought I saw two people. They were running right toward me and then they weren’t under the light anymore. I came to see if they needed help and by the time I got down here, it was just the bushes rustling.”

“Should we call the park police?”

“Yeah. That seemed really shady.”

Chris pulled out his cell, but still no signal. They were about to walk down to the security office, when they saw a park vehicle pass by. The maintenance man radioed for help as they waited in the chilly dark. A few moments later, several green park vehicles pulled up. The officers got out and after everything Chris had seen was recounted, they looked around. Finding nothing, they told Chris and Jess to go back to their tent.

The curiosity was still overwhelming and they couldn’t bring themselves to try and go back to bed yet. Instead, they sat around the campfire. About an hour later, headlights passed by as the vehicles drove off and the darkness was complete again.

“I guess they didn’t find anything,” Chris shrugged. “I still saw something though.”

They gazed into the smoldering embers. The flames had died down, but the logs still gave off an intense heat. Jess leaned in close. Her front was so toasty warm and her back was so cold. After her initial panic at finding Chris missing, it had taken a long while to swallow the fear back down. Even after knowing he was safe, what he saw nearly convinced her force them to pack up that night and leave. She said as much to Chris.

“We don’t need to leave. Nothing is going to happen. We have each other,” he said rubbing her back hard enough to generate a warm friction. “Besides, we have the rest of this week all to ourselves now,” he added. The humor fell flat and they both sullenly watched the flames considering how they’d come to the situation.

As the night continued to count down to dawn, they climbed back into the tent to try and get some rest. Snuggling in side by side, Jess nuzzled in tight to his neck. He stroked her hair and together they fell asleep wrapped around each other.

In the morning, it was like the horrors of the previous night had vanished into the daylight. There was a smattering of clouds in the sky, but the sun shone bright. The golden glow of the early hour was revitalizing and Jess felt worlds better than she expected she would.

Some scrambled eggs and juice revived them even further. Jess was eager to get back into her energetic state of mind. She wanted a walk in the woods. To experience nature without care or concern. The tweeting birds told her it was the right thing to do and with hiking boots that fit like a glove, she practically dragged Chris off toward the semi-tamed wilderness.

The walk down the lakeshore was radiant in the honey light. The day was starting off lazy and hot. Cicadas buzzed their sweet songs of summer. Squirrels scuttled along the boardwalk. A short detour through the sand made a mess of their shoes and they spent time dumping them out and laughing as the lake caressed the shore in rhythmic motions.

At last they stood at the trail entrance. A decrepit sign nearby asked hikers to avoid raccoons which were known to sometimes attack people and then listed all of the wildflowers and birds that could potentially be spotted along the trail. In big bold yellow letters it declared this to be the Lancer Trail. A map detailed the dominant walk and encouraged people to stay on it to see some of the notable landmarks. It was suggested not to leave the trail or there was the risk of getting lost or disturbing wildlife.

Without a glance at the sign, the couple entered hand in hand under the canopy of emerald. It was like a storybook scene the way the branches interlaced overtop of them and welcomed them like a tunnel to another land. Jess was certain the forest was significantly more welcoming than the day when Mark and Steph had followed them in, although she hadn’t found anything that could ruin her day the same way that they did. Immediately she felt a pang of guilt for thinking like that.

It was difficult to remain holding hands. Jess kept wanting to stop and look at things and Chris kept getting jerked to a standstill every time she did.

The farther along the pathway they walked, the more adventurous Jess felt. “Let’s go into the woods,” she suggested.

“I don’t have a signal on my phone. Do you? We might need the compass to get back.”

Jess spared at glance at her screen. Three bars. Plenty. Plus, she had already installed a compass app before they had arrived.

Heading south, they followed a separation in the trees. The forest was welcoming and there were no branches to block their way and barely any roots crossed their path. They were able to walk side by side with each other with comfortable space for exuberant storytelling.

As the got deeper into the forest, the path narrowed a little, then quite significantly. It became only enough room for one person to fit through without scrubbing against bark and grasping twigs. The sun was high overhead, but the trees were gathering in close enough that barely any light came directly through to the ground. Sometimes it wasn’t clear if the path went one way or another, but Jess would simply pick a direction and follow it, certain they could head back to the north again and find the lake well before the end of the day.

Before long, the choices Jess had made led to tighter spaces between the towering pines. Maples, ashes, and other trees were fewer and instead the evergreens crisscrossed each other in a blanket of heavy green. Where there was a leafy tree, the sunlight was dappled across the forest floor.

“What’s that?” Chris asked, pointing to over her shoulder.

Jess shimmied between two bushes and moved in for a closer look. “It’s some stone thing.”

Chris walked around it, running a hand over the pinkish brown stone. It was stacked like a small column that barely reached waist height. It was almost a cube, though the height was a bit longer than the width of any side. The top had a small bowl-shaped recess and a hole.

“This looks just like the drinking fountains in the park. It’s the same stone,” Chris mused.

As soon as he said it, Jess was certain he was right. “What’s it doing all the way out here?”

“I bet this used to be part of the park,” he shrugged. “Hey, there’s another one.”

It became a game of who spotted the next one first. Like children, they ran to each discarded water fountain shouting first when they tapped their hand against it.

“They’re seriously spooky though,” Jess mused. “They’re like little druid monuments or something. It’s so weird.”

They had also discovered a few that were fire pits. On most of them the grate for cooking had been mangled or rusted straight off. On one where the grate remained, an animal had packed the space for the wood into a nest.

“This whole area must have been a picnic area. The forest has really done a number on it,” Chris said. “I wonder when this part of the park was given back to nature.”

“I don’t know how long wood lasts, but maybe not too long,” Jess said pointing toward a dark shape. “I think that’s a picnic table.”

Tucked between the trees was an all but obliterated table with attached benches. The boards were little more than soft rot held together by a prayer. Lichen had taken up residence across most of the surface and tall weeds were entangled throughout.

Jess ran a hand over the wood stained dark with a perpetual dampness. “Not going to lie. This is the creepiest picnic table I have ever seen.”

“Not as bad as that one.”

Jess turned to look at another picnic table tucked behind a large tree. “It’s like it’s spying on us,” she said with a giggle. “It’s like that table is poking out its little table head and having a look at us.”

“The voyeuristic picnic table. Nice, I like it.”

Jess took a few steps toward it when she stopped dead in her tracks. “There’s someone behind the tree.”

“Okay, whatever,” Chris said with a laugh.

“No, seriously.”

He looked over his wife’s shoulder and saw an arm just barely visible from where they were standing. Someone was sitting at the table. Jess was frozen to the spot and he had to walk past her. As soon he was in front of her, he felt her hands press into his back as she clutched on for support.

“They aren’t moving,” he said in a whisper. If they’d been listening up to this point, the stranger would know for certain they were aware someone was sitting there, but so far there hadn’t been a reaction. The woods were dead silent as they stepped together toward the figure. Each footfall was an obvious crunch in the old fallen leaves.

“Hello?” Chris asked as they began to round the tree. No response. Jess leaned out from behind him for a better look. He groaned with uncertainty.

Another step and Jess had a better view. It was definitely a women. Her brunette hair fell around her shoulders in straggly ringlets. She was wearing a plaid shirt and blue jeans. Jess leaned out in front of Chris for a better look. She took a deep breath in relief to see someone so unthreatening, and put her hand out to touch the young woman’s shoulder. Maybe she’d fallen asleep.

The girl tipped forward smacking her forehead into the tabletop, then sideways as soon she fell from the bench. Chris jumped back nearly tripping over Jess in the process and falling to the ground. Jess shrieked as the girl hit the dirt, her arms splayed out to the sides with no effort to stop her momentum. Jess raced forward to help the girl, then gave another scream and dashed off into the woods.

Chris sat upright as his wife fled between the trees. He leaned forward to get a better look at the girl and then scrambled backward to a standing position. The girl’s chocolate hair was fanned out over the pine needles on the forest floor. Her skin was as pale as paper. Violently bright and in stark contrast to her flesh, there was a wash of dark, drying blood from a deep gash in her throat.

Her entire front was spattered with crimson as she lay there positively dead in the dirt. Her makeup was smeared all down her face from when she’d been crying. Those had been her last moments alive. Chris looked her directly in her distant eyes and backed himself into a tree. The girl’s legs were hooked up over the bench seat. She lay there still and awkward. He wanted to put her back upright, to return her to a more dignified death state, but his mind wouldn’t let him walk near the corpse. He couldn’t will one of his feet to even take a single step toward the poor young woman.

Former nurse or not, she was definitely dead and he was having a very visceral reaction to the reality of the situation.

He knew he recognized the face and was certain that he’d seen it recently, but another of his wife’s screams snapped him back to the moment. He slid around the tree and as soon as he couldn’t see the horror behind him, he sprinted off in the direction he thought he’d heard her.

“Jess!” he shouted. Everything looked the same and he had no more sense of direction. Their game of chasing fountains had completely thrown his orientation to the wind. Now he couldn’t even find his wife at all. He had no idea which way to go or where to turn.

“Chris!” Her panicked voice split the air and pierced his heart. She sounded like she was at her wit’s end or in pain. Maybe both.

“Jess! Keep shouting! I can’t find you!”

His feet slammed through the brush as he bounded over fallen logs and through the slapping, scratching branches. His heart felt like it was going to break his ribs it was beating so hard. The sick horror and exercise made him feel light-headed and frantic.

“Chris! Oh God! Chris!”

To the left, just a little. He changed his trajectory, hoping to cross her path, and catch her in his arms. He felt as fast as an Olympian. His feet were barely in contact with the earth before lifting off again. He was flying, faster than a cheetah, faster than a missile. As soon as he saw it coming, it was too late to stop. Crashing through a cluster of berry bushes, he flew straight into the air.

Gravity gripped him hard and quick. His body was soon below his sneakers, the soles pointed at the sky. He toppled over a little further. Sky. Forest. Ground.

The impact against the ground rattled his bones. The air in his lungs expelled out his mouth all at once. The pain followed soon after. He clutched and clawed for a breath.

“Chris!” Jess screamed from nearby. His name crackled with mind-numbing terror as it left her lips.

Oxygen rushed back into his chest and willed himself as hard as possible not to pass out. Regardless of how petrified Jess was, he had to regain himself before he could consider standing up. He couldn’t even turn his head. She was sobbing hysterically and it hurt him to the core.

He let out a moan as he recovered from the impact. Opening his eyes, he could see the ledge he’d fallen from. It was about double his height. Not too far, but far enough. His bones felt like they’d been smacked together without cushioning. It was agony to move his arms and lean up, but it had to be done.

“Chris?” Jess asked between gasps. Her breath was coming in short pants. Each exhale was a sob. He raised himself to his elbows and focused on her. She was sitting and holding her right leg. Blood covered her hands. A lot of blood.

Forcing himself to his knees, he dragged himself over to her. Looking toward the ledge he’d come from, he could see the path she’d taken down. Beside the cliff was a steep slope. Leaves had been disturbed straight down and part of her pant leg was attached to a sharp bit of stump sticking out of the base of a tree. He was certain he could see bits of her flesh clinging to the vicious point.

“Let me see,” he said. She hesitantly uncovered the wound, her hands shaking and clutching at air as he pulled back the remainder of the material to look. “I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry,” she kept repeating. She kept thinking if she hadn’t run off, this would never have happened.

He could see the panic attack building in her eyes. She was woozy and unnerved and soon her whole body was shaking. “Jess,” he said as calmly as he could manage. “Jess, look at me.” Her chest was rising and falling so hard her whole upper body was quaking with each breath.

He grabbed her chin and turned her face to his. Her leg would have to wait a minute. He was afraid she’d hyperventilate until she passed out or have a panic attack if she wasn’t at that point already. “Jess, please. Look straight into my eyes.” Her own eyes moved to his, but continued to jitter. “Honey,” he lowered his voice to a whisper. “You need to calm down. You need to get your breathing under control.”

They stared at each other for a moment. Jess had her bloody hands raised uncertainly still gasping at nothing. They glistened red like she was wearing shiny gloves. He took the right hand, despite the blood on it and gave a light squeeze.

“I want you to lay back,” he said gently. “Just lay down and I’ll take care of you.”

Her breaths were still incredibly violent, but had become deeper. She seemed just a touch more focused and aware. He helped her to lay back. Once she was on the ground, she shut her eyes tightly.

Chris took a deep breath and stared down at her filthy, wet shin.

The stress of working in a hospital had been far too much for him to handle. Jess had said it made him grim and had turned him into a monster to deal with. He’d left it for her sake, but now that there was enough distance, he was glad he’d left it for himself, too. It had been awhile since he’d seen anything quite so gruesome, although this was far from the worst he’d dealt with. Memories that smelled of death and sterility came back to him as he struggled for focus.